The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors this week reinstated or renewed rewards for information leading to the convictions of gunmen in unrelated shootings that killed a 20-year-old man headed home from a church dance in Hawthorne, and a 53-year-old woman sitting on her family’s front porch in Carson.
Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas recommended re-establishing a $10,000 reward that expired last year in the killing of 20-year-old William Fifita in Hawthorne.
Fifita—who was shot about 2:15 a.m. March 20, 2016—had left a church dance and was driving his cousin and two college friends when the driver of a white Kia Soul pulled alongside them near the intersection of Crenshaw Boulevard and West Rosecrans Avenue. Someone inside the Kia opened fire and Fifita died at the scene.
Ridley-Thomas also asked his colleagues to renew a $10,000 reward for information in the killing of Tauvaaga “Judy” Lauvai, who was visiting from Arizona to celebrate Father’s Day with her family when she was shot in June 2018. Set to expire Oct. 16, the reward will now be offered for at least another 90 days.
An additional $25,000 is being offered by the city of Carson, bringing the total to $35,000.
Lauvai was shot just before 9 p.m. June 16, 2018, when a light-colored, four-door sedan stopped in front of her relatives’ home in the 22700 block of Island Avenue and someone inside the car opened fire.
Anyone with information on any of these crimes was urged to call the Sheriff’s Homicide Bureau at (323) 890-5500 or Crime Stoppers at (800) 222-TIPS (8477).
