Highland Park Ca

Last month, Eli Estrada found $140,000 cash in the street on his way to work. The $20 bills were unmarked, bundled into wads of $20,000 and in a bag in the middle of Gridley Road in Cerritos. The 40-year-old Highland Park man's first thought was: "I'm rich." But he immediately decided to turn in his find. The money would go a long way, he thought, but keeping it would be wrong.

The Anti-Defamation League on Thursday honored the federal agents and prosecutors involved in convicting four members of a Latino street gang in Highland Park last year for violating the civil rights of African Americans with a campaign of threats and violence, including murder. The group noted that the case against the Avenues gang "broke new ground as the first time a street gang was convicted of violating federal hate crime laws."

In Highland Park, an explosion of art galleries in the last few years has made the neighborhood a leading light of contemporary Latino art in Los Angeles. East Hollywood, meanwhile, features a profusion of Thai restaurants and spas, along with Armenian bakeries, shops and a boat-shaped library, which reflects the legend that Noah's Ark came to rest on an Armenian mountain.

A Latino street gang threatened, assaulted, terrorized and murdered black people in Highland Park for six years in an effort to keep them out of their territory, a federal prosecutor alleged Wednesday. "Kenneth Wilson was killed because he was black, because he was in Highland Park and because the Avenues gang members had promised each other, had agreed that they would drive African Americans out of the neighborhood, by threats, by force, by murder," Assistant U.S. Atty.

Jose Cruz is a walking testament to what happens when a member turns against the Avenues street gang. He has 30 scars from the stab wounds he suffered in one attempt on his life -- on his arms, torso and legs. In another attack, he was beaten so severely that he has a visible dent in his skull, according to court papers, "the size and shape of a pistol butt."

A former Avenues street gang member acknowledged Wednesday that he had lied repeatedly about the murder of a black man who authorities allege was the target of an organized campaign to harass, threaten and kill African Americans in Highland Park. The defense in the federal conspiracy case pushed hard to suggest that the violent incidents Jesse Diaz recounted were directed at black gang members, and not all African Americans.

Mario Rocha spent his first night out of prison lying on a blanket on the roof of his cousin's El Sereno garage, reading by flashlight -- Luis Rodriguez's gang memoir "Always Running" and the writing handbook "The Elements of Style," by William Strunk and E.B. White. Just a boy of 16 when he was locked up 10 years ago, Rocha, now 27, fell asleep savoring the starlit sky and awoke Friday to face the limelight.

\o7Promise yourself ... to be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind. \f7As boys they saw it hanging from the walls of the dining hall, recited it in unison with other boys, heard it intoned at every special event like a prayer: \o7 Promise yourself ... to think only of the best, to work only for the best and to expect only the best.

Three Highland Park gang members convicted of deadly hate-crime attacks against African Americans were sentenced to life in prison without parole Monday. The members of the Latino gang the Avenues had been prosecuted for breaking federal hate-crime laws -- statutes typically used against white supremacist groups. They were convicted of carrying out a conspiracy that violated their victims' rights to live and walk in Highland Park. The conspiracy included several killings.

Kiersten Puusemp walked into Mr. T's Bowl in Highland Park on a rollicking Saturday night and, as the bar's most ardent fans might expect, fell instantly in love. She came through the main entrance, which is the back door. She took in the ratty, faded carpeting. The perfectly tacky holiday decorations. The eight unused bowling lanes. The framed photographs of "Mr. Joe T" greeting patrons and pouring drinks.