{"id":149396,"date":"2026-03-26T20:33:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T20:33:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/149396\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T20:33:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T20:33:07","slug":"lower-merion-police-cleared-in-fatal-shooting-of-ex-cop-wanted-for-child-rape-da","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/149396\/","title":{"rendered":"Lower Merion Police Cleared In Fatal Shooting Of Ex-Cop Wanted For Child Rape: DA"},"content":{"rendered":"

BALA CYNWYD, PA \u2014 Two Lower Merion Township police officers have been cleared in the investigation of a shooting that killed a former cop<\/a> who they were trying to arrest on child rape charges, authorities said Thursday.<\/p>\n

On Feb. 25, Lower Merion Police tried to arrest Francis Collier \u2014 a former Morton police officer who was charged with raping a child. <\/p>\n

Collier, 38, fired his weapon as police tried to approach him outside his home in Bala Cynwyd. Two officers returned fire, according to the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office, which was investigating the officers’ use of deadly force.<\/p>\n

Further investigation found Collier died from three gunshot wounds to the head, including on that was self-inflicted, according to investigators.<\/p>\n

Both Lower Merion officers have been cleared in the use-of-force investigation, says Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin R. Steele.<\/p>\n

“This was a dangerous situation where police were attempting to arrest an armed man on an arrest warrant,” Steele said. “Our investigation determined the facts of this case justified the use of deadly force by police officers.”<\/p>\n

Collier was previously an officer in Morton, Delaware County. In December, Delco’s District Attorney’s Office contacted Morton Police about an investigation into Collier.<\/p>\n

Investigators relayed that they were looking into criminal allegations against Collier for incidents that happened several years ago \u2014 possibly when he was a teenager \u2014 Morton Police said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Collier was immediately placed on unpaid leave before he resigned on Dec. 19, according to Morton Police.<\/p>\n

The former officer was charged Feb. 24 with child rape and related offenses.<\/p>\n

Lower Merion Police were notified that Collier was wanted on the charges. Officers received photos of him and his Jeep Grand Cherokee, and they were advised that Collier was a former cop whose records indicated he owned multiple guns, authorities said.<\/p>\n

At 1:56 a.m. the next morning, a patrol officer saw Collier’s Jeep outside the suspect’s apartment on Old Lancaster Road. Police looked through the vehicle’s windows and saw a police tactical vest and tactical bags, which are used to store gear and weapons, authorities said.<\/p>\n

Lowr Merion Police formulated a plan to arrest Collier when he exited his apartment. Collier did so at 3:45 a.m. and walked to his Jeep.<\/p>\n

One officer stepped out of his vehicle, and another activated his patrol car’s emergency lights when they heard a gunshot from Collier’s direction, authorities said. The officers believed they were being fired upon.<\/p>\n

A bullet exited the Jeep’s rear driver-side window, authorities said.<\/p>\n

The officers drew their weapons and returned fire. Collier was found dead in the backseat with a Sig Sauer semi-automatic pistol on his lap, authorities said.<\/p>\n

Two rifles, a pistol and a bulletproof vest were also recovered from the Jeep, authorities said.<\/p>\n

Per state protocol, the Montgomery County Detective Bureau investigated the officers’ use of deadly force. They interviewed several officers, reviewed police body-cam and dash-cam footage, and collected on-scene evidence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BALA CYNWYD, PA \u2014 Two Lower Merion Township police officers have been cleared in the investigation of a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":149397,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[183,185,184,186],"class_list":["post-149396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lower-merion","tag-lower-merion","tag-lower-merion-headlines","tag-lower-merion-news","tag-lower-merion-township"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/149397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}