Crime & Safety

UPDATED: Man Trimming Tree Electrocutes Self, Dies

He was working on a bluff-top mansion in Malibu.

Originally posted at 2:03 p.m. Feb. 17, 2014. Edited to add more information. 

A 50-year-old man trimming a tree was electrocuted today at a bluff-top mansion in Malibu, authorities said.

Los Angeles County sheriff's Sgt. Philip K. Brooks said the man's death was reported at 10:18 a.m. in the 24800 block of Pacific Coast Highway.

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Firefighters called for the sheriff's deputies to investigate the fatality after they were summoned to the scene.

The man was lopping branches 25 feet up a tree when he apparently accidentally touched the tool's pole to a power line, Brooks said.

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He was still in the tree when firefighters arrived, he said.

They used an extension ladder to reach him and lower him to the ground before pronouncing him dead at the scene, Brooks said.

The man was a part-time worker for a local landscaping company, Brooks said.

No one saw the man get electrocuted and it was unclear how long he was in the tree before he was found by a co-worker, Brooks said.

--City News Service


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