OXNARD : College Student Arrested in Fatal Shooting

Oxnard police arrested a Ventura College student Tuesday on suspicion of murder, then held a news conference to ask gang members to prevent the slaying from escalating into warfare.

Sgt. Charles Dunham said a “love triangle” was the motive for the south Oxnard shooting on Monday that killed Jerome Hurst, 25, of Oxnard and critically wounded Vernon Hunter, 27, also of Oxnard.

“We have nothing to indicate that this is gang-related,” Assistant Chief James A. Latimer said. But police said they had information that gang members were plotting to retaliate against the arrested man, Zolly Terry Jr., 21, and had been lurking around his residence shortly after the shooting.

“The rival gangs are of sufficient size and the intelligence is sufficiently good that we really need to appeal to them not to take any action,” Latimer said.

Police brought along police chaplain Lonnie G. McCowan to help make their point. “I don’t think that any gang members need to feel that they need to retaliate,” McCowan said.

Undercover Oxnard police followed Terry’s relatives from his home, where the family picked up his clothes, to a motel near Los Angeles International Airport, authorities said. Terry emerged from the motel and was arrested about 2 p.m. at a fast-food restaurant near the airport, police said.

“It went down very smooth,” Dunham said. He said the Los Angeles police and airport police assisted in the arrest, and that Terry was transferred back to the Oxnard Police Station, where he was booked and held for questioning.

Details on the motive for the shooting were sketchy Tuesday afternoon. Police said the matter was still under investigation, but said Hunter had been romantically involved with Terry’s sister, who is pregnant.

Hunter was living with a second woman. Dunham said Hunter had asked Hurst to be in his apartment to help protect Hunter.

Terry and Hunter were known to Oxnard police as members of two different gangs, police said.

Shortly before 2 p.m. Monday, Terry fired more than six shots from a .380 automatic pistol in the living room of Hunter’s apartment in the 1400 block of Friedrich Lane, police said. Police said the shots hit Hurst and Hunter several times each.

Police said they had not recovered the weapon as of Tuesday afternoon.

Hunter managed to stagger out of the apartment and tell authorities what happened before he was taken to St. John’s Regional Medical Center, authorities said.

Hurst’s co-workers at Furr’s Cafeteria in Oxnard fondly remembered him Tuesday. “He was a very nice, well-mannered young man. The customers loved him,” said cafeteria manager Al Madle.

Terry was a league champion sprinter at Hueneme High School in 1991.