2 Dallas Police Officers and a Security Guard Shot Outside Home Depot

Two Dallas police officers were shot and critically wounded outside a Home Depot on Tuesday afternoon after they were called to assist in an arrest, authorities said. A Home Depot security guard was also shot, but his or her condition was not released.

Chief U. Renee Hall of the Dallas Police Department said officers were searching for Armando Juarez, 29, a person of interest in the attempted capital murder of the two police officers. He is thought to have left the Home Depot in a white pickup truck; police posted a photo of Juarez and the vehicle on Twitter. He is presumed to be armed, Hall said.

“Once again, Dallas is at the precipice looking into the hell of heartbreak as our Police Department was attacked this afternoon,” Mayor Mike Rawlings said at the start of a news conference, which was held at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, where the victims were being treated.

The police did not release the names of those shot or elaborate on their conditions, but said that the family of one officer was at the hospital and that the other’s family was en route.

“It sobers us to realize what our officers walk into day in and day out and how quickly they can become victims,” the mayor said.

At 4:12 p.m. Central time, the Police Department received a call to go to the Home Depot in northeastern Dallas to help an off-duty officer who was there make an arrest, Hall said. The shooting happened shortly after they arrived.

The victims were transported to the hospital by the Dallas Fire-Rescue Department.

State, local and federal law enforcement agencies were assisting the Dallas Police Department, Hall said. “Our hearts are very heavy,” she said.

Gov. Greg Abbott offered his “thoughts and prayers” in a tweet, saying, “Texas honors all the men and women who protect and serve our communities, and justice will be served.”

In 2016, five Dallas police officers were shot and killed at a rally against police violence by Micah Johnson, a 25-year-old Army reservist who later died in a standoff with police. Johnson, an African-American, was hoping to single out the white officers in the ambush.

Last week, in Trenton, Florida, two sheriff’s deputies were shot dead by a gunman who ambushed them as they ate at a Chinese restaurant.