the media. you were very helpful to us in keeping things straight, keeping the facts straight, reporting the stories in a way that really helped us to be able to do our job. chief. thanks, mayor. i want to officially announce that the search for steve stephens has ended. at approximately a little bit after 11:00 today, pennsylvania state police officers received a tip that the vehicle that we were looking for, the white ford fusion, was in a mcdonald s parking lot near erie, pennsylvania. those officers responded. the vehicle fled from that area. there was a short pursuit in which the vehicle was stopped. as the officers approached that vehicle, steve stephens took his own life. we are grateful to the people that gave this tip to the
enforcement, we ve heard from sarah and others that they had some idea perhaps where the suspect was going. they pulled some of that information back. this often happens in an investigation. but pings from his cell phone, contacts he had during his flight. and then the idea that the have of this was posted on social media. help with the context of how technology sometimes for the better, you can track a cell phone and sometimes for the worse people post this horrific video publicly on social media, how does that change the character of an investigation? well, in this particular case without him posting the video on facebook, i think a lot of people unfortunately would have thought oh, it s just another homicide in the city. but because it s been posted on facebook and the narrative that this particular individual gave during the homicide that he committed raised this to a whole other level. obviously him talking about committing previous homicides and going to commit some more homici
contact with several people, including detectives in the hours after the murder happened. but that contact seized the same day, so that would have been easter sunday was the last time he had contact with anyone. we do know that there were some friends and family that were able to reach him. and like i said, police as well were able to reach him. police said this morning it was clear he had deep, deep issues, but they were pleading with him to turn himself in, to contact the police, and to have anyone who has talked to him contact the police. they wanted to get this man off the streets as quickly as possible. they ve been conveying that to us very urgently, john. sarah gannon, in a crowded room in cleveland, ohio, waiting for a police news conference on what they believe to be a positive development, even though a sad development, in the death of the suspect. if you re just joining us, a three-day manhunt for the so-called facebook killer has apparently ended in erie county
once he knew he had been found that he stopped and he shot himself. this happened just as officials, police officers were approaching that vehicle. so it ended quickly. and according to somebody who heard this, they heard a loud bang and then silence. and so there was also a sense that, look, the authorities really did want to bring this individual in. this isn t this unlike others that i ve covered, this isn t one of those where there was there was clearly a sense of urgency, but they wanted to coax him to himself in. they wanted to get him help. this investigation is far from over. what they do have to do is figure out where he was. they have to restrays htrace hi. stephens, when we fled after this murder, he basically did
take questions. there s still some information to be gathered. speaking this afternoon will be mayor frank jackson, chief calvin williams, special agent in cla in charge of the cleveland office fbi and pete elliott, u.s. marshal. we have closure in regards to the search for steve stephens. the chief and law enforcement will give you the details of that. i want to, again, give our condolence to the godwin family and all of its members and thank them for the way in which they ve handled this very tragic situation not only for them personally but the community at large. a ualso want to thank the community. there was a lot of support from the community not only in terms of the family but in terms of law enforcement effort and the