EX-AIR FORCE POLICEMAN WANTED IN EDWARDS SLAYING.

Byline: Bhavna Mistry Daily News Staff Writer

Air Force officials are looking for a recently discharged former Air Force policeman as the prime suspect in the robbery-murder of base club manager James Elling.

Investigators traced Johnny Eugene Wyss, 26, to his father's home in Yuma, Ariz., but he disappeared within hours of being questioned there nine days ago, according to an affidavit released Friday by the U.S. Attorney's Office in Fresno.

``He is being looked for countrywide,'' said Gary Hatch, Edwards' deputy chief of media relations.

A warrant for Wyss' arrest on suspicion of murder was issued Thursday by a federal magistrate, according to base officials, who have placed wanted posters bearing Wyss' name and an indistinct photograph around Edwards.

Wyss had worked as a desk sergeant in the base's Security Police Office and left the Air Force on good terms the week before the slaying, which occurred about 90 minutes after Wyss left a going-away party in a base dormitory room, according to officials and the affidavit.

Officials say Elling, 33, night manager of the base's Club Muroc and Stripes Lounge, was discovered unconscious by a newspaper deliveryman about 3:40 a.m. Sept. 1. He was transported to a base hospital and was pronounced dead at 4:34 a.m. Elling was found in a covered alcove leading to the front door of Club Muroc, where he had gone to lock up approximately $1,500 in proceeds from the Stripes Lounge.

The money was gone when he was found, officials said. The murder was the first in base history.

Elling had been shot in the neck by a relatively rare type of handgun, a .40-caliber semiautomatic, and forensic tests linked a shell casing found at the murder scene to a Smith and Wesson pistol stolen in February from a former airman who knew Wyss and asked him to report the theft, the affidavit said.

When Air Force investigators questioned Wyss Sept. 26 at his father's Yuma home, they found in his gym bag a .40-caliber bullet that matched the one used to kill Elling, as well as Adidas athletic shoes. The shoes' tread matched prints discovered on a retaining wall at the murder scene, the affidavit said.

After the investigators departed, Wyss left the home - apparently wandering out into the desert - carrying a revolver with him but leaving behind his car and wallet, according to a phone call from his father to a friend in Rosamond, the affidavit said.

The father reported him missing to Yuma authorities, but he has not been found, officials said.

Officials said Wyss had served in the Air Force for 8-1/2 years, the last four years at Edwards, and was discharged at the rank of senior airman when his term of enlistment was up.

``He chose not to re-enlist,'' Hatch said. ``He didn't have any history of having any problems here on base. He separated on good terms. He wasn't forced out.''

Wyss' identification as a murder suspect surprised Capt. John Paulson, an operations officer with the Edwards Security Police, who had worked with Wyss at Kirkland Air Force Base in New Mexico before both were transferred to Edwards four years ago.

``I could never picture him doing that,'' Paulson said. ``We had never had any type of problem out of Johnny Wyss. I guess there's another side to people you never know.''

Elling, the father of three, was married to Edwards senior airman Diana Elling, who is seven months pregnant.