Moneta, VA – A license plate reader used by Virginia State Police helped spot the car the Virginia TV shooter suspect was driving.
Authorities say the suspect in the on-air fatal shooting of two journalists was found by Virginia state troopers after he switched from his vehicle to a rental car he’d gotten earlier this month.
A Virginia state trooper located him driving on the interstate using license plate recognition equipment.
State Police Sgt. Rick Garletts says the trooper followed Flanagan until backup arrived, then turned on her flashing lights. The suspect tried to evade her but after a couple of minutes, he ran off the road into the median.
The suspect, 41-year-old Vester Flanagan, shot himself as police pursued him on the Virginia highway hours after the shooting. Flanagan, who was African-American, died later at a hospital, police said.
Franklin County Sheriff Bill Overton says Flanagan fled the scene of the shooting, at a mall where the journalists were doing an interview, before deputies arrived. Shortly before 11 a.m., Roanoke police found his Ford Mustang at the city’s airport. The Mustang is being treated as evidence.
Overton says Flanagan then left the airport in the Chevy Sonic he’d rented earlier in the month.
The journalists who were killed were reporter Alison Parker, 24, and cameraman Adam Ward, 27. Both journalists were white, as is a woman who they were interviewing. The woman was wounded and was in stable condition, a hospital spokesman said.
As reported by Vos Iz Neias