Crime & Safety

Support for Slain Yucaipa Deputy's Widow and Children in Redlands

Volunteers this week are helping renovate the Redlands home of Lynette MacKay and her two young children, the surviving family of Yucaipa sheriff's Detective Jeremiah MacKay, who was fatally wounded Feb. 12 in law enforcement's final confrontation with fugitive ex-cop Christopher Dorner.

"Jeremiah had this house for quite a few years before they got married," the fallen detective's father, Alan MacKay, said Thursday June 6 outside the home. "It was actually his bachelor pad really. They were doing a little updating here and there as they could afford it.

"So it was the idea that the Home Depot would come in and supply the materials and manpower to get a lot of this stuff accomplished," Alan MacKay said. "What they wanted to do was get the house to the point where it was pretty much maintenance-free. Also secure, with good doors and windows and so forth.

"So the sheriffs, in support of that, they came over and did a lot of the demolition and cleanup work."

Jon Musgrave, with the Home Depot on West 21st Street, said the idea started with an associate who works for Home Depot and is also an Explorer with the Sheriff's Department.

"We don't want to talk about how much we've spent, but between the Sheriff's Department and Home Depot we've had about 70 people altogether working on it," Musgrave said.

Sherrie O'Connell, a sheriff's service specialist at the Yucaipa Station, and Kristina King, secretary at the Yucaipa Station, both visited with Lynette and her children Thursday and exchanged warm hugs with the detective's widow.

"We're incredibly proud to be a part of this," O'Connell said when asked for perspective. "It's an incredible feeling for all of us to be here and we really enjoyed working with the Home Depot personnel. They were fantastic really."

Lynette brought her children, 8-month-old Cayden and 7-year-old Kaitlyn, outside to spend time Thursday with volunteers. She told Patch she was so moved by support shown for her and her family she found it difficult to put into words, at first.

"Between Home Depot and the Sheriff's Department, they've made the house what my husband always dreamed of making it," Lynette said.

"It's made life so much easier to know the kids have a safe place to play, and that this home, we get to stay here and enjoy it the way my husband would have wanted us to," she said.

"I can't thank Home Depot and the Sheriff's Department enough for everything they've done, and all their generosity. The outpouring from the community and the nation has been amazing. Thank you is not enough for me to say. Thank you is not enough."

Jeremiah MacKay worked in Big Bear and Yucaipa and he was a 15-year veteran with the San Bernardino County sheriff's department. He was fatally wounded in the final confrontation with Dorner east of Angelus Oaks, off Highway 38.

MacKay was the second law enforcement officer killed in the line of duty during Dorner's rampage. Both lawmen had local ties to Redlands and Yucaipa. Authorities believe Dorner was accountable for four killings in the space of ten days: a former LAPD captain's daughter and her fiancé in Irvine on Feb. 3, Riverside police Officer Michael Crain on Feb. 7, and MacKay on Feb. 12.

Crain was a graduate of Redlands High School and he attended Crafton Hills College in Yucaipa before he joined the Marine Corps. He was a resident of Beaumont.


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