Boston bombing suspect killed in shootout

19 April 2013 09:37 am

One of the suspects wanted in Monday's Boston Marathon bombing was shot and killed by police while a second suspect was at large and being pursued, the head of the Massachusetts State Police said early Friday.

Colonel Timothy P. Alben, Superintendent of the Massachusetts State Police said the first suspect from Monday's bombing was shot by police following a pursuit that began Thursday night in Cambridge and ended a short time later in nearby Watertown. He said that suspect later died at a hospital.

Alben said the second suspect, seen in photographs distributed by the FBI as wearing a white cap, is still at large. He said people should be on the lookout and that officials consider him a suspect.

He did not provide their names.

A transit police officer was reported in critical condition after being shot.

The manhunt for the marathon bombing suspects turned to hot pursuit at 10:30 p.m., when the two men robbed a 7-11 convenience store on the MIT campus in Cambridge, Alben said. A few minutes later, police found anMiT campus police officer shot multiple times in his car, Alben said. The police officer died of his injuries at Massachusetts General Hospital.

The suspects then car-jacked a Mercedes SUV, Alben said. Police found the car and the suspects in Watertown, and pursued them into a residential neighborhood where gunfire was exchanged.

Witnesses report hearing between 15 and 50 shots.

Alben said the suspects also threw explosives from the car. Residents, witnesses and media in the area heard at least two large booms.
A Massachusetts law enforcement official, speaking on condition he not be identified by name, said that the suspect who died is thought to be the first suspect in the FBI photos of the alleged bombers, wearing a dark hat.

Police Commissioner Ed Davis said in a Twitter statement that one of the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing on Monday, seen pictured wearing a white hat, was at large and that another suspect was dead.

Davis told reporters the man they are seeking is armed and dangerous. He urged people to stay in their homes and drew the first official link between the overnight police pursuit and the search for suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing.

"We believe this to be a terrorist. We believe this is a man who came here to kill people. We need to get him in custody,' Davis said.

The Middlesex district attorney's office said in a statement that police responded to reports of an armed carjacking by two males who held a victim at gunpoint for half an hour before being released uninjured.

The statement said one suspect was critically injured during the pursuit and later was pronounced dead at a hospital.

Police could be seen with guns drawn one one man face down on a paved street. CNN later reported that man was released by police.

The Massachusetts State Police issued a Tweet at 3:45 a.m. saying police "will be going door by door, street by street, in and around Watertown'' searching for the at-large suspect.

The state police also advised residents in and around Watertown to stay inside. "Do NOT answer door unless it is an identified police officer,'' the department said.

The events unfolded overnight as the entire Boston metro area was on high alert following Monday's fatal bomb explosions during the Boston Marathon and as the FBI was leading a massive manhunt for suspects. The developments came on a day when the FBI issued photographs of two men that it said it is seeking and were seen in surveillance video carrying backpacks in the marathon race crowd on Monday before the twin explosions.

"I heard sirens, then a ton of gunshots.,'' said Adam Healy, 31, a behavioral specialist for autism who lives less than a mile from the scene. "And then I heard an explosion amid the gunshots. After the explosion, the sky lit up. "

Dan MacDonald, 40, sitting in a second story Watertown apartment, said he first heard sirens, then gunshots.

"It was about 10 to 15 shots. then there was an onslaught," he said. "There were 25 to 60 shots within 45 seconds. Then the shots stopped and boom. It was like dynamite." (US Today)