Two police officers were killed in a shootout on Sunday evening outside a house in an upstate New York town near Syracuse, where they had tracked a vehicle whose driver had fled a traffic stop earlier, the authorities said.
Two Syracuse police officers attempted to stop a vehicle at around 7 p.m. on Sunday. The driver fled, but the officers used the vehicle’s license plate to track it to a house in Liverpool, a village in the suburban town of Salina. When the police learned that the vehicle’s driver might be armed, they requested assistance, and deputies from Onondaga County arrived, Chief Joseph L. Cecile of the Syracuse Police Department told reporters early Monday morning.
The officers found the parked vehicle, saw guns inside and “heard what sounded like someone manipulating a firearm from inside the residence” before shots rang out, Chief Cecile said.
At least three people were struck in the ensuing shootout, including a Syracuse police officer, a sheriff’s deputy and one male suspect, the police said. All three were later pronounced dead at a nearby hospital.
Officials said details were few in the hours immediately after the shooting, but the moments leading up to the killings appeared routine.
“We’re chasing cars every day,” said Onondaga County Sheriff Tobias Shelley on Sunday night.
Sheriff Shelley said that officers were investigating the shootout and that there was no danger to the community.
“It’s a dark day for Syracuse,” Mayor Ben Walsh of Syracuse said at the news conference on Monday. “This is our worst nightmare come true.”
