Dallas paramedic shooting suspect found dead, 2nd body found

DALLAS – A man suspected of shooting and critically injuring a paramedic who was tending to a shooting victim on Monday has been found dead in a Dallas home, ending a threat that locked down the neighborhood for hours, authorities said.

A police robot found two bodies in a home east of downtown, including that of the suspected gunman, as authorities scoured the neighborhood following the shooting, Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings said during a news conference. He said the threat to the neighborhood was now over.

Interim Police Chief David Pughes said it’s believed the shooting started as a dispute between the suspected gunman and the victim whom emergency responders were trying to help out on the street. Pughes said the two were neighbors.

“That was what was initially reported to the officers on the scene, that it was just a simple dispute between two neighbors that escalated into a shooting,” Pughes said.

Authorities said that as emergency responders treated the civilian who’d been shot, another person approached, opened fire and critically injured the paramedic.

A second person also was found dead in the home, though no details have been released about that person.

Rawlings said the paramedic underwent surgery and was in intensive care in critical but stable condition at Baylor University Medical Center. The mayor said the paramedic will “have to undergo extensive medical treatment.”

The mayor said the injured civilian also was in intensive care. No other details about the neighbor or the paramedic, including their names, have been released.

Pughes said a police officer was injured during the initial altercation with the suspect and treated at the scene.

Dozens of police vehicles swarmed the mostly residential area after the shooting was reported near a local Fire Training Academy. Several people from a nearby neighborhood and some relatives of people who live in the barricaded area gathered at a nearby gas station to await updates from police.

The Dallas Police Association tweeted earlier Monday that officers responding to an active shooter were “pinned down” by gunfire.

A 33-year-old woman waiting in the shade of a gas station across the street from a police barricade told The Associated Press that her mother lives in the neighborhood and saw SWAT teams arrive Monday.

Brenda Salazar said she was headed to the area to visit her mother when she heard about the shooting on the radio. She called her mother, who told her she didn’t hear any shooting but “saw the SWAT guys and police setting up and going into the neighborhood.”

Salazar said her mother was OK and was watching the news, “but this stuff happens here all the time.”

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott released a statement saying his prayers were going out to all of those affected.

FBI agents and officers with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives also were in unmarked vehicles waiting at intersections in the neighborhood. Officials from the local fire department and parks department passed out water and Gatorade to officers blocking the roads.