Slaying shakes Inland school
11:09 PM PDT on Thursday, May 12, 2005
By PAIGE AUSTIN, JERRY SOIFER and DOUGLAS E. BEEMAN / The
Press-Enterprise
The stabbing death of a promising Corona Centennial High School
football player stunned classmates and school officials Thursday and
raised concerns about the potential for racial conflict at a school
with a recent history of problems.
Dominic Redd was a fun-loving 15-year-old student who was quick with a
hug and "friendly with everyone," classmates said.
But about 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, the teenager was chased down and fatally
stabbed by three Hispanic youths at an apartment complex in Corona,
according to the Corona Police Department. He died two hours later at
Riverside Community Hospital.
Dominic Redd, the slain 15-year-old, played football for Corona's
Centennial High.
Corona police said they don't know what prompted the attack and have no
evidence to indicate whether the killing was racially motivated or had
any connection to Centennial High School.
Still, a dozen or more uniformed Corona officers and campus security
attendants arrived Thursday to walk hallways and to patrol the Rimpau
Avenue campus. School officials said the added security will remain
today.
"It assures parents the campus is safe. This is a preventive effort,"
said Thomas Pike, the Corona-Norco Unified School District's assistant
superintendent of student services.
Shock, Disbelief and Tears
Word of Dominic's death spread quickly.
"Half of the students knew about it (the stabbing) last night, and half
of the students learned about it this morning. Some are in shock, some
are in disbelief, some are in tears," said Matt Logan, Centennial
High's varsity football coach.
On campus, nurses, psychologists and counselors were deployed to talk
to tearful students, who gathered in the school's gym and later in
small counseling groups.
"They're sad," said Robert Garcia, a Corona-Norco school psychologist.
"He was a good kid with friends of all different backgrounds. They're
asking why this happened and trying to make sense of it."
Counselors are expected to remain on campus today and Monday, school
officials said.
Dominic played on the freshman football team for the regular season,
but he was elevated to the varsity team for the playoffs. Centennial
won the CIF Division 5 title in December.
An only child, Dominic loved to talk and joke around, had tons of
friends and wanted to become a pro football player despite being 5 feet
3 inches tall, his close friends on the varsity football team said
Thursday.
"That's the last person you'd think this would happen to," said
teammate Jerry Hardeman, 15. "He had no problems with anyone. He was
friendly with everyone."
Attack in Condo Complex
Investigators have no idea who killed Dominic Redd or why and are
seeking the public's help, said Corona police Sgt. Jerry Rodriguez.
According to police, Dominic tried to elude his pursuers by ducking
into a unit in the Contadora condominium complex in the 1000 block of
Margarita Drive. When he couldn't get in, Dominic ran further into the
complex, where he was overtaken by his attackers, police said.
They stabbed him several times and then ran away, Rodriguez said.
A witness described the attackers as three short-haired 15- or
16-year-old Hispanic males who weighed about 150 pounds and ranged in
height from 5 feet 7 inches to 6 feet 1 inch, Rodriguez said.
Police Presence at School
Police officers and private security officers patrolled the streets
around Centennial High School and guarded every exit and corner of the
campus Thursday.
The intense police presence at the school served two purposes,
Rodriguez said. It allowed investigators to interview students who
might have information about the killing, and it served to allay fears
fueled by rumors that the killing stemmed from racial tension at the
school.
"There are so many rumors, and we were there to make sure anything
didn't get out of hand," he said.
"A 15-year-old kid was stabbed, and we want to be able to solve this,"
Rodriguez added. "Someone out there knows what happened, and we're
encouraging them to call with information."
Centennial High School has had a recent history of racial strife. Last
year, the school was locked down in March and a dozen students were
arrested after a lunchtime brawl between black and Hispanic students.
On Thursday, several parents and students said racial tensions at the
school have been heating up again in recent weeks with a fight between
some black and Hispanic students in the campus quad. Rumors about
racial violence have circulated, prompting some black students to stay
home on Cinco de Mayo out of fear that they would be targeted by
Hispanic gangs, said Mary Foster, whose 15-year-old nephews stayed home
that day.
Sam Buenrostro, Centennial's principal, said some parents called the
school to ask about rumors of a Cinco de Mayo fight, which he said did
not materialize.
"We assured them we had heard no threats and understood they were
nervous," Buenrostro said.
Marilyn Payne picked up her-14-year-old son, Jerrell Andrew, from
school early Thursday. Like many classmates, he was upset over the
killing of his friend.
"He just called me and said, 'Mom come and get me.' " Payne said.
"These kids are too young for this," she said. "It's hard enough for
them just trying to deal with peer pressure without having to worry
about who is waiting for them around the corner."
Jerrell said there had been rumors for several weeks that racial
tensions were building.
"We've known for a couple weeks that someone was going to get jumped,"
he said. "I just didn't think that they would kill somebody."
Pike, the assistant superintendent, said he is aware that racial and
gang problems are present in the community, but the Corona-Norco
district works hard to keep those issues off campus.
"We haven't been perfect," Pike said. "We continue to work on campus
safety, kids getting along."
Concerned parents will be able to express their views at an upcoming
parents forum, Buenrostro said. The date of the meeting has yet to be
set, he said.
Freshmen football coach Danny Shevitski said Dominic was a running back
on the freshmen football team for most of the fall, rushing for more
than 1,100 yards and gaining 300 yards as a receiver.
"He affected a lot of people's lives," Shevitski said. "He was a little
guy, but he always kept other smaller guys positive. He was a great
influence to his peers. He never talked down. If you told him to run
because of discipline, he ran. He didn't question you."
Shawn Brennan, 15, recalled the deal he made with Dominic when they
played together on the freshmen team. Brennan, the quarterback, gave
Dominic the option of earning $1 or a Honey Bun for every touchdown he
scored.
"He chose Honey Buns because he loved them," said Brennan. "He scored
his first touchdown on a play called the Arizona so we changed the name
to Honey Bun, and whenever we used that play, we would go, 'Honey Bun,
Honey Bun on two.' "
'A Lot of Tension'
Dominic lived with his mother in an older central-Corona neighborhood
of apartments, condominiums and single-story homes. Police said
Thursday that they have no record of racial violence in the
predominantly Hispanic neighborhood.
Centennial student Rachel Porties, 18, who joined a cluster of students
grieving outside Dominic's home Thursday, said there is a sense of
danger in the neighborhood where Dominic lived "probably because he's
black. This neighborhood is all Mexican people. There's a lot of
tension between black and Mexican people."
But race didn't matter to Dominic, said Deandre Garcia, 17, a
Centennial senior. Garcia, grieving with four black classmates on the
curb outside Dominic's home Thursday, recalled laughing with him during
dodge-ball games and how, at a gathering of his friends in the school
gym Thursday, there were students of every race and color.
"He didn't see anybody by their color, he saw them by their character,"
Garcia said. "That's how everybody should be and how you present
yourself -- not by whatever color you are or what people put in your
head, because in the end, we've got to take our character to heaven."
Assistant Metro Editor Cindy Rhodes and staff writer Linda Lou
contributed to this report.
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