St. Petersburg Shooting: Suspect Hydra Lacy, Brother of Boxer Jeff Lacy, Had Long Criminal Record
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (CBS/WTSP) Armed and hiding in the attic, Hydra Lacy, Jr., the brother of Jeff Lacy, a former International Boxing Federation super middleweight champion, was a desperate man. According to police, he'd already spent time in prison and he told relatives he wasn't about to go back.
But police in St. Petersburg were hot on his trail, and his return to prison seemed imminent, so Hydra Lacy, Jr. allegedly tried to shoot his way out.
Hydra Lacy, Jr. had a long criminal record, including convictions for sexual battery and false imprisonment of a child, burglary, grand theft auto and resisting an officer with violence. He spent more than a decade in prison.
"He had been to see me," Lacy's stepmother Willie Mae Norton told CBS affiliate WTSP. "He told me, 'I'm not going back to jail no more."
Police in St. Petersburg had been looking for Hydra Lacy, Jr. since November after he skipped out on a trial for a 2009 domestic violence charge. He was accused of beating his wife, Christine Lacy, so severely that she had to be hospitalized, accoriding to WTSP.
It all came to a head Monday when the fugitive task force assigned to find Hydra Lacy, Jr. showed up at Christine Lacy's house with an arrest warrant.
But Hydra Lacy, Jr. was waiting for them, hiding in the attic with a gun.
When it was over, St. Petersburg Police Sgt. Thomas Baitinger and Officer Jeffrey Yaslowitz were dead and Hydra Lacy, Jr. lay dead as well. A U.S. marshal whose name was not released, was shot twice but was doing fine, Chief Deputy U.S. Marshal Tom Figmik said.
Hydra Lacy's brother, Jeff Lacy, is a former champion boxer who has talked about the sport keeping him out of trouble. But it appears when Hydra Lacy turned his fists on Christine, he started down the road to Monday's deadly gunfight, leaving the community and his own family to grieve, WTSP reported.
The shooting comes four days after two Miami-Dade County detectives were killed by a murder suspect they were trying to arrest. That suspect was killed by another detective.
Investigators are now trying to determine whether Lacy was shot by police or may have taken his own life.
MORE ON CRIMESIDER
January 24, 2011 - Two St. Petersburg, Florida Officers Shot, Killed; Suspect Dead
