5 Fatally Shot at El Monte Home : Violence: Two children are among those killed in tiny apartment. But two others survive when gunman runs out of bullets.

With chilling swiftness and precision, an unknown gunman murdered five people in an El Monte home--an execution-style attack that ended only when the killer ran out of ammunition and fled with two cohorts, authorities said Sunday.

The gunman’s lack of bullets apparently spared two young children huddled in their cramped, one-room apartment as their mother and sleeping siblings were shot at close range Saturday night. The tiny room, about 50 square feet and cluttered with beds, became a trap when the gunman stormed in and began shooting, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Rich Erickson said. “There was really no place to run,” he said.

Sheriff’s detectives speculated that the killer would have finished off the entire family if he had carried more bullets for his large-caliber handgun.

‘It appeared to be a very fast execution,” Erickson said. The gunman and an accomplice “walked down the driveway . . . did what they did and left.”

After the two stalked off about 10:30 p.m., one survivor, a blood-splashed 6-year-old boy, dashed to a neighbor’s house to report the carnage. His 2-year-old sister also survived. Both children were placed with relatives.

Investigators found no signs of robbery, Erickson said. And there was no indication of a shootout or struggle.

Each victim was shot at close range, and homicide investigators found no stray bullets.

In the rented one-room apartment attached to the back of a white frame house in the 3800 block of Maxson Road, investigators did uncover what they called “drug paraphernalia,” a syringe and a small cup that could have been used to “cook” narcotics. But department spokesmen emphasized that they had not determined whether the slayings were linked to drugs.

“We can’t sit here and say it was drug-related, because there was just one syringe (at the scene),” Deputy Mark Bailey said. “It wasn’t like we’re talking about a big, major drug dealer with pounds of cocaine.”

Erickson added: “The motive is still unknown.”

The victims included four family members and one friend.

Maria Moreno, 39, and two of her children--5-year-old Laura and 6-month-old Ambrose Padilla Jr.--were found bleeding in the room, along with a 36-year-old Irwindale man whose name was not released pending notification of relatives. All had been shot through the head except Laura, who was struck in the chest, investigators said.

Around the front of the main house, on the porch, lay another victim, Moreno’s brother, 42-year-old Anthony Moreno, also shot in the head.

The three adults died at the scene, and the two children were pronounced dead at local hospitals.

A slick stream of blood trickled from the apartment’s sliding door down the tree-shaded driveway Sunday, winding around a blue and white van parked next to the overgrown yard. A few neighbors paused to peer through the chain-link fence at the scene, marked off with yellow police tape. Others, fearful and distressed, stayed inside.

“It’s a scary world,” neighbor Rebecca Reynoso said.

A mother of three, including a 1 1/2-year-old baby, Reynoso said she plans to guard her children even more carefully--and enlist neighbors to look out for suspicious strangers. “We’ll try to watch out for each other,” she said.

Already, neighbors have helped investigators by providing descriptions of the three killers, all believed to be young Latino men.

Two were described as ages 17 to 20, with shaved heads. Both had similar builds: about 5 feet 5 inches tall and 140 pounds. The third man, who drove the getaway car, was described as 20 to 25 years old, with close-cropped hair.

Alerted by the burst of gunfire, neighbors got a glimpse of the two younger men as they left the house and climbed into a light brown car, described as either a Toyota Corolla or a Nissan Maxima, Erickson said. The car drove away slowly with its headlights off, witnesses said.

The brutal murders stunned neighbors.

“Usually, this street is real calm, so it was quite a shock for everyone around here to have that happen so close to us,” said Marco Plantillas, who has lived on Maxson Road for five years.

Like several other neighbors, Plantillas said he rarely chatted with residents on his block, and did not know the Moreno family. But his 9-year-old daughter, Victoria, played tetherball in her front yard with young Laura.

“She liked to play tetherball, and she was good at it,” Victoria Plantillas said quietly. “She was fun to play with.”