Bio & Incident Details
Age: Not available
Tour: Not available
Badge # Not available
Cause: Gunfire
Incident Date: 5/5/1964
Weapon: Handgun
Suspect: Sentenced to life
· Leave a Reflection
· Add to My Heroes
· Update this memorial
Share this memorial:
Officer Wright and Officer William Mines were shot and killed after stopping a suspicious man behind a local business in the late night hours. The officers called the man over to their patrol car. Unbeknownst to the officers the man was wanted in Minnesota for murder. As the suspect talked to the officers, who were still seated in their patrol car, the suspect produced a handgun and opened fire, killing Officer Mines instantly. Officer Wright, who was wounded, exited the vehicle and was then shot execution style by the suspect. The officers were not found for several hours as they had not called in the stop.
As the suspect fled he nearly struck a delivery man, who wrote down the license plate in order to report him as a reckless driver. During the investigation the plate was traced to the suspect. Three days later the suspect was apprehended in Inkster, Michigan, after he crashed his car into another car during a police chase. The driver of the other car, a 21 year-old man who was to be married the next day, was killed.
The suspect was returned to Virginia, convicted of first degree murder, and sentenced to life. The man died of liver cancer while still in prison on February 17, 2004, several days after an appeal for clemency was denied by the governor of Virginia.
Officer Wright was survived by his wife and three children.
Related Line of Duty Deaths
|
|
Officer William Franklin Mines |
