A noted Santa Monica figure in charge of boosting business, community and safety in the city\u2019s downtown core was found dead inside his Venice home alongside his wife, authorities said.<\/p>\n
The Los Angeles Police Department responded to a shooting incident reported in the 600 block of Superba Avenue at 10:50 a.m. Tuesday, according to a department spokesperson. <\/p>\n
Inside, they found Jeremy Ferguson, who served as director of operations for the nonprofit organization Downtown Santa Monica Inc., and his wife, Mandy Zelinka, with fatal gunshot wounds, a law enforcement source familiar with the incident told The Times. <\/p>\n
The incident is being investigated as a possible murder-suicide, the LAPD spokesperson said. <\/p>\n
Debbie Lee, the chief executive of DTSM, said in a statement Wednesday that the organization was heartbroken as employees processed the news of Ferguson\u2019s death.<\/p>\n
\u201cJeremy was a cherished member of our team and a true champion for Downtown Santa Monica,\u201d she said. \u201cHis passion for placemaking and the dedication he brought to his work each day made a lasting impact. He will be deeply missed.\u201d<\/p>\n
The L.A. County medical examiner confirmed that Zelinka, 49, died Tuesday at a residence. <\/p>\n
DTSM is a nonprofit organization that works with the city of Santa Monica to promote economic development and community events in the downtown business district. It is funded through a combination of property assessments, business license tax, city contracts and event revenue.<\/p>\n
Ferguson brought more than 25 years of public-sector experience to his role with the organization, where he oversaw a redesign of the city\u2019s annual holiday ice-skating rink and helped launch the city\u2019s first outdoor seasonal roller-skating rink, according to reporting from the Santa Monica Daily Press<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A noted Santa Monica figure in charge of boosting business, community and safety in the city\u2019s downtown core…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":281473,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[9238,1409,179,339,12303,121016,121013,48,52,51,47,50,49,121014,8509,100,236,3607,121015,44282,4609],"class_list":{"0":"post-281472","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-chief-executive","9":"tag-city","10":"tag-community","11":"tag-death","12":"tag-department-spokesperson","13":"tag-downtown-core","14":"tag-jeremy-ferguson","15":"tag-la","16":"tag-la-headlines","17":"tag-la-news","18":"tag-los-angeles","19":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","20":"tag-los-angeles-news","21":"tag-mandy-zelinka","22":"tag-murder-suicide","23":"tag-news","24":"tag-police","25":"tag-safety","26":"tag-santa-monica-nonprofit-director","27":"tag-shooting-incident","28":"tag-wife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281472\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}