By Steve Gorman
(Reuters) -Five police officers shot this week in rural Pennsylvania, three of them fatally, were ambushed by a suspected stalker who opened fire on them with an assault-style rifle when they attempted to serve an arrest warrant, a local prosecutor said on Thursday.
The suspect, Matthew Ruth, 24, was himself killed in the ensuing gunfight on Wednesday with officers from the North York County Regional Police Department and York County Sheriff’s Office, according to county District Attorney Tim Barker.
The shooting unfolded at a farmhouse in North Codorus Township, about 100 miles west of Philadelphia, when five police detectives and a deputy sheriff sought to arrest Ruth on suspicion of stalking, prowling and trespassing, Barker said.
According to the DA, the house belonged to the suspect’s ex-girlfriend and her mother, who had reported to police the night before that Ruth was lurking outside the home in camouflage clothing and peering into the dwelling through a window with binoculars.
The ex-girlfriend also told police she believed that Ruth had set fire to her pickup truck back in August.
After a fruitless search for Ruth on Tuesday night, police returned on Wednesday afternoon with an arrest warrant to the suspect’s home, but he was gone.
Officers then drove to the farmhouse of the ex-girlfriend and mother, who had left the residence for their own safety. Finding the door unlocked, police began to make entry, Barker said.
As the door swung open, according to Barker, Ruth immediately blasted away at the officers with his AR-15-type rifle. The four closest detectives were struck by gunfire, and two staggered for cover as they returned fire.
The gunman then turned his attention to the fifth detective and the sheriff’s deputy as they joined in the gunfight, which ended in the deaths of three police detectives and the suspect, authorities said. The fourth detective and the sheriff’s deputy were critically wounded.
The ambush slaying of three police officers in the normally quiet farm country of southeastern Pennsylvania made national headlines and prompted a visit by Governor Josh Shapiro, who spoke about gun violence at a conference in Pittsburgh on Tuesday.
York County was the scene of another fatal shooting seven months earlier of a police officer who responded to a hostage siege at the intensive care ward of a local hospital.
(By Steve Gorman; Editing by David Gregorio)
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