Wildlife Officials Helped Track Dorner

After days of searching by Southern California law-enforcement officials, it was wardens from the Department of Fish and Wildlife who located Christopher Dorner. While police searched the hills of Big Bear, Fish and Wildlife officials were brought in to patrol Highway 38, which is where Dorner, wanted for the murder of three police officers, was first spotted.

Around 12:45 p.m. officers in a Fish and Wildlife vehicle spotted Dorner in a purple Nissan. Dorner then turned on to a side road to evade the officers, crashed his car, and commandeered a truck being driven by a local Boy Scout camp ranger. He continued on, driving the stolen vehicle, and was passed by another Fish and Wildlife vehicle going in the opposite direction. These officials radioed a third vehicle behind them, telling their colleagues that Dorner was headed their way.

As he approached and saw the third Fish and Wildlife truck, Dorner rolled down his window and opened fire, damaging the vehicle and causing it to skid off the road. A warden then got out of the truck and shot at Dorner’s stolen vehicle with a high-powered rifle. Dorner sped away, eventually crashed, and then fled to the cabin, where this happened:

The cabin has since burned down. A body, along with a driver’s license with the name “Christopher Dorner” on it, was discovered inside the charred building, but a forensic examination has yet to identify it as Dorner. For the time being, officials are continuing to operate under “tactical alert … as if he’s still out there.”