FAIRFIELD, Texas (AP) — A man suspected of killing a Texas state trooper during a traffic stop was taken into custody more than 100 miles away, authorities said Thursday night. 
 
 The Harris County Sheriff's Office announced on Twitter that the suspect was apprehended in neighboring Waller County. The Texas Department of Public Safety and other law enforcement agencies had identified the suspect as Dabrett Black, 32, of Linsdale, Texas. 
 
 DPS said the trooper was shot and killed before 4 p.m. Thursday during a traffic stop on Interstate 45 near Fairfield, about 90 miles (145 kilometers) south of Dallas. The trooper was shot with a rifle and died at the scene, the agency said. The suspect then fled. 
 
 The trooper has not been identified. 
 
 Hours after the shooting, the Waller County Sheriff's Office said the suspect's vehicle was spotted in Hempstead, about 110 miles (177 kilometers) south of Fairfield. The sheriff's office said on its Facebook page that shots were fired, but did not indicate who opened fire. 
 
 The suspect was apprehended a short time later. 
 
 KYTX-TV reported in July that Black was charged with evading arrest, reckless driving and aggravated assault against a public servant following a police chase in Smith County. 
 
 Several Texas officials reacted to the trooper's death. In a tweet, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz offered "prayers for the family and loved ones" of the trooper. 
 
 Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called the trooper's killing a "heinous crime" in a statement Thursday. Abbott also expressed his "most sincere condolences" to the trooper's family. ||||| Updated at 6:14 p.m.: State Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, is asking the state Department of Public Safety to publicly release video of the state trooper traffic stop that began the series of events that ended in Sandra Bland’s death in the Waller County Jail. 
 
 West wrote a letter to DPS Director Steven McCraw on Thursday about the “tragic, and I will call suspicious,” death of Bland. The senator said he had “unconfirmed information” that Bland was followed “for some distance” by the state trooper before the traffic stop. 
 
 “This detainment, arrest and the events that transpired have raised a number of questions for numerous persons, none more than myself,” West wrote. “It comes months and weeks into what seems to be an unabated season of unfortunate police-citizen encounters.” 
 
 Click here to read the letter. 
 
 Updated at 6:06 p.m.: Surveillance video in the Waller County Jail shows no evidence that anyone goes into the cell of 28-year-old Sandra Bland and harms her, the county’s district attorney said late Thursday. 
 
 Waller County District Attorney Elton Mathis and other officials briefed the media on the latest on the investigation into Bland’s death on Monday at the jail. Her death has been ruled a suicide by hanging – apparently with a plastic garbage bag, officials said. 
 
 “At no point in the video does it appear that anyone goes into that cell and harms her in any way,” Mathis said of the hallway video, adding that there’s no video of the inside of the jail cell itself. 
 
 Waller County officials mostly reiterated information that’s already been released about the death, which has sparked outrage across the U.S. They also referred many questions to the Texas Rangers, the state officials who are leading the investigation into the matter. 
 
 Waller County Sheriff Glenn Smith, however, did address accusations that he was fired from his prior job as Hempstead Police Chief because of police conduct toward African-Americans. 
 
 “Am I racist? No, I’m not,” he said. “I can assure you that black lives matter to Glenn Smith.” 
 
 Smith said he didn’t want to take attention away from the investigation into Bland’s death by dwelling too much on the past. But he said the accusations are years-old and politically motivated, adding that they have “nothing to do with Ms. Bland.” 
 
 Updated at 4:50 p.m.: Our media partners at NBC 5 (KXAS‑TV) streamed a 5 p.m. news conference by the Waller County judge, district attorney and sheriff. 
 
 Updated at 3:51 p.m.: The state Department of Public Safety has requested — and is receiving — the FBI’s assistance in investigating the death of a 28-year-old black woman in a southeast Texas jail cell. 
 
 The department announced the joint investigation by the Texas Rangers and the FBI in a news release on Thursday. 
 
 The department said DPS will also conduct an internal review of the traffic stop that began the series of events that ended with Sandra Bland being found dead Monday in the Waller County Jail. Her death was ruled a suicide by hanging. 
 
 The news release also outlined law enforcement’s account of the traffic stop, which was made Friday by a state trooper in Prairie View for Bland’s failure to signal a lane change. Bland became “argumentative and uncooperative” during the stop, the news release said. 
 
 With assistance from Prairie View police, she was arrested on a charge of assault on a public servant. She refused medical treatment from paramedics, DPS said. 
 
 “No additional information is available at this time,” the news release said. 
 
 Original post: AUSTIN – Family, friends and a growing number of online supporters are questioning the official account of how a 28-year-old black woman from suburban Chicago died this week in a southeast Texas jail cell. 
 
 Sandra Bland was found dead Monday at the Waller County Jail after being arrested on Friday on a charge of assaulting a public servant, according to media reports. The Houston Chronicle reported that her death was ruled a suicide by hanging. 
 
 But as the Texas Rangers now investigate the death, Bland’s friends and family reportedly aren’t satisfied with the explanations thus far. 
 
 Supporters – in Illinois, Texas and across the U.S. – are using the social media hashtags #SandraBland and #JusticeForSandy to ask federal authorities to look into Bland’s death. More than 24,000 people have tweeted #SandraBland since Tuesday, according to The New York Times. 
 
 “They feel like that’s the case, that she was killed,” the family’s attorney Cannon Lambert said a news conference Thursday, according to the Chicago Tribune. 
 
 Waller County District Attorney Elton Mathis told the Tribune that he understands “there’s some disbelief among some friends and family that she would do this to herself.” 
 
 “That’s why it’s very important that the Texas Rangers be allowed to conduct a thorough investigation,” he told the paper, adding that he had no reason at this point not to attribute Bland’s death to suicide. 
 
 The death follows the high-profile deaths of African-Americans by police officials in New York, Ferguson, Mo., and Charleston, S.C. Those cases – and resulting protests – have spurred renewed discussion over police, race and the use of deadly force. 
 
 In Bland’s case, she had returned to Texas recently to start a new job. She was pulled over around 4:30 p.m. on Friday in Waller County, which is home to her alma mater, the historically black Prairie View A&M, according to media reports. 
 
 A state trooper pulled her over for switching lanes without signaling, the Chronicle reported. Bland was ordered out of her car, then became uncooperative and ultimately kicked the trooper, a state Department of Public Safety spokesman told the newspaper. 
 
 Apparent video of the incident was captured by a bystander (Editor’s note: The video features explicit language.) In it, Bland tells police, “You just slammed my head into the ground, do you not even care about that?” Bland was then brought to the Waller County Jail, where she was placed alone in a “tank,” Waller County Sheriff Glenn Smith told the Tribune. 
 
 She was given breakfast at about 7 a.m. on Monday and then spoke to jail staff around 8 a.m. about making a phone call, Smith said. A jailer then found Bland about an hour later. She was given CPR, but was pronounced dead shortly afterward, Smith said. 
 
 “Any time somebody dies, it’s a tragic deal,” the sheriff told the Tribune. “That’s exactly what this appeared to be.” 
 
 Smith has a contentious past in Waller County, where he was fired from his previous post as Hempstead police chief. Smith told the Houston Chronicle that the dismissal was the result of small-time politics, but some community activists said it was because of police conduct toward black residents. 
 
 #SandraBland Tweets ||||| A 23-year-old Marine suspected in a deadly shooting rampage across west Texas was already wanted in connection with the fatal stabbing of his wife, officials said. 
 
 Esteban J. Smith, 23, was killed in a gun battle with authorities early Sunday following a two-hour terror spree that spanned two counties and left one woman dead, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety. 
 
 Five others were wounded, including Concho County Sheriff Richard Doane. 
 
 Smith, of the Camp Lejeune Marine Corps base in North Carolina, had been sought for questioning in the death of his wife, Rubi Estefania Smith, in a motel room in Jacksonville, N.C. 
 
 Estefania Smith, of Bakersfield, Calif., was found murdered Sunday from a knife wound. 
 
 Police investigating the multiple crime scenes in Texas couldn’t immediately say why Smith was in the area. 
 
 The active duty Marine allegedly opened fire from his pickup truck with an assault rifle as he drove through rural Concho and McCulloch counties, randomly blasting at his victims. 
 
 One of the multiple crime scenes in west Texas where police say a 23-year-old U.S. Marine went on a shooting rampage early Sunday. (KLST) 
 
 Three people were treated for their wounds in hospitals and discharged. Two others, including Sheriff Doane, remained hospitalized Monday with nonlife-threatening wounds. 
 
 The mayhem began at about 4:30 a.m., when the gunman shot a driver in the Eden area of Concho County, southeast of San Angelo. She was hospitalized with wounlds that were nonlife-threatening, said Tom Vinger, spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety. 
 
 Over the next 90 minutes, two more people were shot while sitting in a car at a convenience store in McCulloch County. Both were treated for their wounds and discharged from a hospital, Vinger said. 
 
 Shortly after 6 a.m., Alicia Torres, 41, was found dead in her car in Eola, Concho County. 
 
 Her cousin said she was parked outside of the family’s home when he heard a car honking. 
 
 “Within a few seconds after the horn stopped beeping ... I heard roughly five shots being fired and a vehicle drive off,” Ernest Torres told CBS affiliate KLST. 
 
 Ernest Torres, a cousin of shooting victime Alicia Torres, says she appeared to be randomly targeted. (KLST) 
 
 When he stepped outside, the gunman was gone. His cousin was dead. 
 
 “It’s really random,” Ernest Torres said. “She was a nice person. She didn’t have any enemies. Why someone would shoot her, we don’t know.” 
 
 After peeling away from the scene, Smith crossed paths with Sheriff Doane on a highway north of Eden, authorities said. The suspect fired at Doane, who was wounded in the gunfire and hospitalized. 
 
 A state trooper and game warden then arrived and exchanged gunfire with Smith, who was killed, Vinger said. 
 
 An assault rifle, handgun and hundreds of rounds of ammunition were recovered from the suspect's pickup. 
 
 With News Wire Services 
 
 eortiz@nydailynews.com ||||| Authorities in Texas have released a video covering the three hours before Sandra Bland was found dead in her jail cell. NBC Chicago's Phil Rogers reports. (Published Monday, July 20, 2015) 
 
 Texas authorities on Monday released a three-hour video taken from outside a jail cell where an Illinois woman arrested during a traffic stop was found dead. 
 
 The video from a motion-operated camera shows there was no activity for 90 minutes in the hallway leading to the cell where authorities say 28-year-old Sandra Bland was found hanged on July 13, three days after her arrest. 
 
 Video Footage Shows Hours Leading Up to Illinois Woman's Jail Cell Death 
 
 The video from a motion-operated camera shows there was no activity for 90 minutes in the hallway leading to the cell where authorities say 28-year-old Sandra Bland was found hanged on July 13, three days after her arrest. NBC Chicago's Regina Waldroup reports. (Published Monday, July 20, 2015) 
 
 Authorities also said dashcam video of Bland's arrest is expected to be released Tuesday. Waller County District Attorney Elton Mathis said Monday the video is consistent with information the officer has provided about the traffic stop. The Texas Department of Public Safety has said Bland was arrested after she allegedly kicked an officer. 
 
 But Mathis cautioned that the dashcam video shows only restricted views of the stop in Prairie View, Texas. 
 
 The Chicago-area black woman's death at the Waller County jail in Hempstead, about 60 miles northwest of Houston, comes amid increased national scrutiny of police after a series of high-profile cases in which blacks have been killed by officers. The FBI and the Texas Rangers are investigating. 
 
 "This investigation is still being treated just as it would be a murder investigation," Mathis said. 
 
 Bland's death been ruled a suicide by the Harris County Medical Examiner's Office, a finding that supporters and relatives dispute. Bland's family and others have called for a Justice Department probe and an independent autopsy. 
 
 "This was not a case of suicide, but homicide," Rev. Jamal Bryant, of the Empowerment Temple AME Church of Baltimore, said earlier Monday. He said he was in Hempstead at the Bland family's request. 
 
 DPS has said the trooper who stopped Bland violated traffic stop procedures and the department's courtesy policy, but hasn't elaborated further. The trooper is on administrative leave pending the outcome of an investigation. 
 
 Bland may have been trying to text or email in the moments after she was pulled over for an improper lane change, Mathis said Monday. 
 
 "Sandra Bland was very combative," the district attorney said. "It was not a model traffic stop ... and it was not a model person that was stopped on a traffic stop. I think the public can make its own determinations as to the behaviors that are seen in the video." 
 
 The video from the jail released Monday shows no activity in the hallway leading to Bland's cell for about 90 minutes until an officer goes to check on her. 
 
 It shows a deputy reacting to what she sees while looking in the cell, triggering a frenzy of activity involving other deputies. An EMT crew arrives with a wheeled stretcher. The video does not show the inside of her cell or even her cell door. Deputies and medical personnel are seen coming and going, but a body isn't visible. 
 
 Capt. Brian Cantrell, head of the sheriff's department criminal investigation division, said the video was motion sensitive, indicating if nothing is taking place after a certain amount of time, it turns off. He said the FBI has been given hard drives to determine if there's been any manipulation. 
 
 Cantrell said a guard checked with Bland about two hours before she was found dead and Bland told her, "I'm fine." About an hour later, she asked to make a telephone call from her cell and was advised the phone was on a wall in the cell, according to Cantrell. 
 
 There is no record of her ever making a phone call, he said. 
 
 Mathis also said jail records show Bland was offered a medical checkup but declined. 
 
 Cantrell declined to describe Bland's death in detail. He described the plastic garbage bag used as a ligature by extending his hands about 5 to 6 feet apart. 
 
 The bags, he said, had been approved by a jail inspector, but have since been removed from all cells. 
 
 Relatives and friends have insisted she was upbeat and looking forward to a new job at Prairie View A&M University, the school where she graduated in 2009. She was in the area to interview for the job and accepted it. 
 
 Mathis also said the dashcam video doesn't provide a complete view. The trooper's dash cam shows a view forward toward Bland's car, but not inside and not to the side, where she wound up on the ground after authorities said she kicked the officer. 
 
 "It doesn't show how she got on the ground," Cantrell said. 
 
 Copyright Associated Press / NBC Chicago
– A man suspected of killing a Texas state trooper during a traffic stop was taken into custody more than 100 miles away, authorities said Thursday night. The Harris County Sheriff's Office announced on Twitter that the suspect was apprehended in neighboring Waller County. The Texas Department of Public Safety and other law enforcement agencies identified the suspect as Dabrett Black, 32, of Lindale, Texas, the AP reports. DPS said the trooper was shot and killed before 4pm Thursday during a traffic stop on Interstate 45 near Fairfield, about 90 miles south of Dallas. The trooper, who has not been publicly identified, was shot with a rifle and died at the scene, the agency said. The suspect then fled. Hours after the shooting, the Waller County Sheriff's Office said the suspect's vehicle was spotted in Hempstead. The sheriff's office said shots were fired but didn't indicate who opened fire. The suspect was apprehended a short time later. Several Texas officials reacted to the trooper's death. In a tweet, Sen. Ted Cruz offered "prayers for the family and loved ones" of the trooper. Gov. Greg Abbott called the trooper's killing a "heinous crime." "Sad on Thanksgiving to lose one of our state troopers in the line of duty," he tweeted. "Prayers for his family. Swift justice for his killer."