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LOCAL : Mental Profile Set in Death of Pastor

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<i> From Times staff and wire service reports</i>

A psychological profile will be assembled to help determine if a Glendale pastor who was facing child-molestation charges committed suicide last month when he was struck by a truck on a freeway, the Los Angeles County coroner’s office has decided.

Walter Heroldo Solis, 54, of Arleta was charged Oct. 27 with molesting three girls in his office at Glendale Spanish Seventh-day Adventist Church. He was killed Nov. 29 on the Golden State Freeway near his home after he pulled his wife’s car onto the shoulder, raised the hood indicating engine problems and then apparently jumped into the path of a tractor-trailer, Los Angeles police said.

Citing the pastor’s despondency over his arrest and statements from three witnesses who said Solis jumped in front of the truck, police said the death apparently was a suicide. Solis’ family and many members of the congregation disputed that finding, saying Solis was distraught but not suicidal. Solis had denied the charges against him.

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The coroner’s office has made no ruling on the death, and spokesman Bob Dambacher said the physical evidence and witnesses’ statements are inconclusive. He said the coroner’s office will attempt to compile a psychological profile of Solis through interviews with family members and others who knew him.

“We know how he was killed,” Dambacher said. “It is the mode of death we are concerned with. We don’t know whether this man took his own life or it was an accident.”

Dambacher said a private psychiatric clinic that contracts with the coroner’s office will conduct the investigation, which is expected to take several weeks.

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