A Montgomery County deputy shot and killed a man acting erratically on a road in Gaithersburg on Saturday morning.
Around 8 a.m. on Saturday, Montgomery County police said 52-year-old Kevin Costlow, of Laytonsville, was driving a Volkswagen sedan erratically out of the town of Laytonsville. Police said Costlow crossed the center line a number of times and forced other drivers to swerve to avoid hitting him.
Before the collision, the man was “acting erratically,” according to Popkin. He caused the first car that he engaged with to swerve off the road and hit a telephone pole. The suspect then continued eastbound on the wrong side of the road and crashed into another vehicle.
“[The] driver could not take enough evasive action, and the driver did run right into the front end of that of that second vehicle,” Popkin said.
The Volkswagen then drove a little bit further down the road about 20 feet before coming to a stop.
“He immediately got out of the car with a very large wooden stick of some sort with a very large piece of wood,” Popkin said. “He started going after the vehicle that he had just ran into.”
He said a Montgomery County Sheriff’s Deputy who was driving in the area was the first to arrive at the scene and engaged Costlow near Laytonsville Road at Fieldcrest Road.
The sheriff said a deputy nearby tried to use his taser to deescalate the situation before firing shots and killing Costlow.
“My thoughts are with everybody who was involved in this incident,” Popkin said. “That includes the folks who just happened to be out on a Saturday morning, driving down route one … that got involved in this incident, as well as the sheriff’s deputy that was injured this morning. And to the family of the person unfortunately, that is deceased here as the investigation continues.”
The sheriff’s deputy is being treated for injuries as are two people involved in crashes.
