3rd Colorado shooting victim ID'd; $10K reward offered
LOVELAND, Colo. -Police in Northern Colorado said there is no direct link - but several similarities - between the murder this week of a 65-year-old man in Loveland and two apparently random shootings in the region that authorities say are connected, reports CBS Denver.
Just before 11 p.m. on Wednesday officers responded to a call of a man bleeding from gunshot wounds and lying on the sidewalk.
Emergency responders tried to save the man, but he died there. He's been identified as William Roger Connole Jr., of Loveland. The coroner said Connole's cause of death was a gunshot wound. Police are calling the case as a homicide, and say a task force is now trying to determine if there is any connection to two recently linked shootings in Northern Colorado that have authorities concerned.
"There are enough likenesses to this case that we, as an agency, immediately reached out to the task force that is assigned to investigate this and other crimes with us," Loveland Police Chief Luke Hecker told the station.
Police and the FBI have refused to comment on the possibility of a serial shooter. But they have offered a $10,000 reward for information on the first two unsolved shootings that authorities say are related - though they haven't said how.
CBS Denver reports that bicyclist John Jacoby was found dead May 18 along a rural road in Windsor, and motorist Cori Romero was driving on Interstate 25 on April 22 when she was shot in the neck and survived.
All three shootings, including the Loveland killing, occurred within 15 miles of each other.
Family and neighbors say Connole had survived cancer and often took late-night walks through his quiet neighborhood.
Sadie Rogers, 15, said Connole was her grandfather and had worked for years in the computer industry before taking a job at Home Depot. She said the nighttime walks helped him sleep after work.