CHICAGO _ A gunman was holding state troopers at bay in his car off I-55 Thursday afternoon, hours after he shot and critically wounded a McHenry County, Ill., sheriff's officer who was serving a warrant at a Rockford motel.
The suspect crashed his silver Grand Marquis near Lincoln around 11:30 a.m. local time after leading state police on a chase that reached speeds over 100 mph, authorities said. He has refused to leave the car, and reports from troopers at the scene said he was pointing a rifle out the car.
A SWAT team and negotiators were called in.
"Obviously, he's indicated he's willing to use force," Kurt Whisenand, a chief investigator with the Rockford Police Department, said at a news conference. "We would prefer it ends peacefully, but that's not up to law enforcement."
The sheriff's officer was with a U.S. Marshals fugitive task force who was serving an arrest warrant on Floyd E. Brown, 39, at the Extended Stay America in Rockford, authorities said. As some members of the task force approached Brown's room around 9:15 a.m., shots were fired inside the room, police said.
Brown apparently jumped out the third-floor window and shot the sheriff's in the parking lot, then jumped in his car and sped off, authorities said.
The sheriff's officer suffered a gunshot wound to the head and was taken to a hospital in critical condition. Police were withholding his name to give family members time to notify relatives.
McHenry County Chairman Jack Franks said the officer was "in very critical condition fighting for his life. It is a very dark day for McHenry County. We ask every one to keep this deputy and the family and all law enforcement officers ... in their prayers."
A woman in Brown's room was also wounded, apparently by a round fired by Brown. Her injury was not considered life-threatening, authorities said. Guests in the motel were evacuated but no other injuries were reported.
During a high-speed pursuit down I-55, Brown drove off the road and barricaded himself in the car as police negotiated a surrender, police said. An alert to police agencies said he may be armed with an AK-47.
Brown had been wanted on warrants out of Champaign, McLean and Sangamon counties. In one of the cases, he fled police investigating a burglary and crashed his car, injuring at least two people.
At the time, Brown was on parole after serving time in prison for a series of burglaries in McLean and Macon counties in 2011. He had been arrested then also by a U.S. Marshals fugitive task force, according to authorities.
Brown was sentenced to 13 years in prison and, with credit for good behavior, was released in January last year. He's also served prison time in the 2000s for convictions of unlawful restraint, violating an order of protection and illegally possessing a firearm, according to the Illinois Department of Corrections.
The Winnebago County state's attorney's office has now filed attempted murder charges against Brown.
The wounded officer was assigned to the U.S. Marshals Great Lakes Regional Fugitive Task Force, which pools federal and local resources to arrest fugitives in Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin. Some two dozen police departments contribute officers to the task force, including the McHenry County sheriff's office. The Chicago Police Department also assigns officers to the group, which was established for fugitive apprehension in 2003.
"My heart truly goes out to the officer who was injured, and their entire family as well as all law enforcement," Mayor Tom McNamara said at the news conference. "When one officer is injured in such a horrific situation. ... Every single one of them is impacted."
