Suspect in California Officer’s Shooting Death Is Captured

San Francisco — A suspected drunk driver accused of fatally shooting the California police officer who pulled him over was captured Friday as he tried to flee back to Mexico, where he lived before illegally crossing into the U.S., authorities said.

The sheriff whose agency was leading the investigation blamed California’s sanctuary law for preventing local authorities from reporting Perez Arriaga to federal immigration officials for previous arrests.

If the suspect had been deported, he said, Cpl. Ronil Singh of the tiny Newman Police Department would still be alive.

“We can’t ignore the fact that this could have been preventable,” Stanislaus County Sheriff Adam Christianson said, asking why the state was “providing sanctuary for criminals (and) gang members. It’s a conversation we need to have.”

Gustavo Perez Arriaga was arrested near Bakersfield, about 200 miles southeast of the scene of the shooting.

He crossed the border in Arizona several years ago and had worked a variety of jobs as a laborer, including at several dairies. He also had two prior arrests for driving while intoxicated, Christianson said.

The 33-year-old Mexico native had gang affiliations and multiple Facebook pages with different names, the sheriff said.

Lawyer: Cardinal Repeatedly Abused Youth During Confession

Vatican City — The Vatican’s sexual abuse case against ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick has expanded significantly after a man testified that the retired American archbishop sexually abused him for years starting when he was 11, including during confession.

James Grein testified on Thursday in New York before the judicial vicar for the New York City archdiocese, who was asked by the Holy See to take his statement for the Vatican’s canonical case, said Grein’s attorney Patrick Noaker.

The testimony, which lasted about an hour, was difficult and stressful but Grein was proud to have done it, Noaker said.

“He wants his church back. He felt that in order to accomplish that end, he had to go in and testify here and tell them what happened, and give the church itself the chance to do the right thing,” Noaker said in a telephone interview Friday.

Grein initially came forward in July after the New York archdiocese announced that a church investigation determined an allegation that McCarrick had groped another teenage altar boy in the 1970s was credible.

— Wire reports