Police Chief: Officer’s death ‘the hardest day’

The Latest: Police Chief: Officer’s death ‘the hardest day’

RICHARDSON, Texas (AP) — The Latest on the fatal shootings of a police officer and another person in suburban Dallas (all times local):

11:45 a.m.

A suburban Dallas police chief says the death of an officer who was shot responding to a disturbance at an apartment complex represents “the hardest day we’ve ever had.”

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Richardson police Chief Jim Spivey said during a news conference Thursday that officer David Sherrard is the first to die on duty in the department’s history.

The 37-year-old Sherrard had worked for Richardson police for more than a dozen years and was the married father of two daughters.

Spivey says officers responding to the complex Wednesday night found a man who had been shot. Officers went to a nearby apartment where a standoff ensued with a suspect identified by authorities as 26-year-old Brandon De McCall.

Police say McCall fired his weapon intermittently during the course of the standoff but was later taken into custody. He’s being held at the Collin County jail on a charge of capital murder. Online jail records don’t indicate an attorney for him.

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The second man who was shot, 30-year-old Rene Gamez, died from his wounds.

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8:30 a.m.

Investigators say the second person killed in a shooting that fatally wounded a Texas police officer lived in the apartment where the suspect barricaded himself during an hours-long standoff.

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The officer was shot in the neck as Richardson police responded to a disturbance call at an apartment complex late Wednesday in the Dallas suburb. The officer later died at a hospital.

Police say the shooting sparked a standoff with the suspect, who randomly fired a weapon throughout the night. He was eventually taken into custody.

Police on Thursday said the second person killed was 30-year-old Rene Gamez.

Plano police spokesman David Tilley says Gamez lived at the apartment. He says the suspected gunman and Gamez knew each other but the extent of their relationship wasn’t immediately clear.

Police have not released the names of the officer who died or the suspect.

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11:30 p.m.

A police officer has been fatally shot, another person is wounded and the suspect remains barricaded inside an apartment in suburban Dallas.

Police say the incident began about 7 p.m. Wednesday as the officer was checking on a report of a disturbance at the apartment complex in Richardson, Texas. The officer was taken to a hospital in nearby Plano. About three hours later, Richardson police reported that he had died.

Richardson police spokesman Sgt. Kevin Perlich (PUR’-lihk) said the condition of the wounded person wasn’t immediately known.

Perlich said the suspect remained inside the apartment and that officers had the individual cornered.

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