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SHALIMAR, Fla. (AP) —
A gunman fatally shot a sheriff's deputy outside a lawyer's office Tuesday and then barricaded himself inside a motel, where he exchanged gunfire with other deputies and was killed, authorities said.
Okaloosa County Deputy Bill Myers, 64, was shot multiple times in the back of the head and in the back by 33-year-old Joel Dixson Smith, Sheriff Larry Ashley said. Smith had gone to his lawyer's office to be given a domestic violence injunction by Myers and turn over firearms, Ashley said.
As they went to get the guns from Smith's car, Smith drew a concealed weapon and shot Myers multiple times, Ashley said.
Smith "was a sick little coward," Ashley said, holding back tears.
Smith, a postal worker, then fled in his vehicle, heading to a Comfort Suites about 10 miles away in Niceville, where he had previously rented a room. He barricaded himself inside and deputies fired tear gas into his room. He charged out firing and was shot by deputies, Ashley said.
No one else was hurt.
Myers had retired in 2013 but started working part-time in January serving civil papers to earn extra money to take his granddaughter to Walt Disney World, the sheriff said.
Dixon had been arrested in 2008 for domestic battery, Ashley said, but had no other details. Postal officials had no immediate comment on his employment.
Annie Allen works at an awning business next to the law firm. Allen said she and her boss were starting their day when six to eight gunshots rang out.
"We heard 'pop, pop, pop,'" she said.
Allen said she called 911, and her boss ran outside, where he encountered the gunman leaving the law office.
Her boss took pictures with his cellphone and followed the gunman in his car, Allen said.
"The guy got in his truck and just tore out of the parking lot," she said.
Allen said she saw the sheriff's deputy on the ground moments later.
"When I realized it was an officer that he shot, that's when it really hit me how dangerous it was," she said.
Electric company crews were working nearby, and those men also called 911 and stayed with the deputy until help arrived, Allen said.
She said she and her boss talked to investigators and gave them the cellphone photos and license plate information.
Hours later, Allen was still visibly shaken.
"When someone shoots a law officer, they have nothing to lose," she said. "It is good more people weren't hurt."
A Comfort Suites guest, David Bump of Ozark, Alabama, said he awoke Tuesday to deputies pounding at his room.
"I opened the door and they had their guns drawn," he said.
Bump said officers took him and other guests across the street, where they spent hours watching the standoff.
"When they brought the guy out, he was on a gurney with his face covered," said Bump, who was working in the area as part of a construction crew.
He sat in the parking lot later, watching investigators enter and exit the hotel.
"They just now let me go back in and get my cellphone and cigarettes," he said.
WASHINGTON (AP) —
As his critics grew louder, Republican White House contender Ben Carson retreated slightly late Monday from his weekend charge that Muslims shouldn't serve in the presidency.
In an interview with Fox News, Carson said he would be open to a moderate Muslim who denounced radical Islam as a White House candidate. But he also said he stood by his original comments, saying the country cannot elect people "whose faith might interfere with carrying out the duties of the Constitution."
"If you're a Christian and you're running for president and you want to make this into a theocracy, I'm not going to support you," Carson told Fox News host Sean Hannity in an interview to be broadcast later Monday. "I'm not going to advocate you being the president." Carson said members of the Islamic faith who are willing to accept the American way of life "will be considered infidels and heretics, but at least then I will be quite willing to support them."
The intensifying political fallout is a distraction at least as the retired neurosurgeon tries to capitalize on recent momentum in the unruly GOP field. But it also highlights a sentiment among voters in both parties who agree with Carson's reluctance to elect a Muslim to the nation's highest office.
Carson's campaign reported strong fundraising and more than 100,000 new Facebook friends in the 24 hours after he told NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday: "I would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation." His campaign manager Barry Bennett told The Associated Press on Monday: "While the left wing is huffing and puffing over it, Republican primary voters are with us at least 80-20."
The head of the nation's largest Muslim advocacy group called on Carson to drop out of the 2016 presidential contest during a Capitol Hill press conference on Monday, declaring him "unfit to lead because his views are in contradiction with the United States Constitution."
"Not long ago, some people thought that a Catholic cannot be a president, an African-American cannot be a president," said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic relations. "They were wrong then, and they are wrong now." He cited Article 6 in the Constitution, which states, "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."
While the law is clear, the politics of Muslim culture in America are not. Fourteen years after Islamic extremists executed the deadliest terrorist attack in U.S. history, a suspicious stance resonates with some voters despite the fact that — as Democratic Sen. Harry Reid put it Monday — "they teach in our schools, fight in our military and serve in Congress."
A June Gallup poll found that 54 percent of Republicans would not vote for a well-qualified Muslim nominee from their own party; 39 percent of independents and 27 percent of Democrats said the same. Indeed, conservatives have repeatedly embraced anti-Muslim sentiment in recent years. They have consistently tried to link President Barack Obama to Islam throughout his presidency, using imaginary religious ties.
Republican front-runner Donald Trump declined last week to correct a voter who inaccurately stated that Obama is a Muslim. For Trump, the election of a Muslim president was "something that could happen. Would I be comfortable? I don't know if we have to address it right now."
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)
Hillary Rodham Clinton is laying out a new plan to rein in the rising cost of prescription drugs, seeking to build upon President Barack Obama's health care law.
The Democratic presidential candidate's proposal aims to cap monthly and annual out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs to help patients with chronic or serious health conditions. It would also deny tax breaks for televised direct-to-consumer advertising and require drug companies that receive taxpayers' support to invest in research and development.
"We will start by capping how much you have to pay out of pocket for prescription drugs each month. And we're going to hold drug companies accountable as we work to drive down prices," Clinton said Monday at a campaign event in Louisiana.
Once a political liability for Democrats, the overhaul has been credited with helping reduce the number of uninsured people from 48.6 million in 2010 to 29 million people in the first three months of 2015. Clinton's campaign, however, said a typical senior on Medicare spends more than $500 annually on out-of-pocket costs to buy prescription drugs and those with chronic health conditions or serious illnesses can spend thousands of dollars a year outside their coverage.
Health care and the rising cost of prescription drugs are expected to be a dividing line in the 2016 campaign. Clinton's main challenger, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, has campaigned on the creation of a single-payer health care system and introduced legislation earlier this month that would allow Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices with pharmaceutical companies and let consumers import prescription medication from Canada, where costs are cheaper.
As she did during her 2008 presidential campaign, Clinton would seek to allow Medicare to use its large purchasing power to negotiate lower drug prices.
Her plan also seeks to increase competition for traditional generic versions of specialty drugs to drive down prices and offer more choices to consumers.
Clinton aides said a central component of the proposal would require health insurance plans to place a monthly limit of $250 on covered out-of-pocket prescription drug costs for individuals. The campaign estimated up to 1 million Americans could benefit from the proposal annually.
Her campaign said the proposal would seek to curb the amount of money drug companies spend on advertising and create a mandatory pre-clearance procedure through the Food and Drug Administration for advertising that would ensure the ads provide clear information to consumers.