Posted on 10/01/2002 7:16:59 AM PDT by Phantom Lord
Dozens protest Preble County police shooting
Slain mans roommates say he was unarmed
EATON | Preble County law-enforcement officials declined to talk publicly Monday as they turned information about Friday's fatal shooting by a police officer of a 23-year-old man over to detectives from the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office.
Montgomery County investigators, called in by Preble County Sheriff Tom Hayes, also said they would not talk about their review of the shooting by a member of a Preble County's emergency services group officers from a number of police departments who are trained to handle drownings and hostage and other situations.
However, it was anything but quiet outside the Preble County Courthouse, where dozens of friends and relatives picketed and said that police were covering up what happened to Clayton Jacob Helriggle, 23, of 1282 Ohio 503 South.
The protesters disputed police claims that Helriggle had a gun when he descended a stairwell and was shot by a Lewisburg police officer, whose identity has not been released. Friends and relatives on Monday carried blue plastic cups similar to the one they said Helriggle had in his hand Friday night.
Among the protesters were four of Helriggle's roommates, three of whom said they were inside the brick farmhouse when police stormed the house to serve a warrant to search for narcotics.
Maj. Wayne Simpson of the Preble County Sheriff's Office declined to discuss information about what happened Friday night and said a report on the shooting of the Preble County man had not been completed. Preble County Prosecutor Rebecca Ferguson said she sealed the search warrant after the shooting, and had no comment regarding the investigation.
"They're a professional group of officers, that's what their job is, and I'm not going to second-guess them. Whatever (Montgomery County officials) come up with, they come up with," Ferguson said.
Friends called Helriggle "peaceful and nonviolent," but police said the 1997 Twin Valley South High School graduate held a 9 mm handgun, not a blue cup, in his right hand when he descended the dimly lighted stairs. Roommates said Helriggle owned a 9 mm gun, but that it was upstairs when police entered their house.
"It's like we were armed, hardened criminals waiting inside to take them on," said Wes Bradley, 26, who lived in the bottom of the six-bedroom farmhouse with his girlfriend, 22-year-old Tasha Webster.
Bradley said he and Webster were near the kitchen next to the stairs, when officers "broke through the back door with battering rams and started throwing in flash grenades three at a time, to blind us."
The officers wore full body armor and carried shields, he said.
Another roommate, Ian Albert, said he had returned home from the grocery store with Chris Elmore, 24, who remained outside while Albert ran into the house.
"We saw at least two paddy wagon-type vehicles, like a SWAT bus," Elmore said. "About 30 officers stormed out of the woods" surrounding the farmhouse. "They'd cut the barbed wire, and you could see a staging area, like where 25 to 30 uniformed cops had been lying down and slithered along the grass."
Officers ordered Elmore to get on the ground, and he said he heard three pops, which he said could have been the flash grenades and gunshot.
"I yelled 'Nobody's armed,' and they told me, 'Shut up, shut up.'
Elmore described the action "like a movie, in slow motion."
Inside, Albert said, the police threw him against the staircase, "with my head on the second step up. I wanted to yell at Clay, but I looked up and saw him, rounding the stairway, and he had this look on his face, like, 'What's going on?' and the cops yelled, 'Get down' and then 'boom.'
Albert, who completed four months of Navy Seal training, said he reached up for Helriggle, "and I tried to apply pressure," he said, placing his left palm on his right chest, where Helriggle was struck by the gunshot.
"He died in my arms," he said. "It took about two minutes."
Albert said he was placed in a sheriff's car, and Helriggle's parents arrived.
"They saw me, drenched in Clay's blood, and they ask me, 'Is he all right?' and I just shook my head. The cops are smoking and joking, high-fiving each other. Wow, I think, they took down a farm of unarmed hippies.
"If they would have come to the door and said, 'Give us your dope, hippies,' we'd have gotten about a $100 ticket."
Police said they confiscated a small amount of marijuana, pills, drug paraphernalia and quantities of packaging items used in the distribution of marijuana.
The four roommates said they smoke marijuana from time to time and that they had marijuana pipes in the house. Bradley said he had a prescription for Fiorocet, a codeinelike painkiller, for a bad knee. They said the packaging police referred to was a box of plastic sandwich bags.
Webster said there was nothing in the house "that a good divorce lawyer couldn't have gotten us out on a misdemeanor," and said an old shotgun and a .22-caliber rifle found there were used for hunting.
"We target-practiced outside all the time, shot at bales of hay, jugs, that sort of thing," Webster said.
Bradley and Webster said Helriggle took a nap around 5 p.m. and had made plans to meet his girlfriend later.
"I'm not sure if he woke up from the bashing on the door or what," Bradley said.
All four said they were not read their rights or told what charges were filed against them. They were released from the Preble County Jail around 1:30 a.m. Saturday. No criminal charges have been filed.
Nancy Fahrenholz, the daughter of Everett "Bill" Fahrenholz, an attorney and former country prosecutor, hugged Bradley on Monday at the courthouse. Helriggle and five roommates rented the house from the Fahrenholzes.
"I'm so sorry," said Fahrenholz, a Rhode Island resident in the area to finish up the estate of her father, Bill Fahrenholz, who died a month ago.
"(Dad) would have been furious at this," she said. "We're all very distressed."
She said Helriggle "was a really nice guy," and that her family was pleased with the five young people's work on rehabilitating the farmhouse.
Helriggle's 77-year-old grandfather, Donald, a Miamisburg resident and Ohio Bell retiree, said his grandson rented the farmhouse "so they could play their instruments, listen to their music and drink a little beer. . . . They just wanted to be doing what 23-year-olds do."
I am equally convinced by common sense that the unrestrained growth and power of the federal government is harmful, and that the New Deal Commerce Clause is largely to blame. Every expansion of government power that is based on it is harmful, and your pet is no different. I will not however, accuse you of harboring criminal intent for holding a dissenting opinion.
You said it! You ask him to come out and give some HARD facts he can't respond.
He is in fantasy land and didn't respond to post 677 because he can post no facts.
Here are some DRUG FACTS for you!
You see Havoc, Your problem is that you think we are all for promoting criminal activities.
You are furthest from reality. Many of us are employed in protecting and serving the public every day!
We are against the criminalization of marijuana. We do not think people who break the law should not go to jail.
We do not believe all off the other ignorant blabber that bubbled out your squatter is moral.
If you must call marijuana a drug. You must also call alcohol and cigarettes a drug!
However these three leisure's are used, whether abused or recreational, they have many same effects on people.
Except!-Death Caused by each and 2 are legal!
We want to know why? Can you answer this question with a reasonable, real life, no BS answer? One that maybe has a link to an actual story where marijuana caused death or destruction of thousands, even hundreds, of lives? Not one or two people. Some abuse butane and cough medicine but we don't illegalise those either.
.......Or can you admit that if marijuana should be illegal than maybe alcohol should be called a drug and people who drink should be looked at in the same light as people who smoke marijuana?
Believe it or not, we are the same.
Your neighbor, your teacher, your bank teller, your fire fighter, your local merchant. You never know. It shouldn't matter and you shouldn't be thrown in jail for it. You will some day except this fact, Havoc, and understand the majority does believe this way. Unfortunately you won't take the time to back up your bull and post something "REAL!"
That is why "real life" has a deaf ear for radical hipocrits like you.
What do you say about the Federal Gov. breaking laws?
Havoc says "Y'all don't respect the laws of this land to begin with or our form of government.""I stick to right and wrong and then deal with legal and illegal on a responsible basis." Plus more that deals with criminals are criminals and should be punished.
Havocs Home Page will show that he is a hacker! If you didn't know Havoc, Hacking IS illegal and I hope they lock you up with the other rapists and murderers for wrecking peoples lives by exposing their personal computer information as well as giving everyone fear of using the internet. You want to free Kevin? He is just another crook to needs to serve his time right?
You should also take a look at the people and singers you enjoy and respect. You know how many of them smoke marijuana?
Your Bio tells us all what a fake you.
You are no doubt looking at your web access logs now for my i.p. address so that you can hack me aren't you? Good Luck!
By the way. I'm sure you are aware of the U.S. Federal Anti-Hacking Laws and what breaking them means. You also support the Patriot Act which will ultimately lead to your arrest because the government compromised your rights to obtain a tap on your criminal activities. Let me guess, It doesn't hurt anyone right?
If you don't want your personal activities affecting your ability to post a meaningful and coherent belief or be able to back up your beliefs without lies, reefer madness annotations and hypocritical statements, then you shouldn't post it in your profile.
Hmmmm. . . designated drivers at a golf outing. . . sounds suspecious to me !!! ;-))
Oooops....here I am in another dope thread......never mind.....
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