Fatal shooting of man found in El Monte being treated as ‘suspicious’
***UPDATE 9/24/21***
The Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office has ruled the death a suicide.
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The fatal shooting of a man in El Monte is being treated as a suspicious death Tuesday, police say.
Officers from the El Monte Police Department responded to a two-vehicle traffic collision at the three-way intersection of Elliot Avenue, Meeker Avenue and Mountain View Road at approximately 7:35 p.m. Monday and discovered a male victim in one vehicle bleeding with a gunshot wound to the head. Police found a handgun inside the vehicle, said Deputy Tracy Koerner of the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department’s Information Bureau.
The victim was pronounced dead at the scene.
During the investigation sheriffs’ homicide investigators, who are assisting El Monte in the death investigation, learned that a woman — possibly an occupant of the vehicle — had left the vehicle and was taken to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, Koerner said.
Although in the initial investigation detectives discovered that the victim possibly suffered a self-inflicted gunshot wound prior to the collision, it is now being treated as a suspicious death investigation, Koerner said.
The driver and three passengers — a father, mother and two children — in the other vehicle were transported to a local hospital with non-life threatening injuries. The mother, who detectives say is pregnant, was staying at the hospital for further observation.
Anyone with information about the victim’s death or the collision is asked to contact the sheriff’s Homicide Bureau at 323-890-5500. Anyone wishing to remain anonymous should call the L.A. Regional Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222- TIPS or go directly to www.lacrimestoppers.org.