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2nd LD Writethru: Suspect in custody for killing two U.S. police officers in "ambush-style" attacks

Xinhua, November 3, 2016 Adjust font size:

A suspect who may have gunned down and killed two U.S. police officers when they were sitting in their cars in central Iowa early Wednesday is now in custody, local police said.

Scott Michael Greene, 46, is the suspect in the two ambush-style fatal shootings, the Urbandale and Des Moines police departments said in a statement earlier, noting he was last seen driving a blue Ford F-150 with a silver-colored topper.

He was detained in Dallas County and will be returned to Des Moines for questioning, said the police.

Schools in the area are all closed on Wednesday due to the shootings while a sweeping search for the suspect was underway, involving law enforcement officers from multiple agencies.

The officers "were gunned down when they were sitting in their cars" in two separate locations in Des Moines, the largest city in the state of Iowa, Sgt. Paul Parizek, spokesman for the Des Moines Police Department, said at a news conference after the shootings. He also said there didn't appear to have been any interaction between these officers and the person who shot them.

"We're not anywhere close to that," he later said, referring to the suspect's motive. "We may never know what motivated this act."

One of the officers was fatally shot next to the Urbandale High School, the other was killed two miles away and 20 minutes later.

A video uploaded to YouTube last month by an account named Scott Greene was titled "Police Abuse, Civil Rights Violation at Urbandale High School" and appeared to show a person arguing with police officers asking him to leave the area, according to a Washington Post report.

In the video, the man recording the footage is heard telling the police that he was assaulted and almost mugged while "peacefully protesting" at what appears to be a high school. An officer is later seen explaining that the Confederate battle flag he was waving violated the school's code, said the report.

Killings of police, especially in apparent ambush-style, have risen in the United States this year that has also witnessed increasing tension between the black community and police across the country. Endi