FBI agent shoots robbery suspect
Brockton man was tracked to Braintree hotel
A Brockton man wanted in the armed robbery of a Manchester, N.H., grocery store was shot yesterday by an FBI agent outside a Braintree hotel, an event that rattled guests and passersby.
Stephen A. Butler, 40, wanted in the Aug. 30 robbery of a Vista Foods supermarket, was tracked to the Extended StayAmerica hotel, where he was shot in the parking lot at about 6:30 p.m., FBI spokeswoman Gail Marcinkiewicz said.
Other than saying that Butler was in a car when agents arrived, Marcinkiewicz said she could not provide details of the shooting because the incident was being investigated.
Butler was taken to Boston Medical Center, where officials declined to comment on his condition.
The Union Leader newspaper reported early this month that a man armed with what appeared to be a sawed-off shotgun had robbed the Vista Foods store on Lincoln Street at about 9 p.m. He ordered several employees into an office, demanded cash from them, and fled in a car with Massachusetts license plates, which was driven by a woman, the newspaper reported.
A woman believed to be his companion was at the scene of yesterday's shooting, Marcinkiewicz said, adding that the woman was questioned but not arrested.
The FBI became involved in the hunt for the robbery suspect after invoking a statute that targets people who disrupt interstate commerce through robbery or extortion. ''Usually robberies of grocery stores aren't something we get involved in," Marcinkiewicz said.
Police officers from Manchester, Braintree, and Quincy were also at the scene yesterday.
The shooting startled hotel guests and others. Mark Tobin was sitting in his car in a nearby parking lot at about 6:30 p.m. when he heard tires screeching, followed by three pops. At first, he said, he thought it was a car backfiring.
Declan Kelly, who works at a nearby law office, said he also heard what ''sounded like champagne popping."
''It was too clear to be a backfire," he said.
The shooting yesterday was the second in the region this year in which an agent wounded a suspect.
Kenny Robinson of Mattapan was wanted in the robbery of a bank when he was shot multiple times March 24 in Dorchester. That case was the first shooting by an FBI agent in Boston in more than two decades, Marcinkiewicz told the Globe in March.
