A group of gang members who were recently evicted from a vacant house they had trashed near the border of Highland Park and Eagle Rock was broken into the night before community members helped clean it up this past Monday.



The house, on 905 Pine Grove Ave., is located east of Figueroa Street in Highland Park, although it falls in the territory policed by Los Angeles Police Department Senior Lead Officer Nina Preciado, who is primarily in charge of Eagle Rock and who organized and supervised Monday's clean-up. On Wednesday, Aug. 7, Preciado told the Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council that new locks had been installed in the house that day after the City Attorney's office helped evict four members of the Highland Park gang and one member from a gang in Echo Park.

The gang members, who were recently released from prison, had occupied the house after the departure of a tenant, Preciado said, adding that the owner of the house lives in Pennsylvania. "I don't know who came back, but some of the neighbors said they [gang members] came back to take their belongings," Preciado told Patch, adding that the house was locked up again and anyone who returns to it without authorization will be arrested for trespassing.

Asked why the gang members weren't arrested while they were occupying the house, Preciado said they appear to have known the former tenant, who had the right to bring anyone into the house. "We couldn't establish what the situation was initially," the senior lead officer said. It wasn't until one of the gang members "showed up with a false rental agreement that we knew they didn't have the right to be there," Preciado explained.

A neighbor told Patch that the gang members were heavily tattooed and were a huge nuisance. They made loud noises and listened to loud music late into the night, he said, adding that his car had been keyed and that some LAPD officers had told him he is "a target" for the gang members.