Authorities were looking for up to five men who followed undercover LAPD officers and then fired on the officers’ vehicle in a high-crime area of Montecito Heights near where two young women’s bodies were found about two months earlier, police said Wednesday.
The undercover officers were patrolling around Ernest E. Debs Regional Park about 3:30 p.m. Wednesday when the men fired on them.
“Suspects decided to follow the officers’ vehicle and they engaged in and fired upon the officers,” Los Angeles Police Department Sgt. Marlon Marrache said.
Though their undercover vehicle was struck, the officers were not hurt. The gunmen fled and were not found by evening.
The officers from Hollenbeck Division had been patrolling and “doing crime suppression because of all the recent criminal activity that has occurred here by Debs Park,” Marrache said.
The men being sought were described as Hispanic and about 30, and there were as many as five of them, Marrache said.
Three vehicles were believed to be involved, he said: a blue Nissan Altima, a black compact vehicle, and a “possible black Lexus.”
Police created a large perimeter around the area after the shooting, but none of the individuals sought were found.
Marrache said LAPD needs help from the community. He asked anyone with information to contact Hollenbeck detectives.
The call about the shooting came in from Boundary and Mercury avenues at 3:52 p.m., LAPD Officer Jenny Houser Houser said earlier in the day.
The intersection is at the corner of Ernest E. Debs Regional Park, where the bodies of Briana Nicole Gallegos, 17, and Gabriela Calzada, 19, were discovered on Oct. 28. No arrests have been made in their deaths.