Tampa Airport Police Shoot Homicide Suspect

[BayCityBrawler]

Domestic dispute turns fatal inside Tampa Airport parking garage
an ABC Action News report 06/27/05 - updated 3:44 p.m.

TAMPA - A domestic dispute turned violent inside a parking garage at Tampa International Airport today, leaving one person dead and another in the hospital.

The fatal shooting began as a dispute on the fourth floor of the long-term parking garage. Airport police responded to calls of a domestic dispute in progress and found the involved couple on the seventh floor of the garage.

In front of three officers, the man fatally shot the woman. They ordered him to stop and freeze, but he turned his gun toward them and fired at least two shots. The officers, in turn, fired at least three times, hitting the man, who was taken to St. Joe's Hospital in unknown condition.

No further details were available, and the couple has not yet been publicly identified.

Action News has a crew at the airport. Details are still sketchy, but we'll have more information here online as we get it.

[BayCityBrawler]

Update

Domestic dispute turns fatal inside Tampa Airport parking garage
an ABC Action News report 06/27/05 - updated 6:01 p.m.






TAMPA - A mother of three is dead after a domestic dispute turned violent inside a parking garage at Tampa International Airport.

Lori Nielsen of Port Charlotte put her three children on a plane to Connecticut late Monday morning, then returned to her car in the parking garage to find her soon-to-be killer waiting for her. Airport police were summoned to the scene just after noon by passers-by who were concerned about what they were seeing.

"A citizen saw what appeared to be a domestic. Then we received a second call that said that the male had a gun," airport police chief Paul Sireci stated.

Officers scoured the parking garage's upper floors before they found a gunman and the woman he was chasing on the seventh floor.

"At that point, three officers witnessed the suspect male, in a domestic with the female, actually shoot her," Tampa police spokesman Joe Durkin explained.

As Nielsen lay dying, her killer took aim at the officers and fired a single shot.



The victim's car remained roped off by crime scene tape Monday evening.
"The three officers, in fear for their lives and already in fear for the victim's life, returned fire, striking the suspect," Durkin continued.

It was too late to save the 38-year-old, who literally ran out of her shoes trying to escape her assailant. Along with her flip-flops, Nielsen's purse lay on her trunk next to her open cell phone, which rang throughout the afternoon. The gray Mercury Sable was parked one floor below where the gunman caught up with her.

Tampa police had not publicly identified the gunman Monday evening, but they said he was also from the Port Charlotte area and has a criminal record. He was said to be in critical condition at St. Joe's late Monday.

The three officers were placed on paid administrative leave pending an investigation