NORRIDGEWOCK (NEWS CENTER Maine) — A national manhunt is underway after a Somerset County Sheriff's Deputy has been shot and killed between 1 and 2 a.m. Wednesday morning.
As of noon on Wednesday, there was a heavy police presence surrounding a home in Madison on Jones Street where officers have their guns drawn and a helicopter is overhead.
Somerset County Sheriff's Office said Corporal Eugene Cole was the deputy who was shot and killed.
Police are searching for 29-year-old John Williams of Madison. Police say Williams is armed and very dangerous. Williams is described as 5'6" and 120 Ibs, blue eyes, brown hair and is wearing a ponytail on the top of his head with the sides shaved. If the anyone sees Williams they are told not to approach him but call 911.
Police say Williams stole Corporal Cole's fully marked cruiser and drove to a Cumberland Farms on Waterville Road in Norridgewock, which he then robbed around 1:45 a.m.
The cruiser was found around 5 a.m. on Martin Stream Road in Norridgewock. Police say Williams ran off on foot.
FBI agents are on the scene and assisting in the national manhunt and police say they have issued a national alert. Police are searching on the ground and by air.
Police ordered Mill Stream Elementary School in Norridgewock to close Wednesday, and a section of Route 2 was closed as well. Schools in Oakland, Norridgewock and Fairfield were all on lockdown Wednesday as the manhunt continued.
Early this year, on March 22, Massachusetts State Troopers in Haverhill, Mass. arrested Williams on firearms violations. At the time he was arrested his bail was set at $10,000. Williams was supposed to appear in court in Massachusetts Wednesday, the same day he is suspected of killing a Maine Deputy.
Governor Paul LePage sent his condolences to the family of Corporal Eugene Cole, and law enforcement agencies across the state also echoed the sentiments.
The last Maine law enforcement officer to die in a shooting was Giles Landry. Detective Landry was shot to death on March 31, 1989 while investigating a child abuse complaint in Leeds. The gunman also killed a woman who had been talking to Detective Landry before turning the gun on himself. Landry joined the Maine State Police in 1976 and was promoted to Detective in 1988.
Fryeburg Police Officer Nate Desjardins was killed in the line of duty June 6, 2017 in a boat crash in Fryeburg. Desjardins was on his first day of water rescue training. He is Maine's 84th law enforcement line of duty death.
The first line of duty death in Maine was Ebenezer Parker, who was killed in 1808 while working for the Cumberland County Sheriff's Department.