Tailgater Used .38 in Shooting on I-5 Freeway

The tailgating gunman who shot and killed a 24-year-old man from Orange man on the Santa Ana Freeway last Saturday night used a .38-caliber revolver, authorities said Thursday.

Lab tests on the fired slugs show the weapon was a .38-caliber of an undetermined brand but possibly of foreign make, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department homicide investigators said.

Rick Lane Bynum was shot on the southbound Interstate 5 just south of Santa Fe Springs by a man who apparently was angered when a car in the fast lane driven by Bynum’s girlfriend would not move out of his way.

Bynum’s 3-year-old son, who was with Bynum for the Father’s Day weekend, was in the rear seat of the car when the shooting occurred near the Carmenita Road exit about 9:45 p.m. Saturday. Neither the boy nor Bynum’s girlfriend, Sandra Leigh Tait, 18, was injured in the shooting incident.

Authorities are looking for an Anglo or Latino man about 20 to 30 years of age, driving a 1980-1982 yellow Toyota Corolla with primer spots on its right rear-quarter panel.

Investigators have asked that anyone with information on the shooting contact the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department at (213) 974-4341.