Salvador “Chavita” Esparza III and his mother visited her boyfriend in Altadena on July 5, 2016. An armed suspect walked up to the house in the 300 block of West Figueroa Drive that night and fired at least 13 times, hitting 4-year-old Chavita in the head and wounding a 27-year-old family friend. The Monrovia boy died at a hospital.
Investigators believe the boyfriend and his brother were the shooter’s targets. An hour or two before the shooting, Lt. John Corina said a person of interest argued with the boyfriend in the street. The shooting remains a cold case.
In a move to help generate leads and make the public aware of unsolved murders in Los Angeles County, Justice for Murdered Children and Justice for Homicide Victims put up seven billboards featuring the faces of victims including 4-year-old Chavita.
The billboards went up July 31 and will remain up until the end of August, according to Cynthia Bejar, who is on the board of Justice for Murdered Children and Justice for Homicide Victims.
On Saturday, victims’ families and representatives from law enforcement agencies held a news conference by one of the billboards at 410 Cloverleaf Drive in Baldwin Park, near the 605 Freeway.
“This is a small fraction of murders that have happened, and without the public’s help, we can’t do it alone. There are some murders we can solve, but there are other murders where we need the public’s help,” Capt. Andrew Meyer of the LA County Sheriff’s Department said.
Gabriela Moreno, the mother of 20-year-old Edgar Vazquez, was representing her son, who received gunshots in the Willowbrook area on his way to work as a security guard at City of Hope Medical Center on the night of Monday, July 6, 2020. Vazquez was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.
“There are many murders happening at all times: small kids, grown-ups, and children like mine. He was on his way to work and was looking for a better lifestyle. And what happened? There was gang violence, gun violence, and there were gunshots. I want it to stop one way or another. And I am asking the community if they saw something; this was in the area of Willowbrook. If anyone saw something, say something, there are no small details. Anything,” Moreno said at the billboard unveiling.
There is another billboard on Cloverleaf Drive, off at the 10 Freeway, Bejar said, plus there are two billboards in Irwindale, two in Compton and one in Long Beach. Clear Channel, the billboard company, sponsored them, she said.
Her 24-year-old son, Vincent Bejar of Norwalk, is also on the billboard. He was shot on the 15000 block of Eucalyptus Avenue in Bellflower on Sept. 1, 2008.
“It was a holiday. He was walking down a residential street. A car came up. It was several shots,” she said, adding there were two or possibly three people in the car.
Vincent Bejar died at a hospital. He left behind a son who was then 2.
She went to the area where it happened one or two days later and talked to some of the neighbors.
“We cleaned off the blood in the driveway where he fell,” Bejar said.
In addition to hoping people will call in tips once they see the billboards, she said the billboards are also there for public awareness.
“We make the public aware we are here. We are not going away. Our loved ones matter,” Bejar said.
Among those in support of Vincent Bejar, his cousin Ariana Bejar Nasseri mentioned the family passing out fliers on the anniversary of his death to the public in order to achieve justice for all of the unsolved murders.
“In any sort of loss, you experience grief. This is a grief we were forced into. We didn’t have a choice to be a part of this. We do this not just for our loved ones, but for others who are in the same situation,” Ariana Bejar Nasseri said.
Staff writer Nelson Espinal and contributing photographer Keith Durflinger contributed to this story.
