Mississippi hostage standoff ends with 1 officer and suspect dead, 1 officer wounded

BRANDON, Miss. (AP) — Two Mississippi police officers were shot and one died Thursday during a standoff that started as a hostage situation in a home, the state Department of Public Safety said.

The suspect also was shot and killed, at the home in the Jackson suburb of Brandon, state police spokesperson Bailey Martin said in a statement.

Several law enforcement agencies responded during the standoff, which lasted more than eight hours. The officer killed was from the police department in another suburb, Madison. The injured officer is from the Brandon Police Department.

The Department of Public Safety did not immediately release the names of the officers or the suspect. The Madison officer was killed while trying to enter the home.

Brandon police told WLBT-TV that the standoff began as a domestic dispute between a man and a woman.

Police Chief Wayne Dearman said the department received a call at 1:45 a.m., WAPT-TV reported. After talking for more than an hour with the suspect, the department’s SWAT team got into the house and rescued the hostage.

It was not immediately clear whether police shot and killed the suspect, or the person killed himself.

The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation is examining the case, as it does with most shootings of or by law enforcement officers in the state. After the investigation is finished, MBI will give its findings to the state attorney general’s office, Martin said.