11 Dallas Officers Shot, 4 Dead in Shooting as Protest Ended
Eleven Dallas law enforcement officers were shot, four fatally, on Thursday by what is believed to be two snipers who opened fire during a demonstration downtown over recent police shootings in Minnesota and Louisiana, the Dallas police chief said.
The snipers fired from an elevated positions on police officers minutes before 9 p.m. CT, according to Dallas Police Chief David Brown. He described the shootings as "ambush style."
Amateur video footage shows gunman involved in #Dallas shooting https://t.co/FfyEyhATMM https://t.co/RUXXrQEJRC
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"We believe that these suspects were positioning themselves in a way to triangulate on these officers from two different perches in garages in the downtown area, and planned to injure and kill as many law enforcement officers as they could," Brown said at a news conference — noting that some were shot in the back.
Police were in a standoff with one suspect in the second floor of a parking garage at around 12:30 a.m. and had exchanged gunfire with him, Brown said. Another suspect, a woman, was taken into custody near the garage, and two people seen leaving the area in a Mercedes were stopped and were being questioned.
The suspect in the standoff with police "has told our negotiators that the end is coming, and he is going to hurt and kill more of us, meaning law enforcement, and that there are bombs all over the place in this garage and downtown," Brown said.
There may be others out there. "We still don't have a complete comfort level that we have all the suspects," Brown said, warning that a search in downtown could last through morning. Police were in contact with the FBI and federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Brown said.
Brown said investigators are working under the assumption that all the suspects were working together. They have not been cooperative, he said. "We just are not getting the cooperation we'd like to know that answer of why, the motivation, who they are."
