Hit man in South Hill murder-for-hire case details ‘arsenal’

RICHLAND – Timothy Suckow described the “arsenal” of weapons he obtained illegally in Spokane, and Robert Delao detailed his plans to deliver heroin to James Henrikson, whose trial on murder-for-hire charges completed its second full day of testimony Tuesday.

The 11-count indictment against Henrikson alleges not only that he ordered the deaths of South Hill businessman Doug Carlile and Kristopher “K.C.” Clarke, but also that the 36-year-old felon conspired to manufacture illicit pills as he maintained a legitimate trucking business on the Bakken shale oil fields of western North Dakota.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Aine Ahmed presented Delao, 41, with hundreds of text messages during testimony Tuesday afternoon, referring to assaults as “demolition work,” pure heroin as “Chinese” food and hired strongmen as “welders” in an effort to avoid detection by police. Todd Bates, one of the Spokane men indicted in Henrikson’s alleged criminal enterprise, texted with Delao for months about attacking one of Henrikson’s employees who was threatening to leave his company.

“He was not there to do welding,” Delao, dressed in a Benton County Jail jumpsuit and shackled, said of Bates, when Ahmed questioned whether Bates was employed as a welder by Henrikson’s trucking company, Blackstone.

Defense attorneys challenged the wide range of Delao’s testimony, calling for a mistrial halfway through the afternoon’s testimony because it touched on crimes not alleged in the indictment. U.S. District Court Judge Salvador Mendoza ordered the trial, expected to last six to seven weeks, to continue, with limited questioning of Delao.

Delao recounted a conversation over breakfast with Henrikson in Watford City, North Dakota, some time in the summer of 2012 when he learned that Suckow had killed Clarke at Henrikson’s command. Suckow testified earlier that he bludgeoned Clarke to death then buried Henrikson’s former employee in a shallow grave on state park land near the Fort Berthold Indian reservation. Clarke’s body has not been found.

“He said, ‘You didn’t know that (Suckow) killed K.C.?’ ” Henrikson said during that breakfast, according to Delao’s testimony.

Todd Maybrown, one of Henrikson’s attorneys, said he’d challenge Delao’s testimony by comparing it with a statement made to Spokane police in 2013, during a polygraph exam, in which he denied any knowledge of the Clarke or Carlile killings.

“This is a pro informant, he knows how to play the game,” Maybrown said of Delao, who told jurors in his first few moments of testimony that he’d cooperated with federal agents to put 17 gang members behind bars for drug crimes. “At this point, he’s basically unstoppable.”

Tuesday morning, Suckow said under questioning from Henrikson’s defense that he bought more than a dozen illegal firearms, including the .45-caliber pistol used to kill Carlile, and around 1,500 rounds of ammunition from criminals he met on the streets of Spokane. Suckow also was arrested in possession of tactical SWAT gear and an authentic-looking police badge.

“I knew a lot of people with questionable character. That’s who I got my stuff from,” said Suckow, who testified for two full days about his involvement with Henrikson and the killings of Carlile and Clarke.

Mark Vovos, one of the attorneys defending Henrikson, questioned Suckow about his history of mental illness. The 52-year-old was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 1991 and took lithium while incarcerated in federal prison on robbery charges out of New Mexico. Suckow stopped taking mental health medications when he left probation in 2007, because the government stopped paying for his prescriptions, he said.

“I was doing good,” Suckow said. “I’d just gotten married.”

Under direct examination from Ahmed, Suckow said his mental health issues did not affect his memory of bludgeoning Clarke to death in Henrikson’s machine shop in February 2012, or shooting Carlile to death in his South Hill home in December 2013.

“It haunts me every day,” Suckow said of killing Clarke.

Maybrown and fellow defense team member Mark Vovos have accused both Suckow and Delao of casting Henrikson as a scapegoat to avoid harsher punishment for their own crimes. Suckow took a deal for 30 years to testify against Henrikson; Delao was promised a sentence between 14 and 17 years. Both were facing life sentences, as is Henrikson.

Delao’s testimony is scheduled to resume Wednesday morning.