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Former Los Angeles police officer Christopher Jordan Dorner is a suspect in the killings of Monica Quan and her fiance, Keith Lawrence, who were found shot to death in their car at a parking structure Sunday night in Irvine, California. |
The police were on high alert in a dragnet that appeared to rattle even a part of the country familiar with sweeping police hunts. Protection teams were dispatched overnight to guard uniformed officers and their families, scores of officers set up lines of defense outside the fortress that is the Los Angeles Police Department headquarters, and motorcycle officers were ordered to retreat to the safety of patrol cars.
In Torrance, two women delivering newspapers were shot
and wounded by police officers who mistook the Honda pickup they were driving
for the one identified as belonging to the gunman, a gray Nissan. About 12
hours later in San Diego, squads of police cars, in a blaze of red lights and
screeching tires, converged on a motel where the suspect was mistakenly thought
to be hiding after his wallet was found on a sidewalk.
As night fell, the gray Nissan was found, destroyed by
flames, at the side of a dirt road in a snowy, wooded area near Big Bear, a ski
resort about 100 miles from downtown Los Angeles. The resort and local schools
were closed as soon as the vehicle was discovered.
The suspect was identified as Christopher J. Dorner,
33, who worked for the Police Department from 2005 to 2008. Mr. Dorner posted a
rambling and threatening note on his Facebook page, which police referred to as
“his manifesto,” complaining of severe depression and pledging to kill officers
to avenge his dismissal for filing a false report accusing a colleague of abuse.
In the note, Mr. Dorner said he had struggled to clear
his name in court before resorting to violence.
The 6,000-word manifesto was bristling with anger and
explicit threats, naming two dozen police officers he intended to kill. Mr.
Dorner laid out grievances against a police department that he said remained
riddled with racism and corruption, a reference to a chapter of the
department’s history that, in the view of many people, was swept aside long
ago.
The authorities responded by assigning special security
details to protect the people named in the manifesto, and asked the news media
not to publish their names.
“I have exhausted all available means at obtaining my
name back,” he wrote. “I have attempted all legal court efforts within appeals
at the Superior Courts and California Appellate courts. This is my last resort.
The LAPD has suppressed the truth and it has now lead to deadly consequences.”
“I will bring unconventional and asymmetrical warfare
to those in LAPD uniform whether on or off duty,” he wrote.
The police said that Mr. Dorner was traveling with
multiple weapons, including an assault weapon. On his Facebook page, Mr. Dorner
posted a certificate from the Department of the Navy attesting that he had
completed a course of training to become an antiterrorism officer at the Center
for Security Forces.
“Dorner is considered to be armed and extremely
dangerous,” said Chief Charlie Beck of the Los Angeles Police Department. “He
knows what he’s doing; we trained him. He was also a member of the armed
forces. It is extremely worrisome and scary, especially to the police officers
involved.”
Mr. Dorner bragged about his lethal skills. “You are
aware that I have always been the top shot, highest score, an expert in rifle
qualification in every unit I have been on,” he wrote.
The rampage began with a double homicide in Orange
County on Sunday. One of the victims, Monica Quan, 28, was the daughter of a
former Los Angeles police captain who had defended Mr. Dorner in his
disciplinary proceedings.
On Wednesday, Chief Beck said, Mr. Dorner tried to
hijack a boat in San Diego. Early Thursday morning, police officers assigned to
protect an officer named by Mr. Dorner were alerted by a civilian who spotted a
man resembling the suspect. As they followed him, Mr. Dorner opened fire as
they approached him — grazing one in the head — before he fled, Chief Beck
said.
Less than an hour later, the suspect approached two
Riverside police officers parked at a traffic light in a patrol car and opened
fire, killing one and seriously wounding the second.
“The Riverside officers were cowardly ambushed,” Chief
Beck said. “They had no opportunity to fight back, no pre-warning.”
Sheriff McMahon said that about 125 law enforcement officers were going door-to-door in the area searching for the suspect, looking for signs of forced entry and making certain that residents there were safe.
The authorities were concerned that the gunman would
expand his choice of targets. “This is a vendetta against all Southern
California law enforcement, and it should be seen as such,” Chief Beck said
More than a dozen law enforcement agencies across
Southern California — from Riverside, east of Los Angeles, down to San Diego —
were engaged in the search. Police vehicles crowded the freeways, where
electronic signs urged drivers to look out for the suspect’s vehicle.
F.B.I. agents staked out a home in Orange County where
neighbors said Mr. Dornan’s mother lived. Neighbors said that they had seen Mr.
Dornan on and off after he returned from a two-year deployment in the Middle
East in 2006. They all said he was a cordial and approachable neighbor.
“I don’t expect to see him anymore, because I know that
this is a hot area for him,” said Ike Gonzalez, who has lived there since 1973.
Mr. Dornan was dismissed after being charged with
making false statements about his training officer, who he alleged had kicked a
suspect. A review board ultimately found Mr. Dornan guilty. Mr. Dornan sued the
department, but both the trial court and an appellate court upheld his
termination.
In his online manifesto, Mr. Dornan railed against the
officers involved in his hearing. “You destroyed my life and name because of
your actions,” he wrote. “Time is up.”
“I never had the opportunity to have a family of my
own, I’m terminating yours,” he wrote. “Look your wives/husbands and surviving
children directly in the face and tell them the truth as to why your children
are dead.”
Source: The New York Times
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Monica Quan and Keith Lawrence were found shot to death Sunday in a parking structure in Irvine, Calif., where they lived. Christopher Jordan Dorner is suspected in the double homicide. |
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