NORWICH, Conn. -- The 30-year-old man who shot a city police officer Monday night died of a self-inflicted gunshot, according to state police.
Police sources say that Jason Razzino had at least three weapons - a Mini-14 rifle and two handguns. He began firing at the police when they arrived, state police said.
Officer Jonathan Ley was wounded during the exchange of gunfire, police said. The condition of Ley, who was shot multiple times, has been upgraded from critical to serious. Ley was initially taken to The William W. Backus Hospital and later flown by Life Star to Yale-New Haven Hospital.
Three officers were also injured during the standoff. Two sustained injuries from bullet fragments and one who fell down a flight of stairs.
Norwich police said state police are now in charge of investigating the shooting. A state(Norwich suspect, Page 4)
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police Major Crime Squad van was at the scene this morning.
Razzino does not appear to have a criminal record in Connecticut. He is originally from Rhode Island and it appears that he had only motor vehicle violations in that state.
Ley was shot multiple times while responding to a report of a "despondent, suicidal" man at the Cedar Glen Apartments on Cedar Street.
Police are still blocking off the apartment complex to the public.
The armed standoff that began Monday afternoon ended early this morning.
Witnesses said Ley was conscious, talking and squeezing thehand of one of his fellow officers as he was carried him out of the building after he was shot. Witnesses said he appeared to have been shot in the neck, shoulder and leg.
A woman who lives in the 63unit, four- building complex, said she heard the gunman yell, "I wish it was his head."
Ley served in the U.S. Coast Guard and had been a Coast Guard reservist including an assignment in Bayonne, N.J., after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and in Kuwait in 2009. He has been a member of the police department since 1998 and in 2009 received a lifesaving award.
Police said at about 2:45 p.m., they received a report of a personannouncing an intention " to commit suicide-by-cop," a threat to provoke police into killing him. Officers set up a perimeter and began to attempt to communicate with the gunman. State police also responded with troopers and specialized equipment.
Beginning about 3: 55 p. m., police said several shots were fired and the Norwich officer was struck a number of times. One witness said he heard police officers yell: "We need more guns" after Ley was shot.
Apartment complex residents reported hearing about 30 shots that sounded as if they came from a rifle and handgun.
At the same time, a 14-year-old girl who lives in the apartmentcomplex suffered a seizure after she saw the shot officer and had to be brought to the hospital, according to her father, Steven Bartlett.
" It was crazy. I'll doubt I'll sleep tonight," he said.
Large numbers of local and state police officers, as well as several ambulances, descended on the complex as residents were evacuated. Some residents said police told them to stay close to the building and the run for safety.
Kelly Middle School was opened to house evacuees who needed shelter. According to Sue Rochester-Bolen, the head of the local chapter of the American Red Cross, there were 13 people at the shelter Monday night.
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