Deadly gunfight erupts after driver shoots into police station, NC sheriff says

A driver killed while exchanging shots with a deputy had allegedly been shooting at the town’s police station minutes earlier, according to investigators in eastern North Carolina.

The gunfight happened just before 1 a.m. Tuesday in Elizabethtown, and the driver has been identified as 50-year-old Michael Bynum Horne Jr., of White Oak, the Bladen County Sheriff’s Office said in a May 12 news release.

“At approximately 12:30 a.m., the Bladen County Communication Center received a call from a concerned citizen stating she saw a white colored Honda Accord in front of the Elizabethtown Police Department, shooting at the department,” the sheriff’s office said.

“At ... 12:49 a.m., a deputy with the Bladen County Sheriff’s Office conducted a traffic stop of a vehicle matching the description at N.C. 53 and Saw Mill Lane. A deputy ... asked the male to step out of the vehicle. The male fled down Saw Mill Lane in his vehicle and turned around, and as he was coming out ... fired multiple shots at the deputy.”

The deputy returned fire, hitting the driver multiple times, the sheriff’s office said. The driver fled the scene and was located at a nearby home on N.C. 53 West, officials said.

Deputies performed life-saving measures on the man, but he died after being taken to a hospital, officials said.

Details of a motive have not been released.

The N.C. State Bureau of Investigation will lead an investigation into the incident, which is standard procedure in officer-involved shootings.

The identity of the deputy who fired the fatal shots has not been released. Investigators did not report the deputy was injured.

Elizabethtown is about a 95-mile drive south from downtown Raleigh.