The attorney general’s office is investigating a police officer’s use of deadly force after a shooting suspect died by suicide in Hampton this weekend.
At around 1:19 a.m. on Sunday morning, officers responded to a report of shots fired near a convenience store on Ocean Boulevard, where they found a 23-year-old man and a 25-year-old woman suffering from gunshot wounds, according to the attorney general’s office.
Police located a man who “matched the description” of the suspect for that shooting a block away, at the intersection of P Street and Ashworth Avenue, authorities said.
During that interaction, Tyshawn Cooper, a 28-year-old from Taylors, South Carolina, raised a gun and shot himself in the head. A police officer, whose name has not been disclosed, fired a shot simultaneously.
Cooper died at the scene, and the state medical examiner ruled his death a suicide. The man and woman who were shot are still in the hospital, according to a Monday afternoon update from the attorney general’s office.
Cooper was serving active duty in the U.S. Navy as an information systems technician on the USS Hampton, which is currently undergoing maintenance in Portsmouth. State agencies are coordinating their investigation with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.
The attorney general’s office investigates every use of deadly force by law enforcement and will do so in this case even though the officer’s shot wasn’t the one that killed Cooper.
State law allows police to use lethal force if they reasonably believe their lives or the lives of others are in danger, and the attorney general almost always rules that they are legally justified.
This is the seventh time that New Hampshire police officers have used deadly force this year.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated with new information provided by the attorney general’s office.
