A man has been arrested in the fatal shooting of a western Pennsylvania police officer and the wounding of another as they responded to a domestic dispute call.
Johnathan Jermia Morris, 31, was charged in Allegheny County with criminal homicide, aggravated assault and attempted murder, along with assault of a law enforcement officer, in the Monday-afternoon shooting in McKeesport, about 12 miles south of Pittsburgh.
Police had been called to a residence regarding a man having a “mental health crisis” just after noon on Monday and tried to talk with him. Family members warned that he might be armed as the man walked away. As police caught up with Morris nearby, he “suddenly produced a handgun and shot the two McKeesport officers,” said county police superintendent Christopher Kearns.
A fatal shot felled officer Sean Sluganski, 32, who had worked in McKeesport for two years. A second officer, 35-year-old Charles Thomas Jr., is recovering at home after being treated and discharged from a Pittsburgh-area trauma center. He has been on the force for four years.
Morris also fired at a third officer who shot back and hit him. The suspect was in stable condition at a trauma center near Pittsburgh.
Witnesses said Morris told them police were trying to kill him before a police cruiser pulled up, along with another officer on foot, and Morris pulled out a gun and shot at them. They returned fire and wounded him in the leg, after which he flagged two other people down in a parking lot for help. One of those witnesses said Morris pulled out a handgun while they were applying a tourniquet and aimed at another approaching officer, which led to the final gunfire.
The community rallied around the fallen officers and their families with prayer vigils and an online funding account for Sluganski’s family that had raised $56,000 of its $75,000 goal by Tuesday afternoon. He leaves behind his fiancee and their 1-year-old daughter.