Man Who Killed 4 Washington Police Officers Shot Dead

Tuesday, December 01, 2009

I found a story on Foxnews about the man who recently gunned down four police officers as they sat in a coffee shop. The article highlighted how the shooter was killed when he approached an officer sitting in his patrol car making out a report on a stolen car. The officer recognized the shooting suspect because of a large mole on his cheek and when the suspect went for his gun the patrolman shot him dead.


I am so glad that this criminal will never again hurt anyone. He obviously had a history of violence and crime and also a history of mental illness. I am glad the residents of Tacoma are rid of this menace and closure can be brought to the families of the victims and fellow police officers.
I was surprised to see reported in the article that there was little blame thrown toward the family that helped this man escape capture for days and even aided him in his belly wound from a bullet fired by one of the slain officers in the coffee shop, however some big names were thrown out to blame for this man to even be out in society and not locked up. One of the big names blamed was former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee who in “in 2000 commuted his 108-year prison sentence for armed robbery and other offenses.” The other blame went to a Washington state court where “A psychological evaluation in October found he was a risk to public safety, but not enough of one to justify committing him” But the kicker to the blame game is how this man was able to post bail for charges of raping a child six days before shooting the police in the coffee shop. He should have still been locked up for that and never let out in the first place. A few things reported in the article bothered me. One was that the sheriffs spokesman reported hearsay as if paramedics were the ultimate authority on medical conditions when he said, “Paramedics were stunned that Clemmons lived as long as he did with the bullet wound.” One more use for duct tape as the wound actually was found to have duct tape over it. The other thing that bothered me was reported “Police said Clemmons would have died eventually of the gunshot wound he suffered in the coffee-shop rampage.” What made them the medical authority on his wound? And why was that important to include in the story. Were they trying to justify his being killed by the officer as if,…Well he would have died anyway so it was OK that we shot him? After all the man was up walking around and even supposedly trying to gun down another policeman days after he had been shot. Didn’t sound like a dying man to me. No I’m not siding with the criminal, against law enforcement I know belly wounds are so infectious and painful, I just think it was odd to include this piece of reporting in the article. Seemed kind of like souping up the truth and I just wanted to bring attention to it.


Anyway I am very glad this criminal is no longer a threat to society and I hope justice will also be served to his accomplices in the murders of the policemen.