Man dead after killing 1 officer, wounding another
The Associated PressOne police officer died and another was wounded Tuesday in an exchange of gunfire with a man who was shot to death in his south-central Michigan home, authorities said.
The shootout occurred around 12:30 a.m. when the two officers entered 63-year-old Elvin Potts' home in Jackson, a city about 70 miles west of Detroit.
Potts revealed a handgun and shot at the officers three times, police said. One officer returned fire, killing Potts.
Jackson police Officer James Bonneau, 26, was pronounced dead at a hospital, Jackson County Undersheriff Tom Finco said.
Darrin McIntosh, a 22-year-old Blackman Township public safety officer, was wounded and underwent surgery for a non-life-threatening injury, Finco said. His condition was not immediately known.
It was not immediately clear why the officers went to Potts' home. No other details about the shooting were released.
Bonneau's family has begun making funeral arrangements, his father, Marc, said Tuesday morning from his home in the Detroit suburb of Canton Township.
"This is hard. When I think about it, it's hard," said Marc Bonneau, who works at the Michigan State Police crime lab in Northville. "I just don't believe it."
James Bonneau graduated from Canton High School in 2002. By then, the Sept. 11 terror attacks had inspired him to pursue a law enforcement career, his father said. Bonneau studied criminal justice at Schoolcraft College and Eastern Michigan University and joined the Jackson Police Department in 2007.
"I miss him," Marc Bonneau said. "He was just my buddy."
James Bonneau had a girlfriend in Jackson and is survived by his parents, a sister and a brother.
According to the Jackson Citizen Patriot, Bonneau was the sixth Jackson police officer killed in the line of duty since 1893 and the first since 1978.