Valuing Children Killed by Gangs

I read with interest “Is the Value We Place on a Child’s Life Colorblind” by Gregory Rodriguez (Opinion, June 8) and found myself nodding in agreement with the perception of the perpetual division that tends to fascinate us as a society. Suddenly, however, it came to me how often we fail to recognize those instances where the opposite is true.

Case in point is the death of Erika Izquierdo, an 11-year-old shot and killed in Huntington Park, a 98% Latino, mostly immigrant community, near Halloween in 1995. As a result of her death, only two months later than Stephanie Kuhen’s, this community coalesced in such a way that we saw a profound drop of seven gang-related deaths in 1995 to one in 1996.

Gov. Pete Wilson could have chosen the site of Stephanie’s death to tout his anti-gang program, but he didn’t. He came to Huntington Park only three months after Erika’s death to promote the civil injunction program against gang members. He sent a message loud and clear that gang killings were unacceptable and intolerable regardless of the race of their victims. We are profoundly grateful to the governor, Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren and Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti (all came in 1996 to our city) for helping our Latino community prevent more tragic, senseless deaths. Maybe we ought to consider ourselves lucky to be the city that has dispelled the race myth, and where we’ve proven the value of Latino children is so high.

ROSARIO MARIN

Councilwoman

Huntington Park