Identity of man killed in Newhall robbery identified

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The identity of a man shot and killed eight years ago in broad daylight on a downtown Newhall street has finally been disclosed.

Alonso Rigoberto Hernandez-Andrade, 25, of Los Angeles, was killed on Sept. 26, 2008 during a botched robbery, Lt. Ed Winter of the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Department told The Signal.

The identity of the victim was never disclosed because investigators with the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department’s Homicide Bureau were trying to find the man’s killer.

Come 2017, they’ll still be looking.

The murder of Hernandez-Andrade is one of at least three of SCV’s unsolved killings that investigators are still trying to solve.

Other slayings that continue to dog investigators involve the 2008 shooting death of Anthony Lombardi, 55, of Valencia, and the fatal stabbing of Jose Eduardo Ocampo, 25, of Canyon Country, in 2014.

At the time of the 2008 killings, detectives told reporters they believed there was no connection between the two.

Nine years later, similarities between the Hernandez-Andrade killing and that of Anthony Lombardi remain compelling.

Both men were shot multiple times, each as they sat inside a car.

Both killings were brazen with no attempt by the killer to cover or collect evidence that could have implicated him (or her) – in one case, there were witnesses in the car at the time of the shooting.

The shootings happened within a mile of each other, only 10 days apart, and both were the result of botched robberies, according to detectives.

Revealed for the first time this month by the coroner, Hernandez-Andrade suffered more than one gunshot wound.

Hernandez-Andrade
Reports at the time of the shooting indicated Hernandez-Andrade was shot about 8 a.m. as he sat inside a Ford Ranger pickup truck on Lyons Avenue at Apple Street, waiting for the light to change..

An unidentified gunman shot the young Hispanic man once in the chest at close range as the two wrestled for the gun and their lives, homicide detective Lt. Dave Coleman said at the time.

After he was shot, Hernandez-Andrade staggered from the Ford Ranger pickup, to the horror of at least 10 onlookers, and collapsed on the curb on Lyons Avenue in front of the Washington Mutual Bank near Apple Street.

At least 10 people watched in horror as the brazen daylight gunpoint robbery attempt turned into a bloody homicide.

Hernandez-Andrade was in the passenger seat of the Ranger in the lane nearest the left turn lane when a dark SUV pulled up behind the pickup, Coleman was quoted as saying in 2008.

The passenger in the SUV got out, walked to the truck and apparently demanded money in Spanish, stating, “Give me your money. I know you have money,” Coleman said.

The suspect pointed at the victim a chrome semi-automatic handgun, which discharged after a struggle sending at least one round into the victim’s upper torso, Coleman said.

This month, it was revealed that more than one shot had been fired.

“He died of gunshot wounds,” Winter said when asked about a manner of death. “It was ruled a homicide, the victim of a robbery that went bad.”

Ten days prior to the shooting, another robbery had gone bad, also ending in the shooting death of a man found inside his car.
Lombardi
On Sept. 16, 2008, shortly after 11:30 a.m., three Hart High School students enjoying a minimum school day pedaled their bikes past the driveway of a home on Undine Street and saw legs hanging out of a car.

When they rode by the same car a little while later, they saw the same thing and decided to check it out.

They found the blood-drenched body of Anthony Lombardi who at first appeared to have been stabbed multiple times in the upper torso. His body was half outside and half inside the driver’s door of his Honda Accord coupe.

Nine days after the killing, the day before Hernandez-Andrade was shot, a coroner’s autopsy revealed Lombardi had actually been shot, not stabbed.

Lombardi was robbed at gunpoint and shot while seated in his car in the driveway of his Valencia home Sept. 16, Coleman said.

“The investigation is at a standstill and there aren’t many clues,” he said.

On the day of the Hernandez-Andrade shooting, Coleman was asked about the two cases.

“I was the lieutenant at both (murder) scenes and that was our first thought,” he told reporters.

“Apparently, they are disparate incidents and we don’t think the two are connected at this time.”

Another more recent SCV killing also remains unsolved.

Ocampo
Jose Eduardo Ocampo, 25, of Canyon Country, was stabbed several times at 10:45 p.m. Friday Jan. 10, 2014, on the 18100 block of Sundowner Way.

Lt. Fred Corral of the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Department said at the time that Ocampo died of multiple stab wounds to the chest.

Homicide detectives investigating his murder said they suspect the killing was possibly gang-related.

No arrest was ever made in connection with the killing.

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on Twitter @jamesarthurholt

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