LOS ANGELES (AP) — Authorities are looking into whether grenades recovered from a Santa Monica apartment complex caused an explosion last week at a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department training facility that killed three members of its arson and explosives unit.
Investigators served a search warrant Monday morning at an address in the Marina del Rey neighborhood. The department didn’t say what, if anything, was found as detectives chase leads following the deadly blast early Friday at the Biscailuz Training Facility.
Officials said they are exploring whether there may be a connection to the discovery on Thursday of grenades at an apartment complex in Santa Monica, a few miles (kilometers) north of Marina del Rey. The three members of the arson and explosives team responded that day to assist local police.
Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said the deaths marked the department’s worst loss of life in a single incident since 1857, when four officers were killed by gunfire.
Those killed Friday were identified by the department as Detective Joshua Kelley-Eklund, Detective Victor Lemus and Detective William Osborn. They served 19, 22 and 33 years in the department respectively, Luna said.
Luna said Friday that it took more than four hours to render the scene safe and the deaths were being investigated by the department’s homicide detectives, with the assistance of the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. No one else was injured, he said.
The sheriff said the arson and explosives team undergoes in-depth training and responds to more than 1,000 calls a year.
