Details on 16 homicides

June 28, 2014, 2:43 p.m.

The Homicide Report has reported new details on 16 recent homicides in Los Angeles County. Click on the victims' names for more information.

Marcel Dupre Johns, 28: Shot to death June 27 in Long Beach.

William Dion Carter, 38: Shot to death June 25 in Westchester.

Marquette Byron Carter, 28: Shot to death June 24 in Vermont Square.

Monique Brittanyann Campbell, 21: Shot to death June 24 in Vermont Square.

Antoine D. Hunter, 24: Shot to death in a confrontation with L.A. County sheriff's deputies June 24 in Compton.

Samuel Santoyo-Mendoza, 29: Shot to death June 22 in East Los Angeles.

Israel Lopez, 29: Stabbed to death June 20 in South Whittier.

Rogelio Islas-Morales, 42: Shot to death June 20 in Compton.

John Wayne Whitmore, 65: Died June 20, a weak after being beaten at a Blue Line station in Willowbrook.

Jose Luis Horta, 34: Shot to death June 20 in Vermont Square.

Ruben Victor Zermeno, 56: Found beaten to death June 18 in Avocado Heights.

Eloisa Salas Lara, 37: Found shot to death June 16 in Pomona.

Derrick Anthony Hill, 48: Shot to death June 14 in Broadway-Manchester.

Sotai Jamin Jackson, 38: Shot to death June 12 in Willowbrook.

Dwayne Kenneth McKesson, 47: Shot to death June 12 in Florence-Firestone.

Abraham Saldinas, 38: Shot to death May 29 in Valley Glen.

The Homicide Report has chronicled 264 homicides in 2014, as of June 27, in Los Angeles County. The vast majority of victims died of gunshot wounds. Twenty-eight were stabbed; 18 died of blunt-force trauma.

Eight reader comments

Survivor, your post is too lengthy for me to address all of your points, but I'd like to comment on your assertion that the government doesn't spend enough resources on poor, inner-city areas. As a teacher with fifteen years' experience (six in South-Central L.A. and nine in the Pico-Union area), I can say with confidence that inner-city schools often have more financial resources and lower class sizes than schools in middle-class areas. Federal Title 1 (or 9?) funds flow to schools in high-poverty areas as well as QEIA funds that help to reduce class sizes. In contrast, go to a middle-class high school like Marshall HS or Eagle Rock HS and you'll find 40+ students in the English classes and 45+ in foreign-language classes.

Despite the additional resources that inner-city schools have, many inner-city high-school students continue to neglect their assignments, smoke weed in the bathrooms, ditch school to party with friends, and fail their classes in large numbers. Most parents whom I've spoken to love their kids and want the best for them, but they don't seem to be able or willing to discipline their kids and give them consequences when they misbehave in school or fail a class. Although no teenager in his right mind would admit it, I see whole communities of kids who are crying out for adults to set limits for them.

Money cannot solve the problems of the inner city if the residents of these areas don't want to change their own behavior and meet the teachers, police, and government half way.

Incidentally, Survivor, I moved to the suburbs in 2010, though I continue to work in the inner city. I deal with enough dysfunction during the work week that I like to come home to some peace and quiet - and I'm seven minutes away from my favorite hiking trail.

— James July 12, 2014 at 10:36 a.m.

So Survivor, after all that nonsense what you are basically saying is that it's the white race's fault that blacks and latinos in the "ghetto" are killing each other......And poverty? please....ever been to the hood on July 4th? I have. No better place on the planet to watch fireworks. Must be literally millions of dollars spent in the hood on fireworks, bombs and God knows what else to make it sound worse than a war zone. Can't buy groceries, can't pay the mortgage but can buy enough fireworks to go for week straight even after the holiday. Bad judgement, arrogance born of ignorance (your case) and too many crutches to rationalize your plight. These are the real reasons you should acknowledge. Not the point the finger rationalization you employ.

— jussayin July 10, 2014 at 4:06 p.m.

Survivor,
What exactly are you a survivor of the same system that fed you, clothed you, gave you a free education? Come on get off the soap box that you so proudly placed under your feet! Do you really think that society has an obligation to lift you up every time you fall, or for that matter every time you don’t feel like doing anything to help yourself? So I moved…did you really expect me to stay in a neighborhood that was becoming overwhelmed with crime? So I could afford to move, why would I stay and live in that climate? You can say it was my fault all you want but I was not borne with a silver spoon in my mouth just luck and the desire to work hard!! Oh and by the way no body owes you anything. If I left and you stayed you cannot blame me for taking advantage of the free education that I got from kindergarten through the 12th grade you had the same advantage. I took on the obligation of student loans…worked 2 jobs sometimes 3 to make my way out of the same situation that you found yourself in and when they came by and did a drive by on my block the very next month I was selling and getting the hell out. The only help I got was with the affirmative action act. If you want to change your life change your life but don’t poop all over me because I got out while things were just changing. Don’t sit in the same neighborhood that you have lived in for the past 50 years and point a finger at me for leaving. I found my way out and I’ll be (fill in the blank) if I am going to let you make me feel guilty for leaving. All those kids in your neighborhood now that have been “lost” they are lost because they want to be. After a few times in juvenile hall they know that there is a better way but they want the easy way…more handouts and more giveaways. Hell I was in the ghetto during government cheese days…do you remember those? Well hell yes they got me through more lunches and dinners than I care to remember but it made me a better person. It made me not want to stand in that line ever again. Oh and the prisons are not full because people complain about welfare…how many cuts to welfare have happened in the past 20 years as opposed to raises? How many open opportunities do you want, how much more taxes do you want me to pay to help you get your act together? How many more times to do I have to give up something because you say it’s the right thing to do? And you cannot have it both ways…either we move in and raise taxes and demand better behavior or we stay away and let you do what you want when you want as long as you do not bring in to this area/my area. No survivor you did not survive you lived happily from what I could view from my side of the neighborhood because of what I gave up and what I did not protest and because I voted democrats into office. So you can sit in your La-z-Boy recliner on the porch collecting all the benefits I voted into law and just say thank you.

— Warrior aka Kandace July 8, 2014 at 11:56 a.m.

It always blows my mind to see people so far removed from the inner city and the poverty of it crying about the problems it has.

You live in your suburbs, because people before, after and with you...left the city because of incoming black and latino families decades ago. Hardworking, JOB SEEKING families.

That "white flight" as they call it, drove down property values, and drove businesses out of the area.

With that, came less funding for schools in those neighborhoods, thus lowering the quality of education the people of color in those communities received.

You want to discuss issues, but you don't want to discuss the root of the issue, which is almost always at the end of the day white supremacy, and systemic discrimination against minorities.

There wouldn't be half the crime, particularly homicides in L.A. had not middle class and rich white people created "ghettos" to "protect themselves" from the original well to do, job seeking latino and black families that moved to Los Angeles.

So please cut the acts that you all care, and that you caring and saying something "is racist".

You want to do something? Talk to other white people and tell them stop running out of town everytime the 'coloreds' move in as all people of color are inherently criminal.

Ask other white people, why oh why is it, that only after people of color have finally cleaned up "bad neighborhoods" where they live and start doing cool things with them...do they then decide to move in next to them ONLY TO RAISE property values and push them [people of color] to a new ghetto.

Ask yourselves, how many other white people do you know who perpetually complain about social welfare programs, but then in the same breath wonder why prisons are full?

The problem isn't SOLELY with people of color, it's with white people as well..especially white people who want to have their cake and eat it to.

Meaning, you all want to live in your mostly white, "safe" suburban neighborhoods...but you want to point your finger at the ghetto and cry that something needs to be done...when that ghetto only exists to maintain your precious suburbs ...because you won't let too many of "those people" in to benefit from the goodness of the community.

You can't have both. If you really want urban crime to die down, you're gonna need to come up off your big pot of resources and start sharing a little more.

-Inglewood High School Alum

— A Survivor July 7, 2014 at 2:55 p.m.

Of the sixteen murders described above, seven black men, two black women, six Latino men, and one Latina woman were killed. One of the men was killed by a security guard after he (allegedly) attempted to rob a marijuana dispensary, another of the men - a 65-year-old man - was (allegedly) beaten to death by two black women on a train platform, and another man was shot by sheriffs' deputies. Most of the other homicides seem to be black-on-black or brown-on-brown, with the exception of Abraham Saldinas, who was (allegedly) shot by a white man. African-Americans are getting killed - and killing - in hugely disproportionate numbers relative to their percentage of the population. There has to be some way to address this, but it seems to me that the answers must come from within the African-American community. No white politician or "civilian" will dare address the issue, lest they risk being called racist. I hate to be a typical hand-wringer who says "something must be done," but ... something must be done.

— James June 28, 2014 at 4:23 p.m.

The Homicide Report

Details on 16 homicides

Post a comment

Eight reader comments