Man who attacked Dallas police headquarters has history of violence and mental illness

The man linked to a violent assault on Dallas police headquarters was accused two years earlier of choking his mother, then fleeing to an East Texas town where schools were locked down out of fear he would attack them as “soft targets,” according to accounts from police and family members.

Police said the suspect, who planted pipe bombs outside the headquarters and fired at officers early on Saturday from his armoured van, told them he was James Boulware. He was killed hours later by a police sniper, and the medical examiner still hadn’t officially confirmed the man’s identity on Sunday.

In interviews, Boulware’s father recalled his son’s seething anger at police after losing custody of his child, and his brother recalled that the family’s attempts to get Boulware help were rebuffed.

“We had tried for two years,” his brother, Andrew Boulware, said on Sunday. “I didn’t honestly think that he would ever go this far, but it was always in the back of my mind that it was a possibility.”

Authorities say it was miraculous no one else was injured in Saturday’s attack, in which the gunman sprayed the front of the building with gunfire just after midnight. After opening fire, the suspect drove the armoured van into a squad car, still firing, then led police on a chase to a restaurant parking lot in the suburb of Hutchins. The police sniper shot him during the stand-off, but it took several hours to confirm his death out of fear that he had loaded his van with more explosives.

Police on Sunday said they had put 14 officers involved in the incident on administrative leave pending an investigation.