SALT LAKE CITY – The police chief of a northeastern Utah town was shot and killed today while trying to arrest a suspect in a domestic dispute.
Roosevelt Police Chief Cecil Gurr and other officers were responding to a report of a man beating a woman, according to KNEU radio in Roosevelt. When the officers tried to arrest the man in the parking lot of a convenience store, Gurr was shot in the head with a rifle, it said.
The Utah Highway Patrol confirmed Gurr’s death but gave no details.
The suspect got into a pickup after the shooting and sped away, with his alleged assault victim driving.
Officers returned fire, according to one witness.
“I turned and looked to see what was going on and the cops were just unloading on this truck,” Joshua Stuart told KSL radio.
Police caught up with the man about five blocks away in a residential area and arrested him, Liddell said.
Neither the Roosevelt Police Department nor the Uinta County Sheriff’s office, which was handling the investigation, would release any details on the shooting or the name of the suspect.
A woman who answered the telephone at Gurr’s home refused to comment.
Gurr, 50, had been police chief since the mid-1970s, said city councilman Roger Bart.
“He was a pretty good old boy,” said the chief’s cousin, Adam Gurr, 27.
Roosevelt, a city of 4,000, is about 100 miles east of Salt Lake City.
Gurr was the second Utah police chief to die in a week. Sam Dawson, chief of the Sandy Police Department, was killed in a motorcycle accident Monday.
