work news

Some tragic events have happened to us here on the Peninsula and to law enforcement everywhere. My trainer's wife, Kristine Fairbanks, was shot and killed while doing a vehicle stop. I won't go into all the details but she stopped with a van that had no license plates. She ran the guys name but didn't respond to a status check from dispatch radio a few minutes later. Dispatch tried her again and then sent help to her location. She was found dead of a gunshot to the head. Her body was drug about 30' and dumped over the bank where county deputies found her. Her K9 dog Radar was still in her Expedition. A large search was started and the suspect was found after some good police work. Thanks go out to the State, Federal, County, City, and Tribal Agencies involved. Store clerks recognized the suspect from flyers State Patrol dropped off just a few minutes before he came into the store, they called 911. He left the store and was confronted by two deputies. He drew a gun on the officers who already had their AR-15 rifles pointed at him. Police found out later he had killed another man and stole his pickup prior to being shot. I was with Brian, my trainer, when he got the news. His thoughts were for their 15 yr old daughter that was gone at a volleyball trip. Myself and other FW officers and friends stayed with him until he went to pick Whitney up from the bus. They had family friends stay with them at that point. Kris was a vetran officer with 15 years with the Forest Service and 7 with the Nat. Park Service, all in law enforcement. She will be missed. We were on a call with her backing up county just two hours before she was killed. Please remember her family and friends in your prayers. On a lighter note, here is a picture of me trying to find a bullet in a very dead elk. I'm actually happy we couldn't find one with the metal detector so I didn't have to cut into it and root around to find the thing. We took care not to brush up against it and were careful when we rolled it over but I still drove with the windows down. Sarah noticed right away when I came home and my boots and jumpsuit were banished out to the garage.