Two police officers are wounded after chasing a suspect in Louisiana. When one officer arrived at the scene, Smith fled in a 2013 Dodge Avenger. Smith then got out of the vehicle and shot at the officers using a large caliber semi-automatic assault rifle. BRPD said the man who shot at police is in critical condition at an area hospital.
Advertisement
Just before dawn on Saturday, Baton Rouge police responded to call from someone reporting some property being damaged. He was reported to have suffered from longstanding mental health issues and had attempted suicide past year.
The second officer received a graze wound to the back of the head and is also listed in stable condition. The suspect was in surgery Saturday morning.
“One more inch, and that officer’s dead”, Moore said of the first policeman.
“Moore said Saturday afternoon that he had personally viewed dashboard camera videos of the six-minute chase from the officers’ two cars and believes their actions were” totally justified”.
“Clearly the suspect initiated the firing”, Moore said, calling the attack an “ambush” and adding that an investigation will “look at everything” to make an official determination. One officer was equipped with a body camera, but it may not have been activated before the firefight broke out. “Chambers said she didn’t know where Smith had obtained the rifle police say he used”.
A Baton Rouge neighborhood was awakened early by a hail of gunfire that police say was sparked by a confrontation between an armed suspect and two police officers. For example, deputies in suburban Baltimore shot it out Wednesday with a man at a sandwich shop.
The neighborhood where the shooting occurred is about four miles east of downtown Baton Rouge.
“[The officers] are fortunate they are alive”, Moore said.
Advertisement
Hope Walker, who said she’s a close friend of Smith’s, said she was staying with someone down the street when she heard three gunshots early Saturday morning. Police units lined the area where the shooting took place, and dozens of markers were placed to flag the location of shell casings and other evidence. He says all he heard was “sirens, gunshots and tires squealing”.
