Steven Vincent

Some distant bystanders had waved Robert LeDoux over to the side of the road before he reached the scene and told him he shouldn't get any closer; it was too dangerous, they said, and the man had a gun of his own. LeDoux ignored them.

As he approached, the suspect told him, "'Everything's all right. Mind your own business. You need to go,'" LeDoux told The Associated Press a day later in an exclusive interview. "All I could see was pure evil in his eyes."

Senior Trooper Steven Vincent, 43, died at a hospital in Lake Charles after being shot in the head over the weekend by a man whose pickup truck was stuck sideways in a ditch, Col. Mike Edmonson said.

"This loss exacts an enormous emotional toll on the state police family, but we will do what is necessary and proper to honor Steve and support those who knew and loved him," Edmonson said in a statement Monday morning.