LEE COUNTY, S.C. — Investigators confirmed the name of a suspect who died on Friday following an armed confrontation with deputies that ended with one deputy wounded and a K-9 officer dead.
The Horry County Police Department, which investigated the shooting as an independent agency at the request of state agents, said that 27-vear-old Altson Modlin was dead at the end of the incident, which happened on Una Road in Lee County around 10 a.m.
Modlin was the subject of a statewide search after he allegedly shot a McBee officer in Chesterfield County on Thursday night during a traffic spot. Investigators say he was spotted in Lee County the next day and opened fire on law enforcement again.
In the early stages of the investigation, Lee County officials said that a deputy and a South Carolina Department of Natural Resources officer had been shot. Horry County officials said on Saturday that the SCDNR officer was taken to the hospital as a precaution and was not injured.
However, authorities confirmed that Lee County Sheriff's Office K-9 Mikka died after a vehicle she was in during the gunfire caught fire. Sheriff Simon said law enforcement could not reach the vehicle to help Mikka because they were under fire.
Sheriff Simon said in an update that the officer wounded in the incident was his chief deputy, and K-9 Mikka was his partner.
"We are a smaller agency, and we have to wear several different hats here," Sheriff Simon said. "We are greatly saddened by the loss of K9 Mikka, who was as much a member of our team as my Chief Deputy who was injured."
He thanked the community for contacting his office and offering prayers to those involved. He also thanked Horry County for taking the lead in the investigation and the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED), SCDNR and other sheriff's office and police department counterparts in the region for their help that day.
Authorities haven't yet released how the suspect died.