A parolee accused of murdering a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy returned to court briefly on Wednesday before being ordered to return to court next year for another pretrial hearing.
Trenton Tevon Lovell, 31, has been charged with one count of murder with special circumstances in connection to a fatal shooting involving Sgt. Steven Owen, an L.A. County deputy working in Lancaster at the time, and murder of a peace officer.
The special circumstances attached to the charge allege Lovell carried out the shooting for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest.
He is also charged with one count each of attempted murder with an allegation that he used a patrol car as a deadly and dangerous weapon, and possession of a firearm by a felon with priors, and two counts each of first-degree residential robbery and false imprisonment by violence, with a knife use allegation, according to the criminal complaint filed by prosecutors.
Lovell is accused of shooting Owen, 53, multiple times on Oct. 5, 2016, after the deputy had arrived at the 3200 block of West Avenue J-7 for a residential burglary call.
The suspect allegedly then jumped into the sergeant’s patrol vehicle as a second deputy arrived on the scene, prosecutors have said.
The defendant is then suspected of ramming the patrol vehicle into the responding deputy’s vehicle, before then fleeing into a neighboring home and holding two victims at knifepoint.
Lovell is being held without bail.
He is scheduled to return to court for a pretrial hearing on Feb. 14.
