A United States Capitol police officer was killed and another injured when a man rammed a vehicle into a barricade outside the Capitol building on Friday. The suspect was shot by police after he got out of the car and pounced on the officers. He later died at a nearby hospital.
Official William “Billy” Evans, an 18-year veteran of the police force, was identified as the officer killed on Friday. Capitol Police said the other officer was in stable condition with non-life threatening injuries.
Law enforcement sources told CBS News that the suspect was identified as 25-year-old Noah R. Green of Indiana, who had not been on law enforcement radar.
Green, an African American man, was not on any watch list and appeared to have acted alone, according to a federal law enforcement officer and a Capitol Hill source.
Police said Green rammed his car into the officers at 1:02 pm and then got out of the car and pounced on them. Officers then fired at the suspect, Acting Capitol Police Chief Yogananda Pittman said at a news conference on Friday. Multiple sources said one of the officers was stabbed in the face, but it was unclear which officer was stabbed.
Shortly after 1 pm, the Capitol Police sent an initial alert to members of congressional staff, warning them of a “threat to external security.” In about an hour and a half, the police sent another alert saying that the threat had been “neutralized.”
In a statement, President Biden said that he and First Lady Jill Biden “were heartbroken” upon learning of the attack, adding that he was receiving information about the incident from his national security adviser. Biden, who was at Camp David over the weekend, ordered the White House flags to be lowered to half-staff.
J. Scott Applewhite / AP
The incident came nearly three months after rioters invaded the United States Capitol in a deadly attack on January 6. The riot resulted in the deaths of five people, including Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick. Two Capitol Police officers also died by suicide after the attack and dozens of officers were injured.
The union representing the officers called Friday’s attack “a tragic situation adding to a very difficult year for our members.”
After the January attack, a fence was erected around the Capitol complex and thousands of National Guard troops were dispatched to Washington. That security fence was demolished last week, though a layer of interior fence around the Capitol building remains in place.
The barricade where the incident occurred is a checkpoint on the Senate side of the Capitol. It was launched after the 9/11 terrorist attacks to protect the Capitol from potential car bombings, said Congressman Tim Ryan, who chairs the committee that oversees the Capitol Police.
There were fewer people than normal on Capitol Hill on Friday because Congress is in recess; most legislators are in their home states. Other members of the congressional staff, as well as reporters and police officers, were in their offices.
Andres Triay, Michael Kaplan, Kris Van Cleave and Rebecca Kaplan contributed reporting.