Few days back, a reported shooting of a sheriff’s deputy in Lancaster which headlined all over the news and triggered a massive manhunt turned out to a hoax. Previously, the authorities described the incident as a “targeted attack” and on Saturday night the sheriff’s officials confirmed the news being a hoax.
Lancaster Shooting: The Reported Shooting Was a Hoax
On Wednesday at 2:45 pm, the authorities first described the incident as a shooting being held outside the Los County Sheriff’s Department Lancaster Station. Later, following day they said that the attack may have involved some weapon such as a pellet gun, rather than a firearm.
But then late night on Saturday, the sheriff’s officials declared that the Deputy Angel Reinosa, a rookie deputy with the department, was the one who made the whole thing up and the incident was not true.
Capt. Kent Wegener of the Sheriff’s Homicide Bureau said that on Saturday for a follow-up interview about the incident, detectives met with Reinosa.
Wegener said in the statement, “Deputy Reinosa admitted that he was not shot at from the apartment complex area, as he had initially claimed,”
“There was no sniper, no shots fired and no gunshot injuries sustained to his shoulder. Completely fabricated,” Wegener further added.
The previous reports from the Sheriff’s officials stated that the deputy was walking to his personal car when he was shot in the shoulder. At that time they said that the shot was believed to have been fired from an adjoining apartment building, Lancaster Mayor R. Rex Parris said.
At that time it was described that the deputy suffered a superficial, “very minor” injury.
After that day, the authorities then declared that they had recovered a pellet rifle which seems to have a connection with the investigation. Sheriff’s officials in a written statement said, the deputy’s uniform, contained a damage which “consistent with a gunshot”.
After the incident came into consideration, many deputies along with a SWAT team, conducted a search operation that lasted up till the next morning before the search effort was called off. At that point no suspect was found.
In the beginning, the pellet gun which was seized in connection with the investigation was been then determined to have no connection with the incident and was uninvolved, Wegener said.
The lieutenant said Saturday night that in order to claim of gunfire shot, Reinosa admitted cutting two holes in his own uniform with a help of a knife.
In the meantime, the reason for the alleged hoax is still not clear.
As per to Wegener, “Reinosa failed to provide information regarding his motivation for this act,”
Undersheriff Robin Limon said, “It’s extremely disappointing. We expect our deputy sheriff’s are held to a higher standard, and unfortunately, in this case, he did not act to that standard.”
“I apologize for the inconvenience that was imposed on you,” she said.
