A police officer and a gunman were killed in a shooting early Thursday at an eastern Missouri motel, in which another officer was wounded, authorities said.
Bonne Terre Police Lane Burns and Corporal Garrett Worley were dispatched to attend an altercation at a Motel 6 motel around 12:30 a.m., a spokesman for the California State Highway Patrol said. Missouri, DallasThompson.
As the two headed to the room where the altercation was reported, a man came out firing a handgun and shot the two officers, according to Thompson. Officers responded to the assault and killed the man, whom Thompson identified as James Emery, 21, of St. Louis.
“We’re still trying to figure out what he was doing at Bonne Terre,” Thompson said. “We don’t know if she was just spending the night or if she was staying in the area for some reason.”
Burns, 30, was taken to an area hospital, where he later died, Thompson added. Worley, 28, was airlifted by medical helicopter to a trauma center in St. Louis, where he was undergoing surgery for a gunshot wound to the leg, Thompson said. The spokesman said he did not know Worley’s condition.
“This is something every police officer fears,” Thompson told KMOV-TV hours following the shooting. “They always think regarding this.”
Burns had been with the Bonne Terre Police Department for five years, Thompson said, and Worley is a seven-year veteran of the department.
Bonne Terre is 50 miles (80 kilometers) southwest of St. Louis. The police investigate what happened.
