Ceremony Honors Two Law Officers Killed in ’97

A Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy and a Newport Beach police officer, who both died last year, were memorialized Thursday in Santa Ana’s Plaza of the Flags at an annual ceremony honoring officers who have lost their lives in the line of duty.

In a somber ceremony that included a color guard procession and a riderless horse, representatives of every law enforcement agency in the county remembered the lives and work of Deputy Shayne York and Sgt. Steven Van Horn.

York died in August when he and his fiancee were waiting for service at a hair salon in Buena Park. A pair of armed robbers burst in and, allegedly after discovering York was an off-duty Los Angeles County deputy, shot him.

Van Horn died in November after a protracted battle with leukemia. He was among a group of emergency workers who believed they may have been poisoned while responding to a chemical fire at a metal plating plant in 1987.

Plaques bearing York and Van Horn’s names were added to the memorial that also commemorates the service of 41 other police officers, sheriff’s deputies and Highway Patrol officers who have died in Orange County this century.