Triple slaying in Benedict Canyon tied to Chicago gang violence, LAPD says

Los Angeles police detectives have taken into custody three suspects in connection with a gang-related triple slaying outside a Benedict Canyon home earlier this year.

After months of investigation that led detectives to a Beverly Hills high-rise, where a getaway car had been spotted, police arrested three men they say were involved in the Jan. 28 attack, which left three dead and four others critically wounded.

The ambush shooting was carried out by three Chicago gang members and motivated by events in that city, Los Angeles Police Department Capt. Jonathan Tippet said at a news conference Friday.

Daries Stanford, 28; Dontae Williams, 22; and Dejean Thompkins, 28, were arrested in Chicago; Gary, Ind., and New York City, respectively, with the help of local police and the FBI.

All three are awaiting extradition to Los Angeles.

Authorities also have linked the men to another L.A. slaying that occurred a month before the Benedict Canyon attack.

California

LAPD search Beverly Hills high-rise apartment tied to triple slaying in Benedict Canyon

Investigators say a blue Tesla was seen leaving the scene of the Jan. 28 fatal shooting. The same car was spotted entering the Beverly Hills complex later that morning.

The deadly attack occurred outside a short-term rental home in the 2700 block of Ellison Drive, a street of large hillside homes north of Beverly Hills. Neighbors reported seeing several cars driving away minutes after gunfire rang out around 3 a.m., police said.

Detectives released a crime alert with information they had received from both witnesses and surveillance video from the scene. They said the suspects were last seen driving a blue, four-door Tesla with damage to its right front fender and no license plates. That vehicle was tracked to a condo complex in the 8600 block of Wilshire Boulevard, where one of the apartments was searched in March for forensic evidence connected to the shooting.

Los Angeles police officers stand outside a Benedict Canyon home, near the scene of a Jan. 28 attack in which three people were killed and four were critically wounded.

(Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

Tips from community members who saw the suspects’ vehicle in and around the West L.A. and Beverly Hills area led investigators to the apartment complex on Wilshire. A warrant to search the apartment was obtained after it was connected to the Tesla.

Tippet told The Times in March that the Benedict Canyon attack wasn’t random; it targeted three women and members of their group, one of whom was an aspiring rapper.

On Friday, he said the women were not the intended targets of the shooting, which sought to kill others who were at the scene.

“The violence that occurs in Chicago today is having an effect on all of us,” Tippet said. “We are saddened by this horrible loss of life. We hope the arrest of those responsible for these acts will bring some comfort to the families.”

California

Victims identified as mystery surrounds Benedict Canyon shooting that left 3 dead

Residents were left shocked after a fatal shooting during a gathering in the quiet cul-de-sac of Benedict Canyon, a neighborhood north of Beverly Hills.

Those who were killed — Nenah Davis, 29, of Bolingbrook, Ill.; Destiny Sims, 26, of Buckeye, Ariz.; and Iyana Hutton, 33, of Chicago — all had roots in the Chicago area, police said. The lifelong friends died in a hail of gunfire that peppered their rented Porsche SUV.

Hutton was trying to get into the music business before she was killed and was said by a friend to be in L.A. for an album release. Davis, one of Hutton’s best friends, was a mother who once worked as a nurse. Sims was a mother of three and a hairstylist who grew up in Illinois before moving west with her family.

Earlier the night of the shooting, the trio had visited a bowling alley before returning to their rental home, according to friends interviewed by The Times.

Photos of the victims were on display during a press conference to announcing that the suspects in the Benedict Canyon triple murder were taken into custody.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

Artist Mick E. Finnz, a longtime friend of Hutton’s, wondered whether something happened at the bowling alley to set off the deadly events. But Tippet said detectives found no evidence of any altercation.

The suspects in the triple homicide have also have been tied to the Dec. 22 slaying of Julian Bynum in North Hollywood.

Joseph Iniguez, the chief of staff for Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón, said Thompkins has been charged with four counts of murder — three each for the Benedict Canyon shooting and one in connection with Bynum’s death — and six counts of attempted murder.

Williams and Stanford are charged with three counts of murder and six counts of attempted murder with a semiautomatic weapon.

Because of the “incredible loss of life, we have decided to file special circumstance allegations and gun enhancements in this case,” Iniguez said. “We cannot allow these tragedies to go unanswered.”