The Associated Press
JEFFERSON, Ga. (AP) - A police officer was shot and killed Wednesday night in a gun fight following a chase of a pickup truck on U.S. 129 in Jackson County in northeast Georgia, authorities said.
Police said the Pendergrass police officer had given chase to a pickup truck carrying two men when it went off the road and overturned. As the officer approached, shots was fired. The officer and one of the men were hit. Both suspects reportedly fled and were later arrested after a manhunt.
The officer was pronounced dead at Northeast Georgia Medical Center in Gainesville, and the wounded suspect was hospitalized in stable condition.
At 8:11 p.m., troopers from the Georgia State Patrol’s Athens and Gainesville posts were dispatched to a police pursuit that ended with an officer shot, Trooper Larry Schnall said.
The State Patrol called in its aviation unit to help in a manhunt for the two suspects. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation was investigating the shooting, and the patrol was investigating the crash, Schnall said.
A force of just two officers began to patrol the 25 miles of road in Pendergrass, a town of 500 residents, in early 2003, monitoring the speed of drivers on U.S. 129, which connects Athens and Gainesville.