A bloody stabbing murder suspect at a Metro subway station in Koreatown was in custody Monday after the killing forced the closure of a Purple Line station.
Thousands of commuters were taken by bus to avoid the gory scene at the shuttered station.
Authorities said the murder appeared to have taken place during an escalating argument, and the 62-year-old suspect ran from the scene and hid behind a locked bathroom door at a nearby Carl’s Jr. fast-food eatery.
It took law enforcement officers almost an hour of conversation through the locked door to convince the suspect to surrender.
The stabbing took place during an argument at a subway station in Koreatown, prompting the arrest of a suspect and bus bridges around the Wilshire/Normandie station, which resumed normal service Monday, authorities said.
The stabbing took place about 4:45 p.m. Sunday at the Wilshire/Normandie Station, said Deputy Kimberly Alexander of the Sheriff’s Information Bureau.
“Detectives have learned that the victim had just exited a train on the Purple Line of the Metro Rail,” she said. The suspect was on the platform and “began to argue with the victim. Sometime during the argument the suspect stabbed the victim several times in the upper body with a knife.”
The victim was pronounced dead at the scene, she said. His name was withheld pending family notification.
The suspect, a 62-year-old man, fled the train station and attempted to hide in the bathroom of a nearby Carl’s Jr. restaurant, Alexander said. He locked the door.
“Deputies talked to the suspect for almost an hour through the locked door and convinced him to surrender peacefully,” she said.
The suspect was booked on suspicion of murder at the sheriff’s Inmate Reception Center and was being held in lieu of $2 million bail, she said.
The Wilshire/Normandie station was closed during the investigation and passengers were bussed around the crime scene to stations on either side of it, Metro spokesman Jose Ubaldo said. The Purple Line took a regularly scheduled break from operation at 1 a.m. and resumed normal service through the Wilshire/Normandie station at about 4:20 a.m. Monday.
Red Line service was not affected by the sheriff’s investigation, Ubaldo said.
—City News Service