WEBSTER, N.Y. (AP) -- A western New York police chief says a gunman who entrapped and shot four volunteer firefighters outside a blazing home is dead.
Webster Police Chief Gerald Pickering says two of the firefighters were killed and two others hospitalized after the ambush on a spit of land on Lake Ontario just northeast of Rochester.
He also says the gunman is dead and an off-duty police officer who was driving by has injuries from shrapnel. One of the slain firefighters is also a town police lieutenant.
The shooting Monday morning happened in a quiet neighborhood of seasonal and year-round homes.
Police say four homes in all were destroyed and four damaged by the spreading flames.
The West Webster Fire District received a report of a car and house on fire on Lake Road, on a narrow peninsula where Irondequoit Bay meets Lake Ontario.
The two wounded firefighters were listed in critical condition at a Rochester hospital.
Webster, a middle-class, lakeside suburb, now is the scene of violence linked to house fires for two Decembers in a row.
Last Dec. 7, authorities say, a 15-year-old boy doused his home with gasoline and set it ablaze, killing his father and two brothers, 16 and 12. His mother and 13-year-old sister escaped with injuries. He is being prosecuted as an adult.
(Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
