Fleeing Suspect Jumps Fence, Falls 60 Feet to His Death

A man fleeing sheriff’s deputies at night in a stolen car stopped the vehicle, dashed to a fence and clambered over it, only to fall 60 feet to his death in a dark chasm on the other side, officers said Monday.

A deputy chasing Ernesto Eduardo Acosta, 22, of Santa Paula, nearly met a similar fate, but was pulled back at the last second by another deputy more familiar with the terrain, the officers said.

“It was real dangerous out there, because you couldn’t see anything,” said Eric Nishimoto, a spokesman for the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department.

The incident began shortly before 11 p.m. Sunday, when Acosta, who was on parole for a felony drug conviction, ran a red light at a Santa Paula intersection, Nishimoto said.

As deputies chased him, Acosta sped out of town and turned into a county park, where he ended up on a dirt road that ended at a dead end at the chain-link fence.

Another man who ran from the car, Gustavo Ramirez, 19, of Santa Paula, was arrested later and booked on suspicion of auto theft.

Three others in the car were questioned and released, deputies said.

Acosta’s death was the third involving law enforcement officers in Ventura County in less than two weeks.

Last week, police in Oxnard shot Charles Joseph Valdez, a 22-year-old gang member, after he brandished a gun at them during a chase. On Jan. 10, a mentally ill 17-year-old, Richard Lopez, was fatally wounded by an Oxnard police team after he allegedly held a high school girl at gunpoint in what officers described as a “suicide by cop.”