September 18, 2009
Shooting details emerge
Police identify officers present when Jones was shot approaching suspect's vehicle
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"I don't think they would have ever put another officer, especially one they work with every day, in danger if they knew that he was there."

Rutherford said it's unrealistic to speculate over whether officers should have simply tried to wound Good to stop him. Good was inside the truck, in the dark, with only his head and shoulders visible.

He said trying to shoot out the tires of the pickup truck would not have been a good idea. Officers didn't have time, and Rutherford said shooting at the tires can be dangerous to innocent bystanders.

"That is one of the last resorts that you do," Rutherford said. "You don't know what's going to ricochet or who it's going to endanger."

Police officers are trained to stop a threat, and shoot until the threat is over. Rutherford said the officers had to make decisions in less than a second, with a truck barreling down on them.

"You don't have time to think, 'I'll aim for the arm,'" the sheriff said. "You aim for the mass. You have to stop him, period."

Saturday evening, Good rammed his truck into the car of a woman he knew at about 9 p.m., Webster said Sunday. He led police on a chase, which was eventually called off, he said.

State Police had tried to use a tire spike strip to stop Good, to no avail, Rutherford said.

After midnight Saturday, Patrolman Jones spotted the suspect's truck on the East End, Webster said. He pursued the car from the intersection of Washington Street and Ruffner Avenue to Greenbrier Street, then onto Quick Road, Webster said. The suspect had a female passenger in the car, he said.

During Jones' chase of Good from Charleston to the parking lot on Quick Road, the woman in the car threw things out of the vehicle to stop police, Webster said. The woman has yet to be identified or charged.

Chip Ellis | Gazette photo

A large rock serves as a makeshift memorial near the spot where Patrolman Jerry Jones and Brian Scott Good were killed.

Chris Dorst | Gazette photo

Black wreaths and flowers memorialize Charleston Police Patrolman Jerry Jones, who was killed in a parking lot along Quick Road in a friendly fire incident on Sunday.

Reach Gary Harki at gha...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-5163.

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