Alleged murder Christopher Dorner whose charred remains were found in the burned out mountain cabin has been revealed to have died from a single gunshot wound to the head.

The former Los Angeles Police Department officer that carried out a vengeful rampage against his fellow cops and others have died during a shootout and authorities has yet to determine who fired the single round.

"The information we have seems to indicate that the wound that took Christopher Dorner's life was self-inflicted," said San Bernardino County Sheriff's Captain Kevin Lucy.

The cause of death has been determined by an autopsy conducted Thursday by the San Bernardino County Coroner's Office.

The sheriff's department on Thursday afternoon positively determined the remains that were found in the cabin as Dorner's.

During the news conference San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon addressed questions how Dorner could have been hiding out in a condominium complex in Big Bear just few hundred yards away from the command center set up to find him. He said deputies had knocked on the condo complex's door and found it locked.

"My instructions were that ... if it was secure and there were no signs of forced entry, we were not going to kick down the doors of several cabins or hundreds of cabins during that search," McMahon said.

Police had been seeking Dorner since last week, when they say he launched a deadly revenge campaign against the Los Angeles Police Department over his 2009 firing.