Hunt for cop-killer suspect stepped up

The realisation that the suspect had not been cornered in a SWAT team raid on a house, further rattled people in the Seattle area, many of them unnerved by the thought of a mentally unstable killer in their midst.

Police canvassed the area around the Seattle house and fanned out across the city, looking for any sign of Maurice Clemmons, 37.

Authorities posted a US$125,000 reward for information leading to his arrest in the Sunday morning shooting rampage.

The manhunt came as authorities in two states took heat for the fact that Clemmons was allowed to walk the streets despite a teenage crime spree in Arkansas that landed him a 95-year prison sentence.

He was released in 2000 after then-Governor Mike Huckabee commuted his sentence.

"This guy should have never been on the street," said Brian Wurts, president of the police union in Lakewood, where all four slain officers worked. "Our elected officials need to find out why these people are out."

Police said they are not sure what prompted Clemmons to assassinate the officers as they worked on their laptop computers at the beginning of their shifts.

He was described as increasingly erratic in the past few months and had been arrested earlier this year on charges that he punched a sheriff's deputy in the face.

Sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer told the Tacoma News-Tribune that Clemmons indicated the night before the shooting "that he was going to shoot police and watch the news."

Authorities said the gunman singled out the officers and spared employees and other customers at the coffee shop in a suburb about 35 miles south of Seattle. He then fled, but not before he was apparently shot in the torso by one of the dying officers.

Police later learned he may have been holed up at the house in Seattle. After an all-night siege in which they tried to get him out using loudspeakers, explosions and a robot sent into the house, a SWAT team stormed the place and discovered he was not there. Police would not say who lived at the house or whether it was someone Clemmons knew.

It was not clear whether he slipped past police, left before they arrived, or was never in the house at all, but Seattle police spokesman Jeff Kappel said there was evidence Clemmons at one point was on the property. He would not elaborate.

Police spent the day frantically chasing leads, visiting hundreds of locations as they followed up on tips, at one point cordoning off a park where people thought they saw Clemmons. They also alerted hospitals to be on the lookout for a man seeking treatment for gunshot wounds.

University of Washington officials alerted students by email and text messages to an unconfirmed report that Clemmons might have gotten off a bus on or near the campus about three miles from the home.

Investigators also examined the coffee shop for clues.

Sheriff's spokesman Lt Dave McDonald said that authorities found a handgun carried by the killer, along with a pickup truck belonging to the suspect, with blood stains inside.

"He was very versed with the weapon," Troyer said earlier. "This wasn't something where the windows were shot up and there bullets sprayed around the place. The bullets hit their targets."

Killed were Sgt Mark Renninger, 39, and Officers Ronald Owens, 37, Tina Griswold, 40, and Greg Richards, 42.

Clemmons has an extensive violent criminal history from Arkansas, dating back to his teenage burglary and robbery spree. Huckabee's decision to commute his sentence could create a "Willie Horton" problem for the Republican former governor if he runs for president again in 2012.

During the 1988 White House campaign, Massachusetts Governo Michael Dukakis was criticised after Horton, a killer serving a life sentence, robbed and raped a woman while on a weekend furlough from prison.

On Sunday, Huckabee issued this statement on his website: "Should he be found to be responsible for this horrible tragedy, it will be the result of a series of failures in the criminal justice system in both Arkansas and Washington state."

In seeking leniency from Huckabee, Clemmons wrote the parole board that he was a "misguided fool" when he committed the crimes and "learned through the school of hard knocks to appreciate and respect the rights of others."

Huckabee cited Clemmons' youth in granting the request. But Clemmons quickly reverted to his criminal past, violated his parole and was returned to prison. He was released again in 2004.

Clemmons was charged in Washington state earlier this year with assaulting a police officer and raping a child, and investigators in the sex case said he was motivated by visions that he was Jesus Christ and that the world was on the verge of the apocalypse. But he was released from jail after posting bail with the assistance of Jail Sucks Bail Bonds.

Documents related to those charges indicate a volatile personality. In one instance, he is accused of punching a sheriff's deputy in the face. In another, he is accused of gathering his wife and young relatives and forcing them to undress.

"The whole time Clemmons kept saying things like trust him, the world is going to end soon, and that he was Jesus," a Pierce County sheriff's report said.

Neighbours said Clemmons had surveillance cameras installed along the bushes in front of his house, and had mostly kept his blinds shut since he was accused of throwing rocks through the windows of his neighbours' cars and houses earlier this year.

Neighbour Ken Dietiker said he initially thought Clemmons' cameras were there to prevent crime. "But now I'm starting to think he's just paranoid," he said.

Dietiker said he was frustrated to learn about Clemmons' record and releases from custody.

"There were all these indicators. Who didn't see them?" he asked. "That's what I want to know."

- AP