Suspect arrested in Louisiana officer's killing: police

A suspect was arrested on Thursday afternoon in the fatal shooting of a police officer in Shreveport, Louisiana, ending a 16-hour manhunt, Louisiana State Police said in a social media post.

The suspect, Grover Cannon, is believed to have shot and killed Officer Thomas LaValley on Wednesday evening. He will face charges of first-degree murder, in addition to earlier charges of attempted second-degree murder, Shreveport Police Chief Willie Shaw had said earlier.

The announcement was made at about 3:30 p.m. local time (CT) in a Facebook post by the state police.

Cannon was apprehended in Shreveport around 3 p.m. local time, KSLA television reported, following a statewide search that had involved multiple law enforcement agencies.

Shaw said LaValley responded to a suspicious person call on Wednesday evening in Shreveport, a city of about 200,000 people 200 miles east of Dallas. LaValley then got into a confrontation with Cannon, who had an outstanding arrest warrant, and the officer was shot multiple times, Shaw said at a news conference.

The FBI and the U.S. Marshals Service had offered a $25,000 reward for information leading to his capture.

LaValley worked in the Shreveport Police Department for four years after graduating at the top of his training class, Shaw said.

"He was doing what he loved," Shaw said. "He did not hesitate to confront a bad person."

LaValley was the 29th Shreveport police officer killed in the line of duty since 1898, according to the department's website.

Before joining the department in 2011, he worked as a cameraman at the local broadcaster KTBS, the TV station reported.

The shooting comes at a time of heightened tensions between law enforcement and minority groups. Several unarmed black men have been killed over the past year in confrontations with police. Numerous law enforcement officers have also been killed in the line of duty as well.

Cannon's arrest came on the same day that mourners attended funeral services in Tennessee for Officer Sean Bolton, killed in Memphis on Saturday when he interrupted a drug deal. The suspect surrendered to federal marshals on Monday.

(Reporting by Victoria Cavaliere in Los Angeles, Letitia Stein in Tampa, Fla., Suzannah Gonzales in Chicago, and Karen Brooks in Austin, Texas.; Editing by Tom Heneghan andMohammad Zargham)