Police Officers Get It Tough
Posted on 2 December 2009 by Stenberg-Tendys W.L. in Society
Killer of Sgt. Mark Renninger, 39, officers Ronald Owens, 37, Tina Griswold, 40, and Greg Richards, 42, were shot and killed on Monday, 1st December, by a seven-year veteran of the Seattle patrol force.
Clemmons began running clockwise around the stranded vehicle, when told to stop and show his hands. The officer fired several rounds, killing Clemmons, who was found to be in possession of one of the dead police officer’s guns.
The patrol officer had recognized Clemmons as the possible suspect in the recent police shooting, when he stopped by a stranded vehicle. Maurice Clemmons, 37, had been wounded in the torso during the shootout.
Three people have been taken into custody for aiding Clemmons during his two days on the run. Clemmons’ sister was believed to have driven her brother to Seattle and bandaged his wound.
Clemmons had a history of violent crimes in Arkansas and Washington. He would have been serving a 108-year prison term in Arkansas, but his sentence was commuted by former Gov. Mike Huckabee in 2000, after Clemmons argued that he had committed his crimes, including burglary, aggravated robbery and illegal possession of a firearm, as a youth.
One year after his pardon, Clemmons was jailed for a parole violation, but released again in 2004. Clemmons moved to Washington state, but family members told police, he began acting erratically and appeared to have lost some of his mental abilities. He believed the world was ending and he was Jesus Christ.
Austin Raihl, said his mother was driving down the street in May, when Clemmons picked up a brick and hurled it through the car window. “She called her brother-in-law and Clemmons and another man who was with him threw bricks and rocks and broke two of the car windows,” Raihl said.
The men were believed to have been on drugs. It took four police officers to arrest them. According to police reports, Clemmons punched one of the arresting sheriff’s deputies in the face. Clemmons was released the next day on bail, without going before a judge.
In July Child Protective Services substantiated a sexual abuse complaint, when Clemmons abused both his wife and three daughters. Clemmons was charged with second-degree rape of a child, as well as being a fugitive from Arkansas police. On Nov 23th Clemmons posted $15,000 of a $150,000 bail and was released from jail, just one week before the controlled killing rampage. No onlookers in the café were shot.
Police will be seeking to rule out any link between Sunday’s murders and the death of police officer Timothy Brenton in Seattle last month. Brenton was shot as he was sitting in a police vehicle on the night of Halloween, in the first intentional homicide of a Seattle police officer since 1994.
A suspect in that killing, Christopher Monfort, has been connected to a string of arson attacks on four police vehicles, which has been described by prosecutors as a “one-man war against law enforcement”.
Across the world in Afghanistan, six national policemen were killed on Dec 1st and two others injured, when a rogue policeman opened fire at a checkpoint in southwest Afghanistan. The gunman escaped to another district in the province, where he was identified by an Afghan National Army patrol. The patrol opened fire and the man was killed in the ensuing gun battle.
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