Reserve deputy who caught arson suspect shuns spotlight
Los Angeles Times / Robert Faturechi, Los Angeles Times
04-Jan-2012 (one comment)

A crowd of reporters huddled outside the West Hollywood station of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department on Tuesday evening with the hopes of answering one question: Who is Shervin Lalezary?

Ever since early Monday morning, when the volunteer deputy was vaulted into the limelight after nabbing the suspect in more than 50 fires, the attorney-by-day has insisted on a low profile.

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by yolanda on Wed Jan 04, 2012 06:08 PM PST

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"Desperate for more information, reporters at the news conference Tuesday pleaded with Lalezary to talk about his emotions (no comment), the suspect information he was working with (he demurred) and whether he felt like a hero (no response). Flanked by his beaming little brother, also a reserve deputy, Lalezary walked back into the station.

"He doesn't want to put it on himself. He wants to be part of a team. Personally, I don't get it," said one sheriff's official.

Department spokesman Steve Whitmore said that even Sheriff

Lee Baca hoped Lalezary would give himself more credit. "The sheriff said, 'Put me on the phone with him,' " Whitmore said. "But when he sits in front of me and says, 'I won't want to talk about it,' what are you going to do?"

When Baca met Lalezary to congratulate him before a Monday news conference, the volunteer reserve was even slow to mention that his parents were there, seemingly embarrassed about extending the praise the sheriff was lavishing on him.

"I think it has something to do with his upbringing," Whitmore said of the reserve, who is paid just $1 a year.

One Iranian American reporter at the Tuesday news conference even asked a sheriff's official if she might coax the Tehran-born Lalezary to open up over an authentic homemade rice dish."


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