O.C. Deputy Shot to Death in Patrol Car; Suspect Is Arrested

An Orange County sheriff’s deputy was killed early Saturday when a gunman sprayed his cruiser with dozens of bullets from an assault rifle outside a 7-Eleven in Lake Forest.

Brad Riches, 34, was the first Orange County deputy fatally shot on patrol since 1958.

Police later arrested a 39-year-old Lake Forest man. Minutes before the 12:30 a.m. shooting, they said, he told the store clerk that his intention was not to rob the store but to use the weapon against police.

Riches, a nine-year veteran of the department who came under fire while sitting in his patrol car, suffered a dozen bullet wounds. He did not have time to draw his weapon, according to Sheriff Mike Carona, but did manage to put out an emergency radio call.

“He never had a chance to get out,” said Robert Bombalier, who was cleaning up at his martial arts center just doors away from the minimarket when the gunfire erupted.

“There was so much blood,” he said. “I wish I could have saved him.”

A surveillance videotape recorded at the store moments before the shooting showed an armed man strolling in and purchasing a pack of cigarettes.

According to Lt. Tom Garner, the man told the terrified clerk: “Don’t worry about this. I’m not here to rob the place.” Then, authorities said, he told her that he carried the weapon “to protect myself from the pigs.”

The videotape later provided a key break in the case: A detective recognized the man as someone he had arrested several weeks earlier. About 6:30 a.m. Saturday, investigators took Maurice Gerald Steskal into custody near his home a few blocks from the 7-Eleven.

Steskal’s roommate said Saturday that the unemployed factory worker was furious over his recent arrest and regularly railed against the government and police, who he believed were watching him.

The shooting stunned the quiet bedroom community of Lake Forest, which until April had reported just one homicide in the last year and a half.

“To hear about this sort of stuff happening here is pretty shocking,” said Larry Williams, a retired businessman who lives near the scene of the shooting and regularly buys newspapers there.

Riches, whose hobby was carpentry, built the wall of honor for the five other deputies slain since the department started patrolling Orange County in 1889. Divorced, he had no children. Officials said he regularly stopped by the 7-Eleven during his shift.

“Sometimes,” said Dennis Strom, a friend of Riches, “the really good people are taken early.”

It was shortly after midnight when martial arts instructor Bombalier noticed Riches’ patrol car pulling into the parking lot of the strip mall off Muirlands Boulevard and Ridge Route.

The deputy had not even parked the patrol car when rapid fire rang out. As the shots died off, Bombalier bolted for the door, he said. He saw the gunman drive away and noticed Riches lying in his cruiser with bullet wounds on his arm and chest.

The gunman had fired 31 times at the car. Bullets had torn through the deputy’s bulletproof vest and struck him with such ferocity that they almost severed his arm, officials said.

Bombalier said he ran to the deputy’s side. “I asked him, ‘Are you OK?’ There was no response,” Bombalier said. “I checked his pulse. He was still alive. Strong pulse but fast.”

Bombalier said he grabbed a phone and called police. Meanwhile, the 7-Eleven clerk rushed outside screaming. Bombalier returned to the patrol car and switched off the ignition.

“At that point, his pulse died out,” he said.

After watching an enhanced version of the store’s video footage, a deputy recognized Steskal from a recent arrest. The deputy “knew the suspect as being aggressive, assaultive and noncompliant with law enforcement,” Carona said.