Posted on November 28, 2005

Officer Was Ambushed By Killer In Her Home

Daniela Altimari and Carolyn Moreau, Hartford Courant, Nov. 24

WEST HARTFORD — Ciara McDermott had no idea her estranged boyfriend, Victor Diaz, had slipped into her house while she was at work Monday afternoon.

McDermott, a Newington police officer, left work at 3:30 p.m., went home and sat down on her couch.

She turned on her laptop computer to check her e-mail at 4:15 p.m. Within a minute, she was dead. Police said Diaz, a suspended state trooper, shot her three times before eventually turning his .40-caliber Glock handgun on himself.

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Diaz, who was serving a 60-day suspension after his arrest in March on drunken driving and other charges, had been making harassing phone calls to McDermott. He was also accused of asking a friend to use a state police database to look up the license plate of a car parked in McDermott’s driveway. He learned that the car belonged to McDermott’s new boyfriend, West Hartford police Officer James DeLuca.

Diaz had been scheduled to surrender to West Hartford police on Monday and was going to be the subject of an administrative investigation by state police.

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