The Associated Press
HAZEL PARK, Mich. (AP) - Jessica Wilson’s life centered on policing.
The 26-year-old had 21 months with Hazel Park police. She and her brother graduated from the Ferris State University with degrees in criminal justice in 2000. And for two months, she was married to her college sweetheart - now a Detroit police officer.
Wilson was handling a complaint about an unleashed dog Sunday when she was fatally shot in the neck.
Police Chief David Neidermeier said Wilson thought she was going to the home of Hans Hofe to explain the city’s leash law after a neighbor complained to police, The Detroit News reported Tuesday.
But neighbors have told police that just minutes before the shoot-out, Hofe, angry and drunk, made death threats to neighbors during an argument about his unleashed dog.
“If the cops come to my house, I’ll kill them and then come here and kill you,” Hofe told neighbor Roy Walters, according to The Daily Tribune of Royal Oak.
Neidermeier said he had not reviewed police dispatch tapes but suspected those same threats were never relayed to police.
“This would go directly to a premeditated plan by him,” the chief said. “It’s possible her (Wilson’s) actions may have saved the lives of other officers.”
Wilson died from a shotgun blast about 40 feet away from Hofe’s driveway, police say. Before collapsing on the front lawn, Wilson shot and wounded the 42-year-old Hofe, who remained hospitalized Tuesday with a wound to the abdomen.
Police had been called to Hofe’s address about six times since 1999, the Detroit Free Press said. He was known to have a bad temper, but none of the police visits resulted in an arrest.
Wilson’s was the first death of a Hazel Park police officer in the line of duty. It is under investigation by the Oakland County Sheriff’s Department.
Russell Winger, a Jarvis Street resident, said the shooting evolved from an argument with several people outside an apartment building about 9 p.m.
Hofe “had been drinking ... and was out walking his dog up the street when somebody in my building told him that it should have been on a leash,” Winger said. “He got mad and said some things.”
The shoot-out occurred within 30 minutes.
Wilson would have celebrated a second-year anniversary on the Hazel Park force in October, She Detroit police Officer Matthew Wilson two months ago. Her brother, Rob, is a Fraser police officer.
“Jessica died doing what she loved to do. She loved being a police officer,” Matthew Wilson told reporters Monday. “She couldn’t wait to get on the street. ... She would have been proud of what she did.”