LOS ANGELES — The search for suspected cop killer Christopher Dorner has become one of the largest dragnets in Los Angeles history, now spreading south to the Mexican border with a $1 million reward offered for the fugitive’s capture and conviction.
Along with many unknowns relating to Dorner’s whereabouts and conditions, expert commentators have begun to question how his mental health played a role in his crimes, and whether racism and exposure to warfare overseas may have factored into his psyche.
In his 14-page written manifesto, the 33-year-old accounted for a lifelong plight of oppression, beginning from his grade school years as the only black student at an elementary school in Norwalk, CA, to the alleged racial injustices he witnessed working in the Los Angeles Police Department. It may have been a culmination of these incidents that have led to Dorner’s firing from the department in 2008 when he filed a report against a fellow officer that the police claim was false.
“The LAPD’s actions have cost me my law enforcement career,” Dorner writes in his manifesto. “I lost my position as a Commanding Officer of a Naval Security Forces reserve unit at NAS Fallon because of the LAPD. I’ve lost a relationship with my mother and sister because of the LAPD. I’ve lost a relationship with close friends because of the LAPD. In essence, I’ve lost everything because the LAPD took my name and [knew] I was INNOCENT!!!”
Dorner details all his accusations against the department, commenting, “With the discovery and evidence available you will see the truth. Unfortunately, I will not be alive to see my name cleared. That’s what this is about, my name. A man is nothing without his name.”
At present, Dorner’s rampage has allegedly led to the deaths of three people – the daughter of his former LAPD captain, her fiancée, and another police officer – and the injury of two others. He has also pledged to kill more as a means of avenging the department, which he believes “has not changed since the Rampart and Rodney King days.”
What’s caught most people off-guard about Dorner’s alleged killing spree is his change in character, from a man who lived as a relatively outstanding citizen, serving his country and giving back to those in need, to an assassin. Though his ex-girlfriend has called him paranoid, most people speak highly of Dorner, a guy who once returned $8,000 of church money that he found in the middle of the road to a local parish in Oklahoma.
According to Dorner’s friend, James Usera, up to this point Dorner could only be described as regular.
“In my experience, he was a normal guy,” Usera tells theGrio. “I didn’t find him to be moody or temperamental or aggressive or violent or anything like that, and so these actions are pretty extraordinary to say the least.”
Usera, an attorney in Oregon, played football with Dorner at Southern Utah University in the late 1990s, and the two became friends on and off the field.
According to Usera, Dorner was always sensitive towards racial misconduct, but never in way that was particularly militant or volatile.
“He’d notice something that he believed to be racially-motivated, and he would just point it out; I never saw him act on it,” Usera describes. “He never flipped out on anybody, or lost his temper or anything like that.”
“He was a person of conviction,” he adds. “I found him to be a someone who was honest and a person of integrity, and if he believed something, that’s what he believed. You weren’t going to talk him out of it.”
In Dorner’s 6,000-word manifesto he makes his convictions pretty clear, along with other ramblings and the promise to stop at nothing in support of his cause. He claims he has “no fear of death,” and that so-called analysts should make note of his qualifications in “small arms training, demolition, ordinance, and survival training.”
Dorner has presumably relied on such military skills to evade capture over the past five days, leading police on a chase across the state of California, into Nevada and perhaps to Mexico with little in the way of leads. Dorner’s truck was found deserted and in flames on the side of Bear Mountain, Calif. on Feb. 7, but the evidence did not lead investigators to his hiding place. Inside the vehicle, night vision goggles, a gas mask, cot, and cold weather gear were found, a testament to the former Navy reservist’s strategic preparation.
Officers were also led to San Diego, where Dorner unsuccessfully attempted to steal a boat, claiming “he was taking the vessel to Mexico.” Authorities later found his wallet and identification cards at the U.S.- Mexico Border.
Additionally, a Lowe’s store in Northridge was evacuated on Sunday after police received two separate calls from people who saw someone resembling Dorner.
It all adds up to the makings of a unique criminal, one whose actions are predicated by a long-winded plan posted on Facebook shortly before the shootings.
“The bizarre thing about it is that usually he doesn’t fit the profile of a person who conducts random acts of violence,” explains Dr. Christine Martin, a professor in the department of criminology, law, and justice at the University of Illinois at Chicago. “If you look at the patterns, if you look at the trends, mass murderers or revenge murderers are not typically African-American. They’re white males.”
Martin attributes this tendency to the Christian traditions within the African-American community, which she claims create a moral standard that’s particular to the demographic. Incidentally, Dorner attests to no religious affiliation in his writing.
“Religion has a lot to do with what’s kept [African-Americans] in check all these years,” she explains. “He’s not the only African-American discriminated against, but how many do you know that are going around killing people because of racism? That doesn’t happen…From what I can tell, and what I can see and my own personal experiences as an African-American, I believe what Dorner said [in his manifesto] about discrimination. The Rodney King incident proved it, and racism is still happening. It sounds to me as though he is just one of a rare group that has actually had enough. It’s as simple as that.”
Dorner’s path to destruction has been unpredictable not only due to his previous character, but as a result of his military and educational background. The ex-cop, who was born in La Palma, graduated college with a bachelor’s degree in political science and a minor in psychology, and went on to join the U.S. Navy in 2002. He achieved the rank of lieutenant in 2006, and in his time, served deployments to Bahrain, Kuwait and Iraq. Soon thereafter, he joined the LAPD.
During his military service, Dorner was awarded many honors, including the Iraqi Campaign Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, Rifle Marksman Ribbon, and the Pistol Expert Medal. According to a Navy official, who asked for his name to be withheld, these commendations are fairly standard, but Dorner’s coastal training while stationed in Bahrain may have provided him with specialized skills that have assisted him specifically in his flight.
Furthermore, Dorner’s admirable track record may help explain why he snapped when he did.
“He’s not a normal criminal because he’s lived apparently an exemplary life up until this point,” explains Dr. Michael Peck, a forensic psychologist. “My guess is that he’s been feeding off the anger from being discriminated against since his childhood. It was there all his life, but it propelled him to succeed and excel in everything he did.”
Beck says it’s common for those who’ve suffered from prejudice in their childhood days to channel that energy towards success, and that perhaps Dorner’s new position as a fugitive – and one of eminent threat at that – has granted him a way of gaining back the power he lost when he was fired from the LAPD.
“I’m sure he wanted to be the best cop and the best navel officer and so forth, so it pushed him in that direction; when they pulled that away from him, suddenly he saw it as a betrayal of his whole life,” Peck notes. “And unlike some people in his same situation, he apparently didn’t have another life, like a family life. In some cases, a family life would help; that he’d fall back on his kids and his wife, and want to find some other way to help them and support them. Instead he’s gone off the deep end.”
Martin, conversely, feels Dorner has brought himself to a new low. He’s gained little, and placed himself into a situation of weakness. Even though authorities have reopened his case, they insist it’s merely to clear the slate of the LAPD, not to “appease” or validate Dorner’s allegations.
“I don’t think he feels powerful,” Martin remarks. “He’s still facing the same problem, and now he’s labeled a cop killer. He is in a very vulnerable, precarious, and dangerous situation… I would expect him to be, if anything, relying on his military training to survive… He did cross the line. He did go up against the powerful authority, and for whatever reason, he’s still in the subordinate position that he was in in the first place.”
She adds, “I don’t know how expects this to end, but I think he realizes that he could lose his life because he’s taken a life.”
How Dorner’s story will conclude is a matter of speculation at this point. The options are limited. Dorner notes in his manifesto that he will stop killing “when I get justice,” but justice, from his point of view, likely doesn’t match those offering judgment.
“He’s vulnerable in that he has committed a heinous crime, so punishment has to happen,” Martin comments.
While Peck indicates there is no scientific evidence that racism increases suicide risk, and Usera also comments that he’s never known his friend to fall into those tendencies, the path Dorner has established appears to lead towards an ominous place.
“Based on the manifesto, it sounds like this is going to come to a bad conclusion for Mr. Dorner,” Usera says. “Whether you want to call it suicide or suicide by cop, it sounds like that’s where this is headed. Unfortunately, one of the things about Chris that I always respected was that he was a person of conviction… So that trait, as much as I respect it, could be his demise.”
Follow Courtney Garcia on Twitter at @CourtGarcia.