KTRK-TV(NASSAU BAY, Texas) — The mayor of Nassau Bay, Texas, is calling it a “nightmare scenario” after a police sergeant was killed Tuesday night when a suspect she was trying to arrest struck her with his vehicle.
Sgt. Kaila Sullivan, 43, was one of several officers performing a traffic stop on a vehicle at an apartment complex in Nassau Bay, southeast of Houston, police said.
When officers determined that the suspect was wanted on a warrant for assaulting a family member, they moved to arrest him.
The suspect began fighting with the officers, then broke free and got back into his vehicle, Nassau Bay police Chief Tim Cromie told reporters in a late-night press conference.
The suspect then struck Sullivan as he was driving away, Cromie said.
Sullivan was taken by ambulance to HCA Clear Lake Hospital, where she died from her injuries.
“This a nightmare scenario for our city,” said Nassau Bay Mayor Mark Denman, who said it was the first time a Nassau Bay officer had even been seriously injured or killed in the line of duty. “We’re a very safe city and I know we’ll catch the suspect.”
The suspect appeared to have abandoned his vehicle near the scene of the traffic stop, and was now the subject of a multiple-agency search, police said.
Sullivan would have marked her 16th anniversary with the Nassau Bay Police Department on Dec. 27, according to Cromie.
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