Homicide rate falls in Basin, state

MORONGO BASIN — It looks like the number of homicides here decreased in 2011 compared to past years. There was one murder in the Morongo Basin this year, and another incident Tuesday is under investigation.

In the year's one confirmed murder, Ronald Paoletto, 41, was charged with killing Tanya Petro in January 2011 and dumping her body in Pipes Canyon Wash. Paoletto killed himself in jail in July.

The sheriff's department investigated five homicides in the Basin in 2010: two in Yucca Valley, two in Twentynine Palms and one in Joshua Tree.

In Twentynine Palms:

•    During an attempted home robbery in January, one of the suspects was shot to death by the intended victim.

•    Audrey Allen, the 18-month-old daughter of two U.S. Marines, was found hurt in her crib in a Twentynine house Palms on Nov. 20, 2010. Audrey was taken to Loma Linda University Medical Center, where she died later that day. Joshua Kruzik, 22, a fellow Marine staying with Audrey's parents, was charged with her murder. He has pleaded no guilty and is due back in court Jan. 27, 2012.

In Yucca Valley:

•    Christopher Castañeda, 27, shot Nicholas Fuller, 19, in April in the garage of a Hermosa Avenue home. The two had been smoking marijuana and drinking tequila and got into an argument. In June, Castaneda was sentenced to 40 years to life in prison.

•    The body of 22-year-old Lauren Hanson McLane was found in Diana Marie Jordan's garage Dec. 23. Jordan, a 35-year-old from Yucca Valley, and Heidi McDermott, a 29-year-old from Twentynine Palms, have been charged and pleaded not guilty to murder. They are due in court Jan. 27, 2012.

The 2010 statistics also include an unidentified woman whose burned body was found in August near Hollinger Road in Joshua Tree.

The only homicide reported in the Morongo Basin in 2009 occurred in March, when Stewart McMurray, 59, killed his 46-year-old wife, Tamra, set fire to their Wonder Valley house and then killed himself.

Although police often use the terms murder and homicide interchangeably, investigators make a distinction for reporting purposes. Homicide is a wider term which includes actions including justifiable and vehicular homicide, Cindy Bachman, sheriff's department public information officer, explained.

Officer-involved shootings, where sheriff's deputies shoot and kill a subject — are investigated by homicide detectives but are not included in the annual reports as homicides.

State homicide rate lowest since 1966

The total number of homicides in California declined from 1,970 in 2009 to 1,809 in 2010.

The California Department of Justice reports the percentage of reported homicides that were solved increased for the fifth consecutive year. The 2010 rate is 63.8 percent, the highest since 2001.

Other information about homicides in California in 2010:

•    80.3 percent of victims were male.

•    44.5 percent of victims were Hispanic, 29.6 percent were black, 18.2 percent were white and 7.4 percent were categorized as other.

•    Females were more likely to be killed in their home, while males were more likely to be killed on streets or sidewalks.

•    When the relationship between victim and killer was identified, 47 percent of black victims were killed by strangers, compared to 25 percent of white victims and 35 percent of Hispanic victims.

•    Of homicides where the weapon was identified, 71 percent involved a firearm.

•    Of the homicides where the contributing circumstances were known, 36.1 percent were gang-related.

Over the last decade, the attorney general reports, the rate of homicides per 100,000 Californians ranged from a high of 6.8 percent in 2002 and 2005 to a low of 4.7 percent this year — the lowest since 1966.

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