Capt. Kevin Lacy, the San Bernardino County, California, coroner, said that authorities have not yet ruled on Dorner’s manner of death.
However, information collected so far seems to suggest he took his own life.
“While we’re still compiling the information and putting our reports together, the information that we have right now seems to indicate that the wound that took Christopher Dorner’s life was self-inflicted,” Lacy told reporters.
Speaking at the same new conference, Sgt. Travis Newport announced that authorities had recovered various items from the places and vehicles Dorner occupied, including assault weapons and semi-automatic handguns.
They also found high-capacity magazines, tear gas, a military-style helmet and 10 silencers, Newport said.
The news came three days after a shootout, standoff and fire at a cabin in the mountains east of Los Angeles. Dorner’s remains were identified through dental records.
Dorner was fired from the Los Angeles Police Department in 2009 for falsely accusing his training officer of kicking a subdued suspect. After unsuccessfully challenging his dismissal in court, police say, he launched a campaign of guerrilla warfare against the LAPD, targeting numerous officers involved in his case and their families.
Dorner was cornered and died Tuesday afternoon in the San Bernardino Mountains, about 100 miles east of the city he had once sworn to protect and serve.
The 33-year-old former Navy officer holed up in the cabin after a shootout with law enforcement that left a sheriff’s deputy dead and another wounded, San Bernardino Sheriff John McMahon said.
The cabin caught fire when police shot tear gas canisters into it, McMahon told reporters this week.
Although the canisters included pyrotechnic tear gas, which generates heat, “We did not intentionally burn that cabin down,” he said Friday, echoing earlier comments he’s made on the case.
