Matthew Lathers, the fugitive gunman who shot three Kenner police officers and two bystanders during an eight-hour standoff on Sunday, set up several make-shift alarms and fortifications inside the Kenner home where he was hiding, according to authorities.
Lathers was lying in wait, armed with a rifle, when members of the department’s SWAT team entered the house in the 700 block of Farm Avenue to free up a SWAT robot that had gotten tangled in drapes while checking the residence for occupants.
“The firing upon my officers was an ambush,” Kenner Police Chief Keith Conley said. “He had concealed himself behind a bunker-type situation made out of crude cardboard.”
Conley said Lathers briefly in the U.S. Army. He completed basic training but was dishonorably discharged after about 11 months in 2012 due to drug use.
The police chief provided an update Monday on the standoff that ended when a Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office SWAT team sniper shot and killed Lathers, 31, after investigators say he opened fire on deputies outside of the residence.
All three of the Kenner officers shot by Lathers during the standoff had been released from the hospital by late Sunday night. The two bystanders who Lathers shot before the standoff began have also been released from the hospital, according to Capt. Michael Cunningham, spokesperson for the department.
But a 56-year-old man that Kenner police say Lathers shot and robbed five days before the standoff on April 23 was still hospitalized in guarded condition, Conley said.
It was this earlier shooting that kicked off the manhunt for Lathers, who was wanted for attempted second-degree murder and armed robbery.
“This man shot six people in a matter of seven days, and there was no end in sight,” Conley said.
Mistaken for police
Sunday’s standoff began after Lathers opened fire on two men in the 700 block of Farm Avenue in Kenner, Cunningham said.
The men, 62 and 44, were driving in opposite directions on the street about 9:30 a.m. when they stopped to speak to one another through their open pickup truck windows, according to authorities.
Unknowingly, they had stopped near a house where Lathers was hiding out from police, authorities said. Investigators suspect Lathers spotted the two men stopped near the house and took aim, believing them to be law enforcement.
“They just happened to be at the wrong place, at the wrong time,” Conley said.
The 44-year-old man was shot in the abdomen while the other man was shot in his arm, Cunningham said. They sped from the area, one of them accidentally reversing into a nearby ditch.
The men called 911 and told police the gunfire had come from a single-story, gray brick residence on the street that had iron bars on the front doors and windows, according to authorities.
Detectives who responded immediately realized the vacant house was linked Matthew Lathers and had belonged to his grandparents, Conley said.
Officers quickly obtained a warrant and called in the department’s SWAT team to execute the search. That decision likely saved their lives, according to Cunningham.
Cover fire
The Kenner SWAT team knocked on the front door and tried to make contact with anyone inside. But after two hours with no response, the team sent its SWAT robot into the house to check for occupants.
When the robot got caught up by some drapes, three officers got behind a ballistic shield and entered the home to untangle the device using a long hook, according to Cunningham. That’s when Lathers opened fire and wounded the officers.
One of the officers “heroically returned cover fire so everybody could retreat,” Conley said.
The injured Kenner SWAT team members were evacuated to a hospital. Kenner police contacted the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office SWAT team to take over the scene because they were now down by about four members, according to Conley.
“Every SWAT team has their own language, has their own drills. They train together. You can’t mix and mingle SWAT teams,” Conley said.
A sniper from the sheriff’s office fatally shot Lathers when authorities say he stepped into the front door with a rifle and began shooting at the deputies.
Investigators searched the house after the standoff ended and recovered three weapons, including the rifle, a gun believed used in the April 23 shooting and a second handgun, Conley said. They also found 30 spent shell casings inside the house.
Conley said he was able to view the moment the officers came under fire through their body camera video.
“In law enforcement, that is the worst call to get,” he said.
The Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office is conducting a joint investigation into the incident with the Kenner Police Department. Conley said authorities will release the body camera video once the investigation has been completed.
“I’m totally satisfied, as we stand here today, that we did everything that we could, in the best way that we could,” Conley said.
Previous crimes
Kenner police still don’t know why Lathers attacked the 56-year-old victim from the April 23 robbery. He was accused of shooting the man three times before stealing the victim’s wallet and cellphone in the 700 block of Coleman Place, one street over from the standoff.
The victim, who knew Lathers from the neighborhood, told investigators he just remembered seeing Lathers approach before suddenly finding himself on the ground, according to authorities.
Lathers does have convictions for two counts of armed robbery in Orleans Parish, according to court records. No details were immediately available about the 2012 holdups. Lathers pleaded guilty on Nov. 8, 2013, and was sentenced to 10 years in prison for each count, court records said.
He served about 90% of the sentence and was not on probation or parole at the time of the Kenner shootings, according to authorities.
Lathers had been living in Kenner but had ties to LaPlace. Relatives told Kenner police that he may have had some mental problems, Conley said.
Lathers wasn’t known to police before the April 23 attempted murder and didn’t have any other criminal convictions in Jefferson Parish, according to Cunningham and court records.
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