Police Arrest Man in 1975 Slaying

SANTA ANA —  Police arrested a suspect Wednesday in connection with the 24-year-old robbery and murder of a man who was shot in the head in front of his young stepson.

The case marks the oldest unsolved crime in Orange County to result in criminal charges.

Investigators said they cracked the case by using a statewide computer database that matched fingerprints taken from the 1975 crime scene with those of Larry Donnell Paige, a 43-year-old Long Beach man who has three criminal convictions relating to illegal firearms, grand theft and drug sales.

Prosecutors have charged Paige with first-degree murder, and detectives are seeking a second assailant who allegedly worked as his partner.

“We’re glad to see him off the street after 25 years,” said Santa Ana police spokesman Sgt. Raul Luna. “Certainly anyone who shoots a father in the presence of a 4-year-old is a coldblooded criminal in our eyes.”

The shooting occurred Oct. 18, 1975, as Lawrence Dean Wheelock, 22, and his stepson were walking out of their Bristol Street apartment to pick up Wheelock’s wife. In the apartment complex carport, the two were accosted by two men who ordered them at gunpoint back into the apartment.

After a struggle, the gunman shot Wheelock once in the head. The suspects fled with Wheelock’s wallet and other items, none of which were ever recovered, according to police. The frightened boy stayed alone in the apartment for several hours until his mother came home.

Investigators, including Santa Ana police and Orange County sheriff’s crime lab technicians, said the road to filing charges provides a lesson in perseverance--and luck.

It started years ago when investigators began using the state Department of Justice criminal database to check on the fingerprints found on the car and in the apartment. They tried to make a match several times without success, mainly due to the poor quality of the original fingerprint.

But last November, crime lab investigators using cutting-edge digital imaging technology were able to submit a clearer and larger image of the prints to the database.

Finally, a match.

“This time we got a hit. It’s a sure deal,” said Chief Assistant Dist. Atty. Mike Major. “With all the old cases, we look at evidence and critique: Is there any way to take this old evidence and subject it to new technology? And that’s what [the investigators] did in this case. It’s as sure as you can get.”

It’s the fifth time investigators have cracked a serious crime case using the sophisticated, 3-year-old program called Trackers.

The Trackers team has archived fingerprint and DNA evidence from thousands of old homicides and rapes throughout Orange County. At least 10 investigators are assigned to the Trackers unit, and they try to crack the more than 3,900 unsolved criminal cases countywide, 1,100 of them murders.

Last year, DNA evidence led to a death sentence for Gerald Parker, dubbed the “Bedroom Basher” for a string of sex slayings that terrorized Orange County in the 1970s. And the team also helped in the arrest of alleged serial rapist Steven Morales last year. He is awaiting trial.

Paige is scheduled to be arraigned this morning. Authorities have identified him as the gunman in the crime. They said Paige had lived in Orange County in the years after the murder, but did not specify exactly how long.

At least two of Paige’s convictions stem from crimes committed in Los Angeles County, police said.