Posted on 12/11/2002 2:08:16 PM PST by jdontom
Edited on 04/12/2004 5:46:44 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
Suspect was 'in my grasp,' deputy says Christine Vovakes -- Bee Correspondent Published 2:15 a.m. PST Wednesday, December 11, 2002 RED BLUFF -- An Oregon deputy sheriff said Tuesday he didn't realize it, but he had the suspect in Red Bluff Police Officer David Mobilio's killing "in my grasp" just hours after the Nov. 19 shooting. Andrew Hampton McCrae, 23, wrecked his 1992 maroon Ford Mustang in southeastern Oregon about 11 a.m. Nov. 19 -- less than 10 hours after the shooting, according to a Harney County Sheriff's Department accident report. He was arrested a week later in New Hampshire.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
More info on Andrew McCrae, Red Bluff cop killer.
Bizarre coincidence? Wow... wonder what his problem is - he didn't show any strange behavior even!
If it doesn't happen in D.C., or maybe NY, it's not much news. If the snipers did their thing in Seattle, the national press wouldn't have their commute times disrupted, so it would be less covered.
Plus it has to do with lawyers, maybe. This guy, like the Smiley Face bomber doesn't have a lawyer mouthing off in the press. Johnny Taliban's did, seemingly planned. Unlike the smiley face bombers parents, Johnny's don't realize their kid is crazy.
If it doesn't happen in D.C., or maybe NY, it's not much news.
Unless the victim is homosexual or black. Then it's a very significant crime, an indication of just how horrible straight white folks are. The victim in the Red Bluff shooting was *only* a police officer; the national media could not care less for him or his family.
-archy-/-
After the shooting, the red mustang was seen heading north on Hwy 5.
And according to Mapquest, the route from Red Bluff to Burns Junction starts out North on Hwy 5. The route then crosses the Rocky Mountains on a very long 2-lane winding mountain road, Hwy 31. It continues thru Burns, and then Burns Junction on hwy 78.
Mapquest says a normal daytime traveller should take 11.5 hours to make that trip. Whitehorse Ranch is another HOUR southwest of Burns Junction, so make that 12.5 hours. The red mustang did it in 9.5 hours, with the worst portions of the winding roads taken during the dead of night - while he was would have been very sleepy!
Mickel/McCrae probably had not slept that day or evening before killing the officer. I've driven winding mountain roads at night, and you have to slow down often because your headlights do not light up the road ahead as you go around curves. CONCLUSION: The red mustang HAD to have two drivers if they came that way. The single driver Mickel/McCrae almost certainly could not have driven it alone.
Examining the route, and probable destination... why travel to Burns Junction? And then another HOUR to the GRAVEL road southwest of town! The road to Burns Junction via Hwy 78 would not have been taken if the drivers were heading for Interstate 84. A shorter route would have been to head east from Burns OR, to Nyssa, and then Boise.
So maybe the drivers were heading for Interstate 80 at Winnemuca? No, because the much quicker route to Winnemuca would have been SOUTH to Chico, then to Reno, then north to Winnemuca. There seems to be no good reason for going either to Burns Junction, OR the gravel Whitehorse Ranch Road.
Whitehorse Ranch Road is about an hour southwest of Burns Junction, closer to the tiny towns of Fields or Poe Place in Harney county Oregon. Why travel THERE? It seems unlikely from this path that the killer(s) were headed much further east. It would seem their end destination was somewhere in the Whitehorse Ranch area.
So what's near Whitehorse Ranch? Not much...
There is a large Coyote Lakes HMA [wild Horse Management Area] which lies southwest of Burns Junction near the Whitehorse Ranch. Otherwise, the area is very desolate; and is used largely for hunting and fishing.
There was an auction of 5 acres of land near the Whitehorse Ranch (auction item #2), two days before the shooting. The auction was held in San Mateo, CA, not far southwest of the shooting. Minimum bid was $100. Maybe this land auction was connected somehow to them, and that's why they headed there? This parcel was at Latitude: 42.153 Longitude: -118.5555 and the parcel sits just 600 yards south of Whitehorse Ranch Road.
Another parcel of 20 acres 'near Whitehorse Ranch' was also sold at that same auction. That parcel was auction item 32, at Latitude: 42.4004 Longitude: -118.2368
It would be interesting if police were to check if anyone matching Mickel/McCrae or Mitch Stephens' aliases registered to bid on these parcels, particularly the smaller one. And who succeeded in winning the parcels? Are they in any way connected to the American Resistance movement? or AIM? And just how close was the 5-acre site to the place where he ran off the road? Was it in walking distance? Is that where he could have been when the woman found the wrecked mustang? Did he discard the gun there?
The phrases used in Michel/McCrae's manifestos, closely match the words used by the American Indian Movement (AIM) in Seattle, during the 'Not In Our Name' demonstration on October 7th. I see there are several Indian reservations near Whitehorse, so I wonder if any of the AIM group was an accomplice to Mickel/McCrae, and had roots near Whitehorse?
Now to examine an even smaller, more winding route, highway 140 from red bluff to Denio NV, and then northeast to Whitehorse Ranch...
Mapquest says that route would take a daytime driver 10 hours. OK, now we're in the ballpark. I still doubt that Mickel/McCrae could have driven this alone throughout the night, but it is just barely do-able.
It still doesn't explain what the POS was doing on the tiny gravel Whitehorse Ranch Road. That is NOT the road shownon the 2nd map above, that roughly connects Fields OR to Basque OR. So Michel/McCrae had to have gotten lost, or else had business on that road to be there.
It's possible too that MickleMcCrae might have picked up someone from the area on a college *ride board* looking for a return to their home following/resulting from final exam season pressure, just as McCrae claimed to have been so stressed- he may well have developed that cover story, which certainly sounds a little more acceptable than * I'm stressed 'cause I just killed a cop* from such a rider. And too, that could have also extended his funds for travel/ fuel purchase, if such a rider had chipped in for gas.
And don't forget that the license plates on the car would have not been as uncommon in the Pacific Northwest as they would have been in the East Coast area. I wonder if McCrae's choice of a bolthole where he was apprehended may have been predicated by the license plates on the available *second vehicle* or on the eventual destination of his rider/co-driver/accomplice.
In any event, it doesn't appear that he's inclined to offer any immediate information on that subject. It's speculative, but certainly a possibility worth considering.
-archy-/-
Translation: "I think he's gone off his chump, but maybe the judge is an idiot."
Murray said McCrae and his lawyers intend to exhaust all legal options particularly since the charges against him are severe, carrying the possibility of a death sentence if McCrae is convicted.
Translation: "Oh, this kid has screwed up by the numbers, he's going to just throw stuff on the wall and hopes that it sticks."
What a waste of money, registering as a corporation. All the murderer needed to do was don a Souix ghost shirt to be immune from bullets!
All right, what was his screen name?
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