The authorities arrested a man on Monday in connection with the killing of David G. O’Connell, an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles who was found fatally shot at his home on Saturday, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said.
The suspect, Carlos Medina, 65, is married to Bishop O’Connell’s housekeeper and had done work at the bishop’s house in Hacienda Heights, Calif., a suburban community in the San Gabriel Valley, Sheriff Robert G. Luna said at a news conference.
A tipster told detectives on Sunday evening that he was concerned because Mr. Medina, who lives in Torrance, Calif., had been “acting strange, irrational and made comments about the bishop owing him money,” Sheriff Luna said.
Sheriff Luna said the motive remained under investigation. He said the housekeeper was fully cooperating with detectives.
“I’m not standing here in front of you telling you it’s a dispute over money yet,” Sheriff Luna said. “It’s something we’ve heard to this point, and that is something the detectives will go out and validate and see if it’s true or not.”
He said that Mr. Medina had not been formally charged and that investigators were continuing to examine evidence, including two firearms seized from Mr. Medina’s home, where he was arrested after a standoff. The firearms will need to be tested to determine whether either one was used in the fatal shooting, Sheriff Luna said.
“The suspect had been at the bishop’s house before, doing work,” Sheriff Luna said. “So there was some kind of a maybe working relationship, but we’re still trying to figure out what that relationship was.”
The authorities were called to the bishop’s home on Saturday afternoon by a deacon, who went there after Bishop O’Connell, 69, did not show up for a meeting, Sheriff Luna said.
Deputies found the bishop in bed with at least one gunshot wound to the upper body, Sheriff Luna said. He was pronounced dead at the scene. There were no signs of forced entry, and no weapon was found at the home, Sheriff Luna said.
On Sunday morning, detectives found surveillance footage that shows a dark-colored S.U.V. pulling into the bishop’s driveway and then leaving a short time later, the sheriff said. Investigators later learned that Mr. Medina drove an S.U.V. that matched that description, Sheriff Luna said.
The authorities surrounded Mr. Medina’s home at about 2 a.m. and called on him to surrender, but he refused, Sheriff Luna said. He was arrested about six hours later when he walked out of his home, he said.
“This man, this bishop, made a huge difference in our community,” Sheriff Luna said. “He was loved. And it’s very sad that we’re gathered here today to talk about his murder in this way.”
At the news conference, José H. Gomez, the archbishop of Los Angeles, thanked the authorities for taking a suspect into custody. He praised Bishop O’Connell as a “good friend of Los Angeles” who had served the city for more than 40 years.
“Every day he worked to show compassion to the poor, to the homeless, to the immigrant and to all those living on society’s margins,” Archbishop Gomez said. “He was a good priest and a good bishop and a man of peace.”
Bishop O’Connell, who was born in County Cork, Ireland, on July 16, 1953, was appointed an auxiliary bishop in 2015.
He studied for the priesthood at All Hallows College in Dublin and was ordained in 1979, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles said. He had previously served as a pastor at several parishes in Los Angeles, including St. Michael’s and St. Frances X. Cabrini.
Bishop Robert Barron, a former auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles who now serves in Minnesota, said he first met Bishop O’Connell when they were appointed as bishops on the same day in September 2015.
Bishop O’Connell cared deeply for victims of social and racial injustice and spent most of his priesthood in South Central Los Angeles, Bishop Barron said.
He had a gift for telling stories and had a “delightful, playful sense of humor,” Bishop Barron said, adding that Bishop O’Connell had once performed at a comedy club’s open mic night.
He was “the kind of person that, when he walked in the room, everyone felt better,” Bishop Barron said. “He just lifted everybody up.”
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops said in a statement that “Bishop O’Connell was an active member of our Conference and a champion for the poor and marginalized” who had previously led its antipoverty initiative.
Bishop O’Connell said in a July 2015 interview with Angelus, the publication of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, that being a pastor in South Central Los Angeles had been “the great joy of my life.”
“It’s been a great privilege, a great blessing to be given these parishes all these years, to be pastor all these years,” he said. “The people have touched my heart the way they are sincere.”
Ruth Graham and Christine Hauser contributed reporting.