The message came over Sussex County s fire/EMS radio channel just after 7:53 p.m. Thursday. Police action for gunshots, 19540 Coastal Highway, Econo Lodge, the dispatcher said urgently. Medics requested.
Responding paramedics rushed to the motel near Rehoboth Beach, but they were too late.
Police were already on their way to Beebe Healthcare with a Milford police officer who had been shot multiple times by a fugitive he was trying to apprehend. And the suspect, a 37-year-old wanted for attempted murder in Pennsylvania, was dead.
A day later, it remains unclear exactly how the incident outside the Econo Lodge Inn and Suites Resort unfolded. But witnesses said it happened quickly – and chaotically.