ST. LOUIS _ A retired St. Louis police officer was fatally injured in a shootout with a robber early Monday south of Tower Grove Park.
The officer was a retired sergeant who had 35 years of service as a police officer.
"This is ... very close to home because I knew the sergeant personally," Chief John Hayden said outside Barnes-Jewish Hospital Monday morning, moments after the sergeant was pronounced dead.
"We are all mourning together," he added. "This is a very challenging ... very challenging time."
Hayden choked back tears, and his voice was halting, as he talked with reporters.
The sergeant apparently had just dropped his wife off and was parking his car when he was approached by a gunman. The sergeant exchanged shots with the robber. Police couldn't say yet who fired first.
After the shooting, the gunman fled in a black SUV. The vehicle went to Barnes-Jewish Hospital and dropped off someone who had been shot. That person and two others in the vehicle were arrested.
Additionally, police pursued a green Honda Pilot that may have been connected with the shooting. It crashed near Interstate 44 and Jefferson Avenue about 10 a.m. and one person was arrested.
The shooting was about 7:30 a.m. in the 3100 block of Lackland Avenue. A short time later, an officer-in-need-of-aid call was broadcast. Several police cars then escorted an ambulance to Barnes-Jewish Hospital from the scene.
The shooting scene is in the block south of Tower Grove Park and a few blocks east of Kingshighway.
Police broadcast a description of a gunman in a black SUV at about 7:45 a.m., saying he was wanted in a shooting and may also be injured.
A man who lives nearby, who didn't want his name published, told the Post-Dispatch that he heard four gunshots. He said he saw a man run from the victim's house into an alley, where a black SUV was waiting for him. Someone else was driving the SUV, the witness said. The SUV then sped off.
The man said he went to the spot in the alley where the SUV had been. He saw a key on the ground and thought it was his neighbor's key. He gave the key to police and was told that the key belonged to the victim.
Then he went to the front of the victim's home and saw someone lying in the street.
The man said another neighbor jumped into a car and tried to chase the suspect.
Dan Noecker, another witness who lives nearby, said he heard three shots, then a brief pause followed by two more shots. Noecker said he knows the nephew of the retired cop who was hurt. The nephew lived in the home on Lackland with his uncle, Noecker said.
Noecker said he has lived in the Shaw and Tower Grove neighborhoods for about 30 years. He said there has been talk of the neighborhood association buying surveillance cameras that could be connected to the police. Noecker favors getting the cameras.
"In a situation like this, it sure would help," he said.
"You always want to tell your friends that the city is not that dangerous, and you kind of expect some crime as part of the territory," Noecker said. "But on the other hand, I don't see why it can't stop."
