Authorities have arrested a 29-year-old man in the investigation of the fatal shooting of a Los Angeles county sheriff’s deputy after a manhunt to find the perpetrator behind the ambush killing this weekend.
Thirty-six hours after the killing of Deputy Ryan Clinkunbroomer, law enforcement officers arrested Kevin Cataneo Salazar at a home in Palmdale, about 60 miles north-east of Los Angeles, following an hours-long standoff early on Monday morning.
Officials detained Salazar after a description of a vehicle was released and community members contacted law enforcement with information, according to Robert Luna, the Los Angeles county sheriff.
The motive is not yet known, but the sheriff described the killing as a “targeted act”.
Clinkunbroomer, 30, was shot as he sat in his patrol car at a red light just after leaving the Palmdale station around 6pm on Saturday. He was alone in the vehicle, which was stopped at the intersection of Sierra Highway and Avenue Q.
A passerby discovered him unconscious in the vehicle and alerted authorities, Luna said. Clinkunbroomer died at a nearby hospital.
“Without warning, he was murdered while serving our community,” an emotional Luna said at a Sunday news conference during which he urged any potential witnesses to contact detectives.
The department released grainy surveillance video of a dark-colored sedan that pulled alongside the patrol car in the moments before the shooting. Investigators believed the “vehicle of interest” was a gray Toyota Corolla manufactured between 2006 and 2012.
Authorities served a search warrant at Salazar’s residence overnight. Media reports show armed deputies wearing tactical gear on a residential street and the Los Angeles Times reported that a sheriff’s call code described the detained person as “suffering from diminished mental capacity”. Salazar barricaded himself for several hours, Luna said.
“Deputies surrounded the residence and called out all the occupants,” said Luna. “Eventually family members did come out. The suspect chose to barricade himself and refused to initially come out.”
Deputies attempted to get him to come out using hostage negotiation techniques, Luna said, but those efforts were unsuccessful. They eventually deployed “chemical agents” and Salazar surrendered, according to the sheriff.
Law enforcement found numerous firearms as well as the vehicle of interest previously described by the department.
Authorities are also looking at the man’s possible involvement in a road rage incident before the killing, according to the LA Times.
Salazar’s mother told the LA Times that her son has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and that he in the past had heard voices and would sometimes tell his family he was being followed. He was mentally ill, she said, “and if he did something, he wasn’t in his full mental capacity”.
She had previously contacted police for help with her son after he refused to take his medication, she said. In recent months, his mother said he appeared calm even though he had stopped taking his medication.
As authorities searched for the suspect, Salazar did not give any indication that anything was amiss or that he was nervous, his mother said. She did not know he owned a gun.
“I didn’t know when it happened, I just saw him normal,” she told the newspaper. “We were here, working, cleaning chairs and tables and he was OK. None of us knew anything.”
Clinkunbroomer had been with the sheriff’s department for eight years and followed in the footsteps of his father and grandfather, who both worked for the agency. He had become engaged to his girlfriend just four days before his death, the sheriff said.
“Our son Ryan was a dedicated hardworking deputy sheriff,” Luna said, reading a statement from Clinkunbroomer’s family. “He was proud to work along the side of his partners that he considered brothers and sisters as he sacrificed daily to better the community he served.”
Officials had announced a reward of $250,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the shooter.
Kathryn Barger, a member of the Los Angeles board of supervisors, pledged that the board would contribute $100,000 to the reward.
“The persons or person responsible will be held accountable, and I make that promise to you. Justice must and will be served,” Barger said.
Luna said on Monday that the district attorney pledged that his office would aggressively pursue the case. The sheriff also asked anyone with information come forward as officials continue to investigate.
