On Friday morning, two Wyandotte County sheriff’s deputies were in the process of transporting murder suspect Antoine Fielder from the county courthouse back to jail when Fielder managed to seize one of their guns and shoot both officers.
Deputies Patrick Rohrer, 35, and Theresa King, 44, died as a result of the shooting. Rohrer had served 7 years with the Wyandotte County Sheriff’s Office and King 13 years.
This shooting follows a day in which Kansas City, Missouri, police officers shot and killed three people in two separate shootings. The double fatality occurred in broad daylight in Downtown’s Barney Allis Plaza. There will be more on this story as it develops.
Fielder is a piece of work. Twice he was tried in the murder of Kelsey Ewonus, a 22-year old woman from Overland Park, and twice he was spared by a hung jury. Three months after being sprung, Fielder allegedly went on a bi-state crime spree that included the murder of 55-year-old Rosemarie Harmon.
According to court documents, Fielder had told a woman whom he held at gunpoint that he had killed four people, and that he had “put that bitch [Harmon] in the ground and her man in the hospital.”
Including this shooting, five law enforcement officers have been shot in Kansas City, Kansas, in the last three years alone, four of those fatally. In July 2016 Captain Dave Melton was killed while searching for armed suspects in KCK. Jamaal Lewis has been charged with capital murder.
In May 2016, Officer Brad Lancaster was shot and killed near KCK’s Hollywood Casino. Curtis Ayers has pleaded guilty to this murder and is now serving life in prison.
In March 2015, Deputy Scot Wood was shot and wounded when he he tried to stop a robbery in progress at a KCK 7-11. The perps had murder on their mind. Wood was hit seven times. He is now back on the job.
Before any of the Kansas City Chiefs decide to protest police brutality–or whatever–this year, they might first want to visit with the widows and orphans of law enforcement officers in Wyandotte County.