Man Killed By Crest Hill Police, Officer 'Stable' After Stabbing

CREST HILL, IL — Crest Hill resident Matthew J. Parks, 30, was shot and killed by a Crest Hill police sergeant Monday night at the Pioneer Road apartments after Parks stabbed another Crest Hill police officer in the leg, police announced. The injured officer underwent surgery. He was in serious but stable condition, the Will County Sheriff's Office said.

After undergoing surgery, the injured Crest Hill officer is recovering in the intensive care unit.

According to police, several Crest Hill officers went to the 1400 block of Pioneer Road at 6:48 p.m. for a domestic disturbance inside an apartment. The 911 caller told police that her husband punched her in the face, and children were present, authorities said.

Crest Hill officers were alerted by 911 dispatchers that they were hearing arguing, crying and someone making comments about "suicide by police," officials said.

The 911 dispatchers were told Parks had a knife. Parks also could be heard saying, "he was going to kill himself, and to go ahead and send the police in," the sheriff's department said.

As the Crest Hill officers got to the apartment, Parks confronted them, and he stabbed one of the officers with a knife, police said. The knife cut the officer's femoral artery in his leg.

The injured officer has been on Crest Hill's force since September 2019.

A Crest Hill police sergeant shot Parks several times in defense of the injured officer's life, Will County Sheriff's officials said. The sergeant has been with Crest Hill since September 2004.

Parks was pronounced dead at the scene.

Two other Crest Hill officers were on the scene of the stabbing and shooting.

One officer, who joined the force in February 2007, applied a tourniquet to control the bleeding of the injured officer. A fourth officer, on the force for nine months, was not involved in the confrontation with Parks, authorities said.

Will County Coroner's officials pronounced Parks dead at the scene, and an autopsy will be performed.

Detectives and crime scene investigators affiliated with the Will/Grundy Major Crimes Task Force are now investigating the events surrounding Monday night's deadly shooting.

On Monday night, crime scene taped roped off the area surrounding the apartments between Pioneer and Bicentennial Avenue after the injured Crest Hill officer was taken to St. Joe's hospital.

Crest Hill and Joliet police were at the scene, along with Will County Sheriff's deputies and several members of the Illinois State Police.

More than 30 police vehicles were at the scene.

It wasn't the only shooting involving police Monday night in the Joliet area. Around 11:30 p.m., a Shorewood police officer fatally shot a man in the rear parking lot of the new La Quinta Inn & Suites hotel off the frontage road near Interstate 55.

Shorewood Police Chief Phil Arnold told Joliet Patch that a standoff ensued, and the man in the car fired his gun at officers, prompting one of the Shorewood officers to return fire, killing the man in the hotel's parking lot.

"Based on everything at this point in time, it appears to be justified," Arnold said of his officer's use of deadly force.

Related Joliet Patch coverage:

Shorewood Officer Fatally Shoots Man In La Quinta Parking Lot