2 dead, 1 injured in a shooting near Kentucky courthouse, suspect shoots self after police standoff

A mother and daughter have been fatally shot and another man injured near a Kentucky courthouse

Courthouse Shooting Kentucky (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

A gunman who fatally shot a mother and daughter and injured another man outside a Kentucky courthouse led police on a highway pursuit before shooting himself Monday, police said.

The suspect, Christopher Elder, 46, was in critical condition after suffering a gunshot wound, Elizabethtown police said.

One of the victims, 37-year-old Erica Riley of Elizabethtown, had attended a court hearing in Hardin County with Elder Monday morning before the shooting, police said. The two had been in a relationship, Elizabethtown Police Chief Jeremy Thompson said.

Riley's mother, 71-year-old Janet Riley of Hardinsburg, was also shot and died after being transported to a hospital, police said in a media release Monday afternoon.

The shooting occurred in a parking lot and Elder fled the scene afterward, Thompson said.

Elder's vehicle was located on a highway by police in western Kentucky and he was pursued and stopped, Thompson said. The chief said police negotiators were speaking with Elder before he turned a gun on himself.

Elizabethtown is about 45 miles (72.4 kilometers) south of Louisville.

The man who was shot was also related to Riley, Thompson said. He was in stable condition, police said. His name has not been released.

Nearby schools were placed on a “soft lockdown,” after the shooting until police were able to determine it was an isolated incident, Thompson said.

Michael Cockerel told The Associated Press he was walking out of the Hardin County Justice Center Monday morning when he heard gunshots nearby. He heard a series of shots and initially thought it was a nail gun from a construction site.

But after he heard a few shots, "that’s when it clicked in my head that this might be gunshots,” Cockerel said.

Cockerel said he took cover behind a car in a nearby parking lot. When he thought the danger was over, he returned to the front of the courthouse and saw the victims across the street. He said he never saw the shooter.

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This story has been updated to reflect the correct spelling of Janet Riley’s surname instead of Janet Rylee as previously reported by the Elizabethtown Police Department.