Man arrested and charged with shooting two LA sheriff’s deputies
Investigators have arrested and charged a man in connection with the shooting of two Los Angeles county sheriff’s deputies earlier this month as they sat in a squad car.
The District attorney, Jackie Lacey, said on Wednesday that attempted murder charges had been filed against 36-year-old Deonte Lee Murray.
Murray was arrested two weeks ago in connection with a separate carjacking and was expected to be arraigned later on Wednesday.
Murray, who was already in custody following his arrest two weeks ago on unrelated carjacking charges, pleaded not guilty during an initial court appearance and was ordered held on $6.15m bail by the Los Angeles superior court judge Michael Shultz.
Shultz ordered sheriff’s officials to investigate complaints by the public defender Jack Keenan that Murray was being harassed by deputies assigned to guard him. “He’s been denied food, his food has been repeatedly thrown in the toilet,” Keenan told Reuters in an interview. “They’ve woken him up at all hours of the night, threatened to physically harm him.”
The deputies, who suffered head wounds in the 12 September ambush, have since been released from the hospital and are recovering.
Surveillance video showed a person on foot approaching the patrol car, parked at a Metro rail station in the city of Compton, and firing a handgun through the passenger-side window.
The deputies were able to radio for help despite their wounds.
The deputies, a 31-year-old woman and 24-year-old man who have not been identified publicly, graduated together from the sheriffs academy 14 months ago.
Compton is among communities near south Los Angeles, an area with a large Black population that has long been a flashpoint for racial tension and mistrust of police.
In recent weeks, demonstrators have marched to protest fatal shootings in the area, where deputies killed a Black man on 31 August and a Black teenager in 2018.
Wednesday’s announcement follows a separate assault on another law enforcement officer in southern California.
A Los Angeles police officer was attacked on Saturday night inside the Harbor Community station in San Pedro. The assailant was recorded on surveillance video as he knocked the officer to the ground inside the station, pistol-whipped him with his own gun and pointed it at his chest. The officer is recovering from his injuries.