A New Jersey police officer pursuing a carload of robbery suspects early Sunday morning shot and wounded one of the suspects after they crashed their car into a house and fled, officials said.
The incident began at about 7 a.m. when a woman told a Newark police lieutenant in a marked SUV that she had been robbed at gunpoint, according to the Essex County prosecutor's office.
The lieutenant spotted the suspect's car in the area of 15th Street and drove toward the vehicle, which sped away. After a short chase, the suspect's car slammed into a house at the corner of 13th Avenue and South 6th Street, police said.
Five people spilled out of the car and ran. The lieutenant chased three, who fled north on South 6th Street.
A short distance from the crash site, one suspect with a gun turned toward the lieutenant, who then fired one round which struck the suspect in the chest, investigators said.
The wounded man was taken to University Hospital. Information about his condition wasn't available.
Two other suspects were apprehended and two are at large, police said. The vehicle they crashed had been reported stolen, police said.
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Police haven't released the identities of the suspects. The name of the lieutenant, a 25-year veteran of the force, was being withheld for security reasons, police said.
