Man in Oregon Suspected in ’93 Killing of Officer

A man arrested on charges of murdering a woman during a robbery in Oregon has emerged as the prime suspect in the December, 1993, murder of Manhattan Beach Police Officer Martin Ganz, law enforcement officials said Thursday.

Although they are officially noncommittal about the suspect, Roger Hoan Brady, 28, investigators who have spent eight months pursuing thousands of leads and tips in the Ganz murder are celebrating what they believe is a major break in the case.

“This looks like the one,” said a detective close to the investigation who declined to be identified. “We went out and had a little celebration last night.”

Brady, who served a term in federal prison for robbing an Agoura Hills savings and loan in 1989, reportedly resembles a composite drawing of Ganz’s killer and was allegedly driving a gray 1988 Daihatsu during the Oregon robbery that matches the description of the car driven by Ganz’s killer. Brady is being held without bail in the Washington County Jail near Portland on aggravated murder charges stemming from the Aug. 3 robbery of a supermarket in the Portland suburb of Cedar Mill and the shooting death of a 55-year-old woman outside the store.

A .380-caliber semiautomatic pistol and a 7.62-millimeter SKS rifle seized after Brady’s arrest have been examined by a Los Angeles County sheriff’s weapons expert to see if either matches the Ganz murder weapon, Oregon police officials said. Officials would not reveal the results of those tests.

Ganz, 29, a Garden Grove native who joined the Manhattan Beach Police Department in 1989, was gunned down by a motorist he pulled over during a routine traffic stop near the Manhattan Village shopping mall Dec. 27. The killer opened fire as Ganz approached the car, then pursued the officer on foot as he retreated behind his patrol car. Ganz was wearing a bulletproof vest but was killed by a gunshot wound to the head.

The gunman then pointed his semiautomatic weapon at Ganz’s 13-year-old nephew, who was on a “ride-along” in the patrol car, but he did not fire. The nephew and another witness described the killer as a dark-haired Asian or Filipino man in his late 20s or early 30s, driving a gray or silver hatchback auto.

Washington County sheriff’s Cmdr. Rob Gordon said Brady, who is of Vietnamese and white ancestry, has been charged with killing Catalina Correa, a registered nurse who had gone to buy milk at a neighborhood supermarket and was shot in the back and heart by a man who had just held up a clerk in the store. She died at the scene.

Another witness followed the gunman as he drove off in a gray Daihatsu until the gunman stopped and fired three shots at the witness with a rifle, hitting his van, Gordon said. The witness abandoned the chase but got the getaway car’s license number. Police traced the car to an apartment in Vancouver, Wash., across the Columbia River from Portland, where Brady lived with his parents. Vancouver police surrounded the residence, and after several hours Brady surrendered. The pistol was found in the apartment, and Brady’s father later turned over the rifle to police, Gordon said.

Brady waived extradition to Oregon and was arraigned on the aggravated murder charge Monday. Oregon officials say Brady almost certainly would have to answer to the Oregon murder charge before he could be returned to Los Angeles if he is charged with the Ganz murder.

Federal court and prison records show that Brady was arrested in October, 1989, in the robbery of Home Federal Savings and Loan in Agoura Hills in which he pointed a pellet gun at a teller and got $2,053. Sheriff’s deputies saw his getaway car and chased him to his home in the Topanga Canyon area, where he fled into the brushy hills. He was caught soon afterward.

In February, 1990, Brady was sentenced to 41 months in federal prison with five years probation after his release. He also was ordered to undergo drug treatment, court records show. He was released from federal prison in Lompoc in October, 1992. In May, five months after the Ganz slaying, his probation file was transferred from Los Angeles to Vancouver, federal probation officials said.

Gordon said a chance phone call tentatively connected Brady to the Ganz killing. Brady’s federal probation officer in Vancouver mentioned the case to a friend in the Lennox sheriff’s station, Gordon said. Ganz task force investigators contacted Oregon police and after hearing additional details “they got more and more interested,” Gordon said. Four Ganz task force detectives and the weapons expert traveled to Oregon this week to follow up on the case, officials said.

Manhattan Beach Police Chief Ted Mertens described his reaction to the Brady arrest as “cautious optimism.”

Meanwhile, Pamela Ham, 29, Ganz’s fiancee, said she is hoping the murder case has been solved, but knows the case is far from over.

“I’m still not over losing Martin yet,” Ham said. “If this is the guy, it’s the end of one chapter. But it’s the beginning of another.”

Times staff writer Larry Gordon contributed to this story.