It took 15 hours to find Louisiana trooper dead

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A Louisiana state trooper was shot to death while typing reports inside his patrol car early Saturday morning in Prairieville, but another 15 hours would pass before another officer found him unresponsive — a delay that agency leaders called "absolutely unacceptable" and "a perfect storm" of communication failures.

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Davis said the chaos of the manhunt likely led to Gaubert going undiscovered for the next 15 hours. He said troopers were maintaining radio silence during the search, meaning non-emergency radio calls were suspended.

"It created the perfect storm for this to happen," Davis said.

Normally, Gaubert would have signed off around 6 a.m. when his overnight shift ended, telling his colleagues "10-7" over the radio. But those calls are suspended during major emergencies like a manhunt or other critical incident, per agency protocol, Davis said. So the lack of communication from Gaubert raised no red flags.

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The night of his death, officials believe Gaubert had responded to a traffic accident and then parked in a secluded spot behind the Capital One bank off Airline and Jefferson highways to complete his report. It was a totally routine occurrence that had nothing to do with the search for Mire, who had already shot his neighbors in French Settlement around midnight, stolen a pickup truck and headed toward Ascension Parish.

Investigators believe Mire ambushed Gaubert and shot the trooper multiple times before committing another double shooting at a house less than a mile away, Davis said Monday.

Gaubert filed his last police report at 2:21 a.m.

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