Oregon Public Broadcasting

It’s become a tragic pattern in Washington State: a police officer is killed by a criminal on probation. It happened twice this month - five times in the past two years.

The state has already made some changes to the probation system. But the killings continue.

Now the question is what more can be done to protect police officers and the public from violent parolees? Olympia correspondent Austin Jenkins reports.

The most recent tragedy happened on a remote road on the Olympic Peninsula.

Officer Kristine Fairbanks, with the U.S. Forest Service, was gunned down during a traffic stop. A nearby homeowner was also killed.

The alleged assailant -- 36-year-old Shawn Roe -- was later shot dead by police. Roe was a convicted felon with a history of domestic violence. But he never served time in prison and was on probation for a gross misdemeanor – not a felony.

Even so, the Department of Corrections considered him a high-risk offender. Court documents show Roe had failed to check-in with his probation officer for nearly a month. Yet there was no warrant for his arrest.

Eldon Vail: “It seems possible to go back and say if we’d done one thing quicker or one thing smarter would that have made the difference, but we’ll never know that.”

Eldon Vail is Washington’s Secretary of Corrections. He’s reluctant to point the blame at the Community Corrections Officer -- or CCO -- who handled Roe’s case. He says it’s the system that’s flawed.

CCO’s are burdened with heavy caseloads. And he says they must constantly weigh whether to use a carrot or a stick with criminals transitioning back into society.

Eldon Vail: “CCO’s have the toughest job in criminal justice, I think. It’s a hybrid position. They’re expected to be half social worker and half cop. And we idealize sometimes that people can be good at both those things. But that’s an extraordinary individual who can balance those two different sets of skills.”

In the Roe case, it appears two key factors were at play: there was no urgency to find and arrest Roe. And the bureaucracy was slow.

Here’s how: First, Roe’s probation officer gave him three chances to show up for his weekly check-in. When that failed, the plan was to catch Roe at a court hearing. But he didn’t show up.

A few days later the CCO started the process of obtaining an arrest warrant. But it hadn’t reached the judge yet. That’s where the process stood when the shootings happened.

Because of this case, Corrections Secretary Vail plans to ask the legislature for the authority to issue arrest warrants in misdemeanor cases without waiting for a judge.

Eldon Vail: “Let me tell you the other thing we’re doing. As a result of this case, I’ve gone back and asked the CCOs to take a look at what kind of requests for warrants that they have that are out there and if we’ve got high-risk, high-violent cases then our field administrators need to see what they can do in working with the local courts in getting those warrant requests to the top of the pile. But the long-term fix I think is legislative.”

The Roe case is just the latest in a string of tragedies that have left five Washington State police officers, and several more civilians, dead since August of 2006.

Earlier this month, Skagit County Sheriff’s Deputy Anne Jackson was killed in a shooting spree that took the lives of six people. The suspect in that case - Issac Zamora – was also on probation.

At the time of the shooting, he was under court orders to get a mental health evaluation.

King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg is leading an effort to improve how the justice system manages mentally ill criminals.

Dan Satterberg: “We have found that there’s substantial overlap in terms of the offenders who are both patients of the mental health system and people being supervised by the criminal justice system, but despite that overlap there are significant barriers to the way that we share information or don’t share information and records.”

Satterberg says it should be easier to involuntarily commit mentally ill criminals on probation who are becoming unstable. He also says Washington needs more alternatives to jail. But that would require additional mental health beds.

Dan Satterberg: “Lack of capacity is the elephant in the room It all starts and it all ends with making sure we have place to put people who are under criminal jurisdiction and exhibiting signs of mental illness.”

In 2007, after the first three police officers were killed Governor Chris Gregoire ordered a review of community corrections in Washington State.

Several reforms grew out of that process aimed at patching holes in the system. But it’s not clear how consistently the department is complying with those changes. And the mother of one the dead police officers says it’s not enough.

JoAn Cox: “I find it quite appalling.”

JoAn Cox lost her son Steve – a King County Sheriff’s Deputy – in December 2006. He was shot dead by a gang member who was also on probation. Cox wants the legislature to pass stiffer gun control measures and reduce the caseloads of Community Corrections Officers.

JoAn Cox: “I think it’s just shameful that the legislature hasn’t taken some firm steps to correct the deficiencies that allow this to happen. Every time this reoccurs I just feel sick to my stomach for that family”

But Corrections Secretary Vail says even if he had four times as many probation officers he couldn’t guarantee tragedies like these wouldn’t happen.

He says the system is managing very dangerous, very damaged, and very unpredictable people and because they’re not in prison anymore there’s no way to watch them at all times.