Police Chief calls officer 'a hero'

CHESAPEAKE, Va. (WAVY) - A Chesapeake police officer shot following a pursuit Monday is doing 'quite well', a police spokesperson said at a Tuesday afternoon news conference.

Chesapeake Police Chief Kelvin Wright called Officer Sean M. Fleming 'a hero'.

Fleming was wearing a bulletproof vest when he was shot, police said. The 26-year-old was an August 2008 graduate of the Chesapeake Police Department.

The ordeal started around 4 p.m. Monday on East Liberty in Norfolk. Police say three suspects kidnapped Tione Vincent at that location. Chesapeake police officers attempted to stop the suspects' vehicle at the intersection of Military Highway and George Washington Highway. Police later found Vincent's body in the back of the suspect vehicle.

The suspects kept driving and the chase eventually ended in the Deep Creek section of Chesapeake late Monday afternoon, when the suspects' vehicle crashed at the intersection of George Washington Highway and I-64, near the High Rise Bridge. Police say the suspects got out of the vehicle and Christopher White started firing an assault rifle at the Chesapeake Police Officers. Officer Fleming, who was off-duty, heard the transmission of shots fired and responded to the scene. When Officer Fleming arrived, police told WAVY.com White shot him multiple times. Officer Fleming returned fire from inside his vehicle, killing Christopher White, police say.

20-year-old Willie Simmons was taken into custody at the scene. A third suspect, 31-year-old Dedrion Short fled but was later caught.

Police say they recovered a 380 automatic handgun and an assault rifle from the suspects.

Simmons and Short were in court Tuesday morning to face a long list of felony charges, including Attempted Capitol Murder of a Police Officer and First Degree Murder, for Tione Vincent's death. They are scheduled to be back in court July 29th.

WAVY.com spoke with Tione Vincent's wife. She did not know any of the suspects by name but confirms they all ran in the same circles in the Campostella section of Norfolk.

She says Vincent was turning his life around and the others weren't. "He tried to be a good father, and was a good father against all odds, and he made it work," says Mrs. Vincent, whose identity WAVY.com has agreed to conceal for her protection.

As part of a plea agreement, Tione Vincent was wearing a home monitoring device and working a corner on East Liberty Street in Norfolk, where he operated a mobile meals wagon with his wife.

On Monday, the suspects pulled up with guns and ordered Tione into a white van. "When I heard about it I immediately called the home monitoring department," says Mrs. Vincent. "She wouldn't tell me until I had an officer call her, so I called back and had my friend put an officer on the phone. I then told him to call the monitoring department and that's how they could track the van," added Mrs. Vincent.

During a news conference, police credit that piece of information for allowing them to quickly close in on the white van. When police reached the van, officers say the suspects had already killed Tione.

Mrs. Vincent thinks the killing was so Tione wouldn't tell police who his abductors were. "He was very well loved. Very well loved. He didn't do anything wrong. Nothing wrong at all," Mrs. Vincent emotionally said as tears were running down her cheeks.

Vincent's aunt and other family members live in the Campostella section of Norfolk. They too are saddened by the death of a man they say was trying to turn his life around, "Why? I don't know why. Why were people so hot to do things like this? Why, I don't know why. People need to wake up and we as a people need to wake up and quit killing each other," said Katheryn Mullen.

Motive is the big unknown here. Mrs. Vincent has no idea except to say she knows her husband had no plans to testify against anyone in court, "He never told me anything about anything like that. They killed him because they didn't want him to identify them."

Chesapeake resident Dominick Intorre was on his motorcycle on Route 17 at the time of the pursuit. He was just seconds ahead of the suspects' van.

Intorre told WAVY.com, "I looked through my rear view mirror and I saw the van come up at an extremely high speed. I thought for a second about what to do, then I decided to speed up and try to get out of his way. He hit the back of my tire and I almost lost control of my motorcycle. Then he veered right off the on-ramp to go to 64. And he lost control, hit a hill, spun out and I saw the police just ram his van."

People in surrounding neighborhoods heard the gunshots. One resident told WAVY.com, "We heard gunshots you know, just firing... Sounded like a shootout. Sounded like somebody has a Mossberg or something. You know, just pow pow. Rapid fire and stuff and it stopped and then we heard a bunch of sirens."

All the commotion led to major traffic delays and headaches at the High Rise Bridge and I-64, which were shut down until nearly 2 a.m. Tuesday morning.