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| A San Bernardino County Sheriff SWAT team returns to the command post at Bear Mountain near Big Bear Lake, Calif. after searching for Christopher Jordan Dorner on Friday, Feb. 8, 2013. Search conditions have been hampered by a heavy winter storm in the area. Dorner, a former Los Angeles police officer, is accused of carrying out a killing spree because he felt he was unfairly fired from his job. |
BIG BEAR LAKE,
Calif. (AP) -- Authorities hunting for an ex-Los Angeles police
officer suspected of three killings have wrapped up a four-hour search
of his mother's Orange County home.
Irvine
police Lt. Bill Whalen says his department and U.S. marshals removed 10
paper grocery bags of evidence from the home Friday in La Palma. He
didn't elaborate.
Computer forensics lab technicians removed five items as evidence.
Whalen
says Dorner used to live at the home, but nothing indicates he's been
there recently. Dorner's mother and sister cooperated with the search.
Dorner is suspected in a spree of violence as revenge for being fired from the Los Angeles force.
A
former LAPD captain's daughter and her fiance were killed in Irvine
last weekend. A pair of shootings Thursday killed one officer and
wounded two others.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
All
that was left were footprints leading away from Christopher Dorner's
burned-out pickup truck, and enormous, snow-covered mountains where he
could be hiding among hundreds of cabins, deep canyons and dense woods.
More
than 100 officers, including SWAT teams, were driven Friday in
glass-enclosed snow machines and armored personnel carriers to hunt for
the former Los Angeles police officer suspected of going on a deadly
rampage to get back at those he blamed for ending his police career.
With
bloodhounds in tow, officers went door to door as snow fell, aware to
the reality they could be walking into a trap set by the well-trained
former Navy reservist who knows their tactics and strategies as well as
they do.
"The bad guy is out there, he has a
certain time on you, and a distance. How do you close that?" asked T.
Gregory Hall, a retired tactical supervisor for a special emergency
response team for the Pennsylvania State Police.
"The bottom line is, when he decides that he is going to make a stand, the operators are in great jeopardy," Hall said.
As
authorities weathered heavy snow and freezing temperatures in the
mountains, thousands of heavily armed police remained on the lookout
throughout California, Nevada, Arizona and northern Mexico.
Police
said officers still were guarding more than 40 people mentioned as
targets in a rant they said Dorner posted on Facebook. He vowed to use
"every bit of small arms training, demolition, ordinance and survival
training I've been given" to bring "warfare" to the LAPD and its
families.
At noon, police and U.S. marshals
accompanied by computer forensics specialists used a search warrant to
remove about 10 paper grocery bags of evidence from his mother's
single-story house in the Orange County
city of La Palma. Dorner's
mother and sister cooperated with the search, and a police spokesman
said.
The manhunt had Southern California
residents on edge. Unconfirmed sightings were reported near Barstow,
about 60 miles north of the mountain search, and in downtown Los
Angeles.
Some law enforcement officials said
he appeared to be everywhere and nowhere, and speculated that he was
trying to spread out their resources.
For the
time being, their focus was on the mountains 80 miles east of Los
Angeles - a snowy wilderness, filled with thick forests and jagged
peaks, that creates peril as much for Dorner as the officers hunting
him. Bad weather grounded helicopters with heat-sensing technology.
After the discovery of his truck Thursday afternoon, SWAT teams in camouflage started scouring the mountains.
As
officers worked through the night, a storm blew in, possibly covering
tracks that had led them away from his truck but offering the
possibility of a fresh trail to follow.
"The
snow is great for tracking folks as well as looking at each individual
cabin to see if there's any signs of forced entry," said San Bernardino
County Sheriff John McMahon.
The small army
hunting him has the advantage of strength in numbers and access to
resources, such as special weapons, to bring him in.
In his online rant, Dorner baited authorities.
"Any
threat assessments you generate will be useless," it read. "I have the
strength and benefits of being unpredictable, unconventional, and
unforgiving."
Without the numbers that authorities have, Dorner holds one advantage: the element of surprise.
"He can be behind every tree," Hall said. "He can try to draw them into an ambush area where he backtracks."
Authorities
said they do not know how long Dorner had been planning the rampage.
It's not clear if he is familiar with the area, or has provisions,
clothing or weapons stockpiled in the area. Even with training, days of
cold and snow can be punishing.
"Unless he is
an expert in living in the California mountains in this time of year, he
is going to be hurting," said former Navy SEAL Clint Sparks, who now
works in tactical training and security. "Cold is a huge stress factor.
... Not everybody is survivor-man."
Jamie
Usera, an attorney in Salem, Ore., who befriended Dorner when they were
students and football teammates at Southern Utah University, said he
introduced him to the outdoors. Originally from Alaska, Usera said, he
taught Dorner about hunting and other outdoor activities.
"Of
all the people I hung out with in college, he is the last guy I would
have expected to be in this kind of situation," Usera, who had lost
touch with Dorner is recent years, told the Los Angeles Times.
Others
saw Dorner differently. Court documents obtained by The Associated
Press on Friday show an ex-girlfriend of Dorner's called him "severely
emotionally and mentally disturbed" after the two split in 2006.
Dorner
served in the Navy, earning a rifle marksman ribbon and pistol expert
medal. He was assigned to a naval undersea warfare unit and various
aviation training units, according to military records. He took leave
from the LAPD for a six-month deployment to Bahrain in 2006 and 2007.
Last
Friday was his last day with the Navy and also the day CNN's Anderson
Cooper received a package that contained a note on it that read, in
part, "I never lied." A coin riddled with bullet holes that former Chief
William Bratton gave out as a souvenir was also in the package.
Police said it was a sign of planning by Dorner before the killing began.
On
Sunday, police say Dorner shot and killed a couple in a parking garage
at their condominium in Irvine.
The woman was the daughter of a retired
police captain who had represented Dorner in the disciplinary
proceedings that led to his firing.
Dorner wrote in his manifesto that he believed the retired captain had represented the interests of the department over his.
Hours
after authorities identified Dorner as a suspect in the double murder,
police believe Dorner shot and grazed an LAPD officer in Corona and then
used a rifle to ambush two Riverside police officers early Thursday,
killing one and seriously wounding the other.
The
incident led police to believe he was armed with multiple weapons,
including an assault-type rifle. That detail concerned officers whose
bullet-proof vests can be penetrated by such high-powered weapons, said
LAPD Deputy Chief Kirk Albanese.
As a result,
all LAPD officers have been required to work in pairs to ensure "a
greater likelihood of coming out on top if there is an ambush," Albanese
said. "We have no officers alone right now."
In Big Bear Lake on Friday, residents were on edge about the manhunt even as ski slopes remained open.
"A
lot of people are frightened by it," said Dennis Pitner. "A lot of
people are at home locked in their houses and probably won't come out
for a couple more days, maybe even longer."
