Man Held in Fatal Shooting of Girlfriend

A 25-year-old man was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of murder in the fatal shooting of his girlfriend in the Tustin apartment they shared.

Several residents in a corner of the Pasadena Village Apartment complex said they heard Michael Dean Cyrus and Melanie Ann McLaughlin, 21, arguing in their second-floor apartment before the shooting Tuesday night.

Witnesses said they heard two shots around 10:30 p.m. and then heard Cyrus screaming his address, apparently on the phone to police.

“The suspect called to say he just shot his girlfriend and needed help,” Tustin Police Sgt. Bill Fisher said Wednesday.

Police said the couple were arguing when Cyrus apparently pulled a .32-caliber revolver from a drawer.

Scream, Shots Heard

McLaughlin, who was shot in the head, died about 7 a.m. Wednesday at Western Medical Center in Santa Ana, police said.

Ron Smith, a maintenance man at the complex, said he went to the apartment after hearing a scream and then two “bangs.”

“I went up there and knocked on the door, you know, I made a big noise, a boom on the door and (Cyrus) came to the door as calm as can be,” Smith said. “He had blood on his face and hands.” Smith said Cyrus then asked him to come in and help McLaughlin.

“I walked inside the apartment and in the bedroom. (Cyrus) went over and put his hand on her head. There was blood all over and I saw the gun there. . . . He grabbed the gun and I backed up and ran out the door,” Smith said.

Smith shouted to the crowd of residents gathered outside that Cyrus had a gun. He told them to clear the area, he said, but most of them just stood there.

“They didn’t listen. . . . This place looked like a party,” he said, shaking his head.

Lucinda Goodpasture, who lives in the apartment below the couple, said residents couldn’t help but hear the arguing.

“We were going to give them five more minutes and then go up and tell them to stop,” Goodpasture said, adding that by the time her husband headed upstairs, Smith was running down saying McLaughlin had been shot.

Goodpasture and her sister, Shelly, said they could not understand everything Cyrus was yelling.

“He was screaming a lot of obscenities and nothing ever really made sense,” Shelly Goodpasture said. Lucinda Goodpasture added: “I could hear him saying that he loved her.”

Another neighbor, Robert Tebroski, said he had heard the couple arguing a few times before Tuesday night.

“But last night I could tell that scream was for her life,” Tebroski said. “I heard her hollering and I called 911. But as soon as I hung up--bang!”

Police said Cyrus and McLaughlin had moved to Orange County from Bishop in the Owens Valley. They had lived in the apartment about two years.

She was working as a dental assistant in Newport Beach and he was a heavy-duty equipment operator for a company in Orange.

“He’s a good, dependable worker and always showed up to work,” said Bill Bates, a controller for Mesa Contracting Corp., where Cyrus delivered and operated rental equipment such as forklifts.