Dedication Ceremony for CHP Officer Fatally Shot in Cabazon, November 1969

A California Highway Patrol officer who was fatally shot in the line of duty in Cabazon 44 years ago will be remembered next week in Beaumont, and a stretch of Interstate 10 is going to be named in his honor.

Officer Ambers O. "Sonny" Shewmaker, badge No. 7059, was 28 years old when he did a traffic stop Nov. 23, 1969 on the driver of a speeding vehicle, "who unbeknownst to him, had earlier been involved in an armed robbery" at the B and B Drive-In in the city of Riverside, said Darren Meyer of the San Gorgonio Pass Area CHP.

The alleged robber, Gene Myrick of Sacramento, shot Shewmaker twice in the head and the officer died the next day at a hospital in Riverside, according to news accounts from 1969. Myrick was captured by Palm Springs police, convicted of murder, and died in prison in 2006, Meyer said.

Shewmaker is the only officer assigned to the San Gorgonio Pass Area, formerly 
Banning Area, to be killed in the line of duty, Meyer said.

He was born in Santa Maria in 1941 and his family moved to Yucaipa, according to the CHP. He was a graduate of Redlands High School, Class of 1960. He served three years in the Army, and he met his wife to be, Kandie Barnett, in Yucaipa.

A Shewmaker's funeral was held in his hometown of Yucaipa.

"As the funeral procession made its way to the cemetery, many local residents stood along the roadside funeral route and paid their respects by saluting or bowing their heads for a downed law officer who gave his life while protecting theirs," according to his CHP bio.

A memorial highway dedication ceremony for Shewmaker is scheduled at 10 a.m. Nov. 19 in the Multi-Purpose Room at Beaumont Civic Center. The San Gorgonio Pass Area CHP will dedicate a three-mile section of Interstate 10 between Malki Road and Main Street "CHP Officer Ambers O. 'Sonny' Shewmaker Memorial Highway."

Beaumont Civic Center is at 550 East 6th St., Beaumont.