Tragic Shooting, Suspect Dials 911

A Turner County (SD) sheriff’s dispatcher answered 911 call last Sunday morning to hear a man say, “A cop walked into my house and I shot him.” The caller, later identified as Ethan Johns, 19, hung up the phone and fled the rural farmhouse, leaving behind Dep. Chad Mechels slumped over in his patrol car. Arriving police rushed Mechels to a hospital, but he did not survive two gunshot wounds, one to the arm and one to the throat. Johns later turned himself to sheriff’s deputies in an adjacent county and was charged with murder. Sheriff’s investigators filed court documents that showed the dispatcher asked Johns, “How do you know it was an officer?” Johns told the dispatcher, “Cause he started shooting back at me.” Read more about the incident and watch a TV report here.