Ex: Fitch Stopped At My House After Fatal Cop Shooting
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- The man accused of killing Mendota Heights Police officer Scott Patrick will likely be charged on Friday.
Investigators say they are testing a gun Brian Fitch Sr. used in a shootout with police as they arrested him. They're trying to determine if it's the same weapon used to kill Patrick.
A former girlfriend of Fitch said he stopped at her house around the time Patrick was fatally shot while performing a routine traffic stop in West St Paul.
"He's not at all what they try and describe who he is," Kate Oney said.
She says she's known Fitch for more than 15 years. They dated for a couple of years and since then have been close friends.
"He's got a past, everybody knows that" she said. "He's got an angry side...who doesn't."
Oney was one of three people inside a duplex on Robert Street in St. Paul that heavily-armed police surrounded for hours.
Officials thought Fitch was inside the house.
His car, the one police say was involved in Patrick's death, was parked in the back.
Oney says Fitch was visiting her earlier that day.
"He got here a little after noon...and he stayed here until about one," she said. "He stopped by to see if we were all right, see if I needed anything, I made him something to eat. He always stops by here."
Oney says Fitch left to get her cigarettes and came back minutes later. He then left in a mini-van that belonged to her roommate's mom.
Fitch was in the van around 8:30 p.m. Wednesday when he got into a shootout with police just a few blocks north of the Capitol building.
Oney says the time she spent with Fitch early afternoon Wednesday was like any other time he would drop by.
"He sat down and [talked] with me for a while," she said. "He was just like he woke up a little sleepy-eyed, he sat here and [talked] with us. He wasn't sweating like he had just shot a cop."
Oney says she feels for the officer who lost his life and the family he leaves behind. But she is having a hard time believing her friend is responsible for his death.
Fitch was facing up to 30 years in prison on a meth charge from last year.
