LOS ANGELES – Fugitive ex-police officer Christopher Dorner died of a single gunshot to the head, San Bernardino County (Calif.) Sheriff’s Department officials said Friday.
Officials said it appears the wound was self-inflicted but said a final determination has not been made.
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At a news conference Friday, officials also announced that they had found a cache of weapons as well as a powerful tear gas and high-capacity magazines in the possession of Dorner or at sites connected with him.
Officials said they recovered 10 silencers, assault weapons, a sniper rifle, a “tactical style” vest and military helmet.
Dorner, who was fired from the Los Angeles Police Department in 2009, was killed at the end of a long standoff Tuesday with SWAT deputies in a cabin near Big Bear.
San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon at a Wednesday news conference adamantly denied that deputies intended to burn the cabin down. But the department Thursday declined to answer further questions about the standoff.
Sources, however, have provided details of what happened.
The day’s light was fading when the SWAT officers decided they could wait no longer for Dorner to surrender.
Dorner, the fired Los Angeles officer suspected of killing four people in a campaign of revenge, had been holed up in a cabin near Big Bear Lake for hours, trading gunfire with sheriff’s deputies.
Dorner ignored repeated calls over a loudspeaker to surrender. Attempts to flush him out with tear gas led nowhere.
Wanting to end the standoff before nightfall, members of the sheriff’s SWAT unit carried out a plan they had devised for a final assault on the cabin, according to law enforcement sources. An officer drove a demolition vehicle up to the building and methodically tore down most of its walls, the sources said.
With the cabin’s interior exposed, the officer got on the radio to others awaiting his order. “We’re going to go forward with the plan, with the burner,” the unidentified officer said, according to a recording of police radio transmissions reviewed by the Los Angeles Times.
“The burner” was shorthand for a grenade-like canister containing a more powerful type of tear gas than had been used earlier. Police use the nickname because of the intense heat the device gives off, often starting a fire.
“Seven burners deployed,” another officer responded several seconds later, according to the transmission, which has circulated widely among law enforcement officials. “And we have a fire.”
Within minutes the cabin was fully engulfed in flames, ending a dramatic manhunt that captivated the nation.
The SWAT radio transmission, in addition to the comments of at least one officer who earlier in the gun battle could be heard by a TV reporter calling for the cabin to be burned down, have raised questions as to whether authorities intentionally set the structure on fire to end the standoff.
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