Two cops have been shot and killed by a driver in Virginia Seaside throughout a visitors cease on Friday night time, the authorities mentioned on Saturday. The motive force was later discovered lifeless.
The officers, Cameron Girvin, 25, and Christopher Reese, 30, have been assigned to a late-night shift after they stopped a automobile with expired plates at 11:27 p.m.
The motive force was instantly “argumentative” earlier than exiting the automobile in a residential space and getting right into a “tussle” with the officers, the Virginia Seaside police mentioned at a information convention on Saturday afternoon.
The motive force, John McCoy III, 42, then shot each officers, and as they have been on the bottom wounded, he stood over them and shot them every a second time, Chief Paul Neudigate of the Virginia Seaside Police Division mentioned on the information convention. Each officers later died at a hospital.
“I’m going to be fairly trustworthy, we’re all hurting,” the chief mentioned, including, “We nonetheless have jobs to do, and we could seem stoic on the skin, however I can let you know, our hearts are damaged on the within.”
Mr. McCoy was later present in a shed close to the capturing, with a gunshot wound that officers consider to be self-inflicted. He was pronounced lifeless on the scene.
There was a second particular person within the automobile that Mr. McCoy had been driving however Chief Neudigate mentioned on Saturday that the division did “not anticipate expenses for anyone else on this incident.”
Officer Girvin had been a member of the Virginia Seaside Police Division since 2020, and Officer Reese had been with the division since 2022, after having served as a deputy sheriff within the Virginia Seaside Sheriff’s Workplace from 2020 to 2022, Chief Neudigate mentioned.
The capturing was captured on video from the body-worn cameras on each officers and the digicam of their patrol automobile, Chief Neudigate mentioned.
He described the footage as “fairly horrific” and mentioned that the motive force calmly walked away after the capturing.
The deaths of the 2 officers rocked Virginia Seaside, a coastal metropolis of about 450,000 close to the state’s border with North Carolina. Whereas Virginia Seaside is a pretty big metropolis, Chief Neudigate mentioned, “we’re actually only a small group.”
Mayor Bobby Dyer was emotional as he spoke on the information convention.
“At the moment our metropolis is heartbroken,” he mentioned. “No phrases can ease the ache and loss as we mourn.”
