Suspect fatally shot during arrest
Jesus Guzman was sought for questioning in seven Antelope Valley homicides.
A man who was wanted for questioning in seven Antelope Valley homicides and suspected in an eighth was killed by authorities Thursday morning when he pulled out a weapon during his arrest, Los Angeles County sheriff ’s officials said.
Homicide detectives tracked Jesus “Chuy” Guzman, 34, to Charleston View, Calif., a community near the Nevada border, where, along with the U.S. Marshals Service Pacific Southwest Regional Task Force, they went to arrest him just before noon, the Sheriff’s Department said.
Guzman brandished a handgun at the pursuing officers and was shot.
He died at the scene, and his weapon was recovered, authorities said.
Investigators began searching for Guzman last month after they found three decomposing bodies on the property he rented in the 30900 block of 106th Street East in Littlerock. Two have been identified as Jose Joseph Lara Paez, 66, and Julieta Arvizu, 49, both of Littlerock.
Later last month, investigators found the remains of two more bodies in a different part of the property.
Guzman was also named as a person of interest in the fatal shootings of Gerardo “Jerry” De Luna, 33, and Mariano Panduro Campos, 41, who were found dead on Campos’ property in Littlerock, according to Sheriff ’s Lt. Joe Mendoza.
Guzman, De Luna and Campos “were acquainted socially,” Mendoza said earlier this month. “It took us a little while to figure out he was a friend of theirs, and based on the other stuff he’s involved in, we’d like to ask if he knows what happened during that double murder.”
The Riverside County Sheriff’s Department was also looking for Guzman. He, along with Rodolfo Garcia, 35, of Perris, was suspected in a botched homeinvasion robbery in Menifee in February that claimed the life of Silvano Gutierrez Esteves, 43, according to a department news release. Garcia has been arrested and charged with murder.
Investigators believe the two were drawn to the “large amount of marijuana” found on Esteves’ property.
Witnesses reported seeing several men fleeing the property after Esteves was killed, the news release said.
‘It took us a little while to figure out he was a friend of theirs.’ — Joe Mendoza, L.A. County sheriff ’s lieutenant