Two Slain While Sleeping; Gang Link Suspected

Robert Gonzales was sleeping on a sofa bed in the back patio of a friend’s Pomona home. A block away, Ernest Dickerson was sleeping in an abandoned car in a storage lot owned by his brother.

Neither man woke up.

In what police theorized were random executions associated with a decades-old feud between street gangs, Gonzales and Dickerson were shot to death in their sleep Wednesday, apparently by someone using a .22-caliber rifle.

Detectives were still not sure on Thursday what touched off the violence but said they believe it was rooted in gang rivalry.

The deaths occurred in a tiny neighborhood called Cherrieville, about 75 homes clustered around a horseshoe-shaped street that has endured some of Pomona’s worst gang violence. Since the early 1960s, two gangs known as Cherrieville and 12th Street have fought bloodily, claiming at least 13 lives during the last eight years, police said.

Two Witnesses

Detective John Holzberger said Gonzales, 40, was killed by several shots around 4 a.m., when someone leaned over a block wall that separates Cherrieville Park from the house where he had been sleeping.

Soon after, Dickerson, 52, was killed while he slept in the storage lot, which also lies next to the park.

Holzberger said Dickerson’s assailants were seen by two people sitting in another car parked in the lot, listening to music. These witnesses saw two men, one with a rifle, walk into the lot from the park.

Fearing an attack, the witnesses crouched down and heard several shots fired into the car where Dickerson slept, Holzberger said. The witnesses said there was no conversation before the shooting.

In suggesting that the same men killed both victims, police speculated that the suspects feared that Dickerson might be a potential witnesses to their role in Gonzales’ death.

‘Street Talk’

Holzberger said the occupant of the house where Gonzales was staying is affiliated with the Cherrieville gang and had been wounded several weeks ago in a drive-by shooting at the park. The occupant “indicated that there had been a lot of street talk� about retaliation by a gang, “so everybody basically was on the lookout,� the detective said.

Holzberger said there is no indication that the assailants knew the identities of the men they killed and that it is common for rival gangs to carry out attacks on anyone in the neighborhood.

“I think they just happened to see Mr. Gonzales. Basically, any male figure (in the area) would have done,� he said.