Canberk Yüksel
19 July 2016•Update: 20 July 2016
NEW YORK
The FBI is working to determine if Gavin Long had any help when he killed three law enforcement officials in Louisiana, the bureau said Monday.
"We are committing all resources to identify co-conspirators or facilitators,” FBI's special agent Jeff Sallet said during a press conference.
The 29-year-old Long was identified by authorities as the alleged shooter in the attack Sunday in Baton Rouge.
The former Iraq war Marine sergeant managed to wound three other officers before being shot dead by police, according to authorities. One officer remains in critical condition.
"We’re confident this was the only shooter at the scene," Louisiana State Police Superintendent Col. Mike Edmonson said Monday. "His intentions were accurate and they were all aimed at law enforcement officers."
Describing the shooting as ''chilling in its sheer brutality," Edmonson said "these officers were intentionally targeted and assassinated."
Police Chief Carl Dabadie said the shooter ''was not going to stop here.
"After he was finished here I have no doubt he was heading to our headquarters, and he was going to take more lives,'' he said. ''Our 'militarized tactics,' as they're being called, saved lives here. That shot that our S.W.A.T. team made was a hell of a shot."
Following attempts to quell protests against police brutality across the U.S. in recent years, police departments have faced greater public scrutiny from the minority communities that complain of law enforcement using military weapons against residents.
President Barack Obama on Monday ordered all flags on federal buildings to be flown at half-mast. They had already been in that position to honor the victims of a terror attack in France last that killed at least 84 victims.
The shooting Sunday comes amid rising tension between law enforcement and the black community in the city and less than two weeks after the controversial shooting on July 5 of Alton Sterling, a 37-year-old black man, by two white police officers in Baton Rouge that helped spark nationwide protests.
Hours before Monday's press conference in Louisiana, a judge in Baltimore, Maryland, handed down a not guilty ruling in a case against the highest-ranking officer on trial of a black man who died in police custody after suffering a spinal injury.
Judge Barry Williams cleared Lt. Brian Rice, of involuntary manslaughter, reckless endangerment and misconduct in office in connection with the arrest and death of Freddie Gray last year in the city.
Shortly after the verdict was announced, the White House said it expects individuals who might have concerns with the court's decision to "register those concerns peacefully”, apparently attempting to mitigate any potentially violent reactions to the verdict as tensions run high from a string of police killings of black men by police officers.
