Harbor City Ca

Lured by promises of a rosier future, the small, independent cities of San Pedro and Wilmington in 1909 joined themselves to their burgeoning neighbor to the north, port-hungry Los Angeles. Now they might get out again, led by activists in these contrasting harbor-side neighborhoods of picturesque hillsides, historic waterfronts, towering refineries and grimy industrial districts.

A Harbor City man refueling an airport SuperShuttle van with natural gas was killed Saturday when the fuel tank on the vehicle exploded, Los Angeles County sheriff's officials said. The explosion occurred shortly after 10 a.m. at a Clean Energy station on South Figueroa Street in Carson, Deputy Ed Hernandez said. Hernandez declined to name the victim, but KCAL-TV Channel 9 identified him as Bob Mancuso, 61. The force of the blast threw the shuttle driver 10 to 20 yards away, Hernandez said.

In the far southern reaches of Los Angeles, where cargo-laden 18-wheelers rumble by day and a thick blanket of fog rolls in most nights, 50 people have been killed this year. So far. With two days yet to go, the body count in the Los Angeles Police Department's Harbor Division--which includes San Pedro, Wilmington and Harbor City--is up 72% from 29 in 1996. The increase in the Harbor Division is perplexing because it comes amid a citywide decrease in homicides of about 17%.

Members of a Harbor Gateway gang accused in the racially motivated slaying of 14-year-old Cheryl Green later killed a man who witnessed the attack, fearing he would testify against them, prosecutors charged Friday. Five members of the 204th Street gang allegedly stabbed 21-year-old Christopher Ash 80 times and cut his throat before dumping his body in the middle of a Carson street Dec. 28, according to the L.A. County district attorney's office. Lt.

City officials hope a tough gang abatement program in Harbor City will return calm to an eight-block area that has been rocked by gang activity and illegal drug sales. In a 10-0 vote Tuesday, the City Council directed city prosecutors to seek a court order to bar the activities of a Harbor City street gang. The measure is similar to one taken against the Blythe Street gang in Panorama City.

Los Angeles City Atty. James K. Hahn on Monday announced the filing of a court injunction to severely restrict the activities of two Harbor City gangs accused of terrorizing and intimidating residents of their neighborhood. Hahn alleged that 30 people named in the court papers have helped turn a working-class community near the Port of Los Angeles into a "24-hour-a-day drug dealing hell and a battleground where violence frequently erupts."

Nothing, it seems, can insulate Ann's paint store from the violence that drug dealers visit on Harbor City--not her 10-foot chain-link fence, not the barbed wire coiled on top, not even her big German shepherd. When a drug deal on the street soured recently, one of the people involved scaled her fence and sprinted through her shop, gunshots ringing out behind him. "I couldn't believe it, but I looked up and there's this guy just running by me," said Ann, who declined to give her last name.

The battle of wits between a renegade alligator and a crew of Colorado "gator wranglers" stretched into its second day Wednesday as boats dragged an enormous fishing net across Harbor City's Lake Machado, but twice failed to snag the 7-foot reptile. As a Los Angeles recreation and parks truck hauled the massive net out of the murky waters Wednesday evening, scores of spectators crowded around to see whether the net contained "Harbor Park Harry," as some have nicknamed the beast.

Members of a Harbor Gateway gang accused in the racially motivated slaying of 14-year-old Cheryl Green later killed a man who witnessed the attack, fearing he would testify against them, prosecutors charged Friday. Five members of the 204th Street gang allegedly stabbed 21-year-old Christopher Ash 80 times and cut his throat before dumping his body in the middle of a Carson street Dec. 28, according to the L.A. County district attorney's office. Lt.

In an apparent setback to secessionists, a study concluded Wednesday that a breakaway city in the harbor area of Los Angeles would generate $35.4 million less in revenue than is needed to pay for existing city services. Leaders who oppose a breakup of Los Angeles said the study proves that independence for Wilmington and San Pedro would cost residents dearly.

They were killed within an hour of each other, one as he stood in his driveway, the other while paying for groceries at a convenience store. Both were 34. They were killed in the same part of town, and police suspect gang members in both shootings. And as best as anyone can tell, neither was doing anything more than minding his own business.

A 20-month-old girl was killed after being run over by her uncle's car while he was backing out of a driveway in the 1300 block of West 251st Street, police said. Los Angeles Police Department officials said the uncle, who was not identified, told officers that he saw the toddler before he started backing up but also knew that her father was nearby and assumed he had gotten her out of the way of his vehicle.

Gator wranglers from Florida have quit their search for an elusive 7-foot alligator in Harbor City's Lake Machado after they were publicly ridiculed by a Hurricane Katrina evacuee brought in to help nab the reptile. Thomas "T-Bone" Quinn described as "retarded" the methods used by the wranglers from Orlando-based Gatorland. He made his comments Saturday after being escorted by Los Angeles City Councilwoman Janice Hahn to the park where the gator, dubbed Reggie, has lived for at least two months.

A day after being tapped to track down an urban alligator in a Harbor City lake, a New Orleans evacuee was taken off the job Sunday after city officials determined that he had no liability insurance and no known credentials. Thomas "T-Bone" Quinn had been invited Saturday to join the effort to capture the alligator named Reggie just a week after arriving at a Los Angeles shelter for those displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

The strange summer of urban alligators grew wackier Tuesday when local and international media reported the capture of Reggie, the elusive critter residing in a Harbor City lake -- only to learn hours later that it was a hoax. The false report was the latest twist in the saga of the wayward reptile, whose owner abandoned him sometime before he was spotted Aug. 12 in the man-made Lake Machado. At 2:35 a.m.

Forget the professional alligator wranglers, with their reptilian mating calls and fang necklaces. It was the Los Angeles Fire Department that finally netted one of two renegade gators lurking in the waterways of Harbor City on Thursday night. After bystanders spotted a 2- to 3-foot alligator in a murky flood channel near Lake Machado behind an apartment complex, firefighters used an enormous ladder and a net to snare the creature and haul him into captivity.

A study of San Fernando Valley and Harbor cityhood should be completed in 22 months, soon enough for a potential vote in two years, officials said Thursday. "If we keep to that schedule, we can make the 2002 ballot," said Larry Calemine, executive officer of the Local Agency Formation Commission. The ambitious schedule and details of the study are contained in a work plan released Thursday by LAFCO and developed by Pacific Financial Management Inc.

Efforts to save the harbor area's faltering secession bid went down to the wire Thursday as officials for a state commission struggled to draft a budget that would allow the proposed city to survive apart from Los Angeles. The cityhood application for San Pedro and Wilmington will rise or fall on a financial viability report expected to be released today by the Local Agency Formation Commission.

In the summer drama that is Find the Gator, Wednesday's installment opened with a reptile basking in a Harbor City drainage ditch and closed with a cliffhanger. Again. "He stuck his snout and his eyes out, then he sunk back under the water," said Nick Reagan, 16, who will have some kind of back-to-school tale for today.

Old Bob, a 4-foot-long, 100-pound alligator snapping turtle, was a local legend for years before repairs to Fullerton's Laguna Lake dredged him up last September. A monitor lizard appeared several years ago in a dam pond near Yuma, Calif., but was never captured. Now an alligator in Harbor City's Lake Machado has alternately thrilled and tantalized a growing crowd.