Evan Ebel, 28, was gunned down by officers in north Texas this afternoon after he shot and wounded a sheriff's deputy and led police on a dramatic 100mph chase during which he repeatedly fired out the window at the squad cars pursuing him.
Ebel's black Cadillac sedan with Colorado license plates matches the description of the car seen fleeing the home of Tom Clements, Colorado's top prisons official, who was shot dead when he answered his door at his home in Monument, Colorado, on Tuesday.
Ebel is a member of '211 Crew,' a white supremacist prison gang that has been responsible for numerous high-profile crimes in Colorado. He was on parole after he was convicted of robbery.
Ebel was shot in the head and is 'basically legally dead,' police say
Suspect: Detectives are investigating whether Evan Spencer Ebel, 28, (left) a member of the Colorado prison gang '211 Crew' was responsible for the murder of state prisons chief Tom Clements (right)
'Basically dead': Emergency personnel carry the suspect away on a stretcher after he was shot in the head following a 100mph police chase
Wrecked: The suspect's black Cadillac, which matches the description of the car seen fleeing the home of murdered Colorado prisons chief Tom Clements, is seen after it collided with a tractor trailer rig during a police chase
Detectives from Colorado are traveling to Texas to investigate whether there is any evidence tying Ebel to the death of Clements, 58.
Investigators also suspect he could be behind the murder of a pizza delivery driver who was gunned down in Denver on Sunday.
Wise County Sheriff David Walker said at a press conference this afternoon that the suspect is 'basically legally dead,' although he remains hooked to equipment for organ harvesting at a Fort Worth hospital.
The showdown began about 11am 675 miles away from Clements murder scene when Montague County sheriff's deputy James Boyd pulled Ebel over for a routine traffic stop. The suspect opened fire and shot Boyd three times, twice in the chest and once in the head.
Boyd was wearing a bulletproof vest, which stopped two of the rounds and likely saved his life, authorities say. The third bullet only graved his head. He is recovered at a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
The deputy was able to give other police in the area a description of the suspect who shot him, and a Texas State Trooper caught up with the car in Wise County.
The suspect fled and stuck his arm out the window and fired about 30 rounds at the squad cars pursuing him.
Long journey: Ebel was killed 650 miles from Monument, Colorado, where prisons chief Tom Clements was murdered
Fiery wreck: Ebel's Cadillac burst into flames when it struck a tractor trailer rig during a high speed chase with officers
'He shot at me at least four times. It looks like he hit my front tire,' Decatur, Texas, Police Chief Rex Hoskins told the Wise County Messenger.
The chase ended when the driver smashed into tractor trailer rig and his car burst into flames in Decatur in Wise County.
He jumped out of the car and opened fire on officer. Police returned fire and shot him in the head.
Ebel no identification on him and police used his fingerprints to confirm who he was.
'211 Crew,' named after the California penal code for armed robbery, recruits its members in prison. Once released, they join up with the gang's drug and gun running operations on the outside, the Denver Post reports.
Police have previously said they were investigating Homaidan al-Turki, a convicted sex offender of Saudi descent, after Clement denied the inmate’s request to serve the rest of his sentence in his native country, citing al-Turki's refusal to complete a treatment program.
Detectives are examining whether Clements was killed by a hired assassin.
Sheriff's Lt. Jeff Kramer said Clements was shot at around 8.30pm Tuesday when he answered his front door in Monument, north of Colorado Springs.
Shattered family: Clements is survived by his wife, Lisa, far right, and two daughters
Witness: Lisa Clements, left, was home at the time of her husband's deadly shooting but said she did not see the gunman
A family member called 911 to report the shooting. Officers who arrived on the scene found Clements dead from a gunshot wound to the chest in his home, 9News reported.
Al-Turki, a well-known member of Denver's Muslim community, was convicted in state court in 2006 of unlawful sexual contact by use of force, theft and extortion and sentenced to 28 years to life in prison.
Prosecutors said al-Turki kept a housekeeper a virtual slave for four years in his home and sexually assaulted her. A judge reduced the sentence to eight years to life.
Al-Turki insisted the case was politically motivated. He owned a company that some years ago sold The Lives of the Prophets CDs, a series of incendiary sermons recorded by Anwar al-Awlaki, killed in a drone strike in Yemen in 2011.
Al-Turki's conviction angered Saudi officials and prompted the US State Department to send Colorado Attorney General John Suthers to Saudi Arabia to meet with King Abdullah, Crown Prince Sultan and al-Turki's family.
Anonymous sources have told Fox31 Denver that al-Turki's influential relatives in Saudi Arabia have long been putting pressure on Colorado officials to send him back home.
Crime scene: Clements was found dead from a gunshot wound to the chest at his wooded home in Monument, Colorado (pictured)
Hunt: Searchers use a dog to comb through the area around the Monument, Colo. home of Colorado Department of Corrections Executive Director Tom Clements
Clements lived in a wooded neighborhood of large, two-story houses on expansive 2-acre lots dotted with evergreen trees in an area known as the Black Forest. Long driveways connect the homes to narrow, winding roads that thread the hills. Clements' home was out of view, behind a barricaded of crime-scene tape in the road.
It would have been simple to find where Clements lived. It took two clicks to get his correct street address through a publicly available internet locator service this morning. The listing also included his previous home address in Missouri.
Gov. John Hickenlooper appointed Clements to the post in January 2011 after he served for 31 years in the Missouri Department of Corrections. He replaced Ari Zavaras, a former Denver police chief who led the department under two governors.
The department with an annual budget of over $700million operates 20 adult prisons and a juvenile detainment system.
Gov. John Hickenlooper was red-eyed and somber Wednesday at a news conference in which he said he doesn't think the killing was part of any larger attack against his cabinet.
'Tom Clements dedicated his life to being a public servant, to making our state better, to making the wold a better place. And he is going to be deeply, deeply missed.
‘His unfailing good nature would come through in everything that he did and the depth of his caring about again not just the people that he worked with,’ said Hickenlooper. 'But the inmates that were there, about those of us here that he worked with was remarkable.’
In a statement released earlier in the day and sent to 6,000 department employees, Hickenlooper said he was in disbelief over the killing.
Target: Colorado authorities are looking for a dark-colored 'boxy,' dark-colored, two-door 1990s-model car with green dashboard light seen idling for 15 minutes near Clements' house
Cordoned off: A police vehicle blocks the road to the home of the head of Colorado's prison system, who was shot and killed in Monument
‘Last night, Tom Clements was killed at his home in Monument. I can hardly believe it, let alone write words to describe it,’ Hickenlooper wrote.
‘As your executive director, he helped change and improve (the department) in two years more than most people could do in eight years. He was unfailingly kind and thoughtful, and sought the “good” in any situation.
‘I am so sad. I have never worked with a better person than Tom, and I can't imagine our team without him,’ Hickenlooper said.
Clements is survived by his wife, Lisa, who is director of the state Office of Behavioral Health, and their two daughters, Rachel and Sara. Hickenlooper asked the public to respect their privacy.
somber: Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper appeared emotional and red-eyed during a press conference about Clements' shooting, saying that he dedicated his life to being a public servant
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