Reputed Latino gang member charged with killing Black man amid racially charged turf war

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Set us as preferred At 1 a.m.one Friday morning two years ago, Clyde Moore idled in his red Jaguar sedan outside a Panorama City apartment building known as a hotbed of drug dealing.Moore, 70, sat next to his wife, who testified at a recent hearing that a Latino man approached their car before demanding, “What y’all n— doing out here?” He was holding a gun.It’s unclear whether Moore and his wife, who are Black, knew about recent tensions between two gangs — one Black, one Latino — over drug turf.

A predominantly Latino gang called Blythe Street considers 9010 Tobias Ave.its “stronghold,” Officer Julio Paredes of the Los Angeles Police Department testified Wednesday at a preliminary hearing.

“They dominate that building,” he said.The hulking, three-story gray concrete structure is the width of a city block, with entrances on Tobias Avenue and Van Nuys Boulevard.

Paredes testified that when customers drive up on either side of the building, Blythe Street members retrieve drugs from apartment units inside and run back to the waiting buyer.The building has been the site of several killings.In 2018, two Blythe Street members ambushed a higher-up in the gang as he exited his ground-floor apartment.

Prosecutors alleged Oscar “Smokey” Molina was gunned down on orders of Blythe Street’s imprisoned leader, Ezequiel “Wicked” Romo.California When aspiring Mexican Mafia member Ezequiel Romo ordered a series of murders from prison, he told underlings he intended to purge their Blythe Street gang of weaknesses.

Instead, authorities say, the plan backfired.The two killers, Eder “Mousey” Mendoza and Lorenzo “Scooby” Gonzalez, were convicted this year of murdering Molina and a woman who witnessed the crime.More recently, an associate of Blythe Street, Luis Gaona, was shot to death outside the comp...