Story highlights Slain Detective Sean Suiter was shot at close range with his own gun, police say

Suiter was scheduled to testify before a federal grand jury the day after he was killed

(CNN) A Baltimore homicide detective was fatally shot in the head with his own gun after a struggle with his killer last week, the city's police commissioner said Wednesday.

Sean Suiter, 43, was to testify before a grand jury the day after he was killed, Commissioner Kevin Davis said. The grand jury is looking at a corruption case involving several Baltimore officers who were federally indicted in March.

Suiter, an 18-year department veteran, was investigating a killing in west Baltimore on November 15 when he saw a man exhibiting suspicious behaviors, police said. The officer died the next day at a hospital.

In an apparent attempt to address speculation about a connection between Suiter's killing and his pending testimony, Davis said the Suiter and his partner were not lured to the scene of the shooting and made a "spontaneous decision" to investigate the suspicious man.

"It certainly makes for great theater," Davis said. "We have a police officer who's shot and killed and we don't have a really good description, and we don't have someone in custody -- and lo and behold ... I found out after the fact that he was scheduled to testify in front of a federal grand jury."

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