"It's always to our interests to have the person come out. Unfortunately this person decided to take his own life," said Louisville Metro Police spokesman Robert Biven.
Datillo, 37, of Jeffersonville, Ind., was wanted in the shootings of Jeffersonville Cpl. Dan Lawhorn and Patrolman Keith Broady, who police say were ambushed Thursday evening at a motel in southern Indiana, just across the Ohio River from Louisville.
A SWAT team, hostage negotiators and federal agents had descended on the neighborhood of well-kept one-story brick houses around 10:30 a.m. after a vehicle believed linked to the shootings was seen, said Alicia Smiley, a Louisville police spokeswoman. Two other people in the house were able to leave after police arrived.
The ordeal began a day earlier when Lawhorn and Broady went to a Motel 6 to investigate drug activity and gunfire broke out in one of the rooms. Broady was shot in the chest in an area not protected by his bulletproof vest, and Lawhorn shot in the leg, Jeffersonville Detective Todd Hollis said. Both were in stable condition early Saturday at a hospital.
At least seven shots were fired at the officers, and Broady fired twice back, Hollis said. Drugs and two pipe bombs were later found in the motel room, and the explosives were safely detonated there, police said.
Lynn Murphy of Louisville, who said she was Datillo's sister, told reporters she had spoken to him on the telephone while he was in the house and that he was scared.
