Free Republic

Senator wants to ban semi-automatic weapons      By HEATHER BOSCH KIRO Radio  Expect to hear a lot about gun control when the legislature reconvenes in January. Senator Jeanne Kohl-Welles is among those who want to ban the sale of military-style, semi-automatic weapons. "These are guns that I don't see have any function in our society." Kohl-Welles said she was prompted to act after the murder of Seattle Police Officer Tim Brenton. "He was believed to be killed by a semi-automatic assault weapon. Of course, we also had the killing of several other police officers not by assault weapons....

Note: Photos included. Last updated 8:37 p.m. PT “Monfort, accused cop killer, pleads not guilty” KOMO-TV SNIPPET: “Investigators said DNA evidence found at the scene of Brenton’s slaying and the earlier arson at a police maintenance yard were a match to Monfort. His DNA was found on identical American flag bandannas dropped at both scenes as “calling cards,” according to court documents. In addition, a rifle found in Monfort’s apartment is an identical ballistic match to the weapon used to kill Brenton and wound his partner, Britt Sweeney, according to investigators. Prosecutors accused Monfort of placing bombs at the scene...

A Seattle court declared Naveed Haq guilty Tuesday for the 2006 shooting spree at a Seattle Jewish center. He as sentenced to life in prison on the eight counts of murder and harassment he was convicted on. Haq killed one person and injured five, one critically, in the shooting spree at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle in July 2006.

SNIPPET: "A King County jury this morning found Naveed Haq guilty of eight counts, including aggravated first-degree murder, in the 2006 shootings at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle." SNIPPET: "Haq opened fire in the federation offices on July 28, 2006, killing employee Pamela Waechter, 58, and wounding Cheryl Stumbo, Carol Goldman, Dayna Klein, Christina Rexroad and Layla Bush..."

June 28, 2006 was quite a day for anti-Semitism, wasn’t it? Surely, you remember how an intoxicated Mel Gibson was pulled over by a Malibu cop, only for Gibson to tell the officer, “Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world.” That, of course, was just after Gibson’s movie, “The Passion of the Christ,” led to nationwide headlines, such as the one in The Jewish Week, “Jews Horrified By Gibson’s Jesus Film.” Countless Jewish organizations, rabbis and executive directors told us to be afraid, very afraid, of what that movie might unleash in unsophisticated American Christians. Even this...

SEATTLE - Police say an 18-foot-tall totem pole stolen from a West Seattle park has been found about 200 miles away in Oregon. The Seattle Times reports a 69-year-old West Seattle man led investigators to the pole. Police say he apparently had a crew with a crane help move the totem, but it's unclear if the crew knew the man didn't have permission to take the landmark.

Today In Irony: Robert Henry Smith, Rainier Beach High School Drug Prevention Counselor, Indicted On Drug Charges By Vernal Coleman in Crime & Punishment Friday, Dec. 11 2009 @ 4:47PM   Staff Photo: Rainier Beach High School Robert Smith   If you're hiring a person to ward the kids off getting involved with drugs, you hire a guy who has previously been prosecuted on federal drug charges.   Of course, that logic falls apart when the person you've hired goes from preventing back to pushing. Enter Robert Henry Smith, the Rainier Beach High School drug and alcohol prevention counselor who...

Boeing said Thursday evening that the first flight of its 787-8 long-range jet is set for 10 a.m., Dec. 15 in Everett, Wash. The first of six test airplanes, ZA001, is due to take off from Payne Field next to the airplane's final assembly factory north of Seattle. Chief Pilot Michael H. Carriker and copilot Randall Neville will conduct low- and high-speed taxi tests that take the airplane to the threshold of flight in preparation for Tuesday's events. Once airborne, Carriker and Neville are not expected to return ZA001 to Everett. They will land at Boeing Field in Seattle, headquarters...

It’s no wonder we haven’t heard this story from the Democrat controlled media, but a new group of anti American Black Muslims calling themselves the National Black Foot Soldiers actually celebrated what they call the BOW Black on White “martyrdom” of Police murderer Maurice Clemmons.

Portland has the 19th worst traffic congestion in the country, with 23 percent of the city’s roads having “heavy delays,” according to a report released Wednesday.Seattle’s road woes are the worst, followed by Los Angeles at No. 2, with 38 percent of its roads having heavy delays, followed by Chicago (37 percent), San Francisco (35 percent) and New York City (31 percent), according to global positioning system (GPS) company TomTom of Concord, Mass.The company ranked cities as most to least congested according to how fast cars could travel on the street network. Traffic was defined as congested if drivers...

Maurice Clemmons threatened to kill more than just cops Maurice Clemmons threatened to kill more than just cops in the days before he massacred four Lakewood police officers at a coffee shop in Parkland. Schoolchildren and others also were on his list of targets, according to court records filed Wednesday. A witness told Pierce County sheriff’s detectives that Clemmons told friends and family gathered for Thanksgiving dinner at his aunt’s home in Pacific that he planned to kill “cops, children at a school” and “as many people as he could in an intersection,” according to an affidavit filed by prosecutors....

A policeman investigating a stolen car on a Seattle street shot dead the man accused of gunning down four police officers at the weekend, US police say. Maurice Clemmons, aged 37, was killed in Seattle early on Tuesday, said Assistant Police Chief Jim Pugel. He said the officer recognised Clemmons and told him to stop, before opening fire after the suspect tried to flee. Four people have been arrested for allegedly helping the suspect elude authorities during the two-day manhunt.

Tremoglie's Tea Time Blog For the past several years I have written extensively about the deadly problem of repeat violent offenders who are let loose from prison by our political representatives or the institutions for which they are responsible....

The Seattle Times has posted documents from the state parole board that bear on the decision by Gov. Mike Huckabee to commute murder suspect Maurice Clemmons' 108-year-prison sentence to immediate parole eligiblity. He said he'd fallen in with a bad crowd after moving to Arkansas, but had turned his life around. He said he'd prayed Huckabee would help him. Circuit Judge Marion Humphrey, who is also a Presbyterian minister, supported the clemency application. Clemmons wrote in an appeal to Huckabee that he'd been sent to prison after an extended crime spree that started in 1989 when he was a teenager — and that he was a different...

Police trying to hunt down a man suspected of the execution-style killings of four of their colleagues burst into a house in Seattle today after spending the night trying to talk him out of the building - only to find that he was not there. The setback came after a night of loudspeaker warnings, explosions and gunshots all apparently designed to flush Maurice Clemmons, a convicted armed robber, out of the house. Mr Clemmons, 37, is the prime suspect in the case and witnesses to the murders yesterday morning in a coffee shop on the edge of the McChord Air...

November 30, 2009: Today is the 10th anniversary of the Battle of Seattle. This is not a call to arms for anarchist thugs, but to remember their actions that day 10 years earlier. I am willing to discuss with FRiends about the day that generated worldwide attention and left downtown Seattle a scarred battlefield - 11/30. Many people across the world, even the anarchists themselves, saw the Battle of Seattle as a 'war' against globalism - the globalist nature of the WTO. Here is an article about the 10th anniversary of the Battle of Seattle and how the American right...

A 37-year-old Tacoma man, Maurice Clemmons, is being sought for questioning in the execution-style shooting of four Lakewood police officers this morning, according to two law-enforcement sources. Clemmons, who was recently released from jail, has an extensive criminal record in Pierce County and Arkansas, court records show. Clemmons is wanted in Arkansas and faces eight criminal charges in Washington state.

Maurice Clemmons, the 37-year-old Tacoma man being sought for questioning in the killing of four Lakewood police officers this morning, has a long criminal record punctuated by violence, erratic behavior and concerns about his mental health. Nine years ago, then-Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee granted clemency to Clemmons, commuting his lengthy prison sentence over the protestations of prosecutors. "This is the day I've been dreading for a long time," Larry Jegley, prosecuting attorney for Arkansas' Pulaski County said Sunday night when informed that Clemmons was being sought in connection to the killings. Clemmons' criminal history includes at least five felony convictions...

Police Say Alcohol Likely Played Role SEATTLE -- Seattle police say a man who thought he was ninja was impaled on a metal fence when he tried to leap over it. An officer who was looking for an assault victim nearby Monday night heard the man screaming for help. Police supported him to prevent further injuries until medics arrived and took him to a hospital, where he was in serious condition in intensive care on Tuesday. Police spokeswoman Renee Witt wrote in a department Web site posting that officers thought the man might have been involved in the reported assault,...

SNIPPET: “Accusing the alleged cop killer of waging a “one-man war against police,” King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg announced charges that could see Christopher J. Monfort executed. Monfort, 41, has been charged with aggravated first-degree murder in the Oct. 31 slaying of Seattle Police Officer Tim Brenton, Satterberg announced Thursday. Prosecutors also charged Monfort with three counts of attempted first-degree murder and one count of arson, asserting that the man rigged several bombs at a City of Seattle garage hoping to kill officers and firefighters. Like Monfort’s other intended victims, Brenton and partner Officer Britt Sweeney were “targeted solely because...

UPDATE: Kirby will be replaced with Laura Ingraham and John Gibson. Behold the new syndic-robot KVI. (Weissbach doesn't count- they don't pay him). See below for new schedule. The Seattle early morning earscape has again felt a seismic shift: With the typical Fisher aplomb, Kirby Wilbur has been fired from KVI, the morning after his birthday! He no longer exists on the KVI site. Haven’t yet heard the details, but the longtime, Seattle conservative was let go a month before his contract for the early morning show was up. Big things will henceforth occur on KVI, as the last vestige...

Nancy Pelosi was in The People's Republic of Seattle on November 9th, and held a press conference alongside fellow Comrade, "Baghdad Jim" McDermitt. Ironically, a member of the media actual did their job in Seattle, one of the most hard-left cities in America (or China for that matter).

Note: Video and photo included. "Update: Child Porn Found On Suspect's Computer, Investigation: Police Match DNA To Monfort Christopher Monfort detained in the hospital, formal charges likely by the end of the week" Q13 FOX News Online 3:51 PM PST, November 10, 2009 SNIPPET: "SEATTLE - UPDATE: Sources close to the investigation have confirmed to Q13 FOX News that child pornography was found on the a computer belonging to suspected police officer killer, Christopher Monfort." SNIPPET: "Monday afternoon a King County judge found probable cause to detain Christopher Monfort. It is expected that he will be charged by the end...

SEATTLE - The suspect in the shooting death of a Seattle police officer was "a lone domestic terrorist" whose apartment was a virtual arsenal of bomb-making materials and weaponry. (snip) There also is evidence that the suspect, Christopher M. Monfort, 41, of Tukwila may have been planning to escalate his activities in the coming days if he had not been caught. (snip) In addition, there have been reports of loud explosions in the area around Monfort's apartment complex in the past three months. Those blasts may have been experiments by Monfort and may indicate that he planned a larger-scale terrorist...

Some votes critical in determining the Seattle mayoral race may not get counted until next Tuesday. Vandals tried to get at a ballot drop box in Tukwila in the early morning hours after the election. "The metal cover plate that we seal the ballot drop box with at 8pm on Election night was ripped off," said Kim Van Ekstrom, with King County Elections. Ekstrom said the ballots themselves weren't tampered with because the box's design doesn't allow access unless you have the keys. The question is whether anything was slipped in that shouldn't have been. "They were in the process...

A man sought in connection with the shooting of Seattle Police Officer Timothy Brenton has been shot by Seattle police in Tukwila, according to a law enforcement source. The man, 41, was shot in the head and is being taken to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, according to Interim Seattle Police Chief John Diaz. The apartment complex is in the 13700 block of 56th Avenue South. A second suspect is being sought, according to police. Police traced a car being sought in connection with Brenton's shooting to the apartment complex, Diaz said. As the officers approached the apartment a man...

Note: Audio included at link. SEATTLE -- As the second trial of Jewish Federation shooter Naveed Haq continued, jurors heard Haq describe the violent rampage in a series of phone calls. In court Wednesday, jurors listened to 10 different recorded calls Haq made from jail to his parents in the Tri-cities in the days after the shootings. During the calls, Haq bragged of being a celebrity and said he was motivated by a desire to be a Muslim martyr, something that seemed to surprise his parents. Mother: I'm just afraid to tell you, you are not feeling well -- your...

A Seattle police officer was shot to death and another officer was wounded late Saturday night while conducting a traffic stop in the city's Central District neighborhood. The officer who died was a veteran of the department, and the woman who was wounded is a student officer in training, Assistant Chief Jim Pugel said

·11250 Waples Mill Road ·   Fairfax, Virginia 22030    ·800-392-8683 NRA Sues Seattle Over Illegal Gun Ban Wednesday, October 28, 2009 Fairfax, Va. - Today, the National Rifle Association filed a complaint in the Superior Court of Washington State against the City of Seattle, asking the court to enjoin and declare invalid a recently enacted parks and recreation administrative policy that prohibits firearms in parks, community centers and other city-owned buildings. Other plaintiffs in the case include state correctional officers and private citizens. “NRA members are outraged that the City of Seattle has ignored and defied state law and an opinion of...

SEATTLE -- Seattle Parks and Recreation on Wednesday put into effect a new rule banning the possession or display of firearms at playgrounds, community centers and other places where children are likely to be.   Firearms will be prohibited at designated facilities once signs are posted notifying people of the new rule. The first signs are to be posted Friday, with the rest up by Dec. 1.   In all, the rule will be applied at more than 500 parks, recreation centers, pools, beaches and golf courses.

Want to know what Fox News talk show host Glenn Beck told the thousands who gathered at Safeco Field Saturday to hear him? Beck spoke at Safeco Field Saturday in an event sponsored by the Evergreen Freedom Foundation. (Josh Trujillo/seattlepi.com) | See more photos Someone put the entire appearance on YouTube. And all told, he said nothing shocking. Beck advised the crowd to focus on the message, not the messenger -- admitting that he himself is mainly an entertainer -- and at one point asked if they knew any Democrats who were out to destroy the country. Attendees shook their...

In a sea of 7,000 fans, controversial TV and radio talk-show host Glenn Beck took his crusade to Safeco Field today, saying he is the voice of reason in a divided America. "I am a flawed human being," said Beck, 45. "But I'm in a position to ring the bell of warning." Beck, sponsored by the Evergreen Freedom Foundation, came to Seattle amid a torrent of anger over his proclamation on July 28 that President Obama was a racist and that he believed the president has a "deep-seated hatred for white people or the white culture." Outside the stadium, about...

Tonight, Bert and Jayme Coates will bring their electronic gear to the Central Saloon and go down to its basement to begin hunting for ghosts.When they pull up in their 1978 Chevy Step Van emblazoned with "Northwest Paranormal Investigation Agency," Bert and Jayme Coates inevitably get friendly greetings from people. And why not? A 2008 Harris Poll said 44 percent of Americans believe in ghosts. That means somebody sitting right near you at the office is a believer, if it's not you. Friendly greetings are what the Gold Bar couple got Friday afternoon, as they parked in front of Central...

About 30 protesters turned out for the appearance of controversial TV and radio talk-show host Glenn Beck at Safeco Field at midday today, many expressing their displeasure with Beck calling President Obama a racist.Among Beck's roots in the state lies a South Sound mystery About 30 protesters turned out for the appearance of controversial TV and radio talk-show host Glenn Beck at Safeco Field at midday today, many expressing their displeasure with Beck calling President Obama a racist. Don Sly of Seattle held a huge, tongue-in-cheek sign that said, "Sure he's an idiot bigot, but he's our idiot bigot, Welcome...

During six months of the 2009 season, Safeco Field has been a place for late inning home team rallies, one-run victories, quiet and intelligent managing, and rebuilding from the ashes of a 101-loss season. The stadium will take on a different ambiance when radio-TV shouter Glenn Beck hits town Saturday: It will be the rallying place for those who scream conspiracy, sow tension and tear things down. The Emerald City is hosting a man who calls Barack Obama a "racist," sees a back-to-school presidential speech as "indoctrinating" children and defends an obscure 18th Century constitutional provision that set in place...

Federal investigators are looking into reports that one of the men who detonated a truck bomb in Mogadishu last week that killed 21 peacekeepers was a Somali refugee who had lived in Seattle as recently as 2007. Two federal law enforcement sources, both speaking on condition of anonymity, said the FBI in Seattle received information last week that indicated that one of the suicide bombers was from Seattle. "We've been looking into it ever since," said one of the sources. One of the sources, a senior federal law enforcement official, said the FBI is actively investigating whether terrorist groups are...

SNIPPET: "The word Nazi and at least eight other swastikas also were painted on a sidewalk and driveway in the area, Bikur Cholim Machzikay Hadath member Sarah Rivkin told the newspaper. Congregants at Bikur Cholim Machzikay Hadath and the Sephardic Bikur Holim Congregation were attending Selichot services during the incident."

Two men arrested Friday night during a bizarre shooting spree along Interstate 5 in North Seattle may have been planning to fire at vehicles driving up and down the freeway, police said Sunday. “One theory is that maybe they were going to snipe at people as they were driving by on I-5,” Seattle Police Department spokeswoman Renee Witt told KOMO News

SEATTLE - Police this weekend uncovered what they call a "secret camp" near North Seattle Community College while searching for evidence related to an overnight shooting spree. Two suspected gunmen are in custody in connection with the Friday night shooting, which prompted a massive police callout and a two-hour closure of I-5. Detectives and K-9 units searching a wooded area just between the college and the interstate found a site covered in camouflage netting that they believe is home to the two men. The area contained bathroom and kitchen supplies, fireworks, cell phones, sleeping bags and piles of books, which...

SEATTLE - Two men arrested Friday night during a bizarre shooting spree along Interstate 5 in North Seattle may have been planning to fire at vehicles driving up and down the freeway. Investigators found a hidden campsite the suspects had built in a wooded area near North Seattle Community College. One of the suspects was found with an AK-47 assault rifle and multiple rounds of ammunition. Searchers also found the hidden campsite, covered in a camouflage tarp, with a "significant" amount of ammunition.

Only this Breaking News header on the King 5 news site, thus far: "Shooting - Rapid shots have been fired at North Seattle Community College in the Northgate area of Seattle; I-5 southbound near college has been shut down.

After two terms as mayor of Seattle, Greg Nickels is now conceding.

Seattle (AP) - Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels has been hailed as a visionary and a leader on environmental issues, helping persuade nearly 1,000 mayors around the country to abide by the standards of the Kyoto Protocol on global warming. But an environmental issue of a more basic sort — the city's inability to clear streets during paralyzing snowstorms last winter — might have set the stage for his political undoing. Nickels narrowly trails two challengers following Tuesday's primary and is at serious risk of not advancing to the general election in November, potentially ending his eight-year run at City Hall....

SEATTLE (AP) - Seattle voters have rejected a 20-cent fee for every paper or plastic bag they get from supermarkets, drug stores and convenience stores. The city's incumbent mayor didn't fare much better than the fee, trailing two challengers in a bid for a third term. With about half the ballots counted in the all-mail vote, the bag fee was failing 58 percent to 42 percent in Tuesday's primary. City leaders had passed an ordinance to charge the bag fee, which was to start in January. But the plastics industry bankrolled a referendum to put the question to voters in...

"Using sophisticated seismometers and global positioning systems, scientists have been able to track minute movements along two massive tectonic plates colliding 25 miles or so underneath the Puget Sound basin. Their early findings suggest a mega-earthquake could strike closer to Tacoma and Seattle than earlier thought. [snip] Earlier calculations creating a virtual earthquake using a supercomputer indicated that such a mega-earthquake in the Northwest could result in ground motion of 1.5 feet per second in Seattle, nearly six inches per second in Tacoma, Olympia and Vancouver, and three inches in Portland. That would be more than enough to cause major...

WASHINGTON — Using sophisticated seismometers and GPS devices, scientists have been able to track minute movements along two massive tectonic plates colliding 25 miles or so underneath Washington state's Puget Sound basin. --------------- By comparison, the largest earthquake ever recorded was 9.5 on the Richter scale, in Chile in 1960. The largest in North America was the 9.2 Great Alaska Earthquake in 1964, which killed nine people and spawned a tsunami that struck the Northwest coast. The 1906 San Francisco earthquake, which killed 750 to 2,500 people, was estimated to be an 8.2.

SEATTLE -- An Everett mother says she's outraged over a weekend protest full of naked cyclists. The group was riding along the Seattle waterfront Friday night wearing nothing but smiles to expose some of the dangers they face. But not everyone was smiling. "I looked and there were naked men with their genitals hanging out," said Marcy Hayes, who was there with her 6-year-old daughter Ashland. "I'm yelling at my daughter to look away." Hayes says she and her daughter walked out of the Seattle Aquarium and right into the path of a pack of cyclists and all their nakedness....

SEATTLE – A Seattle bank teller has lost his job because he ran down a would-be bank robber and held him until police arrived. Jim Nicholson, 30, who had worked for more than two years at a Key Bank branch near the Seattle Center, says he understands the bank's strict policy that employees comply with robbery demands and avoid confrontations. But he told The Seattle Times that instinct took over when a thin man in a beanie cap, dark clothing and sunglasses pushed a black backpack across the bank counter on Tuesday and demanded money. Nicholson threw the bag to...

Jim Nicholson knew he should have just handed over the cash. But when the thin man in a beanie cap, dark clothing and sunglasses pushed a black backpack across the bank counter and demanded money, Nicholson says his instincts took over. After more than two years working as a teller at the Key Bank branch in Lower Queen Anne, Nicholson clearly understood the bank's strict policy of quickly complying with robbers' demands and avoiding confrontation. Instead, Nicholson threw the bag to the floor, lunged toward the robber and demanded to see a weapon. Surprised, the would-be bank robber backed up...

SEATTLE – A Seattle bank teller has lost his job because he ran down a would-be bank robber and held him until police arrived. Jim Nicholson, 30, who had worked for more than two years at a Key Bank branch near the Seattle Center, says he understands the bank's strict policy that employees comply with robbery demands and avoid confrontations. But he told The Seattle Times that instinct took over when a thin man in a beanie cap, dark clothing and sunglasses pushed a black backpack across the bank counter on Tuesday and demanded money. Nicholson threw the bag to...