Man Sought After Firing at Officers
Police using search dogs and a helicopter scoured a rugged area in the Santa Susana Pass near Chatsworth Tuesday evening looking for a man suspected of shooting at two Oxnard police officers, authorities said.
The officers were not injured when Mark M. Richendollar, 32, allegedly fired at them with a police service revolver he pulled from the holster of one of the officers during a scuffle in an Oxnard apartment complex about 5:45 p.m. Tuesday, Oxnard Police Sgt. Denny Phillips said.
Richendollar tried to shoot again but the gun failed to fire, Phillips said. Richendollar drove off in a nearby car.
Phillips said the officers had gone to the apartment complex at Charles and Clara streets to arrest Richendollar on an assault warrant. The officers wrestled the gun from him before he started running, Phillips said.
About an hour later, a California Highway Patrol officer pulled over a car registered to Richendollar near the Topanga Canyon Boulevard off-ramp of the Simi Valley Freeway, Los Angeles police Lt. Frank Malan said. The driver, believed by police to be armed with a pistol and a large knife, fled into thick brush next to the freeway, Malan said.
Malan said winds up to 50 m.p.h. made it difficult for police dogs to track the man’s scent.
Phillips said Richendollar had been staying with his girlfriend at the Oxnard apartment, but police did not know how long he had been living there.
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