FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – Dressed in a Penn State sweatshirt and sweatpants, the girlfriend of a Miami police officer who was fatally shot at his Pembroke Pines home was booked into the main Broward County jail early Thursday morning.
Tiniko Thompson was arrested just hours earlier Wednesday on a charge of second-degree murder in the death of Carl Patrick.
Patrick, a 25-year veteran of the Miami Police Department, was found shot to death May 9 at his home on Northwest 93rd Avenue.
Pembroke Pines police said Thompson, 46, was taken into custody about 7 p.m.
Thompson, a Miami police public service aide who was Patrick's live-in girlfriend, had been considered a person of interest in the shooting.
Pembroke Pines police Capt. Al Xiques defended the amount of time it took for them to make an arrest.
"Some evidence has come back that's allowed us to prepare the case," Xiques said. "All of that hard work has brought us to the point we're at now."
READ: Miami Fraternal Order of Police president issues letter in response to Thompson's arrest
Rod Vareen, Thompson's attorney, claimed his client was "acting in self-defense." He said Thompson was defending herself during a struggle and the gun fired, but she did not have her finger on the trigger.
Vereen also provided Local 10 with photographs of injuries to Thompson that he said came at the hands of Patrick.
A key piece of evidence in the death investigation was surveillance video showing Thompson at a storage facility in North Miami hours after the shooting. It shows her dropping off baby items from Patrick's BMW.
Personnel files reveal that Patrick and Thompson requested medical leave for a birth, possibly because they were expecting a child.
"My hope now is that this arrest brings the closure that we so desperately need in the aftermath of what has been a terrible tragedy for us all," Miami Police Chief Manuel Orosa said in a statement Thursday morning.