Kentucky church shooting leaves three dead, including suspect

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(Reuters) -A gunman killed two women at a church in Kentucky and shot and wounded a state trooper outside an airport on Sunday before police were able to shoot him to death, authorities said.

The women were killed at the Richmond Road Baptist Church in Lexington. Two men were also wounded there, including one who was in critical condition, Lexington Police Chief Lawrence Weathers told an afternoon press conference.

Authorities did not provide the suspect’s name or age.

“There are days like today that are extremely difficult,” Weathers said. “Sometimes things happen, you just don’t have a reason why.”

The suspect fired at the trooper after being pulled over near Blue Grass Airport at about 11:30 a.m. in Fayette County, Weathers said. The shooting happened on a road that rings the airport but was not connected to its operations, police said.

The trooper was being treated at a nearby hospital and was in stable condition.

The suspect then carjacked a vehicle about 10 miles (16 km) from the airport and fled to Richmond Road Baptist Church, where the individual began firing at people on the church grounds.

Police tracked the location of the carjacked vehicle to the church.

The police chief did not offer any motive for the shootings, but said there was some indication that the suspect may have known some of the people at the church.

Weathers said Lexington police would conduct an internal review of the shooting, as required by department policies.

The Blue Grass Airport posted on X at 1 p.m. ET (1700 GMT) that there was a law enforcement investigation affecting a portion of an airport road, but that all flights and operations were now proceeding normally.

(Reporting by Ryan Patrick Jones in Toronto, Leah Douglas and Bo Erickson in Washington and Laila Kearney in New York; Writing by Ted Hesson and Andrew Goudsward; Editing by Scott Malone and Sandra Maler)