GORMAN – A suspect who authorities said broke free from a sheriff’s deputy taking him to his patrol vehicle and dragged the deputy as he attempted to drive away was shot and killed in Gorman Wednesday.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department deputy stopped the man in his vehicle at about 12:15 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 11, on the southbound Golden State (5) Freeway about a mile north of Templin Highway, according to Deputy Alejandra Parra of the Sheriff’s Information Bureau.
[the_ad id=”96478″]
The deputy had the man exit his vehicle and was escorting him back to a patrol car when he broke free and ran up an embankment. The deputy pursued the man back to the door of his vehicle, where an “altercation occurred,” Parra said.
The suspect drove off, dragging the deputy along with him.
“The suspect crashed through a chain-link fence leading to the southbound I-5 shoulder,” Parra said. “He then crashed again through the fence back to the frontage road and a deputy involved shooting occurred.”
The man was struck by the gunfire and pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics. His name was not immediately released.
Investigators later recovered a handgun that was found “where the suspect was sitting,” Parra said.
The deputy was taken to a hospital, treated for injuries he sustained in the altercation and was later released.
The stretch of the southbound portion of the freeway in the vicinity of the shooting was closed for more than five hours after the shooting. Caltrans announced at about 5:55 p.m. that the three left lanes had reopened to traffic.
The right lane of the freeway remained closed as authorities investigated the shooting.
–