Posted on 06/04/2020 5:05:41 AM PDT by Uncle Miltie
Investigators on Thursday released details about what led a Lakewood police officer to fatally shoot a man during a traffic stop earlier this month.
Said Joquin, 26, was pulled over May 1 after allegedly running a stop sign at Whitman Avenue Southwest and Steilacoom Boulevard Southwest.
A Lakewood officer had to brake to avoid hitting Joquin’s vehicle.
That officer and another traveling in a different direction pulled over Joquin in the 6400 block of Steilacoom Boulevard.
As police approached the car, officer Mike Wiley said he noticed a gun on the driver’s side floorboard.
The officers requested backup and ordered Joquin and his passenger to keep their hands up.
“However, a few minutes into the incident, the driver lowered his arms, causing the primary officer to believe the subject was reaching for the firearm,” according to a statement by investigators.
Wiley fired several times, striking Joquin.
Joquin was taken to a local hospital, where he died.
The passenger was not injured.
A gun was recovered from Joquin’s vehicle, investigators said.
The Cooperative Cities Crime Response Unit is continuing its investigation, which will be turned over to the Pierce County Prosecutor’s Office within weeks.
Wiley remains on paid administrative leave, which is standard after an officer-involved shooting.
He has been a law enforcement officer for 18 years.
This is at least the second officer-involved shooting he has been involved with since joining the Lakewood Police Department in October 2004.
Wiley was one of three officers named in a wrongful death suit in the 2013 death of a Fife man, who was killed by a sniper while clutching his 4-year-old son in a SWAT standoff.
A jury in U.S. District Court found police committed 14 civil rights violations that night, including excessive force.
Wiley’s actions in the standoff, which included leading an assault team that blew down the back door of the home and killing the family dog, were singled out in the ruling as being particularly egregious and leading to the Fife man’s unnecessary death.
The man’s family was awarded $12.5 million to settle the suit.
The mob is ready and waiting.
“Hands down. Don’t shoot!”
This article is a couple of weeks old. Joquin is becoming a cause celebre for the Antifa BLM types here.
In addition, we have this guy:
https://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3851688/posts
Tacoma is situated between Seattle and Portland. Antifa from both cities may converge here as a result of these two cases.
We went to the Seattle area to visit our relatives and got a pretty cheap motel in a place called “Lakewood”. It is the only time in my life I ever declined a hotel room after driving around to where the room was. It was a scene out of a movie. People hanging around outside their rooms yelling at each other, etc. It was like the whole place was a big crack house. And it was a name brand. Well, Econolodge (we’d stayed at others that were actually decent).
Anyway, it was in Lakewood. We went to our son’s house in Tacoma and stayed that first night on their floor. My son’s response to where we tried to stay was, “Have you guys not heard of lakewood? Have you never watched Cops?”
And yeah. The whole area around the motel was a place you’d want to carry. A couple of 66 year olds in a new Camry kinda stood out.
The only way I’d become a cop today is if it was the only job I could find.
Point goes to the officer:
...officer Mike Wiley said he noticed a gun on the driver’s side floorboard.
“Hands down. Don’t shoot!”
BMTI
(Beat Me To It)
Sounds like you guys would’ve been targeted.
Long story made short, GF got pulled for speeding and told the cop her son was in school for an LEO certificate.
He told her the kid should find something else to do. The only reason he was still in it was he too much time invested towards retirement.
We’re going there in two weeks. Hopefully they will have culled the herd by then. :)
It’s not just about Tacoma. It’s about Lakewood specifically. Last year we were visiting and, online, got a motel room there. It is the only time in my life that a quick look around the neighborhood, and the people in the motel itself, caused me to cancel, after I’d signed in.
Lakewood is tacoma’s version of the dangerous neighborhoods in LA, Chicago, et al. Heck, when my son, who lives in tacoma, found out where our hotel was, he said something like, “Lakewood? Seriously, dad? Don’t you guys ever watch ‘Cops’?”
So I’m sure stuff like this goes on all the time there and the cops are on a hair trigger as it is. Who wouldn’t be?
First rule of CCW CARRIERS when pulled over, KEEP YOUR HANDS ON STEERING WHEEL. Tell officer each move you intend to make, do it slow. I had retired police as CCW instructors.
Camden, NJ west.
I honestly think we would have. I always tend to have a “Naw, it will be fine.” attitude about stuff. Not this time. And it was the little things:
Waited ten minutes for the lobby to open. When it did, it was manned by this fat black lady with four inch nails and dressed almost like in a costume. There was a tenant coming in to complain with her toddler in tow that looked like a crack head. And her complaint was about her “rent” going up. A guy shows up in a taxi and parks behind our car, almost completely blocking it. And then it can’t start. And he gets mad at us for backing out and getting around him anyway.
And then we drive around to our unit: There must have been at least twenty people hanging around balconies and around cars in the lot, talking, screaming, etc.
When we went back to get our money back, the girl behind the counter had no authority to do that. And she was SHOCKED that I had read the contract and it said I had ninety minutes to say never mind. She read it like she never knew it said taht.
So we get in the car and I realize I hadn’t shut the trunk, so I pull into the nearest convenience store to shut it. Even THAT felt dangerous. The situation there was similar.
This sort of thing has never happened to me in KY and it never happened in Seattle either, and I lived there for 46 years. I even bicycled to work through the Central District and it never felt “dangerous”. This did.
This is also why I carry in my car now.
This cop is a real money tree. Time for some chain saws and a stump grinder. It would cost us less to pay him to stay at home and play video games.
Lakewood is still Mau-Mau land...
If things go as they have been, it will eventually be gentrified.
Heck, if you’ve seen “The Blues Brothers”, you’ll notice at that outdoor market where they see John Lee Hooker and all that 70’s junk being sold, there are addresses on some of the buildings. I looked it up on Google street view. It’s a really nice area now, fully gentrified.
Maybe he WAS reaching for the gun?
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