NICEVILLE, Fla. (AP) — Two deputies from a troubled sheriff's office in Florida had no warning a confrontation with a National Guard soldier accused of beating his wife would turn deadly, the sheriff said.

Deputies Burt Lopez and Warren "Skip" York used a stun gun to subdue Joshua Cartwright, but he was able to start shooting at them from the ground. Both Lopez and York died.

"Within seconds he sat up and began firing a weapon that came out of nowhere, it was somewhere on his body we assume," Okaloosa County's Interim Sheriff Ed Spooner told more than 300 sheriff's office employees who gathered Sunday night to pray and hear an explanation of the shootings.

Cartwright was killed in a shootout at a roadblock after a car chase into a neighboring county. The deputies had gone to a shooting range to arrest him after his wife sought treatment for domestic abuse injures at an area hospital.

Spooner said the deputies had no information to make them think Cartwright would turn his weapons on them. Continue reading