(AP)
ON LAM: Christopher Dorner, an Army vet, is thought to be hiding in Big Bear, Calif., where SWAT teams were searching cabins yesterday. (
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Fearful that a crazed former LA cop will kill again, California authorities yesterday shut down all schools in the ski area where he’s believed to be hiding and ordered protection for the 40 people he named as targets in a wacko Facebook manifesto.
SWAT teams conducted house-to-house searches for Christopher Dorner — the most wanted man in America — around Big Bear Lake, a mountain resort town outside Irvine where the three-time killer was last seen.
But the 270-pound Army veteran — who has declared war on law enforcement because of his 2008 dismissla from the LAPD — continued to elude more than 100 officers for a second day.
“We did not find any additional evidence, and we certainly did not locate him,” San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon told reporters.
“He could be anywhere at this point.”
The dragnet had been centered on the greater Los Angeles area, but it now stretches across California, Nevada, Arizona and northern Mexico.
Searchers — some with dogs or riding on “snowcat” tractors — thought they were closing in when they found footprints near a burning pickup truck that Dorner, 33, was believed to have abandoned Thursday.
They followed the tracks in the forest “until we lost them where the ground got frozen and we couldn’t continue to track,” McMahon said.
Police suspect that Dorner set the gray pickup ablaze knowing cops had been alerted to be on the lookout for it.
Authorities believe Dorner began a bloody rampage in Irvine with the killings last weekend of a university security officer and the officer’s fiancée, Monica Quan.
Quan, 28, was the daughter of a former LA police officer who Dorner believes bungled the appeal of his firing.
Dorner allegedly later got into a gun battle with two LA cops in Corona, Calif. Then he ambushed two other officers in their patrol car — killing one — at a traffic light in nearby Riverside.
Police have said they believe Dorner is packing an arsenal — and cops didn’t find any weapons when they searched his home, the Los Angeles Times reported. He hinted in his Facebook manifesto that he had Russian-made, shoulder-launched missiles.
“Do not deploy airships or gunships. SA-7 Manpads will be waiting,” he wrote.
Police now suspect that Dorner, who claims a broad knowledge of police tactics, may be hiding in one of the 200 cabins around Big Bear Mountain.
“Of course he knows what he’s doing; we trained him,” LAPD Chief Charlie Beck said. “It’s extremely worrisome and scary.”
Dorner, whom the LAPD fired for making false statements, has said he wants to clear his name.
“When the truth comes out, the killing stops,” he said in his manifesto.
But Beck said there was no reason to clear Dorner’s name.
The case has been “thoroughly reviewed,” he said.