CARLOS NAVA - 3 yo (8/2011) - / Convicted: Willie Torrence and Lawrence Denard - Oakland CA

3-year-old Oakland boy killed, two adults wounded in drive-by shooting

By Kristin J. Bender and Harry Harris, Oakland Tribune
POSTED:   08/08/2011 02:17:54 PM PDT

OAKLAND -- The dead boy's mother sat on her front porch sobbing, gasping for breath and unable to speak. The father of the 3-year-old needed the help of four men to get up the stairs into his house.

The couple and their three children, who relatives said have lived in the house on Havenscourt Boulevard for just weeks, were a few blocks away shopping in the 6400 block of International Boulevard about 1:15 p.m. Monday when someone drove by and sprayed at least 15 bullets at two men on the street. The couple's son, identified by relatives as Carlos Fernandez Nava, in a blue and red stroller shaped like a car, was hit in the neck. He later died at Children's Hospital Oakland, police said. The two men sustained minor injuries.

"I'm a little off-balance right now," said Chief of Police Anthony Batts after he came from talking to the family at the hospital. "I just went up to give our condolences to the family of this 3 -year-old boy and, quite frankly, I'm tired of the violence that takes children in this community. You don't know how tough it is to tell a parent their child has been killed."

Police have not made any arrests and do not have firm motive in the case, though Batts said the shooting stemmed from an ongoing feud between two parties in the community. He declined to say if it was gang-related.

The two men who were walking ahead of the boy and his family have not been identified. Police said they are 37 and 27 years old.

Police issued a citywide "tactical alert," and held several officers over from the day shift while others blanketed the neighborhood searching for the car involved in the shooting, Batts said. The car was traveling east on International Boulevard at the time of the drive-by, police said.

Batts said finding the killer or killers was a top priority.

"Budget concerns are not my concern right now. Stopping the violence is my concern right now," he said, adding that extra patrols would be in the area through Friday.

Two people in the area, who declined to be identified, said they heard gunshots, saw people running and then saw at least two bystanders come to the child's aid.

One bystander said she saw a woman holding the child's hand while an employee of a nearby store was holding the child, telling him, "Don't close your eyes, don't close your eyes. Don't go to sleep."

A crowd gathered and once people realized that a small child had been shot, they reacted angrily. There was yelling and screaming, and one woman shouted, "This is just craziness. This was a baby."

The boy is the youngest victim slain in a street shooting in Oakland in recent history, but county prosecutor Richard Moore said children have been the accidental victims of the city's violence far too often.

"It's not something you see every day, but it happens way too often," said Moore, who heads the felony trial team for the Alameda County District Attorney's office. "One is too many ... It's a reflection of the senseless gun violence we see out there. And to have it happen right in the middle of the day? That's just horrific."

The boy wasn't even the first child shot on that block in recent memory. In April 2009, a 1-year-old named Prosperity Banks was hospitalized along with a 4-year-old girl and a 14-year-old boy after they were all hit by stray gunfire in another daytime shooting. All three children survived.

More recently, a 6-year-old girl was shot in September as she slept in her home in the 1600 block of Seminary Avenue around 2 a.m. She also survived, after surgeons removed the bullet that had gone through her arm and lodged in her chest.

International Boulevard was closed in both directions between 64th and 66th avenues as police continued their investigation Monday afternoon.

Several businesses, including the All-Mart store, were open at the time of the shooting. A man who answered the phone at the store but did not give his name declined to comment or confirm the shooting.

"We don't have any comments. I can't talk about that. Goodbye," the man said.

http://www.insidebayarea.com/top-stories/ci_18640007

2 Gang Members To Be Tried In Murder Of Young Oakland Boy

June 27, 2013 10:17 PM

OAKLAND (CBS SF) — Two reputed gang members were ordered Thursday to stand trial on murder and premeditated attempted murder charges for a drive-by shooting in East Oakland two years ago that left 3-year-old Carlos Nava dead and two men wounded.

Alameda County Superior Court Judge Thomas Reardon issued his ruling in the three-day preliminary hearing for suspected shooter Lawrence Denard, 28, and suspected driver Willie Torrence, 24, after Oakland police Lt. Tony Jones said he believes the shooting was gang-related.

The defendants are accused of opening fire outside a grocery store in a strip mall in the 6400 block of International Boulevard around 1:10 p.m. on Aug. 8, 2011.

Testifying as an expert witness on gangs, Jones said he believes Denard and Torrence are members of the 69th Village gang and the two men who were wounded, 39-year-old Robert Hudson and Jerome Williams, are members of the rival 65th Village gang.

The two gangs operate out of housing complexes that are located between 65th and 69th avenues near the scene of the shooting, he said.

After Carlos was fatally shot, an incident that outraged many community members, Oakland police said they believed he was not an intended target because he and his family, who were shopping at the time, had no connection to the two men who were struck.

Jones said the manner in which the shooting occurred had all the hallmarks of a drive-by gang-related shooting because it was carried out in broad daylight and shots were fired “indiscriminately into a crowd.”

Jones, who said he grew up in the area and has investigated gangs throughout his 19-year career with the Oakland Police Department, said he believes Denard and Torrence were trying to send a message that members of the 65th Village gang “are not safe anywhere” because the shooting occurred in 65th Village turf in the middle of the day.

He said he believes Denard and Torrence were trying to boost their standing in the 69th Village gang by carrying out the shooting because “the respect it will command is real.”

The area between 65th and 69th avenues near International Boulevard used to be considered “one neighborhood” at one time but the 65th Village and 69th Village factions have been feuding since at least 1995 and there have been many retaliatory shootings in the 6400 block of International Boulevard since 2000, according to Jones.

About 10 supporters of Denard and Torrence attended their hearing Thursday but on Wednesday about 30 supporters packed the courtroom in an apparent attempt to intimidate Williams when he testified.

Prosecutor Ben Beltramo noted the large crowd and asked Williams if he knew the audience members. Williams said he only knew a few family members who were in the courtroom but didn’t know the others.

Court officials escorted Williams and his family members from the courthouse after he completed his testimony.

Williams and Hudson were both reluctant witnesses, as Williams had to be subpoenaed to appear in court and Hudson had to be arrested.

When Hudson took the witness stand on Tuesday, Beltramo played a recording on his interview with police on Sept. 14, 2011, about a month after the shooting, that Denard was the shooter.

But Hudson tried to distance himself from his recorded statement, saying that he never identified Denard as the culprit and alleging that police had doctored the recording.

Denard’s attorney, Annie Beles, said Thursday that Denard shouldn’t be ordered to stand trial, arguing that there’s not any reliable evidence that he was the shooter.

Beles also said she doesn’t believe there’s sufficient proof that Denard is a gang member and that he shouldn’t stand trial for the two counts of premeditated attempted murder for the shooting of Williams and Hudson because there isn’t proof that the shooting was intended to kill the two men.

Beles said the shooting “seems to be a scare tactic that went abysmally wrong.”

But Beltramo said he believes there clearly was an intent to kill because there’s evidence that the suspects drove by the scene twice, got close to their intended targets and then fired about 30 shots.

In addition to being ordered to stand trial on one count of murder and two counts of attempted murder, Denard and Torrence were ordered to stand trial on being ex-felons in possession of a firearm, discharging a gun from a vehicle and for acting to benefit a criminal street gang.

Denard has prior convictions for grand theft and possession of a firearm by a felon and Torrence has a conviction on an illegal gun charge.

Carlos’s family didn’t attend the hearing, which was guarded by four bailiffs.

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2013/06/27/2-gang-members-to-be-tried-in-murder-of-young-oakland-boy/

2 Men Found Guilty in 2011 Shooting Death of Oakland 3-Year-Old Carlos Nava

By NBC Bay Area Staff  
Monday, Jun 23, 2014  
Updated 11:29 AM PDT


An image of Carlos Fernandez Nava, who was killed in a 2011 drive-by shooting in Oakland.


Booking photos show Torrence (left) and Denard (right).

A jury has found two alleged gang members guilty of first-degree murder in the 2011 shooting death of a 3-year-old boy in Oakland.

Jurors reached that verdict against Willie Torrence, 25, and Lawrence Denard. Denard, 29, pulled the trigger, while Torrence was the getaway driver.

Carlos Nava was shot and killed on the 6400 block of International Boulevard in 2011.

The verdicts were reached on Friday but weren't announced until Monday morning, when 11 bailiffs were present to guard the courtroom of Alameda County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Horner.

The prosecution said the men were trying to get revenge on a rival gang when the toddler was shot. The intended targets in the shooting were hit but survived.

Prosecutors said Nava was going to a nearby grocery store at the time of the shooting and was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

In addition to first-degree murder, Denard and Torrence were convicted of two counts of premeditated and deliberate attempted murder, two counts of discharging a gun from a vehicle, being ex-felons in possession of a gun and multiple clauses of acting to benefit a criminal street gang.

Denard and Torrence both face life in prison when they are sentenced on July 22.

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Carlos-Nava-Murder-Suspects-Found-Guilty-in-2011-Shooting-Death-of-Oakland-3-Year-Old-Boy-264275421.html

Such a sad, tragic waste of a precious child's life. These fiends should never be free to roam the streets again. NEVER.

Bet they're not such big "men" in prison. I hope they become the queens of their cell blocks.