Manhunt begins for suspect Scott Michael Greene in fatal, 'ambush-style' shooting of 2 officers in Iowa

Des Moines Police Department via AP

This undated photo provided by the Des Moines Police Department shows Scott Michael Greene, of Urbandale, Iowa.

DES MOINES, Iowa (Reuters) - Two Iowa police officers were shot dead in separate "ambush-style" killings as they sat in their patrol cars early on Wednesday, and police said they were urgently seeking a suspect they consider armed and dangerous.

Police are searching for a local man named Scott Michael Greene, 46. A police photo showed him as white, with a light beard.

"Our detectives are looking to speak with Mr. Greene right now," Des Moines police department spokesman Paul Parizek told a news conference. "He is definitely someone that we want to talk to."

The Des Moines Register reported that police are looking for a blue 2011 Ford F-150 with Iowa license plate 780 YFR. Police described Greene as a 46-year-old white man who is 5 feet 11 inches tall, about 180 pounds, with brown hair and green eyes.

One officer was found dead about 1 a.m. local time in Urbandale, an affluent suburb of Des Moines. The second officer was found dead about 1:30 a.m. local time in the city.

"These officers were ambushed," Parizek said, adding that they were shot while sitting in their patrol cars about 2 miles apart. "There is a clear and present danger to police officers right now," he said.

Area police will be working in pairs for safety on Wednesday, Parizek said.

Police would not identify the slain officers, saying that they were still notifying their families, but Parizek said the names may be released by midday.

The apparently unprovoked attacks came two years after two New York Police Department officers were shot dead while sitting in their patrol car in Brooklyn, by a man who said he wanted to avenge the deaths of unarmed black men killed by police.

It was unclear what provoked Wednesday's attack, Parizek said, adding that "we may never know."

A police cruiser at the site of the Des Moines shooting was riddled with three bullet holes, according to a Reuters witness there.

"An attack on public safety officers is an attack on the public safety of all Iowans," Ben Hammes, a spokesman for Governor Terry Branstand, said in a statement. "We call on Iowans to support our law enforcement officials in bringing this suspect to justice."

Before the shootings in Iowa, 50 police officers had died by gunfire, two accidentally, in the line of duty in the United States this year, according to the Officer Down Memorial Page website.

"To see this pattern that is developing - that's what's unconscionable," said House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan during an interview with radio host Hugh Hewitt. "If it's a random, mentally ill person, it's one thing. But it's people consciously going out and doing this."

Wednesday's shootings come seven months after two Des Moines officers were killed when their vehicle was hit by a wrong-way drunken driver. Another Des Moines police officer died in a motorcycle accident in August.

Officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, were the targets of deadly ambushes earlier this year after police killed two black men in separate incidents in a Minnesota suburb and Baton Rouge. Philadelphia police officers have been deliberately targeted by a gunman twice this year.