Suspect arrested in Vegas robbery

Robert Macy

Friday, June 16, 2000 | 8:11 a.m.

A police officer responding to a robbery in progress was shot in the face, touching off an intensive manhunt for three men who fled the scene, leaving a trail of evidence.

One suspect, 22-year-old Marcus Weatherspoon, was arrested Thursday afternoon.

A woman was kidnapped near the robbery scene, then kicked out of her car several miles away. The woman, whose name was not released, was not injured, according to officer Steve Meriwether, a Las Vegas Metropolitan Police spokesman.

The officer, Peter Rossi, was shot in the chin and the bullet then lodged in his eye.

Rossi, a three-year member of the department, was reported in fair condition Thursday at University Medical Center.

Some 150 officers scoured the area following Wednesday night's shooting, searching car trunks and going door-to-door through nearby neighborhoods, looking for suspects identified as three young black men.

Metro homicide Lt. Wayne Petersen said more than a dozen employees and customers witnessed the robbery.

A woman employee was pistol-whipped by one of the robbers, Petersen said. The trio fled with an undetermined amount of cash, some of which was recovered.

Rossi was responding to scene when the three suspects ran from the establishment toward a getaway vehicle. Before the officer could get out of his car, one of the suspects fired two shots. One of the shots went through the windshield, striking Rossi.

The suspects fled in a brown Chevy Blazer, which was recovered a few minutes later in a parking lot, along with guns, a mask and other evidence from the robbery.

Police say two of the suspects ran then south and kidnapped a female as she was getting off work at a nearby restaurant. They took the woman's vehicle and kicked her out several miles away.

Petersen said a car bearing California license plates and believed to belong to one of the suspects was found Thursday several miles from the robbery scene.

"At this point we're working on identifying possible suspects," Petersen said Thursday afternoon.