By Allen Reed
Associated Press
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Law enforcement officers fatally shot a handcuffed parolee after he opened fire from the back of a patrol car in central Arkansas, a corrections official said Wednesday.
Corrections and sheriff’s officers were looking for an unrelated suspect Tuesday night when they searched Jonathan McIntosh in Cabot and discovered he was in possession of a white powder, Arkansas Department of Community Correction Deputy Director Dina Tyler.
They found no gun on McIntosh, who was on parole for a firearm possession conviction, Tyler said.
The officers cuffed the 35-year-old man’s hands behind his back and put him in the back of the Lonoke County Sheriff’s Department patrol car, she said.
McIntosh somehow got his cuffed hands in front of him and when two ADCC officers returned to the vehicle for follow up questions, he started shooting at them with a subcompact pistol, Tyler said.
It’s unclear where the gun came from.
The two officers and one sheriff’s department employee returned fire. McIntosh was shot multiple times and died at a hospital, Tyler said. No officers were injured.
Arkansas State Police is investigating the shooting. Agency spokesman Bill Sadler declined to comment about the weapon.
The shooting occurred near a residential area along main street, a few blocks from both Cabot High School and Eastside Elementary School. Cabot is 25 miles northeast of Little Rock.
McIntosh was set to finish parole on July 2 and had caused little trouble for law enforcement while in the corrections system, Tyler said. He was employed and had no disciplinary action in prison or since his parole in September 2014. He wasn’t allowed to possess firearms due to previous convictions including drug possession and theft by receiving.
The ADCC officers have been placed on administrative duties while state police investigate the shooting. The status of the sheriff’s department employee is unclear. A sheriff’s department spokesman didn’t immediately return a call from the Associated Press on Wednesday.