Two officers shot near Wellston; manhunt underway

by Robby Trammell, Graham Lee Brewer, & Ben Felder
Published: October 23, 2016 8:27 PM CDT

[Linked Image]
Michael Vance

WELLSTON, OK — Two officers were shot Sunday evening, and one suspect is in custody as a manhunt continues for a second suspect, authorities said.

The Highway Patrol and the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation are assisting the Lincoln County sheriff's office and Wellston police.

Law enforcement officials said the two officers, Shawn Stewart and Jim Hampton with the Wellston police department, were shot, one officer possibly shot twice in the legs. One suspect was apprehended shortly after the shooting.

"At approximately 6:30 this evening, two Wellston police officers were shot while responding to a shots fired call in the Wellston area," the sheriff's office posted on their Facebook page.

When they arrived, one suspect, Michael Vance, 38, came out of the home with an AK-47 “and just started firing at everybody,” Sheriff Charlie Dougherty told reporters near the scene of the shooting.

Vance jumped a patrol car of one of the officers he had shot, drove the car about half a mile across a field to a nearby trailer park, where he car jacked another vehicle from a woman. Vance shot at the woman, but she refused medical treatment at the scene. Vance fled the scene in her white Lincoln town car with a blue top.

Police say officers Stewart and Hampton both sustained gun shot wounds. One of the officers was taken to OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City and another was taken to Integris Hospital in Edmond, both with injuries that were not life-threatening.

Vance is still at large, and authorities believe he is still in possession of the AK-47.

Dozens of law enforcement vehicles gathered around State Highway 66 and S 3310 Road, about three miles west of town, where authorities had the highway blocked off Sunday evening.

“There is shooting over there all the time, 24/7,” said a neighbor, who asked not to be identified, of the residence where the shooting occurred.

Vance was charged in July in Lincoln County with child sexual abuse, after a former conviction of felonies.

"All that the South has ever desired was that the Union, as established by our forefathers, should be preserved, and that the government, as originally organized, should be administered in purity and truth." – Robert E. Lee