Deputy kills suspect in Sparta overnight - UPDATED 1:25 p.m.

(May 7, 2012 — UPDATED 1:25 p.m.) By RANDA WAGNER – A Mor­row County Sheriff’s Deputy shot and killed a man who stole a cruiser in Knox County overnight.

Accord­ing to a press release issued today at 12:40 p.m., William E. Myers, age 51, of Cen­ter­burg, died at Knox Com­mu­nity Hos­pi­tal in Mount Ver­non from gun­shot wounds fol­low­ing an inci­dent that occurred about mid­night in Sparta.

Mor­row County Deputy Clif­ford O’Connor responded to the south­east por­tion of Mor­row County to assist the Knox County Sheriff’s Office in a search for a cruiser report­edly stolen from an offi­cer in the Vil­lage of Cen­ter­burg in Knox County about 10 p.m. Offi­cers from Knox, Delaware and Mor­row coun­ties searched for the sus­pect for about two hours before Myers ended up in a Sparta church park­ing lot after hit­ting a deer.

O’Connor, a deputy with the Mor­row County Sheriff’s Office for eight months, spot­ted Myers out­side the vehi­cle, hold­ing a patrol rifle he had removed from the stolen cruiser.

“He ordered the man to put his weapon down, and the guy approached our offi­cer,” Mor­row County Sher­iff Steve Bren­ne­man stated early Mon­day. “[O’Connor] kept telling him to put it down, put it down… our offi­cer retreated and got behind the cruiser. The guy just kept com­ing and the offi­cer felt he had no choice but to fire upon him.”

At this time it is not known how many times Myers was hit.

Bren­ne­man said the deputy imme­di­ately called for assis­tance and med­ical per­son­nel. O’Connor then began admin­is­ter­ing first aid. Offi­cers from the Ohio State High­way Patrol, Knox County Sheriff’s Office, Delaware County Sheriff’s Office, and Mt. Gilead Police Depart­ment responded to the scene along with med­ical per­son­nel from Mor­row County and Knox County.

The sub­ject was trans­ported to the Knox Com­mu­nity Hos­pi­tal where he died from his wounds. An autopsy will be per­formed at the Lick­ing County Morgue some­time today. O’Connor was not injured.

The cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing the theft of cruiser are under inves­ti­ga­tion by the Knox County Sheriff’s Office. The entire inci­dent is under inves­ti­ga­tion by the Mor­row County Sheriff’s Office along with the Knox County Sheriff’s Office and Ohio BCI&I.

Posted by Randa Wagner on May 7 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.