'Kill for Thrill' 40 years later: Policeman Slain In Apollo Chase

Editor’s note: The Tribune-Review wrote a series of articles 40 years ago about a murder spree in which four people were killed in eight days across Western Pennsylvania. This is one of the original articles, published Friday, Jan. 4, 1980.

State and local police are pressing their investigation into the slaying of 21-year-old Apollo Patrolman Leonard Clifford Miller, who was found shot to death early Thursday following a high-speed chase. No arrests have been made.

Miller, who became one of two full-time patrolmen within the Armstrong County borough’s police force only four days ago, was shot once in the left shoulder and once in the stomach on a semi-secluded stretch of Route 66 in Oklahoma Borough, just south of Apollo.

An autopsy reported completed Thursday evening by the Allegheny County Coroner’s office described the death as a homicide and attributed it to gunshot wounds to the chest and abdomen.

State police at Kiski recovered the pursued late-model Lancia sports car two hours after the 5 a.m. shooting at Routes 286 and 380 in Sardis Hill, Murrysville, seven miles south of the shooting scene.

State Police Capt. Blair Swistock, commanding officer of Troop A, Greensburg, said the car is registered to William C. Nicholls of 724 Shady Drive, Pittsburgh, but the man was not a suspect late yesterday.

According to Swistock, police were alerted that a shooting occurred when Miller radioed Rainbow Control, the emergency-dispatch system in Vandergrift, and told dispatchers he was shot and needed an ambulance.

Swistock said a clerk at a 24-hour Stop ‘N’ Go convenience store at Apollo Plaza in the downtown section of the borough told police Miller pursued the silver sports car after it sped past the plaza traveling south.

Miller, who was working alone during the midnight to 8 a.m. shift, pursued the car a quarter of a mile past the Apollo bridge and over railroad tracks and apparently stopped the car, Swistock said.

“Then something happened,” Swistock said. “The next thing we knew he called saying he had been shot and needed an ambulance.”

Vandergrift and Kiski state police found the officer lying face down, his body partially under the left side of his patrol car, shot once in the left shoulder and once in the stomach.

Miller was pronounced dead at the scene at 6:23 a.m. by Allegheny Township physician (NAME UNCLEAR) Bush. The patrolman’s body was taken to the Allegheny County Morgue.

Swistock said six shots had been fired from Miller’s revolver, which was found next to his body. The homicide weapon was identified as a .38-caliber handgun, which has not been recovered. Swistock said such a gun can be carried legally with a permit.

The sports car was recovered about two hours after the shooting when a passing motorist spotted it in the parking lot of Cooper Trailer Sales in Murrysville and alerted police.

The sports car had a bullet hole in the lower left side in front of the reartire. The window on the passenger’s side of the car had been completely shot out, Swistock said. It is not known whether the suspect or suspects were wounded, he said. No bullet holes were found in the patrolman’s car, he said.

Swistock said details are sketchy but speculated on what had occurred.

“In all probability, Miller was fired on first, and he returned the fire,” he said. “A police officer won’t draw his weapon unless he has reasonable cause.

“It could have been a normal traffic violation of maybe Miller had information on the car. He could have drawn and been shot at, and there was an exchange of gunfire. Any of these things could have happened,” Swistock said.

Objects from inside of the sports car were being processed late Thursday.

Swistock said there was no blood or other visible evidence on the car’s exterior. There were no reports that the sports car was stolen, he said.

State police from Kiski, Greensburg and Pittsburgh, along with Westmoreland County Coroner’s office and county detectives, are investigating.