Update on Andreas Raya Situation

Background on Raya Shooting (From Modesto Bee):

Andreas Raya, a 19 year old US Marine had returned to the United States in September after a tour of duty in Iraq including Fallujah. Three months later, the 19 year old with no criminal record, apparently lies in wait for police outside a liquor store, and guns them down with a SKS assault rifle. One pollice officer was killed. After a three hour manhunt, Raya is killed after a brief gunbattle.

Friends described him as an outgoing, often lighthearted kid who matured when he joined the Marine Corps out of high school. Family members said he was happy-go-lucky, very charismatic, great with people.

"All that changed when he came back on this last leave," his mother, Julia Cortez Raya. Raya was quiet at first. Then he began to voice that he did not want to go back to Iraq. His family asked him what was going on. He said no one would understand. His family tried to give him the best Christmas they could, his mother said. By the end of the visit, Raya's family thought he had decided to make the best of it, she said. He had 2½ years left and he thought the hardest part was over.

Ceres, CA January 9, 2005

It started as a seemingly simple and somewhat routine call Sunday night: a man was acting strangely at a liquor store.

Moments later, a burst of gunfire echoed through the normally quiet neighborhood. One Ceres police officer lay dying, another was critically wounded, and law enforcement was storming the scene by land and air.

Helicopters hovered above as police ordered people to go inside, lock their doors and turn off the lights.

Three hours later, another gun battle erupted, this one ending in the death of a 19-year-old Marine from Modesto,suspected of shooting the two officers.

Altogether, police and neighbors said Monday, dozens of bullets flew, shattering windows and piercing vehicles as residents hunkered down in terror.
In the end:

# Ceres police Sgt. Howard Stevenson, 39, was dead.

# Andres Raya, who police say seemed determined to die rather than return to Iraq, was dead.

# Ceres police officer Sam Ryno, 50, was hospitalized with multiple gunshot wounds. He was in critical condition Monday, and is expected to recover.

Monday, detectives from sev-eral law enforcement agencies — from the Ceres police to the FBI — sifted through events leading to Sunday's carnage.

Officers were still struggling to figure out what drove Raya to fire on officers.

"It was premeditated, planned, an ambush," Ceres Police Chief Art de Werk said. "It was a suicide by cop."

De Werk said investigators are not ruling out other motives or accomplices, but believe that Raya, a Marine who had served seven months in Iraq, was concerned about the possibility of going back into combat.

Raya returned to the United States in September and recently visited his family in Modesto.

Julia Cortez Raya said Monday that her son served in Fallujah: "He came back different."

Raya told family members he did not want to return to Iraq. But his father said the family believed by the end of his holiday visit, Raya had decided to make the best of the 2½ years he had left in the Marines.

He rejoined his unit at Camp Pendleton on Jan. 2. Sheriff's Lt. Bill Heyne said Raya was last seen at Camp Pendleton Saturday.

He reportedly told fellow soldiers he was going to get a quick bite to eat. Instead, he showed up in Ceres 24 hours later, armed with an SKS assault rifle. The rifle is a Chinese version of the weapon that Raya was trained to use in the Marines, Heyne said.

The first moments of the three-hour drama were caught by video cameras at George's Liquors, 2125 Caswell Ave., near Central Avenue.

The tape shows Raya firing one round into the pavement of the store's parking lot. He then walks into the store.

According to police, Raya told the clerk that he had just been shot at and asked the clerk to call 911, Heyne said.

Steven Marchant, working at the store Sunday night, said he was standing in front of the store when he saw Raya walking toward him from across the street about 8 p.m. Raya was wearing a poncho and yelling "how much he hated the world," Marchant said.

Marchant recognized Raya as a friend of the owner's brother and a regular customer.

Marchant went into the store when Raya stopped at the front door and asked him to call police.

Another employee tried to calm Raya down. Then the employee realized Raya had a gun under the poncho. After Raya walked out, the employees locked the door and called police.

Raya waited outside, a surveillance videotape shows.

About 8:07 p.m., about two minutes after the call, Ryno and a police trainee pulled up into the parking lot of Jiro Tires Plus, a neighboring business that faces Central Avenue. The trainee's name was not released.

As the two officers peered around the corner of a building to locate Raya, a third officer pulled into the same parking lot. Raya opened fire on all three, hitting Ryno — who had stepped out from behind the building — several times in the leg and once in the lower back.

Raya then rushed the trainee, firing several times but missing. The trainee and the third officer, whose name was not released, shot back.

Raya ducked around the corner of George's. After a few seconds, he saw Stevenson pull up in front of the liquor store. Raya opened fire again, shooting through the window of a white car in the parking lot and hitting Stevenson.

He then ran out of view of the camera.

Stevenson, lying injured on the ground, was shot twice in the back of the head, Heyne said.

"I was walking in my back yard to use my spa when I heard a horrible grinding noise," said Norm Travis, whose home is on Glenwood Drive, around the corner from George's.

"Then an alarm went off and there was a bunch of yelling and screaming and then another round of shots," he said.

"We knew that it was an automatic weapon," said his wife, Karen Travis.

Witnesses told police that after shooting the officers, Raya calmly walked east on Caswell and disappeared, either into a house or a back yard.

Within minutes, officers from the Ceres, Modesto, Turlock and Newman police departments, as well as the Stanislaus and Merced sheriff's offices and the California Highway Patrol, responded.

Nearly one square mile of the city's streets were closed as a CHP helicopter hovered and police officers and SWAT teams took positions around the neighborhood.

Police officers began shooting out street lights to diminish Raya's vision, officers said.

Residents were told to lock their doors and turn off their lights, said Kim Rose, 25, who lives about one block from the liquor store. She had been in the store about 20 minutes before the shooting.

"We heard a lot of gunfire, and I mean a lot of gunfire," Rose said. "Then a few minutes later, police were walking up and down the street with guns drawn, yelling for everyone to go back in their houses."

George Newton, who lives two blocks from the store on Beachwood Drive, said his 42-year-old daughter was visiting him when the neighborhood was locked down. She wasn't allowed to leave the home.

"She slept on my couch last night," Newton said. "She was stuck here until 4:30 a.m."

Across the street, the Garcia family was evacuated. Their home was believed to be directly behind the home in which Raya was hiding. Members of a SWAT team took over the Garcia's house, Kandy Garcia said, positioning themselves in her back yard and on her neighbor's bal-cony.

"They were nice and professional but very firm and matter-of-fact," Garcia said. "They said we had to leave now."

She grabbed her four children and stayed the night at her mother's house.

The CHP helicopter beamed its light into the yards of homes on the south side of Beachwood and north side of Caswell.

After about two hours, officers began a slow house-to-house search, according to a press release issued Monday.

"Our poor neighbors across the street were evacuated, so they locked their doors," Norm Travis said. "Then about an hour later, the SWAT team broke down their front door to search for the suspect."

About 11:08 p.m., Raya jumped over a backyard fence from a home on Caswell and ended up in an alley between Glenwood and Myrtlewood drives.

Police say he fired at four officers who were positioned at the Glenwood end of the alley, about 100 yards away. The officers fired back and struck him multiple times.

He dropped his rifle but started running toward them. He motioned as if he was going for a second weapon, officers said, so they continued to fire.

He fell to the ground and died at the scene.

His body was still in the alley Monday afternoon as investigators worked the scene.

Police said that an exact number of rounds fired by Raya and police had not been determined Monday evening, but it was probably more than 60.

Police also released the liquor store video tape. De Werk said he wanted the public to see the tape so they could understand not only what happened but "what's really going on in the world."
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Since the situation on Jan.9th 2005 their have been numorous complaints to the Modesto Bee that the Ceres Police are pulling people, from the neighborhood, over & often at gunpoint. Here is one complaint from a women that lives in the neigborhood:
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Police intimidate residents of Raya's neighborhood

By EVELYN PADILLA

The events that have shaken Ceres have brought anger to many.
I am grateful to the Ceres Police Department for having protected my family. And I knew the man many have come to call a "terrorist"; yet to me he was just Andy.

His actions are unjustifiable and my deepest sympathy goes out to the families hurt by this tragedy. Nevertheless, the aftermath of the tragedy angers me.

Across from Ceres High School is a neighborhood known to many as "El Campo," or "The Camp." I live in this neighborhood, as did Andy and as do other hard-working citizens.

In the past weeks, I've seen many police officers drive down my street. One would think they are around this area to ensure our safety. However, what I have seen, and what I have been told, is a completely different story.

My older brother was seen talking to one of Andy's friends who is under scrutiny. My brother was followed by a sheriff's deputy from my home almost all the way to his home in Oakdale. I doubt that was a coincidence.

After Andy's funeral, the same friend was pulled over at gunpoint and his car was confiscated by Ceres police. They found nothing in the car, yet they took it anyway. A week later, the same friend's worried mother came to me and said that her son and other friends of Andy's had been harassed by some of the members of the Ceres police.

Apparently, they pointed guns at them and made many unnecessary comments about the people living in my neighborhood.

Is this legal?

This behavior angers me because I come from this neighborhood and I am not a drug dealer, gang member or low-life. The people in my neighborhood have been harassed, violated and put under scrutiny -- all for what? Is it because Andy's dead and the police need someone else to blame to restore peace in our community?

I understand that they are doing their jobs; however, when we pose no threat, are the guns really necessary? We are grateful for their service, but a bit fearful of the constant attention they are focusing on the people who knew Andy. The police haven't exactly made us feel safe by constantly pulling out their weapons.

Why do they want to threaten and intimidate us? Is it because we knew him and we mourn his death? Or is it because we, too, are the drug dealers, gang members and low-lifes you've made us out to be? Whatever the reason, this treatment is unnecessary. The people in my neighborhood are hard-working, active members of the community, aspiring adolescents and people who deserve to be treated equally.

This is an attempt to open the eyes of those who stigmatize the people who live in my neighborhood, and a way to stop the continuous harassment of innocent people. We should not have to fear officers of the law simply because we knew Andy and we loved him.

Padilla is a graduate of UC Santa Cruz in sociology.

An anonomous person gave me this>

I Am
I am a person with fears & desires.
I am woundering when the world is going to end.
I hear a fist slamming against the door.
I see my dreams turning into reality.

I want my name (RAYA) to be remembered.
I am a person with fears & desires.
I pretend that i can never die.
I feel my heart beating when i am scared.
I touch the clouds in my dreams.
I worry how i will die.
I cry when i see animals mistreated.
I am a person with fears & desires.
I understand that death comes to us all.
I say all Mexicans should be treated the same.
I dream of my future family.
I try to stay on the right sidse of the tracks.
I hope that my choices are the right ones.
I AM A PERSON WITH FEARS & DESIRES."

--Andreas Raya, from his 8th grade composition "The All Most Life Story".