WETHERSFIELD, Conn. (AP) – A man suspected of killing his child’s grandmother in Hartford was shot and killed hours later by Wethersfield police after a confrontation in that town early Tuesday, police said.
State police, who are investigating the Wethersfield shooting because officers were involved, identified the dead man as Gerard Chapdelaine, 39, of Hartford. An autopsy determined that he died of multiple gunshot wounds, state police said.
The names of the Wethersfield officers involved were being withheld until Wednesday.
Police were called to a home on Bolton Street in Hartford about 8 p.m. to investigate a domestic dispute, Hartford police said.
The occupants reported that Chapdelaine, the father of an infant who lived there, had been in the front yard waving a gun and making threats. A restraining order prohibited him from being at the house.
Hartford police said officers towed Chapdelaine’s car, connected family members with emergency shelter services, and started preparing an arrest warrant as they searched for him.
About four hours later, Hartford officers were called to the same address for a report of a shooting. Police discovered 47-year-old Lorna Coley, the infant’s grandmother, dead of a gunshot wound to the head. No one else was hurt.
A short time later, Wethersfield police got a call from a convenience store clerk who was suspicious about a man with blood on his hands.
Wethersfield police chief James Cetran said the man walked out of the Food Bag store and was confronted by an officer.
Cetran said the man fled the scene, but returned a short time later and was confronted by several other Wethersfield officers and a SWAT officer.
“He was pointing the gun at the officers, the SWAT officer shot him with his rifle and he went down right in the middle of Silas Deane Highway, between the two yellow lines,” Cetran said.
State police said Chapdelaine refused repeated orders to drop the gun and instead pointed it at officers.
He was taken by ambulance to Hartford Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
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