Killing of Driver Triggers Search

Looking for evidence that might lead to a killer, police plan today to search the car of a 26-year-old man who was shot in the head Saturday apparently while he drove on the Costa Mesa Freeway.

Jake Tuason, 26, of Fontana was shot about 1 p.m. while driving north in his 2005 Subaru WRX, a car his mother said he loved to tinker with.

Tuason crashed into a wall and drove up and across an embankment on the connector to the westbound Garden Grove Freeway on the edge of Tustin, said city police Sgt. Mark Hein.

The driver was taken to Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, where the emergency room staff saw that he had been shot in the head. He later died at the hospital, Hein said.

Police said they had few details to work with and didn’t know where or why he was shot. An autopsy was performed Monday, but no results were available.

Police, with the help of forensic investigators for the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, plan a thorough search of Tuason’s car, Hein said.

Police are also seeking help from anyone who may have witnessed the crash.

Cellphone records of motorists who dialed 911 to report the crash are being pulled in an effort to find such witnesses, Hein said.

Tuason was an electronics engineer for a Pasadena company that manufactures cameras for NASA.

His mother, Marilyn Tuason, described him as a “hard-working, wonderful son” who loved working on his high-performance car.

She said her son was helping to pay some of the family bills because she had started nursing school and his father had recently retired as a bus driver.

Anyone with information about the incident is urged to call Det. Shawn Porter at (714) 573-3248.