Police stationed at the scene on the Brunswick side of the Route 196 bridge on Monday afternoon. C. Thacher Carter / The Times Record

A woman who was shot during a confrontation with a Topsham police officer on the Route 196 bridge Monday has died.

Kourtney Sherwood, 37, of Brunswick, who was in critical care at Maine Medical Center, died Tuesday afternoon, according to hospital’s Senior Communications and Public Affairs Manager Caroline Cornish.

Topsham Police Chief Marc Hagan said Officer Mathew Bowers fired one round “as a result of an armed encounter” between Sherwood and police officers who responded after receiving a call that Sherwood “was in her car on the side of the road” and “making threats to harm herself and others.”

In a statement on Monday, Hagan said the caller reported that Sherwood was possibly armed with a gun.

“As is customary in any situation where an officer uses deadly force, Officer Bowers is on administrative leave while the police department investigates the incident,” Hagan stated.

The Office of the Maine Attorney General is conducting a separate investigation, which is also standard procedure when an officer uses deadly force. Police have not revealed what Sherwood was armed with.

“To ensure the integrity of the investigation, no further details will be released at this time,” Hagan said. “When appropriate, the department will release further information.”

Attempts to contact Hagan and the Office of the Maine Attorney General for further comment were unsuccessful on Tuesday.

It is unclear why Sherwood was pulled over to the side of the road or whether she was alone in the car.

The incident took place around 2:34 p.m. on the four-lane Topsham Bypass – Route 196 – which connects Topsham and Brunswick crossing over the Androscoggin River.

Maine State Police and Brunswick police closed the Route 196 Bridge to traffic following the shooting and advised drivers to take an alternate route. Traffic was backed up for at least a mile as a result of the closure.

Route 196 reopened to traffic around 7:30 p.m.

In February 2020, Topsham commissioned The Maine Chiefs of Police Association to conduct a review of the police department and provide a written report.

“Officers are empowered to use deadly force in defense of themselves or a third person against deadly force, or to effect the arrest of a person when the person has committed a crime involving deadly force and is likely to endanger human life unless apprehended without delay,” the report, which was released in July 2020, states.

The report stated that a review of the town’s situational use of force policy “revealed that it is properly updated and contains the minimum standards” and that prior documentation related to the use of force “appeared to be filled out correctly and appeared to be within reason for an agency of their size and crime volume.”

There have been 29 deadly police shootings in Maine since 2015, according to a national database assembled by The Washington Post last updated on Feb. 28, 2022. That translates to a rate of 22 police shootings per million people since 2015.