A manhunt for a suspect in the fatal shooting of a veteran Texas police detective ended Monday with an arrest in the killing, authorities said. The shooting was one of several weekend attacks against law enforcement in three states.
The San Antonio detective and officers shot in Missouri and Florida were conducting traffic-related tasks Sunday when they became the targets of violence. Detective Benjamin Marconi, a 20-year veteran of the San Antonio force, was writing a traffic ticket when he was shot to death in his squad car Sunday morning outside police headquarters.
"I think the uniform was the target, and the first person who happened along was the first person that he targeted," San Antonio Police Chief William McManus said at a news conference Monday.
McManus said Otis Tyrone McKane was arrested without incident on a capital murder warrant after the car in which he was riding was stopped Monday afternoon on an interstate.
Police in San Antonio said Monday that they did not believe the fatal shooting of Marconi was tied to another ambush hours later in St. Louis, where a police sergeant was shot twice in the face Sunday evening while he sat in traffic in a marked police vehicle. The sergeant was released from the hospital Monday.
A police officer in Gladstone, Mo., a suburb of Kansas City, was also shot and injured during a traffic stop Sunday night, as was a police officer in Sanibel, Fla. Authorities have not suggested these were targeted attacks.
In Gladstone, the suspect was shot and killed. The officer, whose name has not been released, is expected to recover.
In Sanibel, officer Jarred Ciccone was shot in the shoulder, treated for his injuries and released. Authorities said they arrested Jon Webster Hay, 49, about 90 minutes after the shooting. They said he was booked into jail on an attempted murder charge Monday after he was treated for wounds suffered during a standoff and shootout with officers.
The shootings were the latest in what law enforcement officials say is an alarming spike in ambush-style attacks. Sixty officers have been shot to death on the job this year, compared with 41 in all of 2015, according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. Of the 60 killed, 20 were purposely targeted by their assailant, compared with eight last year, the group said.
The number of officers fatally shot by suspects has declined in recent decades, falling from an average of 127 officers shot and killed during the 1970s to about 53 officers each year during the past decade. But current and former members of law enforcement have described feeling under siege. Some officers have said they keep their guns with them at times they otherwise would not, while others described being more wary when in public.
In San Antonio, police say the suspect is black, and the officer was white. In St. Louis, the suspect was black. Police have not released the race of the officer shot. Most police slayings are carried out by white men, and most people shot and killed by police are white, said Craig Floyd, president of the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. However, a Washington Post survey this year found that blacks make up 13 percent of the U.S. population but account for 24 percent of police shootings.
San Antonio surveillance video shows the suspect at police headquarters about four hours before Marconi was shot.
"I don't know why he was in headquarters. We have some ideas," he said.
St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson declined to name the 46-year-old officer on his force who was shot in the face Sunday evening, but said he is a married father of three who has been with the department for about 20 years.
"This officer was driving down the road and was ambushed by an individual who pointed a gun at him from inside of his car and shot out the police officer's window," Dotson said.
The suspect, 19-year-old George P. Bush III, was wanted for questioning in recent violent crimes that included several robberies, a carjacking and perhaps a killing, Dotson said. He didn't elaborate.
Police said Bush was later killed in a shootout with officers.
"We believe he knew he was good for those crimes and that we were looking for him," Dotson said. "That's why he aggressively attacked a police officer."
Information for this article was contributed by Jim Salter, David Warren, Jamie Stengle and Tammy Webber of The Associated Press; and by Mark Berman and Katie Mettler of The Washington Post.
A Section on 11/22/2016