Supremacists Sought After Ohio Gunbattle Northwest Pair Named In Warning Sent To Authorities Nationwide
Two Spokane area white supremacists are named in a warning sent to police nationwide by investigators hunting for suspects in an Ohio gunbattle last weekend.
Two men escaped from police in Wilmington, Ohio, after two gunfights, including one captured by a dashboard video camera in an Ohio State Patrol cruiser.
A passer-by was wounded slightly in the second exchange which occurred when the gunmen’s car was located in a shopping mall.
No police officers were hit in the exchanges of gunfire on Saturday.
The episode began when an Ohio State Patrol trooper stopped a 1977 Chevrolet Suburban with expired Washington state license tabs.
Despite the video, the suspects still are not positively identified and no charges have been filed.
Investigators continue to process fingerprints and other evidence, including firearms, left behind in the suspects’ vehicle.
The gunmen fled on foot in Wilmington, and their whereabouts were unknown Tuesday.
But attention once again is turning to white supremacists from the Pacific Northwest.
The FBI is expected to label the case domestic terrorism and formally enter the investigation.
The suspects’ Suburban is registered in the state of Washington to Jacob “Jake” M. Settle, 39, who lists a post office box in Priest River, Idaho, according to authorities and public records.
There is no evidence yet, however, proving that Settle was one of the two men involved in the shootouts with Ohio police. Settle spends time in both North Idaho and Spokane.
Settle and his longtime friend, Chevie O’Brien Kehoe, 24, formerly of Colville, are named in an “officers warning notice” sent Tuesday to police agencies by the Ohio State Patrol.
Both should be considered armed and dangerous, the notice says.
Kehoe is wanted for questioning about the unsolved triple-murder of an Arkansas gun dealer and his family in 1995, according to police sources.
His name surfaced in that investigation last summer after a gun taken from the slain weapons dealer turned up in a Seattle pawn shop, law enforcement sources say.
Another of the murder victim’s stolen guns was found in the possession of Sean Michael Haines, 19, of Spokane, when he was arrested Dec. 10 in Sioux Falls, S.D.
Like Kehoe, Haines has ties with the Aryan Nations and neo-Nazi skinheads in this region.
Haines was released on his personal recognizance after reportedly cooperating with authorities. He has not been charged in connection with the Arkansas murder investigation.
Authorities also are still looking for one of Kehoe’s associates, Timothy Thomas Coombs, 38, who is wanted for shooting and wounding a Missouri state trooper in 1994.
Settle is a former Marine and police officer for the city of Winthrop, Wash., public records show.
He has been affiliated with the Aryan Nations where he and his wife, the former Susan Murray, of Spokane, were married.
The couple now have five children and were among those who attended a survivalist expo in Spokane earlier this month.
Settle works as an itinerant laborer and frequently travels and lives with his family in a motor home, authorities say.
Settle and his wife introduced her sister, Angie Murray, to Chevie Kehoe in 1993. At the time, Angie Murray was an 18-year-old Mead High School graduate who became estranged from her parents.
Angie Murray became Kehoe’s second wife in a polygamous marriage performed at the Aryan Nations compound and witnessed by Jake and Susan Settle.
Angie Murray left Kehoe after traveling for 54 days with him, his first wife and their children to Oklahoma and Arkansas.
She disavowed white supremacy beliefs, and later remarried and moved from the area, family members said.
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