November 29, 2009 in Region

4 police officers shot dead in Wash. coffeehouse

Associated Press

Lui Wong photo

A Pierce County Sheriff deputy runs to the site where four police officers killed in an ambush at the Forza Coffee Co. near Parkland, Wash., on Sunday, November 29, 2009.
(Full-size photo)(All photos)

ADVERTISEMENTAdvertise Here

PARKLAND, Wash. — A man with an extensive criminal past — whose 95-year prison sentence was commuted in Arkansas nearly a decade ago — was being sought Sunday as a “person of interest” in a deadly ambush on four police officers who were gunned down inside a coffee shop.

Pierce County sheriff’s spokesman Ed Troyer told reporters that Maurice Clemmons, 37, was one of several people investigators want to talk to and that he could not be called a suspect at this point.

In a news release, the sheriff’s office said Clemmons has an extensive violent criminal history from Arkansas, including aggravated robbery and theft. Clemmons also recently was arrested and charged in Pierce County in Washington state for third-degree assault on a police officer, and second-degree rape of a child.

In 1989, Clemmons, then 17, was convicted in Little Rock for aggravated robbery. He was paroled in 2000 after then-Gov. Mike Huckabee commuted Clemmons’ 95-year prison sentence. Huckabee, who was criticized during his run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008 for the number of clemencies and commutations he granted, cited Clemmons’ age at the time of the sentence.

After his release from prison, Clemmons violated his parole and was returned to prison in July 2001. He was released March 18, 2004, according to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette newspaper.

The four officers were with the 100-member police department of Lakewood, which adjoins the unincorporated area of Parkland, where the shootings took place. The city identified the victims as Sgt. Mark Renninger, 39; Ronald Owens, 37; Tina Griswold, 40; and Greg Richards 42.

Troyer said one of those officers fought with the gunman and may have wounded him before the officer died just outside the doorway. He told reporters that investigators were asking area medical providers to report any people wounded by gunshots.

Troyer said investigators believe two of the officers were shot dead while sitting in the shop, and a third was killed after standing up. The fourth apparently struggled with the gunman out the doorway and “gave up a good fight,” getting off a few shots before he was either shot there or succumbed to earlier wounds.

“We believe there was a struggle, a commotion, a fight … that he fought the guy all the way out the door,” Troyer said.

He added, “We hope that he hit him.”

Troyer said the gunman entered the coffee house and walked up to the counter as if to place an order. A barista saw a gun when the man opened his jacket and fled out the back door. The man then turned and opened fire on the officers as they sat working on their laptops, killing the three men and one woman in what Troyer described as a targeted ambush.

Troyer said the attack was clearly targeted at the officers, not a robbery gone bad.

“This was more of an execution. Walk in with the specific mindset to shoot police officers,” he said.

Troyer said the officers were catching up on paperwork at the beginning of their shifts when they were attacked at 8:15 a.m. Sunday.

“There were marked patrol cars outside and they were all in uniform,” Troyer said.

There was no indication of any connection with the Halloween night shooting of a Seattle police officer. The suspect in that shooting remains hospitalized.

“We won’t know if it’s a copycat effect or what it was until we get the case solved,” Troyer said. “We don’t even have a suspect ID right now.”

Troyer estimated that a couple of hundred officers from the Washington State Patrol and multiple surrounding police agencies in the area were at the crime scene, with some coming on their own time.

On Sunday night, a motorcade of dozens of police cars and motorcycles with lights flashing escorted the bodies of the four officers from the crime scene to the Pierce County medical examiner’s office in Tacoma. The motorcade rolled under a giant American flag hanging from fire truck ladders.

“We have no motive at all,” Troyer said. “I don’t think when we find out what it is, it will be anything that makes any sense or be worth it.”

Two employees and a few other customers were in the shop during the attack. All were interviewed by the Pierce County sheriff’s investigators.

“Some are in shock. They are very upset,” Troyer said. “They are the ones who are going to put together for us how this happened.”

The Forza Coffee Shop, part of a popular local chain, is on a side street near McChord Air Force Base in Tacoma, about 35 miles south of Seattle. The shop is in a small retail center alongside two restaurants, a cigar store and a nail salon.

Brad Carpenter, founder and owner of Forza Coffee, said his staff was OK and being interviewed by police, and that his main concern was for the families of the police officers.

“I’m a retired police officer, so this really hits close to home for me,” said Carpenter, of nearby Gig Harbor.

Troyer said the Lakewood officers were two blocks outside their jurisdiction, and the coffee shop was a popular place for officers from surrounding jurisdictions to meet and share information.

Streets around the coffee shop were blocked off late Sunday morning, and a police helicopter hovered over a large crowd of investigators. TV video showed police taking possession of a pickup truck parked in a grocery store in Parkland.

Troyer said investigators were checking surveillance video from multiple sources, trying to identify a possible getaway car.

Dave Gabrielson, a clerk at Foot Mart about a block away from the coffee shop, told the newspaper all was quiet when he opened the store at 8 a.m. About 30 minutes later, “All of a sudden a million cops were zooming up and down the road,” Gabrielson said.

He said he saw officers bring a police dog into a nearby apartment complex.

Last month, Seattle police officer Timothy Brenton was shot and killed Halloween night as he was sitting in a cruiser with trainee Britt Sweeney. Sweeney was grazed in the neck.

Authorities say the man charged with that shooting also firebombed four police vehicles in October as part of a “one-man war” against law enforcement. Christopher Monfort, 41, was arrested after being wounded in a firefight with police days after the Seattle shooting. He remains hospitalized in stable condition, the hospital said Sunday.

The officers killed Sunday were a patrol squad made up of three officers and their sergeant. No threats had been made against them or other officers in the region, sheriff’s officials said. Their families have been notified.

“We lost people we care about. We’re working to find out who did this and deal with him.” Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor told reporters at the scene.

Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire said she was “shocked and horrified” by the killings.

“Our police put their lives on the line every day, and tragedies like this remind us of the risks they continually take to keep our communities safe,” she said in a written statement. “My heart goes out to the family, friends and co-workers of these officers, as well as the entire law enforcement community.”

26 comments on this story so far. Add yours!

biasedopinion on November 29 at 1:07 p.m.
Gee I can hardly wait to see how posters on this site will twist this into being the police officers fault or justify the killer(s) actions by connecting it to some perceived wrongdoing.
I feel for the families of the slain officers, I imagine that not one of them feared that watching their loved one leave for work on a Sunday morning would be the last time that they would have the opportunity to see them alive, or say I love you, just one last time.
Hopefully the shooter is taken into custody expeditiously.
Rifleman__Dodd on November 29 at 2:07 p.m.
biasedopinion. It appears that you have already started.
Rumor has it Mayor Greg Nickels of Seattle has declared all of Tacoma and its suburbs gun free zones.
SugarShane on November 29 at 2:27 p.m.
Well biased, this story reeks of something fishy. Cops have a way of bending the rules to suit their needs and protect their own. In light of the recent stories of our own boys in blue, Im sorry but the question arises, what were these guys involved in that got them executed. It hardly seems random. I wouldnt be surprised if the killer or killers are never found.
calvinandhobbes on November 29 at 3:58 p.m.
Sugar shane!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? what are you talking about? with that line of reasoning, you would also say that every person who gets mudered was involved in something that they shouldn’t be.
Rifleman__Dodd on November 29 at 4:02 p.m.
There is a lot of speculation about why 4 Police Officers would be having a pre shift meeting at a local coffee place and not at the Police Department. Why they were there at 08:15 when their shift starts at 06:00. How they were killed when wearing bullet proof vests and why not a one of them were able to get a single round off or a radio call. A laptop is not my weapon of choice.
How can a single (theoretically scruffy) person can rush in and take them all out by surprise?
There are a whole lot of answers that will come out. Perhaps some of them not as pretty as we would like to expect.
Of course we are quarterbacking in three hours what took place in 30 seconds and 30 days to investigate. Thanks to the media and PA person for dribbling out the facts so we can only speculate.
I am sure detractors, finger pointers such BiassedOpinone will certainly attempt to continue their obfuscation in order to draw attention to themselves rather than the subject at hand.
biasedopinion on November 29 at 4:05 p.m.
When you piece together other newspaper reports I don’t come to the “something is fishy” line of thought. However, I am not surprised at all by your opinion.
It appears that this “patrol unit” was probably having their roll call at the coffee shop when they were killed.
“The officers — three men and one woman — were found dead by deputies who arrived at Forza Coffee at 11401 Steele St. S., said Pierce County Sheriff’s spokesman Ed Troyer. The officers made up one patrol unit, including a sergeant
The officers were in uniform, including bulletproof vests, and were working on their laptop computers as they prepared to start their day shifts, Troyer said.”
zelda on November 29 at 4:31 p.m.
The latest reports say that one of the officers was able to get off a shot so they’re asking the public to be on the lookout for the killer as he probably will seek medical treatment.
Lakewood was incorporated about five years ago. There are towns and cities all over WA that incorporated over the past 10 years (Fife, SeaTac, Liberty Lake, Spokane Valley, etc.) and I can imagine that the jurisdictional messes that has created make a well-coordinated law enforcement response that much harder.
I don’t see anything “fishy” in this. Those areas around Ft. Lewis and McChord are tough neighborhoods. Makes me wonder if the police who were killed had a routine of stopping at this coffee shop and the killer was aware of the routine. Regular customer? Former worker at the strip mall?
Spokane_PI on November 29 at 5:11 p.m.
Sounds the the mexican drug war has arrived in Pierce County!
empyrius on November 29 at 5:33 p.m.
They were apparently regulars Zelda. “Brad Carpenter, CEO of Forza Coffee, and a retired police officer from Oakland and Gig Harbor, stated that, ‘The slain officers were well-known to our staff’”.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2010382767_webfourdead29m.html
We should create domestic jobs for every able-bodied American, federal minimum wage twenty dollars an hour, universal health coverage, and the opportunity for every citizen to get a college education either while they work, or straight-out full-time school with work-study; and no disqualification for college b/c of a previous drug conviction!
Additionally a college education should be mandatory, and free, just like it is for grades K-12!
We need an American that provides opportunity for all because far too many people are being left behind, and if Wall Street continues to get richer while main street simply struggles to not be sleeping on the street, further needless tragedy shall only increase . . .
And this nation will become a very ugly place.
Peace
empyrius on November 29 at 5:34 p.m.
Did you cause some trouble on the “Man shot by Spokane deputies” thread Rifleman?
hines_don on November 29 at 6:06 p.m.
Something is very wrong here,This was an execution.
zelda on November 29 at 6:26 p.m.
Saying this guy is a bad actor is the understatement of the year. Things don’t look so good for Mike Huckabee either.
Maurice Clemmons, the 37-year-old Tacoma man being sought for questioning in the killing of four Lakewood police officers this morning, has a long criminal record punctuated by violence, erratic behavior and concerns about his mental health.
Nine years ago, then-Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee granted clemency to Clemmons, commuting his lengthy prison sentence over the protestations of prosecutors.
“This is the day I’ve been dreading for a long time,” Larry Jegley, prosecuting attorney for Arkansas’ Pulaski County said Sunday night when informed that Clemmons was being sought in connection to the killings.
Clemmons’ criminal history includes at least five felony convictions in Arkansas and at least eight felony charges in Washington. The record also stands out for the number of times he has been released from custody despite questions about the danger he posed.
Clemmons had been in jail in Pierce County for the past several months on a pending charge of second-degree rape of a child.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2010385617_webmansought29.html
Ron_the_Cop on November 29 at 7:09 p.m.
This was an assassination. The suspect must have had some firearms training/experience to get off four kill shots that quickly. Mind you the officers were wearing vests which would indicate head or neck shots in rapid order. Apparently only on officer was able to get off a shot.
Here’s more on who the suspect is:
http://confederateyankee.mu.nu/archives/295247.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ConfederateYankee+(Confederate+Yankee+Blog)
Ron_the_Cop on November 29 at 7:12 p.m.
Here’s more on the suspect:
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/11/29/violent-felon-granted-clemency-by-huckabee-now-sought-in-lakewood-wa-police-ambush/
mosieD on November 29 at 7:22 p.m.
What a horrible thing.These policemen and women put their lives on the fence to protect others every day.They have every right to take a coffee break where ever or when ever they want.I hope they catch the sicko shooter and hang em high.If it does turn out to be this clemmons then they should oust huckabee out of office.Talking about Spokane,the criminals running city council including the so called mayor just budgeted out more policemen.And yet they want crime solved.They had the money to buy a race track property but can’t afford the policeman force we should have.One of the lowest ratio of police to population in the country.If the council and mayor get robbed then maybe they should call the race track for help
I have deep respect for our police and fire fighters,they are true heroes.
spokanecougar on November 29 at 7:28 p.m.
Another violent criminal released by that freak Mike Huckabee coming back to hunt him. This is now 5 innocent people killed by criminals Huckabee personally let out of prison early.
The only good news out of this is we now don’t have to worry about that religious freak Huckabee running for president.
Now, just have to worry about that other religious freak Palin.
Shylock13 on November 29 at 7:50 p.m.
First, my condolences to the families, friends, and fellow officers of those law enforcement personnel who were brutally gunned down, apparently for no particular reason.
Second, those who want to shift the blame to the victims are those who continually criticize law enforcement officers (some already have), should question their own motives for exonerating perps!
Third, how did the alleged perp get his weapon—legally or illegally? Yes, it does matter if he got it legally, since a hole needs to be plugged, and it does matter if he got it illegally, since there is a larger hole to plug.l
Fourth, why was the alleged perp even on the street? He has “an extensive violent criminal history” in Arizona. Somehow, Arizona let him out despite his 95 year sentence–WHY? Also he was recently arrested and charged with assaulting a police officer and rape of a child! Those charges should have been sufficient to deny him bail! Who let him out, and why????
Finally, I fear our judicial system leans for more toward the “rights” of criminals than it does to the “rights” of the rest of society! I demand lo know WHY the alleged perp was not incarcerated without bail!
All law-abiding citizens are entitled to know that!!!!
Rifleman___Dodd on November 29 at 7:59 p.m.
No empyrius. however the poster at the very top was exercising his option to practice ad hominem commentary not germane to the subject.
Perhaps we should all wait until the facts come in in-toto rather than getting the microscope out at every little dribble. Often times the person they find is not the person they they are looking for. Often times by focusing on a possible wild hare they are concurrently overlooking the obvious
The facts often come out without perpective such as the case in this incident as nearly 12 hours have passed and we are learning/hearing of some of the most basic parts of it. I imagine it will unravel in time. I suggest just let the professionals do their job and disregard the armchair Inspector Clouseau’s. There is/will be enough mis-information to fog the incident as it is.
They dont say how or why this is a person of interest, which causes me to consider some of the validity of what is being released. Even when its from an “Official Source”, it sometimes is a bit murky. Sgt Troyer’s early uncalled for lambasting of the news media certainly set a bad tone and the false accusations of King 5 demonstrate a certain inability of their spokesperson’s to maintain calm and focused. How many times has the news media uncovered a tip or a lead that escaped the investigators?
maria on November 29 at 8:12 p.m.
Damn sad is what it is. Mike Huckabee commuted the suspect’s sentence years ago.
zelda on November 29 at 9:55 p.m.
Could be Huckabee’s Willie Horton moment. The other GOP hopefuls for 2012 are changing their game plan as we speak.
I looked at the officers’ faces on the Seattle Times site. All had spouses and children. The randomness of death sucked the scarce sunlight out of a tranquil winter day. I hope they catch this murderer before he ruins more lives and families and provides more fodder for political strategists.
cme on November 30 at 4:01 a.m.
Execution, Karma-Style Murder pay back, is not going to win anyone friends….
No doubt, nobody on the job deserves to die & these officers are no different than you and me.
The recent escalation of police allowed to “shoot to kill first, ask questions later”, & get away with it… is the REAL focus here. The condition is totally out of control on the west side. So much so that a police officer in Everett, WA is being charged with murder after he shot a DUI suspect 6-times in the back, only after suspect refused to get out of car after the same officer tased him twice & he could not move, except in convulsions, in which case the officer shot him dead for.. “moving”.
That officer has not been fired… a Jury convicting him may not be enough for him to be fired as well. After all… ‘the good ‘ol bois” club has much more power than a frikin JURY of the LAW!!!
It is doubtfull such investigating reports, such as the Everett, WA “dui, taser, kill” would ever be investigated by prosecutors here in Spokane, or surrounding counties.
With such reports of police brutality, it is simply a matter of time until we see the criminal RISE ABOVE….
This kind of killing happens ALL THE TIME in Mexico, let that be a lesson Spokane. Just because it happened 300 miles west, does not mean it cant happen to you, today.
Diana on November 30 at 5:18 a.m.
To all the armchair cop haters, if you’re a victim of a crime, I can only imagine how fast you’ll be calling 9-1-1.
philipgregory on November 30 at 8:47 a.m.
“…second-degree rape of a child.”
How can there be ‘degrees’ of the rape of a child..?
He didn’t plan it? There were contributing issues..?
What crap! The justice system shows once again how pathetically lacking it is in JUSTICE!
mike_s on November 30 at 3:48 p.m.
… and the Spokesman’s front page today was dedicated mostly to a feature story on the remodel of a Browne’s Addition home? (Though the L.A. Times and USA Today both ran as their lead photos the tragic police shooting in the state of Washington
ramiamaro on December 01 at 6:28 a.m.
I’ve been stressing this for years.
There are three prongs to the criminal justice system: 1) Justice for the victim; 2) Punishment for the convicted; and 3) Rehabilitation.
Far too often the judicial system focuses on number three to the exclusion of numbers one and two. There is supposed to be a hiearchy here! Rehabilitation of violent offenders or offenders who prey on those unable to protect themselves (children, elderly, handicapped …) should occur DURING incarceration! There should be none of these early releases - look at the Duncan case, none of these temporary releases to have Thanksgiving at home, and none of these insanely short sentences for rapes and murders. The justice system MUST place victim’s rights above criminals (this is AFTER conviction after all) to protect society.
If current politicians and judges won’t do this - put somebody in office who will. Otherwise crime will simply get worse until we are no longer free to even leave our homes without fear of being a victim.
linhanyi on December 01 at 10:22 p.m.
http://www.uggboots-space.com winter ugg boots
http://www.nikestarsonsale.com nike star