California Police Investigate ‘Suspicious’ Death of Catholic Bishop

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A well-known Catholic bishop’s shooting death in Hacienda Heights is being investigated as “suspicious.”

Los Angeles Auxiliary Bishop David G. O’Connell, 69, was found dead in the room of a home on the 1500 block of Janlu Avenue around 1 p.m. Saturday, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Lt. Michael Modica said. O’Connell appeared to have been shot in the upper torso.

Modica said LASD homicide investigators were looking into the death. He added that police do not believe there is any threat to the public.

O’Connell was born in County Cork, Ireland in 1953 and was named an auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles by Pope Francis in 2015, according to the Los Angeles Archdiocese. He served as a priest and bishop in LA for more than 45 years.

O’Connell was the chairman of the interdiocesan Southern California Immigration Task Force, as well as the chairman of the Subcommittee on the Catholic Campaign for Human Development of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

“He was a peacemaker with a heart for the poor and the immigrant, and a passion for building a community where the sanctity and dignity of every human life was honored and protected,” Los Angeles Archbishop José H. Gomez said in a statement.