ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, March 25, 1996 TAG: 9603250095
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CHRISTOPHER RICKETT STAFF WRITER
note: lede
A Northwest Roanoke man was shot to death Sunday evening by police after officers responded to a 911 call at his home regarding a domestic dispute, Chief M. David Hooper said.
Hooper told a Sunday night news conference that Edwin L. Plunkett, 35, was dead at the scene after he displayed and aimed a .270-caliber hunting rifle at two officers who had planned to arrest him on assault charges. Plunkett did not fire his weapon, the police chief said.
Officers T.D. Kanode and G.F. Bigeman responded shortly after 6 p.m. Sunday to the 911 call from Plunkett's residence by a woman police described as a live-in girlfriend. The woman, whom police did not identify, went to a Roanoke hospital for treatment.
Police met the woman at a neighbor's house. She told them Plunkett had been beating her, Hooper said. The officers then went to Plunkett's home and told him to leave his house. They also said he was going to be arrested.
It was then, Hooper said, that Plunkett, who was standing in his own doorway, brandished the hunting rifle, which had one cartridge in it, and put his finger on the trigger. The officers then shot several times at Plunkett. Hooper said the precise number of bullets fired was not known.
Although an investigation into the officers' actions is to continue, Hooper said all indications were that the officers acted properly.
"We have no reason to believe [the investigation] will indicate anything other than what we are telling you," he said.
Hooper said police, including one of the officers involved in Sunday's incident, had been sent to Plunkett's home in the 100 block of Cherryhill Circle before, but he did not describe the nature of past runs.
The officers are on administrative leave for at least 72 hours following the shooting; they are in debriefing, Hooper said. The case will be assigned to the commonwealth's attorney, and an autopsy is planned.
In four other incidents since 1989, Roanoke police have shot and killed armed suspects who made threatening actions. All the shootings were ruled to have been justified:
* In February 1989, Robert Stephen Moran was killed outside a Roanoke nightspot after he grabbed a police officer's service revolver and fired at least one shot during a struggle.
* In December 1989, Larry Houchins Williams was shot to death after he opened a motel door and pointed a pistol at a police officer who was responding to reports of gunshots in the parking lot.
* In March 1991, Leonard A. Morris was shot nine times in his Arbutus Avenue home after he stabbed one officer and charged two others. Police had gone to Morris' home because he was a suspect in a stabbing and sexual assault.
* In September 1994, Gary Wayne West was shot nine times by Roanoke police after he leveled a loaded shotgun at officers during a two-hour standoff on Williamson Road.
In an incident in May 1993, Eric Scott Lee died from asphyxiation after city police struggled with him and one officer applied a choke hold.
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