POLICE TAKE 137 TRUANTS OFF STREETS CRACKDOWN: STUDENTS SKIPPING CLASS GET $250 TICKETS.

Byline: Rachel Uranga

Staff Writer

Ditchers beware.

Police rounded up 137 high school and middle school students skipping class Thursday in the first San Fernando Valley-wide truancy crackdown of its kind.

Officers from five agencies picked up dozens of teens at bus stops hanging with friends and chilling out blocks away from school.

"Hopefully, this gives these kids a wakeup call," said Patricia Jimenez, an attendance coordinator with the Los Angeles Unified School District overseeing the West Valley. "They are at the point right now that they are trying to figure out the path to take."

Youths as young as 12 and from as far away as Lynwood were cited with a $250 truancy ticket and taken to the Sepulveda Recreation Center in Panorama City. There, each had to meet with a school attendance counselor, probation and other service agencies, and their parents were called to pick them up.

The idea was to get kids onto the right path before they drop out and get involved with drugs, alcohol or anything criminal.

"It's sad that I am here," said Salvador Sanchez, who came to pick up his 12-year-old daughter, Yocelin.

He shook his head as a deputy city attorney chided his daughter, warning that more sweeps were coming and ultimately if she continues to ditch, her father could be cited $10,000 or be put in jail.

Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies picked up her and several friends around 9 a.m. at the Universal City Red Line station. They had come from Virgil Middle School, a few miles west of downtown.

Yocelin said it was the first time she had ever ditched.

"I am scared, I don't ever want to do this again," she said as tears welled in her eyes.

But others were not so apologetic.

A girl named Georgina sulked in a corner as officers refused to let her leave with a friend who she said was her brother.

At 17, she is not enrolled in school and says she has no credits. She wants to re-enroll but instead has been drifting for the past year, hanging out alternately in the Valley and in her home near Rampart. Her mother is on her case, but it hasn't deterred her.

"She told me when I get home, something is going to happen," she said.

In all, youths from 39 schools, including five middle schools and one elementary school, were taken to the center. Panorama, East Valley and Van Nuys highs led the way with 13 truants each.

Paul Vinetz, the probation director for the Van Nuys juvenile office, estimates about a third of those detained are chronically truant like Georgina, who has been cited before.

He said he believes getting to them now will help them later. At the recreation center youth program, managers and family guidance counselors talk to parents and their kids about getting on the right track.

"Kids who have problems at home and lack of connection at school are more likely to be hanging out with criminally minded peers," he said. "The safest place a kid can be during school hours is in school."

Blanca Martinez said the phone call from police at first unnerved her, thinking her daughter Jacqueline -- a junior at East Valley High School -- was hurt.

"I think it's good. It puts pressure on them. They learn they can't do all those things," she said.

Jacqueline ditched first period because she said there was a fire drill.

"It's my responsibility to go to school and I didn't go," she said. "I feel bad."

Now, her parents said she's going to have to pay the ticket.

rachel.uranga(at)dailynews.com

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