2 Mississippi officers killed after 30-minute talk with woman during welfare check
Sergeant Steven Robin (left) and Officer Branden Estorffe. (Bay St. Louis Police Department photo illustration)
BAY ST. LOUIS, Miss. - Two police officers in coastal Mississippi were shot and killed early Wednesday by a woman who they had talked to for nearly 30 minutes in a motel parking lot, authorities said. The woman also died.
Amy Anderson, 43, was sitting in a parked SUV with a female child when the officers were sent to the parking lot of a Motel 6 in Bay St. Louis around 4:30 a.m. on a welfare check, the Mississippi Department of Public Safety said in a statement.
Bay St. Louis Police Sgt. Steven Robin and officer Branden Estorffe spoke to Anderson for nearly a half-hour before she fired at them while sitting in the vehicle, investigators said. During the conversation, the officers called for Child Protection Services, the police statement said.
Robin, 34, died in the parking lot. Estorffe, 23, died a short time later at the hospital, Mississippi Bureau of Investigation agents said.
Additional officers who rushed to the scene found Anderson dead from a gunshot wound to the chest. An earlier statement said the woman shot herself. It was unclear what happened to the girl inside the SUV.
Bay St. Louis, Mississippi
Police said more information would be released at a Thursday morning news conference.
Investigators Wednesday blocked a large part of the motel parking lot with crime scene tape. An officer was seen taking photos of the driver's seat of a SUV just a step away from bloodstains on the pavement and discarded emergency medical equipment. Other officers were looking inside a nearby police car.
Bay St. Louis is a city of 10,000 people about 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of Biloxi.
The Mississippi governor offered condolences in a message on social media.
"I am heartbroken by this terrible loss of two brave law enforcement officers," Gov. Tate Reeves posted on Twitter. "I am praying for their family, friends, their fellow officers, and the entire Bay St. Louis community."