Police say suspect in South Carolina serial killings is dead
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Police say the suspect in five slayings was a man resembling this sketch.
Investigators believe the serial killer blamed for five deaths in South Carolina died in a shootout with police in neighboring North Carolina on Monday, a South Carolina state police official said.
Tests on the gun found on 41-year-old Patrick Tracy Burris match the weapon used in the killings that have haunted Gaffney, South Carolina, since June 27, said Reggie Lloyd, director of South Carolina's State Law Enforcement Division. The dead suspect and his vehicle appear to match descriptions circulated by investigators in Gaffney, he said.
"We believe a killer is off the streets," Lloyd said.
Burris was killed early Monday morning in Dallas, North Carolina, after police received a call about a possible burglary in progress, officers there said. At a news conference Monday evening, investigators described him as a "habitual felon" with a record in several states who was on probation at the time he was killed.
When police arrived at the home, they found inside two people who lived there and a third who was an acquaintance, said Bill Blanton, the sheriff of Cherokee County, South Carolina. Police checked Burris' background and found there was an outstanding warrant on him from a probation violation from Lincoln County, North Carolina.
When police attempted to serve the warrant, Burris shot at the officers, who returned fired, Blanton said.
One officer was shot in the leg and was treated and released from a hospital, police said.