"Troopers Joseph Longobardo, 32, and Donald Baker Jr., 38, were shot Thursday while staking out the isolated hilltop home of Phillips' former girlfriend, Kasey Crowe, who is among six people accused of aiding the fugitive. One trooper was hit in the back by a bullet that penetrated his bullet-resistant vest. The other suffered massive blood loss from a severed leg artery.
"Dan Suitor, who said he had known Phillips for 25 years, said the arrest of Crowe and Phillips' 23-year-old daughter, Patrina Wright, on August 24 drove his friend over the edge, especially after authorities removed Wright's three children -- the youngest 3 weeks old -- from her custody for a week.
"Buck has made it clear numerous times over the years, you don't mess with his family and you don't mess with his friends. ... Once they went after that daughter and those grandchildren, I'm sure he just snapped," Suitor said.
"Wright, contacted by telephone Saturday, declined to discuss her father at length."We are caught in the middle, though, and my kids were used to bring him out," she said.
SOURCE: http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/09/02/manhunt.shootings.ap/index.html
A vehicle approaches the property near where two New York State Troopers were shot in Pomfret, N.Y., Friday Sept. 1, 2006. New York State Police have confirmed two troopers were in critical condition after being shot while staking out the hometown of an escaped convict's girlfriend in an ambush Thursday, and authorities were searching the area for the fugitive. Police believe the gunman was Ralph 'Bucky' Phillips, who escaped from jail in April and may be traveling between Philadelphia and western New York, a State Police spokesman said (AP Photo/David Duprey)