TRIO SOUGHT IN FATAL SHOOTING.

Byline: Ryan Oliver Staff Writer

Police were seeking three suspects Tuesday after a 29-year-old man was gunned down in a Sun Valley park while trying to stop them from breaking into his cousin's truck, officials said.

Pedro Carrillo, 29, died Monday from a single shotgun blast to his upper chest at Fernangeles Park about 1 a.m., police said.

``What it looks like right now is the three suspects were going to do an auto burglary and they're confronted by the potential owners, so they decide they'll do a carjack instead,'' said Detective Mike Coffey of the Los Angeles Police Department.

The slaying comes at a time when Los Angeles police are reporting increases in auto thefts and auto burglaries in much of the San Fernando Valley.

Carrillo and his 26-year-old cousin had parked the 2002 GMC truck and walked to the park's baseball diamond to talk. Carrillo had been in town for approximately one week visiting family.

Three men later pulled up in a sedan and one of them began looking inside the truck's tinted windows, possibly for valuables, Coffey said.

``It's a nice looking truck,'' he said. ``It stuck out like a sore thumb in the area. It was in a parking lot with no other cars around.''

The man who looked inside the truck returned to the car and the suspects drove toward the cousins. Two men then stepped out of the car, one wielding a shotgun, Coffey said.

The cousins frantically ran to their truck to get away, but Carrillo was cut off and shot, police said.

The gunman shot at Carrillo's cousin but missed, so she managed to reach the truck and get away, Coffey said.

The woman was only able to describe one of the men as Hispanic, approximately 22 years old and about 5-foot-9 wearing a hooded T-shirt.

The car appeared to be a four-door green or brown sedan, possibly a Pontiac Grand Prix, Coffey said.

Ryan Oliver, [phone]

ryan.oliver(at)dailynews.com