The Region - News from April 24, 1986

A hamburger stand manager was shot to death by robbers, Los Angeles police said. As Tae Choi, 25, slumped behind the counter at Fred’s Charbroiled Hamburgers at Gage Avenue and Broadway, the robbers reached into the cash register, grabbed less than $100 cash and fled, Lt. William Hall said. “The manager . . . hesitated or refused or didn’t understand (the demand for money) and was shot,” Hall said. Choi, a Korean whose family owns the stand, died at Century Community Hospital. It was the latest in a series of attacks on Korean merchants in South Los Angeles. On April 15, Jung Keun Chong, 47, and his wife Jung Ran Chong, 40, were stabbed to death in their liquor store. Lee Kee Hong, 38, was shot to death 16 days earlier in his small market. In the Chong case, investigators said, Guy Vincent Ross, 23, and Reynard Vallery, 22, both of South Los Angeles, turned themselves in to police and both were booked on suspicion of murder.