A Pennsylvania state police trooper who was shot in a 2014 ambush has had his right leg amputated below the knee.

Trooper Alex Douglass underwent the surgery this week at a New York City hospital.

His friend Earl Granville said Friday that Douglass had been having some medical complications with his leg and decided to have it amputated to improve his quality of life.

"As an athlete, it will be better for him in the long run," Granville said. "This will give him an opportunity to do what he loves again."

Granville is a veteran who lost his leg in 2008 when his vehicle hit a roadside bomb in Afghanistan. An acquaintance connected the two when Douglass expressed interest in doing a marathon, knowing Granville had completed several since being wounded. The two, both of Scranton, completed the New York City Marathon handcycle event in 2015, he said.

Douglass has run marathons in the past, and Granville said he knows his friend would love to do so again and should be able to with a prosthetic.

Douglass is in great spirits, he said.

"His attitude has been phenomenal. It's something we could all admire," Granville said.

Douglass was wounded when Eric Frein opened fire at the Blooming Grove state police barracks in northeastern Pennsylvania in September 2014. Cpl. Bryon Dickson II, a married father of two, was killed.

Frein then led authorities on a 48-day manhunt through the rugged Pocono Mountains before U.S. marshals caught him at an abandoned airplane hangar. He was convicted in 2017 and is on death row for the slayings.

He's seeking a new trial.

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This story has been corrected to show Douglass did the New York City Marathon handcycle event in 2015, not last month.