According to authorities, a sheriff’s deputy in Wisconsin was shot and killed while responding to a report of an intoxicated driver stuck in a ditch near Glenwood, Wisconsin on Saturday night.
Deputy Kaitie Leising, 29, arrived at the scene around 6:15 p.m., where she found a car in a ditch and another vehicle with people who had stopped to assist. Leising asked the driver of the car in the ditch, 34-year-old Jeremiah Johnson, to perform a field sobriety test, but he was ‘evasive,’ authorities sa
id. After speaking with Johnson for about eight minutes, he pulled out a handgun and shot her. Leising returned fire, but none of her shots hit Johnson.
Good Samaritans who had stopped to help tried to save Leising’s life, but she was declared dead at a nearby hospital, according to the Wisconsin Department of Justice.
Officers combed the surrounding woods for the suspect, and about an hour after Leising was shot, an officer spotted Johnson, heard a gunshot, and saw him fall to the ground.
Johnson was found dead with a handgun next to him, and no officers fired their weapons while searching for him, according to the DOJ.
At the time of the incident, Johnson was on supervised release for kidnapping and criminal sexual misconduct.
Deputy Leising leaves behind a husband and a son.
The motive for the shooting is still under investigation.
Officers saluted and people filled nearly every overpass on Interstate 94 as the body of Deputy Kaitie Leising was brought back to Wisconsin this afternoon.
Deputy Leising was shot and killed in the line of duty on Saturday evening.
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— Nick Streiff (@nickstreiff) May 8, 2023
