CONFESSION TO SHOOTING

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 29010, 26 September 1959, Page 4

CONFESSION TO SHOOTING

Puerto Rican Youth Gang Leader (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) NEW YORK, Sept. 22. A 16-year-old Puerto Rican gang leader confessed today he was the "Royal Knight” who yesterday shot and killed another 16-year-old on their high school steps. ‘‘lt was all a mistake,” Edward Peres told reporters today. ‘‘l didn’t want to shoot anyone . . . something went wrong ... I just pointed the gun at him to scare him, and it went off. I'm very sorry.” Police said that witnesses to the shooting told them the youngsters took careful aim at John Guzman, believed to be the leader of the ‘‘Valiant Crowns,” a rival Puerto Rican gang. Peres deliberately pulled the trigger, the witness said, while his own gang members shouted: “Burn him. Burn him. Burn him.” “Burn him” is juvenile gang slang for “shoot.” Police said the dying boy had identified his killer as a member of the “Royal Knights” gang which had been feuding with the “Valiant Crowns” gang over “territorial rights.” They said Guzman was believed to have insulted a member of the “Knights.” Peres and six other members of the “Knights” were arraigned on charges of homicide, and held without bail. Both boys were students, in different classes, at the Bronx High School, where the killing took place. School officials said both had poor grades and records of truancy. Mrs Ida Peres, aged 42, a gar-

ment worker, who has three other younger children, said her son had made good grades at a topranking Roman Catholic high school until shortly alter his father’s death 16 months ago. Mrs Peres said the boy’s father had kept him away from bad companions and made him study, but that since the elder Peres’s death, “he wouldn’t listen to me.

“He has brought shame on himself, the good name of his family, and the memory of his father,” Mrs Peres said. “He has failed me as a son, but I’ll not fail him as a mother. I’ll stick by his side.”