Source: Fitch Told Officer 'I Hate Cops & I'm Guilty'
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- While lying in a hospital bed at Regions Hospital earlier this week, the man suspected of killing Officer Scott Patrick looked another officer in the eye and said, "I hate cops and I'm guilty," sources tell WCCO-TV's Liz Collin.
Charges are expected to be released on Friday against Brian George Fitch Sr., 39, who has been described by authorities as a "career criminal."
Police say that Fitch shot Patrick, 47, a 19-year veteran of the Mendota Heights Police Department, on Wednesday afternoon during a routine traffic stop.
That evening, a number of police officers were involved in a standoff with Fitch, who was holed up inside a Hyundai Veracruz with another woman, later identified as 36-year-old Kelly Lee Hardy. Police said Fitch fired several rounds at officers, and they returned fire.
Sources told WCCO that Fitch showed no sign of either giving up or surrendering. An officer said he was ducking up and down in the seat while firing.
According to WCCO's source, Hardy was hit and rolled out of the SUV, and that she told officers that Fitch would never come out of the vehicle. SWAT officers using an armed vehicle eventually managed to apprehend Fitch, who had been shot several times.
He was taken to Regions Hospital. While under watch by a St. Paul Police officer, sources told WCCO, Fitch looked directly at the officer and said, "Just to let you know, I hate cops and I'm guilty."
Last night, Reg Chapman interviewed one of Fitch's exes, Kate Oney. She said that she was one of three people inside the duplex on Robert Street in St. Paul that heavily-armed police surrounded for hours following Patrick's death.
She says she's known Fitch for more than 15 years. They dated for a couple of years and since then have been close friends.
The Dakota County Attorney's Office and Ramsey County Attorney's Office will host a joint news conference at 2 p.m. Friday in West St. Paul, where Fitch will be formally charged in connection with Patrick's shooting death.