A former Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who was on death row for killing a grocery store manager during a robbery in Yorba Linda in 1994 was found dead in his cell, state prison officials said Friday.
Stephen Moreland Redd, 78, was found unresponsive in his cell at San Quentin Rehabilitation Center around 12:30 p.m. Thursday, and he was pronounced dead by medical staff, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
The Marin County coroner’s office will determine the cause of death.
Redd was a convicted bank robber free on parole when he began a string of robberies in Orange County leading up to the shooting of Timothy McVeigh as McVeigh tried to wrestle a gun out of Redd’s hand July 18, 1994.
Redd was convicted of McVeigh’s murder Oct. 25, 1996, the attempted murders of two other men, two counts of second-degree robbery and two counts of second-degree commercial burglary.
Redd was a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy from 1967 to 1973 when he resigned. He was going through a divorce and, according to court testimony, was traumatized by watching helplessly as a man burned to death in a car fire.
Redd was described as a wise-cracking robber who one officer claimed waved at him as he drove his car at him during a high-speed chase, according to a 2010 state Supreme Court decision upholding his conviction and sentence.
Redd even once wrote a letter from prison to California Highway Patrol Officer Peter De Bernardi, who had cited him for speeding, saying he decided not to shoot him because he was a “pleasant sort of guy,” according to the decision.
Redd told the officer he had guns in the car and was “struggling with two personalities at the time of his crimes — a `regular Mr. Nice Guy’ and one with a violent nature,” according to the decision.
Redd’s attorneys unsuccessfully argued in the appeal that his arrest violated his constitutional rights against unwarranted search and seizure.
Redd was arrested March 6, 1995, in San Francisco by U.S. Park Police Officer Robert Jansing, who detained him because the car he was driving had the vehicle registration tag on the license plate “affixed poorly.”
The registration was expired and Redd gave Jansing the wrong name. Eventually, Jansing searched Redd’s car and found weapons that ballistics experts testified matched the guns used in the crimes Redd was charged with.
The Supreme Court also rejected arguments that Redd did not receive competent legal counsel and that prosecutors made inappropriate comments during arguments in the trial.
Redd was not a nice guy in any fashion. He ran me down when I ran from his interview with my watch commander to the watch commander’s patrol vehicle. When I reached inside of the patrol vehicle for a cellular telephone I looked up as Redd shot at my head three times I acted as if he hit me, grabbed my head as if he hit me and rolled out of the vehicle and played dead. Redd the ran back to my watch commander and began shooting at him wounding him in the back. Redd then fled the scene and got away! Redd was later caught by a park ranger in San Francisco.