Philadelphia police: Robbery suspect kills officer

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (AP) -- A police officer who confronted at least two bank robbery suspects was shot and killed Saturday, leading to a manhunt during which an officer fatally shot one suspect, authorities said.

Investigators released few details about the shootings as police searched a wooded area for another suspect in the robbery of a bank in a grocery store.

Sgt. Steven Liczbinski, 40, a 12-year officer who had recently been promoted, was shot with an assault weapon not far from the bank.

"It is my understanding that he was either in the car or had just gotten out of the car at the time he was struck," Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey said outside Temple University Hospital.

The suspects fled but were spotted by another officer, who shot and killed one, police said. Ramsey did not confirm how many people were involved in the robbery or how many were sought.

Police originally described a man and a woman in Muslim-type clothing and a man wearing a white hospital mask. The masked man had shoulder-length dreadlocks, but Officer Tanya Little said that could have been a wig.

Ramsey said that one of those suspects had been killed but that he did not know which one.

Liczbinski's killing comes only a few days after Ramsey announced a major reorganization of the police department's command structure and the addition of nearly 250 officers on street patrols as part of a strategy to reduce crime.

Liczbinski was married with two sons and a daughter.

"This loss of life from a fine Philadelphia police officer is just one more example of the senseless violence that takes place here in our city," Mayor Michael Nutter said. E-mail to a friend

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