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Talking to the cops could be a potential motive for murder, as we found out in tonight's story. gabriel ayala was in his backyard when someone shot him in the head at close range. ayala was a gang member. this looked like a hit. at the crime scene, detective dwayne fields picked up on a telling detail. >> whoever walked up on gabriel walked right up to him. gabriel had a gun in his waist and never pulled it out. that tells me that he knew who ever killed him. >> reporter: detective fields knew ayala well. so, it wasn't a big surprise what happened to him? >> it wasn't if, it was when. >> it wa...

But gabriel ayala walked free. >> so what did his gang think? >> reporter: they thought that he talked. >> they thought he was a rat, that he talked. >> reporter: they considered him a snitch. >> they considered him a snitch. >> reporter: richard moya knows the inner workings of gangs. the term snitch, what does that mean on the streets? >> that's somebody that's talking to the cops, law enforcement, anybody that's talking to somebody to give up the information, that's a snitch. >> reporter: what happens to snitches on the street? >> different consequences. sometimes they get taken out by thei...

>> when he got out of jail, detective fields says gabriel ayala was a dead man walking. >> i believe the gang thought he must have had some information because his homeboy was still in jail and he wasn't. and i believe that they killed him. the truth, gabriel didn't tell us anything. they killed him for nothing. >> he didn't give up information? >> he didn't give up information and his cohort was later convicted for that murder, as he would have, had he survived. >> gabriel was killed by his own gang, you think? >> i believe so. >> reporter: in the tug-of-war between gang rivalry and gang loya...

From his gang to tell me a fellow gang member killed him, it will be a tough one. >> unless one of them is arrested for something else and try to lessen their sentence? >> that's what i can hope for. >> reporter: detective fields needs someone inside ayala's gang to talk, someone with a reason to tell everything they know about who killed gabriel ayala. you will be here waiting for him? >> i will be here. i'm not going anywhere. >> boxing legend oscar de la hoya grew up near hollenbeck in east l.a., a champion of the ring who founded a charter school in his old neighborhood. he said he was sur...

At the crime scene, detective duane fields picked up on a telling detail. >> whoever walked up on gabriel walked right up to him. he had a gun in his waist and never pulled it out. that tells me he knew whoever killed him. >> reporter: detective fields knew ayalo well. it wasn't a big surprise. >> it wasn't if, it was when. >> reporter: just a matter of time? >> yeah, gabriel's time was coming. he was too active, too well known, played too hard, trying to be too tough in his gang, and it caught up to him. >> reporter: he had a lengthy criminal record and everyone in hollenbeck seemed to know h...