After an emotional week in which two Hattiesburg, Miss., officers were killed in the line of duty, the news that a Jackson police officer was "down" shook the Jackson Police Department to the core.
It happened between 9 and 9:30 p.m. in the parking lot of the Express Fuel Food Mart at the corner of Bailey Avenue and Northside Drive.
Police spokesperson Colendula Green confirmed that an officer was injured but no one was killed. Several shots were fired, one of which hit the officer in the leg.
Officers were clearing the lot when shots were fired, Green said. Store co-owner Desmond Brown said the gunshots were fired, and police fired back.
He said police had been harassing customers for four hours, driving them out of the parking lot and out of the store, and that an officer had told him he had seen someone drinking and "smoking dope" on the premises. Brown, who has often claimed harassment by police but does not have a felony conviction on his record from the state of Mississippi, has been arrested at least twice since April 1. One of those arrests was for allegedly selling spice out of the gas station.
Several people have been taken into custody in the Sunday night shootout, but no names or charges have been released, the Clarion-Ledger reports.
