BURLINGTON, Vt. (WCAX) – Authorities have named a suspect in the shooting death of a Vermont National Guardsman at his Northeast Kingdom home last October, but officials tell WCAX that the suspect won’t be charged.
Family members of Gunnar Watson described the 27-year-old as a wholesome person who worked hard.
Police say he was gunned down the morning of October 16 while getting ready for work at his home in Wheelock. Watson died from a single shot to the torso. Police say he’d been targeted from outside the home and that his wife found him bleeding to death in their kitchen.
The murder rocked the Kingdom. Watson was a father of two very young children and was a rising star in the Vermont National Guard. The sergeant completed the Airborne Ranger and Sniper School in just two years and became a team leader. But he also worked for a tree-cutting company, and now we’ve learned it was a colleague at that company who police say killed Watson.
Sources tell WCAX that Gary Larocque, 40, of Brownington was the trigger man. They found bullets at his home that matched the gun used and they say digital location data — like a cellphone — put Larocque at the time and location of the sniper-style shooting.
He would have been charged with first-degree murder but Larocque died by suicide about 10 days after the murder. After police searched Larocque’s home, they found his body in a wooded area near Chapdelaine Road.
The motive for the shooting is still not clear. The two had known each other for years and some people have told WCAX Larocque was jealous of Watson. Police have not commented on what allegedly drove him to kill.