P.O. Dell Fountain #18247

Officer Dell Fountain was alerted to a disturbance in an upstairs apartment that was being used for narcotics activity.

During the investigation Officer Fountain got into a struggle with the man and was shot in the leg. The bullet severed a major artery and he died at the hospital due to blood loss.

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Officer Fountain was buried in Belzoni, Mississippi.
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West Side Man Guilty Of Killing Off-duty Cop, Death Penalty Looms For Murder Conviction
June 06, 1998|By Terry Wilson, Tribune Staff Writer.

A Criminal Court jury on Friday convicted a West Side man of first-degree murder for fatally shooting an off-duty Chicago police officer during a scuffle for the officer's gun. Tajuan Murray, 30, of the 4000 block of West Van Buren Street, looked down and shook his head from side to side as the jury's verdict was read in the courtroom of Judge Daniel Kelley. The verdict, reached after 7 1/2 hours of Murray was charged with shooting Chicago police officer Dell Fountain, 40, on March 22, 1996, as Fountain, who was off duty and out of uniform, confronted Murray over words he had exchanged with Fountain's son a few minutes earlier.

"It was this defendant who turned a simple police investigation into a murder," said Assistant State's Atty. Domenica Stephenson. "The only time something happened with the gun is when this defendant lunged for it." Fountain's son, Dell Woodard, 19, a U.S. Marine, testified that several months before, an acquaintance of Murray, their upstairs neighbor, had pointed an assault rifle at him and barred him from entering the building where he and his father shared an apartment at 3934 W. Van Buren St.

When he told his father about the allegation, police were called and arrested the man and recovered the rifle, Woodard said.
The day Fountain was shot, Woodard testified he had told his father Murray had tried to keep him from entering the building. Because of the previous incident involving the rifle, Woodard testified Fountain, who was clad in sweatpants and a T-shirt, took a 9 mm handgun when he went outside to confront Murray.

According to trial testimony, Fountain followed when Murray fled into the upstairs apartment, and he was fatally shot after the defendant grabbed for the police officer's gun and it discharged as they struggled over it. At that point, Woodard tried to take the gun from Murray before the two wrestled their way downstairs to Fountain's apartment, where Woodard called 911 for help, even as he maintained a grip on the gun, as did Murray.
Murray was still at the scene when police arrived and arrested him. Defense attorney Daniel Lynch argued that neither Fountain nor Woodard were in danger when they left their apartment to confront Murray.