The gunman who killed three Baton Rouge police officers was intentionally targeting law enforcement, authorities said Monday.
“There is no doubt whatsoever that these officers were intentionally targeted and assassinated,” Col. Michael Edmonson, superintendent of the Louisiana State Police, said in a press conference Monday. “It was a calculated act.”
Earlier on Monday, Lt. J.B. Slaton said he also saw the attack as an ambush.
“We’re trying to figure out his motive. We’re trying to figure out why he would commit this heinous crime,” Slaton said.
In addition to the three dead law enforcement officers, three others were wounded.
The gunman has been confirmed as Gavin Long, a black resident of Kansas City, Mo. Authorities believe the 29-year old had been in Baton Rouge for a few days prior to the Sunday attack. He was a Marine who had been deployed to Iraq before leaving service in August 2010. Long died after a shootout with police.
“He came here from somewhere else to do harm to our community, and specifically the law enforcement officers in our community,” Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, said at a news conference Monday afternoon. “This was a diabolical attack on the very fabric of society.”
The investigation and motive is ongoing, but there have been reports that he was targeting cops to respond to the most recent deaths of black men at the hands of police.
Those killed were identified as Matthew Gerald, 41, Montrell Jackson, 32, also of the Baton Rouge police department, and Brad Garafola, 45, of the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office.
One East Baton Rouge officer remains hospitalized in in critical condition. Another officer is in serious condition, but not with life threatening injuries, and one more has been released.
In a detailed explanation of Sunday morning, Edmonson said that the three slain officers were all shot in the same location. The slain Carafola, a deputy, had left cover to check on other officers who were shot.
Baton Rouge Police Chief Carl Dabadie called the SWAT team member’s shot that killed Long from a distance of roughly 100 years and through barriers “a hell of a shot.”
Dabadie, who was visibly shaken during the press conference, praised his officers.
“They went to the fire. They didn’t run, They didn’t go the other direction,” Dadabie said.
