AP
Thomas J. Fritz, 38, served a one-year sentence in Ohio on a 2007 third-degree criminal sexual conduct conviction, authorities say.
By WTOV's Natalie Herbick and wire reports
SISTERSVILLE, W.Va. -- U.S. Marshals hunting a?former military police specialist in connection with?the shooting deaths of his ex-girlfriend and her pregnant sister in Michigan surrounded a cabin in West Virginia late Tuesday.
Authorities later said a man in the cabin died of self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Marshals believed that suspect Thomas Fritz was in the building but they were immediately unable to confirm the dead man's identity.
Fritz served nearly a year in Iraq and later was jailed in Ohio for sexual battery.
NBC News station WTOV reported that marshals and officers from several other agencies were combing the area when they came across a cabin and said they spotted a man with a gun.
They said the man started yelling and went in the house, which is when marshals said they heard one shot come from inside.
When marshals got inside they said they found a man with a self-inflicted fatal gunshot wound.
More stories from WTOV9.com
Fritz, 38, was charged with killing his 33-year-old ex-girlfriend Amy Merrill in a house they shared in Blissfield, a village on the edge of southern Michigan's scenic Irish Hills region. He is also accused of killing the woman's 24-year-old sister?Lisa Gritzmaker,?who was eight months' pregnant, and shooting and wounding their 52-year-old mother?Robin Lynn McCowan.
Fritz moved in with Merrill last winter along with her two sons from another relationship and a toddler they had together. She broke up with him about three weeks ago, investigators said.
Fritz served in the Ohio National Guard beginning in 1997 and later the Army Reserve. He then spent nearly a year in Iraq with the guard's military police unit from the spring of 2003 through early 2004.
That same year he received an associate of applied science degree in criminal justice from Owens Community College in suburban Toledo.
Authorities had previously said that Fritz was believed to be armed and dangerous.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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