CLEVELAND (AP) - A man has been arrested and is expected to be charged in the hit-and-run death of a Cleveland patrolman on an interstate, Cleveland police said Tuesday.
The 44-year-old man was arrested in Lorain, about 30 miles west of Cleveland, hours after Patrolman David Fahey was struck around 6 a.m. Tuesday in the westbound lanes of Interstate 90 in Cleveland.
Fahey, 39, was setting down road flares at the time because of two previous accidents on the freeway. Rocky River firefighters and police had responded to a single-car crash when a van drove into the back of a firetruck, killing the van’s driver and hospitalizing a passenger.
A Cleveland police spokeswoman said prosecutors will be consulted about possible charges in the officer’s death, including aggravated vehicular homicide.
Cleveland Police Patrolmen’s Association President Steve Loomis said officers took Fahey’s handcuffs from the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office to use on the suspect, who surrendered to police at gunpoint after a U.S. Department of Homeland Security agent spotted his car in the driveway of a home. Officers from several agencies had searched for the white Toyota Camry that struck Fahey.
Fahey joined the Cleveland Police Department in July 2014. His step-father is a retired Cleveland police lieutenant, his brother is a Cleveland officer and his mother once worked for the department, Loomis said. Fahey was a Navy veteran who spent several years as Cleveland paramedic before joining the police department, Loomis said.
Fahey is the first Cleveland police officer to die in the line of duty since Patrolman Derek Owens was shot and killed by a suspect he was chasing on foot in 2008.
An Ohio State Highway Patrol Trooper was struck and killed on I-90 last year near where Fahey was killed.
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