REALITY TV
TV
MOVIES
MUSIC
CELEBRITY
About Us Contact Us Privacy Policy Terms of Use Accuracy & Fairness Corrections & Clarifications Ethics Code Your Ad Choices
© MEAWW All rights reserved
MEAWW.COM / NEWS / CRIME & JUSTICE

'Tarzan' actor Ron Ely's son was shot 24 times by police after he fatally stabbed his mother, dashcam footage reveals

Cameron Ely was killed by deputies from the Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office after they responded to his home on reports of a domestic disturbance.
UPDATED JAN 22, 2020
Ron Ely with producer George Pal (Source : Getty Images, IMDB)
Ron Ely with producer George Pal (Source : Getty Images, IMDB)

SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA: Police footage captured the moment deputies from the Santa Barbara Sheriff's Department fatally shot the son of 'Tarzan' actor Ron Ely after he had stabbed his beauty queen mother Valerie Lundeen, 62, to death.

MEAWW previously reported that the police responded to Ely's residence in the 4100 Block of Mariposa Drive in Hope Ranch, an unincorporated area in Santa Barbara County, at around 8 pm on October 15 to investigate a domestic dispute.

Deputies searching the property came across 30-year-old Cameron Ely, one of Ely's three children, and fatally shot him after he was deemed a threat, with one source reporting that they heard over a dozen shots ring out from the home.

Now, dashcam footage obtained by TMZ shows the moment the deputies find Cameron, a Harvard-educated quarterback who also worked as a licensed security guard, hiding inside the house and confront him. The video, which runs for a total of five minutes, also shows several more police cars arriving at the property.

The officers can be heard warning the 30-year-old to not reach for anything, with one of them shouting "he's still moving" even as they repeatedly order him to show them his right hand.

They shout, "Can you hear me?!" multiple times, with the audio not clear enough to make out Cameron's responses to the command. One deputy says he has a gun on him before they fire multiple shots at him. Both Cameron and his mother were declared dead at the scene, with the latter found to have suffered multiple stab wounds. 

It later emerged that Cameron had been shot a total of 24 times and that despite the sheriff's office's assertion that he had a weapon and made motions as if he was drawing a gun, he was unarmed at the time.

"Deputies searched the residence and surrounding area for Cameron Ely. During the search, the murder suspect was located outside the home," a spokesperson for the office said at the time. "The suspect told deputies that he had a gun, advanced towards the deputies, and motioned with his hands as if he were drawing a weapon."

"In response, four deputies fired a total of 24 rounds from their service weapons, fatally wounding the suspect," the spokesperson continued. "When deputies were able to safely approach Cameron using a ballistic shield, they found that he had feigned being armed and did not have a weapon."

Ely, 81, has not made any public appearances since the deaths of his son and his wife, whom he had been married to for 35 years.

POPULAR ON MEAWW
MORE ON MEAWW