The Board of Supervisors Tuesday approved or renewed rewards for information leading to a gunman in a fatal shooting outside a Bellflower house party and the killer of a 4-year-old boy in a suspected 2016 gang shooting in Altadena.
Supervisor Janice Hahn recommended a $10,000 reward for information leading to the whereabouts of Marco Garay, a person of interest in the shooting death of 25-year-old Oscar Ruiz in Bellflower. Ruiz, a Compton resident, was seen fighting with Garay in the 17100 block of Downey Avenue just before the shooting occurred around 12:30 a.m. on Jan. 20, Hahn said.
Homicide detectives said Ruiz, the father of two young sons, came to pick up his girlfriend from the party. The girlfriend had been arguing with other women there and some partygoers followed her into the street.
“When Oscar arrived, he was truly an innocent victim in this case, he tried to diffuse the situation,” Los Angeles County sheriff’s Lt. Charles Calderaro said at a news conference last week.
Ruiz was attacked and shot out on the street and died at the scene.
Supervisor Kathryn Barger recommended reestablishing a $20,000 reward leading to the whoever fatally shot 4-year-old Salvador Esparza in Altadena about 10:30 p.m. on July 5, 2016. The reward expired in October 2016 and will now be available for at least the 90 days.
Detectives said a suspected gang member was chasing a 27-year-old man onto a property in the 300 block of West Figueroa Drive and fired at least 13 rounds, striking both the young man and Salvador, who was shot once in the head. The wounded man survived.
Authorities believe the shooting was gang related but that Salvador and his family — who lived in Monrovia and were visiting friends — were not intended targets.
At the time of the shooting, sheriff’s Lt. John Corina said a person of interest had gotten into a heated, alcohol-fueled argument in the street with the live-in boyfriend of the boy’s mother an hour or two before the shooting.
The boyfriend and his brother were the shooter’s intended targets, Corina said.
“It’s never easy when you see a child lose his life and it’s never easy for anybody and of course he’s not the intended target, not the intended victim in this,” Corina said at the time. “You know a bullet has no name, so it just ends up striking a child who just happened to be on the porch.”
Several other children were asleep inside the house when the gunfire broke out, the lieutenant said.
Anyone with additional information on either of these shootings was urged to the Sheriff’s Homicide Bureau at 323-890-5500 or Crime Stoppers at (800) 222-TIPS (8477).