For two days, an Aurora murder suspect eluded a mass search by authorities. But his escape unraveled Saturday when he fell asleep while holding a newlywed couple hostage in their Kansas home.
A Kansas SWAT officer shot Jesse Dennis Dimmick, 23, after he brandished a knife following a hostage standoff in Dover, Kan., authorities said.
Dimmick was taken to a local hospital with a non-life-threatening injury just before noon, Topeka police Capt. Jerry Stanley said.
Dimmick is a suspect in the murder of a man whose body was discovered early Thursday in a room at the Carriage Motel Inn, 9201 E. Colfax Ave.
Kansas officials also arrested Shayne Michael Miller, 35, believed to have rented the Aurora motel room where the body was found. He was discovered in a Salina, Kan., hotel late Friday night.
Aurora police said Saturday night that Miller faces charges of felony murder and theft by receiving, and Dimmick faces charges of first-degree murder and theft by receiving. Both are being held without bail pending extradition.
The confrontation with Kansas police happened after the hostages being held at knife-point left the rural Kansas home and SWAT officers stormed the house, Stanley said.
The Associated Press reported that the couple offered Dimmick something to drink and gave him pillows and a blanket so he could lay down in their bedroom. When he dozed off about 2 1/2 hours later, they ran from the house.
Saturday’s violent confrontation was the culmination of a two-day mass search for the fugitive.
A Geary County, Kan., deputy first spotted Dimmick about 2:30 a.m. Friday and tried to pull him over for a traffic violation, Geary County Undersheriff Carlos Roman said.
Dimmick sped away, leading the deputy on a 10-mile, high-speed chase along a country road. The suspect crashed the car and ran into a wooded area about 15 miles southeast of Junction City.
Early Saturday morning, a second deputy spotted Dimmick in a stolen Chrysler Town and Country minivan and gave chase.
When they crossed the Geary County line, a succession of jurisdictions joined the hour-long chase as Dimmick crossed through county to county.
When Topeka police took up the chase they set a tire-deflation stick in the road.
Dimmick continued riding on the deflated tires until he drove onto the front lawn of a house in Dover, a rural town with only a few businesses, farmhouses and a school, Stanley said. Dimmick ran into the house, where the two newlyweds were watching a movie on TV, and threatened them with a knife. After the couple escaped, the SWAT team threw “flash-bang” distraction devices inside the home.
A SWAT officer shot Dimmick as he brandished a knife.
