Highland Park Homicide Victim Was a Gang Member

A man found shot to death in Highland Park Tuesday was a documented gang member, although police believe his killing is not tied to his gang affiliation, nor is it part of the retaliatory gang warfare that erupts in the neighborhood from time to time.

The Los Angeles Police Department identified the slain man Wednesday as Ernesto Ramirez, a 21-year-old Highland Park resident, but Capt. Jeff Bert, commander of the LAPD Northeast Community Station, declined to give the victim’s gang affiliation for investigatory reasons.

The murder occurred in an area that is “home to several gangs, most notably the Avenues,” Bert told Highland Park-Mount Washington Patch, adding: “The LAPD has no indication at this time that, although the victim was a gang member, his assailants were from a particular gang.”

Bert said Northeast detectives have “some good investigative leads we’re following up on.”

Ramirez’s body was found at 4:55 p.m. Tuesday on the 4700 block of Benner Street, a leafy residential area near Avenue 57 where some of his relatives live. He was standing on the sidewalk when he was shot multiple times with a handgun, Bert said, adding that Ramirez ran a few yards and collapsed.

His assailants are believed to have fled in a car toward Avenue 57, which leads to the 110 freeway. Ramirez was rushed to Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena, where he succumbed to his wounds at 6:48 p.m.

Dozens of Avenues gang members were arrested in a 2009 countywide joint taskforce operation that included the LAPD and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.

“What we’re seeing now is that as time goes on, some of them are getting out [of prison],” Bert said. “As a result, I’m putting most of my gang units in Highland Park, but I’m also working with interventionists and [gang] prevention workers” from organizations such as the Children’s Hospital and the All Saints Episcopal Church on Monte Vista Street, Bert added.

Mother Alexandra Conrads, a priest at the All Saints church, was at Huntington Hospital on Tuesday night for eight hours, offering prayers, Bert said.