An off-duty Orange County sheriff’s deputy was killed in a crash Thursday in Lake Elsinore, but the circumstances weren’t immediately clear.
The fatality occurred about 5:15 a.m. in the 25000 block of Railroad Canyon Road, near Canyon Hills Road, according to the Riverside County Fire Department.
Fire officials said paramedics reached the location a short time later and pronounced the victim, whose name was not immediately released, dead at the scene. Video from the scene showed a vehicle that appeared to have struck a tree in the roadway median.
Dozens of the fallen lawman’s comrades gathered at the crash scene and saluted as the deputy’s body — draped in an American flag — was removed from the vehicle and placed into a hearse. Just after 11 a.m., a law enforcement procession began, transporting the body eastbound, presumably to the Riverside County coroner’s facility in Perris.
The Orange County Sheriff’s Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Riverside County sheriff’s deputies were handling the investigation.