Derek Ochoa's family prayed the rosary for nine days, erecting a shrine to the La Sierra High School senior that included candles and photographs of Derek as a younger boy.

Derek, 17, was walking near his home on Jan. 11 when a car pulled up. After a brief conversation, someone in the car began shooting. Derek tried to hide behind a mailbox, but the shooter got out of the car and fired again.

Police said that Derek had friends who were in gangs and joked about belonging to a gang but was not a gang member.

"He was a good boy, a good boy," his father, Daniel Ochoa, said from the living room of his home, steps away from where his son was slain.

The night his son died, Ochoa heard six gunshots and ran out of the house. Derek lay dying from several wounds. The killers already had disappeared.

Ochoa, a supervisor at a lumber company, moved his family to Riverside from Santa Ana 17 years ago. Watching his 5-year-old son play, he accidentally called the little boy "Derek." He said his wife is depressed and can't sleep.

Derek never gave him any trouble, he said. "They took something away from me."