The Armenian gang problems are getting worse in Hollywood and the Valley. Taggers are GANG MEMBERS...not art students; but they are treated as just poor little kids who need to express themselves. They should all be deported or stripped of their 'citizenship' and deported. They are a plague on our society!

Man shot in chest confronting taggers in Hollywood


The victim, the owner of an auto body shop, was shot Wednesday after telling two young men to stop painting the side of his building. He is in stable condition.
By Francisco Vara-Orta and Molly Hennessy-Fiske, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
9:19 AM PDT, June 26, 2008
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An auto body shop owner shot in the chest Wednesday during a confrontation with graffiti taggers in Hollywood was in stable condition today, according to authorities and the man's brother.

The midday incident took place in the 5000 block of Hollywood Boulevard shortly after 1 p.m. when workers at the business spotted taggers painting a side wall with 6-foot high black letters and told the owner.

The man and his employees were writing down license plate information when the alleged taggers got out of their car, said LAPD Sgt. Alfredo Flores. The owner told the two youths --described as white males, each not much taller than 5 feet -- not to tag his property, Flores said. One of the youths pulled out a handgun, shot the man in the chest and then got back in the car and drove away.

Authorities said the youths are believed to have ties to a local Armenian gang. Flores could not confirm that any arrests have been made.
The auto body shop had previously been tagged with graffiti and the owner had installed video cameras connected to the store's computers to monitor activity.

At the shop this morning, the wounded man's brother, who would not give his name, said only that his brother was doing fine.

The taggers' bold black letters were still fresh on the building's beige wall. At least one coat of paint already covered a previous paint job. The wall faces the parking lot for a costume rental shop and a Head Start program.

Liousin Demirtchian, 46, was home listening to music when the shooting took place.

"It's scary for my daughter and my son," Demirtchian said while on a morning walk with her daughter Marine 12. "I don't want my daughter getting in the path of that."

She said in their eight years in the neighborhood their building had been tagged only once, although graffiti is common in the area.

Demirtchian said they did not hear the shooting but later walked outside to find street near their apartment building shut down by police. Neighbors told them what had happened.

"I wouldn't have done anything at all," Marine said. "I would just let them go ahead and tag because its not worth my life."

Los Angeles police advised residents that taggers, even those who seem like young kids, are often armed and can be dangerous.

"They're out there tagging, they're criminals," Flores said. "Call the police. Get the most info as you can, be the best witness, be involved in your community, take a stand."

Flores stressed that by taking a stand he meant residents should keep police informed, not confront taggers themselves.

Vilma Infante, 42, a single mother who works as a nanny, was on her way to take the bus to work with her , Rebecca, 4, and Aldo, 3. She said the shooting was the most violent tagging incident she has seen in her eight years in the neighborhood. But she described tagging as "a big problem for the neighborhood."

"It's pure vandalism," she said. "I mean, don't they think that they are destroying their own neighborhood?"

At the Norwood Market a block from where the shooting took place, owner Feroz Ahmed, 39, said he has been friendly with the wounded man, who had stopped in to buy something shortly before he was shot.

Ahmed said he had to call city crews to come paint over graffiti on the sides of his store so often in the three years he has owned it that they just started coming every week.

"I have 20 years of experience in this business, and I known not to mess with them," Ahmed said of the taggers. "Sometimes you feel like you are in the taggers' hands, so you feel powerless."

Customer Maggie Blandon, 36, of Hollywood talked to Ahmed this morning about the shooting.

Blandon, a Nicaraguan immigrant who grew up in the neighborhood recently moved back from Highland Park because of gang problems there. But she said the move did not mean an end to her concerns.

"If they want to paint walls, they should go to college and take a painting class to vent out those frustrations," Blandon said. "People that live here are forced to stay here in this little 'hood because we're poor or our families are based here, and they obviously have no respect for that."

molly.hennessy-fiske@latimes.com

Francisco.varaorta@latimes.com

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me ... 0193.story