Sergeant Cowart was shot on Sunday, December 6, 1931, by a former deputy sheriff he had arrested five years earlier. Sergeant Cowart was at home when the man knocked on his door. When he answered the suspect, standing in the yard, fired a single shot through the glass-enclosed porch, striking Sergeant Cowart in the stomach. Arriving officers found the suspect fatally wounded after his shotgun accidentally discharged as he attempted to dismantle it. Sergeant Cowart sucumbed to his injuries on Monday, December 7, 1931.

Sergeant Cowart served the Des Moines Police Department for nine years.

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