Cop Kills Five, Then Self

A police officer wanted in a shooting rampage that killed five people was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound Wednesday about 15 miles away, authorities said.

Edward Lutes, a Seaside Heights police officer for 15 years, was found dead in his car in Barnegat Township at about 10 a.m., said Greg Sakowicz, the executive assistant Ocean County prosecutor. He did not say who found the body.

Several police officers stood early Wednesday afternoon near the 1995 Buick Regal, which was parked in the driveway of a home. The front passenger door was open and a rifle sat on the front seat; a computer printout of an American Flag was taped inside the back window.

Lutes was wanted for a shooting late Tuesday night in Dover Township, a New Jersey shore community that is still reeling from a February rampage in which a retired police officer allegedly killed four people, including his granddaughter.

Police said Lutes shot five of his neighbors, including two people who lived next door to him and three who were in a house across the street. Lutes later went to nearby Barnegat Township and shot Seaside Heights Police Chief James Costello as he was leaving his house, police said.

Another man was shot in Dover Township and taken to Community Medical Center in Toms River. Police did not say exactly where the man was when he was shot.

Authorities would not provide a motive for the shootings.

"We have our suspicions. We're fleshing them out," Sakowicz said.

Costello was taken to Jersey Shore Medical Center in Neptune, where he was listed in satisfactory condition. He was shot twice in the leg and once in the wrist.

From his hospital room Wednesday morning, Costello said he could not explain the rampage.

"I really don't know. He's a very close friend of mine," said Costello, the chief in the New Jersey shore town for seven years.

Lutes fled the scene and was armed, authorities said. More than 100 officers searched for him for about 12 hours.

Autopsies were scheduled for later Wednesday for Lutes and the five victims. It wasn't immediately known what time Lutes killed himself.

The shootings happened about a mile from the street where John E. Mabie allegedly killed his granddaughter and three neighbors on Feb. 21 as he went from house to house shooting a .38-caliber revolver.

"It's just a sad time for the community," Dover Township Police Chief Michael Mastronardy said.

Steve Rizzolo said Wednesday he moved into the neighborhood 10 years ago, about the same time that Lutes did. Lutes lived in a a beige two-story house; neighbors said he had a daughter and two stepsons.

"He used to walk his dog down the street, and he'd say hello. He wouldn't go by without saying hello," said Rizzolo, who described Lutes as a "real neighborhood guy."

Several parents, including neighbor Karen Picht, waited with their children at school bus stops in the neighborhood Wednesday morning. Picht, whose 12-year-old daughter sometimes played with Lutes' daughter, said she normally wouldn't accompany her daughter in the mornings but she was concerned since the two neighborhood shootings.

"To do something like that, they snap," Picht said.

In another multiple shooting this year, six people were shot to death Feb. 4-5 in two towns near Camden. Four were killed at one home and two were killed the next day in an apartment complex. A 16-year-old boy, the nephew of one of the victims, was arrested.

Article continues below

---

advertisement

---

Author: 6 ABC-AP