Sketch Released in Shooting of Food Executive

NEWPORT BEACH — Police released a detailed sketch Thursday of the man who shot and wounded a fast-food executive as she sat in her Mercedes-Benz in the driveway of her Harbor View home.

Investigators also disclosed a license plate number--3CSN547--that may be close to the plate on the gunman’s getaway car, possibly a maroon Pontiac Grand Am or Grand Prix.

The license plate number came from a neighbor who called police Aug. 23 to report a suspicious man parked on quiet Port Sheffield Place, but the resident did not get the exact plate number before the man drove off, Sgt. Andy Gonis said.

Still at a loss for a motive for Tuesday’s shooting of Beverly J. Blake, police readied stacks of flyers bearing the assailant’s likeness and asked the public for help.

Gonis said officers would begin distributing the flyers today throughout the neighborhood where Blake was shot.

“Anyone who saw anything is a reliable witness to us at this point,” he said.

Police crafted the composite with help from residents who reported seeing a man matching the gunman’s description lurking in the neighborhood in the week before the shooting.

“Later, the victim confirmed that there is a likeness to the suspect,” Gonis said.

Authorities described the man as 35 to 40 years old, 6 feet, 1 inch tall and weighing 230 to 250 pounds. He is black with black hair, brown eyes, large shoulders, arms, and neck, and a slight belly.

He was wearing a dark shirt and dark pants and a blue baseball cap. The car is described as a relatively new Pontiac, dark in color, possibly maroon.

The man approached Blake after she got into her car to leave for work at 8:18 a.m. He fired one round through the driver’s side window with a .45-caliber, semiautomatic handgun, police said.

Blake, 48, a vice president of marketing for the Wienerschnitzel hot dog chain, was recovering at a local hospital and was doing well, said Gonis, although her condition is still considered “guarded.”

Investigators reviewed bulletins from other departments looking for reported crimes of a similar nature, and also planned to mail the flyer today to other law enforcement agencies. Police also were reviewing all calls for service from the neighborhood where Blake was shot, Gonis said.

Gonis asked that anyone with information call the department at (714) 644-3754 or (800) 550-NBPD.