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Shootings into homes, buildings and police barracks investigated
St. Johnsbury Police Sgt. Stephen Bunnell looks through the shot-out rear window of a police cruiser. A man arrested Tuesday after allegedly shooting at the car is being investigated in a series of earlier shootings that targeted churches, homes and a Vermont State Police barracks. (AP Photo) |
By John Curran
Associated Press
ST. JOHNSBURY, Vt. — A man arrested Tuesday after allegedly shooting the window out of a police car is being investigated in a series of earlier shootings that targeted churches, homes and a Vermont State Police barracks, authorities said.
John M. Davis fired a sawed-off shotgun from a moving car outside the St. Johnsbury Police Department early Tuesday, blowing the back window out of a marked police car, Police Chief Richard Leighton said.
Ricocheting shotgun pellets also penetrated a second-story police station on the police station, he said.
Davis, 48, of New Britain, Conn., was captured after a short chase when his car hit a building and he jumped out and hid behind a snowplow, authorities said.
“He said `Shoot me, shoot me.’ But we didn’t,” said Leighton.
A sawed-off shotgun, a bandolier containing 17 shells and a police radio band scanner were found in the car, he said.
No one had been hit or hurt in the 11 earlier shootings and Davis hasn’t been charged in any of them, but ballistics tests were planned, State Police Detective Lt. J.P. Sinclair said.
The most recent shootings, on Saturday at Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s Witness and the Church of Latter Day Saints in Lyndonville, also involved a shotgun.
The weapon used in the other shootings was a .40-caliber pistol, according to Sinclair.
On Dec. 20, a bullet went through a window at the State Police barracks in Derby and struck a trophy display case. Gunfire also has struck five churches of various denominations since Nov. 21, as well as the Newport Country Club in Newport, which is closed for the winter.
“They all could be the same shooter,” said Sinclair. “My hopes are that this (arrest) is going to bring an end to the problem that we’ve had up here.”
Davis, whose criminal record includes convictions for discharging a firearm, theft of a firearm, sex assault, reckless endangerment and burglary, was charged with reckless endangerment, unlawful mischief, discharging a firearm in village limits and illegal use of a police scanner. Bail was set at $50,000.
Because of the allegation he used a sawed-off shotgun, Davis was taken into custody by agents of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives pending an appearance in federal court in Burlington.
It wasn’t clear if he had an attorney yet; a telephone call to the federal public defender’s office in Burlington wasn’t immediately returned.
St. Johnsbury is in northeastern Vermont, about 50 miles northeast of Montpelier.