Mr. Hangud was charged with four counts of murder, the chief said. He did not provide the victims’ names, ages or relationship to Mr. Hangud, but he said they were related and that the authorities were working to locate the next of kin.

Mr. Hangud was being held at South Placer Jail , in Roseville, the authorities said.

The police captain said that detectives were still trying to put together a timeline of the murders, which he said took place over a few days.

He said Mr. Hangud and the male victim in his car, who was of East Asian descent, had left the apartment and gone to “unknown places in North California” before ending up in Mount Shasta, a town of more than 3,200 about 220 miles north of Sacramento.

“We are not sure at what point he left his residence to go north,” Captain Simon said. He said that detectives were still investigating to determine whether there were other crime scenes along the route that Mr. Hangud took.

“That is a piece of the puzzle that we are still looking in to,” he said.

Sgt. Robert Gibson, who was in the Mount Shasta station when the man turned himself in, said the man was very calm and “matter of fact.”