Deputy's Killing Could Lead To Death Penalty For Accused: DA

RANCHO CUCAMONGA, CA — A man suspected of fatally shooting San Bernardino County Deputy Andrew Nuñez during a domestic violence call, then fleeing on a motorcycle and crashing on an Inland Empire freeway, was charged Monday with murder and other serious crimes.

Angelo Jose Saldivar, 47, was released from a local hospital Sunday and booked in the county's West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga. In addition to murder, he was charged with attempted kidnapping and four counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm. He is also charged with one count each of discharge of a firearm, evading an officer, false imprisonment by violence, and battery on a spouse.

Special allegations of murder to avoid arrest, murder of a police officer, and personal and intentional discharge of a firearm have also been filed with the murder charge.

If found guilty on all charges, Saldivar could be sentenced to life without the possibility of parole and death, according to the San Bernardino County District Attorney's Office.

At about 12:37 p.m., on Monday, Oct. 27, deputies were dispatched to the 12300 block of Hollyhock Drive in Rancho Cucamonga regarding a report of an armed man threatening a woman.

When deputies arrived at the scene, they were immediately fired upon, according to the sheriff's department.

"One deputy was struck and was airlifted to a hospital," the agency reported.

That deputy, later identified as 28-year-old Nuñez, died the same day. He left behind a pregnant wife and a 2-year-old daughter. He was a six-year veteran of the sheriff's department.

During a press briefing that afternoon, San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus said, "We are embedded in sorrow. Unfortunately for this department, it happens way too often."

Saldivar's high-speed chase immediately after the shooting ended on eastbound Interstate 210, where he crashed at Campus Avenue, west of Etiwanda.

The San Bernardino County District Attorney's Office said the high-speed motorcycle pursuit endangered the lives of motorists until Saldivar was finally stopped by "a legal intervention." An off-duty narcotics deputy deliberately struck Salvidar's motorcycle with his vehicle.

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