RIVERSIDE (CBSLA.com) — Riverside County Supervisors gave final approval Tuesday to a plan to split a $100,000 reward between four people who assisted law enforcement during the Christopher Dorner manhunt in February.
A fifth person, Richard Heltebrake, attended the meeting but will not receive any reward money.
Heltebrake was carjacked by Dorner in Big Bear, and claims his call to a local deputy led authorities to Dorner’s whereabouts before the quadruple-murder suspect ultimately barricaded himself inside a cabin and took his own life.
A three-judge panel ruled that law enforcement were already pursuing Dorner when Heltebrake called police.
“We believe that they made a decision in error based upon faulty information that was presented to that three-judge panel,” said Heltebrake’s attorney Allen Thomas.
Jim and Karen Reynolds, who found Dorner hiding in their Big Bear cabin, will receive $80,000, the bulk of the reward.
R. Lee McDaniel, a tow truck driver who spotted Dorner at an AM/PM in Corona Feb. 7, will receive $5,000 for calling police. McDaniel’s sighting led to two shootouts between Dorner and law enforcement.
Daniel McGowan, an employee at Snow Summit ski resort, will receive $15,000 for alerting authorities to a burning truck on a mountain road that was later confirmed to belong to Dorner.
In May, a judge denied an injunction filed by Heltebrake to stop the distribution of the larger $1.2 million reward offered by various agencies. The $100,000 offered by Riverside County is independent of that larger reward.
The approval comes as a man who was shot by police during the Dorner manhunt on his way to go surfing announced that he has filed a lawsuit against the City of Torrance and its police department.
