Free Republic

Hundreds of union workers managed to block a mile-long train from delivering grain to the new EGT terminal at the Port of Longview, Wash. The terminal wants to use non-union labor. The train was rerouted to Vancouver after the Thursday morning standoff. Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad spokesman Gus Melonas says the blockade has prompted BNSF to indefinitely suspend train traffic to the grain terminal. It's the third major protest this week in an increasingly volatile dispute between EGT and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 21. The Daily News says EGT executives say they can save $1 million...

BAINBRIDGE, Wash. -- A suspected burglar was shot three times Monday morning in Bainbridge by a bystander who police said acted in self defense. Around 8:00 a.m. Monday, a homeowner found the suspect rummaging through cabinets in his house on Stetson Avenue. The homeowner said he confronted the suspect, who grabbed a large knife and began moving toward the homeowner. The homeowner told police he ran outside and armed himself with a large claw hammer as the suspect attempted to reach for his children. According to police, the suspect fled the home and began yelling at a man in a...

Police said an officer used his weapon at 6 a.m. Saturday morning to stop an attempted carjacking. Mount Rainier Police said an officer from their department was the carjacking victim, and used his service weapon in his own self-defense. The incident happened in Capitol Heights. Police said the officer fired and hit the carjacking suspect several times in the upper body. The suspect did not die in the shooting, and has been transported to an area hospital, the police said, for treatment. Mount Rainier police said the officer was also injured in the incident.

SNIPPET: "Shanti was arrested by u.s. Customs and Border Protection in Blaine, Wash. ..." SNIPPET: "Both were from Morocco. It's unclear why Shanti would need to jump the border so often. But a LinkedIn account listed in Shanti's name lists a string of jobs in Canada, Dubai, and Jordan, so it may have been work-related."

Hopes of turning an informal target shooting area off Ayres Road at the far southeast end of Benton County into a properly managed shooting facility have been shot down. County officials said the state's Growth Management Act and a related King County court ruling prevent them for allowing a shooting range on land zoned for agriculture. Ag lands must be preserved only for ag-related uses, according to the 2000 case, King County v. Growth Management Act Hearing Board. "We used to have shooting ranges and even race tracks allowed in our zoning ordinance until 2007, but we had to take...

PORTLAND --The suspect stabbed in a burglary in Northeast Portland Tuesday pleaded no contest as a 15-year-old to the first Portland murder of 1999. Portland police arrested Michael Jerard Parker, 26, Tuesday night in connection with a violent burglary in Northeast Portland early Tuesday morning. Parker previously pleaded no contest as a 15-year-old to the first Portland murder of 1999. "That had to be a scary moment," the suspect's father Barry Orjan said about the crime."Someone is in their home, you don't know who the person is, you don't know what is going on." Orjan said drugs were not the...

Evergreen State hunting activists are sounding the alarm in the wake of Saturday’s Fish & Wildlife Commission discussion in Olympia on the revised wolf management plan. There are now at least five active discussions on wolves in Washington, and their potential impact on hunting, on three different local internet hunting forums. With but one exception, sentiments are all negative. One forum has a whole sub-topic on wolves. Wolf advocates are determined to bring up the population of predatory canines in this state, regardless of the impact on big game herds. Hunters see them as something close to snake oil peddlers,...

The man who gunned down five people yesterday in Yuma, AZ formerly lived in Washington’s Kitsap County, and authorities now believe he targeted all of his victims. Carey H. Dyess, 73, apparently was frustrated with problems surrounding his latest divorce, and he took it out on those involved in that process. According to published reports, while he was living in Kitsap County, he was divorced four times. That’s quite a track record, and this latest case only upped the score to five divorces. Even the New York Times covered this story. The body count includes Jerrold Shelley, the attorney who...

EVERETT, Washington -- Everett detectives arrested a man Friday in connection to a robbery last week that also involved what police said was a fatal self-defense shooting. Following up on a confidential tip, detectives from the Everett Police Department provided information to the Snohomish County Sheriff's Office that led them to Kevin Price Odneal, 46, who was hiding out on a property near the Snohomish County line, police said. Odneal was arrested at about 11 a.m. Friday at the property, in the 2400 block of Newberg Road. Police said the property owner was unaware that Odneal was hiding out. The...

Less than two hours after picking out a man in a police lineup who held up his drugstore, pharmacist Mike Donohue was getting robbed — again. This robber's face was hidden under the hood of a bulky black sweatshirt. He rocked back and forth anxiously, with his right hand planted in his pocket. Like the other five robbers who had previously held up Donohue's store, the man demanded OxyContin, a popular painkiller known for its high-abuse potential. "My technician came back and showed me the note that said, 'Give me your OxyContin. I have a gun'," Donohue said. Instead of...

When Canadian Oliver King was sentenced yesterday in a Seattle federal courtroom to six years in federal prison for illegal firearms possession, unlawful dealing in firearms and associated offenses, reports about the case contained some unintended revelations. The Vancouver Sun quoted a document from U.S. prosecutors that stated: "Firearms are dangerous and those that Mr. King was convicted of possessing are particularly lethal. The possession, purchase and sale of firearms are highly regulated for this reason…” This tends to put the lie to claims by gun prohibitionists that the firearms industry is “unregulated.” The investigation followed King, an Iranian-born Canadian...

Listeners to Friday morning’s KIRO-FM news broadcasts were treated repeatedly to a one-sided report regarding this weekend’s Folklife Festival and the Seattle Center, and the attempt by the city to ban guns from the Center and city parks facilities. These reports quoted Bob Scales, formerly with the mayor’s office under anti-gunner Greg Nickels and now with the city attorney’s office. This column spoke with Alan Gottlieb, executive vice president of the Bellevue-based Second Amendment Foundation, which sued the city over its gun ban attempt and won. According to Gottlieb, KIRO did not attempt to contact him for an opposing view,...

The Elwha River on Washington's Olympic Peninsula once teemed with legendary salmon runs before two towering concrete dams built nearly a century ago cut off fish access to upstream habitat, diminished their runs and altered the ecosystem. On June 1, nearly two decades after Congress called for full restoration of the river and its fish runs, federal workers will turn off the generators at the 1913 dam powerhouse and set in motion the largest dam removal project in U.S. history. Contractors will begin dismantling the dams this fall, a $324.7 million project that will take about three years and eventually...

A terrifying burglar has been preying on Seattle's hippest 'hood lately. This person (or persons) apparently has no fear of entering people's homes while they sleep and stealing their shit before they wake up. Fortunately, at least one Capitol Hill resident packs heat. Capitol Hill Seattle reports: CHS has learned that a prowler was held at gunpoint by a neighbor and then arrested by police early Wednesday morning in the area near Volunteer Park where a spate of recent burglaries has had residents on edge . . . We're still trying to confirm details of the arrest with SPD but...

A jury in Tacoma has convicted the getaway driver in the Lakewood police killings with first-degree murder. The News Tribune reports the Pierce County jury did not find Dorcus Allen guilty of aggravated circumstances. Prosecutors charged Allen with four counts of aggravated first-degree murder in the 2009 deaths of four Lakewood police officers. Allen admits he drove Maurice Clemmons near the Forza coffee shop in the gunman's truck in November 2009. His defense argued he only drove Clemmons to a nearby car wash because Clemmons told the man he could borrow his truck that day to make some money. Clemmons...

The federal government is suing Starbucks for firing a dwarf. According to Reuters, the barista, at a store in El Paso, TX, requested a stool or small stepladder to do her job. Starbucks denied the request and fired her that same day. The company said she could have been a danger to employees and customers. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission said after three days of training, the store should have made a reasonable accommodation for the woman.

A paper sign that simply read "Closed today" fluttered in the shattered doorway of Sharp's Outdoor Power Equipment in Georgetown on Friday, where an employee fatally shot a suspected burglar in the head and held a second man at gunpoint during a break-in Thursday night. The King County Medical Examiner's Office identified James Philip Stapleton as the 46-year-old man who was shot and died near the front of the business at 5931 Fourth Ave. S. Stapleton was carrying a chain saw when he was confronted by the store employee and shot about 11:20 p.m. Thursday, said Seattle police Sgt. Sean...

Although Gov. Christine Gregoire yesterday signed legislation that legalizes the use of firearm sound suppressors in Washington State, the law does not actually take effect until 90 days after the end of the current legislative session. That means the first legal opportunity one will have to actually shoot a gun with a mounted suppressor – they are called “cans” by fans of the devices – is probably July 23. That’s 90 calendar days after the Legislature is due to adjourn, on April 24. However, that ought to be just about the right timing for someone interested in getting one of...

Angry Evergreen State gun owners can “stand down” – for the moment – and not travel to Olympia this afternoon for a hearing on House Bill 2067 before the House Ways & Means Committee, because it has been removed as an agenda item. The National Rifle Association sent out word this morning, congratulating Washington State members for a job well done. According to Joe Waldron, a veteran Olympia gun rights lobbyist and legislative director for the Bellevue-based Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA), “That doesn’t mean we’re safe, it just means we have a breather.”...

A bill that would strip Washington citizens of a unique self-defense protection is being fast-tracked by its sponsor, anti-gun State Rep. Ross Hunter (D-48th District), who unveiled the measure on Saturday and has it scheduled for a hearing before the House Ways & Means Committee – which he chairs – on Wednesday at 3 p.m. in Olympia. Both the National Rifle Association and Bellevue-based Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms are furiously alerting their members. CCRKBA is issuing a press statement that calls the move “an outrage.” Both alerts have the names, phone numbers and e-mail...