Drunken Driving Suspect Shoots State Policeman

Drunken Driving Suspect Shoots State Policeman
The Hartford Courant (1923-1984) - Hartford, Conn.
Date: Mar 28, 1953

NEWTOWN, March 27 (Special.)--A shotgun blast shattered the left arm of State Policeman Edward F. McMahon today as he attempted to arrest a drunken driving suspect in his home.

( The rest is paid article =[ )

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Crazy story for the 50s, but what's crazier is his name was Ed McMahon, hehe...

Police: Father Kills Son on Father's Day

A Jackson Township man, 62, shot his 19-year-old son on Father's Day, killing him in the family’s garage with a .44-caliber magnum handgun after a domestic disturbance, according to state police.

Bernard John Uckele was arraigned at district court in Marshalls Creek on Sunday night, at one point asking a trooper in court how things were going at his house. According to police, he had murdered his son at that house hours Sunday afternoon after a fight with his son’s girlfriend, Jacqueline Martinez.

State police troopers were dispatched to the Uckele home at 8902 Adams Drive around 12:45, police said in court documents. While on the way to the home, police learned that 19-year-old Justin Uckele had been shot in the chest and that his father had left the home in a brown pick up truck.

When they arrived they found the 19-year-old dead in the home’s garage.

“Initially it did not look like our male victim was even involved or even home,” said Lt. Robert Bartal, of the Hazleton state police barracks. “When he arrived home the incident escalated to a shooting, at which time we had a male victim shot and a male suspect flee the scene.”

Troopers on their way to the murder scene saw the suspect’s truck driving on Sugar Hollow Road, about one mile from the shooting. Uckele then tried to flee from police, passing cars and briefly eluding troopers. He was later located on Route 115 and the chase ended when a Pocono Mountain Regional Police car approached from the opposite direction and forced him to stop on Route 115 just south of Interstate 80.

At the scene, police spoke with the victim’s girlfriend soon after the shooting. She told police that she lives at the Uckele home and that she had a fight with the victim’s sister Jenna earlier in the day. Bernard Uckele got involved in the fight and it became physical, she told police.

When she called her boyfriend at work and told Bernard Uckele that his son was coming home, Bernard threatened to kill them both, she said.

She told police that when Justin Uckele came home, he spoke with her and entered the home alone. Moments later she heard a single gunshot. She told police that Bernard Uckele walked calmly to Justin’s car and locked it then got into his truck. She told police that when she asked Bernard “Did you shoot him?” he replied, “Yes, it’s all your fault” and drove away.

During interviews with police, Uckele admitted to shooting his son with a .44-caliber Magnum revolver within three feet. He told police he saw blood and believed he shot his son, according to court documents.

The gun was found in the home. It appears that after the shooting, Uckele returned the gun to storage. Police found the gun loaded with five live rounds and one spent round.

After arraignment before Marshalls Creek Magisterial District Court Judge Brian Germano, Uckele was taken without bail to Monroe County Correctional Facility, where he will await a preliminary hearing.

State police are continuing to investigate the shooting with the assistance of the county coroner’s office and district attorney’s office, Lt. Bartal said at the scene.

Check back at PoconoRecord.com for more information on this story as it becomes available.

New Details On the Alabamba Shooter

(CNN) -- An Alabama man who went on a shooting rampage in March, killing 10 people and himself, left a note saying he put his mother "out of her misery" and that "some of the people who made us suffer will pay," according to newly released police records.


The shooter, Michael McLendon, killed his mother before killing nine others in several towns.

"Moma was very sick. Had lung cancer, I think," stated the letter police say was written by Michael McLendon.

"She wanted to die with her dogs and she did. I shot her while she was asleep. She never knew what hit her. Nor did the dogs. I'm sorry! But Moma had suffered enough. And so have I."

The letter, found in a relative's mailbox, was released earlier this week, along with a 25-page police summary and other documents. Police said they have no doubt the handwriting was McLendon's.

The 28-year-old Marine Corps and police academy washout shot his mother to death March 10 in Kinston, Alabama, then went on an hourlong rampage in neighboring Samson and Geneva.

[rest of article here]

Four Found Dead In Alabama Home

(CNN) -- Four people were found dead Tuesday morning in a home in northwestern Alabama, an investigator said.

Deputies with the Lauderdale County Sheriff's Department found the bodies in Greenhill, Alabama, about 8:30 a.m., said Kelly Muston, an assistant investigator with the department.

Authorities were looking for Kevin Lee Garner, who is believed to have a connection to the people found in the home, Muston said.

Chief Investigator Travis Clemmons said that the home that Garner lives in was burned and that investigators were searching it Tuesday afternoon.

Investigators believe the fire "had something to do with a divorce hearing," Clemmons said.

Authorities have not linked the fire to the killings, he said, but they found a car at Garner's house that belonged to one of the four who was killed, Clemmons said.

U.S. Killer Left Behind Grudge List, and Letter

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama (Reuters) - An Alabama man who shot and killed 10 people, including his mother, wrote a letter explaining how he killed her and saying he would take his own life, authorities said on Thursday.
Michael McLendon killed his mother, grandmother, uncle, two cousins and five others, including an 18-month-old girl, in a spree that ended when he shot himself dead after a shootout and car chase along a rural road on Tuesday.

Authorities trying to piece together why the 28-year-old committed the worst mass shooting in Alabama history found a list of people he bore grudges against and discovered additional evidence on Thursday that he was motivated at least in part by revenge against perceived slights and injustices.

"McLendon left a letter that is in the possession of investigators, describing how he killed his mother and his intentions of taking his own life," said J. Christopher Murphy, director of the Alabama Department of Public Safety.

McLendon, who lived with his mother Lisa McLendon, killed her at home some time before setting out on the rampage. He also set her house on fire and shot family dogs.

"The letter describes how McLendon harbored ill feelings toward family members due to a family dispute," Murphy told a news conference in the state capital, Montgomery.

The letter also detailed a dispute with his family over a Bible, Murphy said.

McLendon was a self-proclaimed survivalist who bought ammunition the day before the killings, Murphy said. At his house, detectives also found a supply of batteries, water, a bullet-proof vest and other equipment.

"He was a very unhappy man. He had been booted out of law enforcement. He had been bumped out of the Marines. He had just quit his job. He felt his life was a failure," said Gary McAliley, the district attorney in Coffee County, where the killings began.

McLendon was armed with two military assault rifles, a handgun and a shotgun. More than 125 rounds were fired in the rampage, which started at a home in Kinston in southeastern Alabama.

Aside from family members, McLendon killed the wife of a local deputy sheriff and her 18-month-old daughter, who were visiting one of McLendon's relatives.

The woman's four-month-old baby was wounded along with five others. Three people, including a motorist at a gas station, were killed as McLendon drove through the nearby town of Samson and randomly shot people.

Gunman in Alabama Slayings Was Briefly A Police Officer

GENEVA, Alabama (CNN) -- The gunman who authorities said launched a shooting rampage over three south Alabama towns, slaying 10 people in his path before killing himself, was once a police officer in Samson, the small town hit hardest by the deadliest crime in the state's history.

Authorities identified the shooter as Michael McLendon, 28, of Kinston, Alabama, in Coffee County. Speaking at several news conferences on Wednesday, authorities also released a detailed timeline of the rampage -- which lasted less than an hour -- and identified the victims.

Investigators late Wednesday said they were closer to finding a motive behind why McLendon would fatally shoot his mother in his hometown of Kinston before moving on to open fire in Samson and then Geneva.

"Evidence collected does indicate his reasons -- what the reason are I can't get into right now," said Lt. Barry Tucker of the Alabama Bureau of Investigations. "He was somewhat depressed about job issues, but the information we have does not specify [the motive] was job-related."

Coffee County District Attorney Gary McAliley told the newspaper in nearby Dothan that McLendon likely planned the rampage for a while. He said investigators have found dozens of ammunition boxes, military and survival gear and medical supplies at McLendon's Kinston home.

The Alabama Bureau of Investigation said authorities recovered a phone list and a notebook from the home, "but there is no evidence that indicates a hit list of any kind."

Tucker said the notebook contained, "a couple of pages of notes, people he worked with, places he worked -- it was over a year old." Asked whether the notes expressed grievances against others, Tucker said no.

The assault Tuesday ended at the Reliable Metal Products plant in Geneva, 24 miles from Kinston. Police said McLendon engaged in a shootout before killing himself inside the building.

McLendon shot and killed at least 10 people, including two children, and wounded at least four others, officials said.

McLendon, who had no known criminal record before carrying out the rampage, worked briefly as a police officer in Samson, but failed to complete the "required training" at the police academy in Montgomery in 2003, according to Alabama State Trooper Capt. Marc McHenry.

He "didn't last a week and a half" at the academy and received no firearms training there, Murphy said.

"We believe he fired in excess of 200 rounds during the assaults," Alabama State Police Cpl. Steve Jarrett said.

The rampage began Tuesday afternoon when McLendon shot and killed his mother before setting fire to the home he shared with her in Kinston, near the Alabama-Florida state line. He then headed to Samson, where he opened fire on his uncle's front porch as his uncle and other relatives stood outside with the neighbors from across the street.

Those neighbors happened to be the family of Geneva County Sheriff's Deputy Josh Myers, who was later involved in a shoot-out with the gunman, unaware that McLendon had shot and killed his wife and young daughter and critically injured his nearly 4-month-old baby, Ella Kay.

A family friend found the couple's 4-year-old son hiding in the Myers' home after the shooting.

Five people, including Myers' wife, Andrea, and their 1½-year-old daughter, Corinne Gracy, were killed on the porch. McLendon then opened fire on his grandmother, who was standing in the doorway of her home next door.

Alina Knowles was in her home in Samson when she heard the gunman fire on the porch so many times that it sounded like a horror film.

After the shooting stopped, Knowles saw the gunman flee the area and drive around the block.

Knowles, a certified nurse assistant, looked around for survivors. She saw members of Myers' family dead on the porch, but nobody's chest was moving to signal they were alive.

Then she heard Myers' baby girl, Ella Kay, crying.

"[I] picked her up, came between the two vehicles," she said. "Saw him coming up the road, ducked so he wouldn't see me, as he was coming up this way I ducked, was still ducking and moving around their van trying to keep him from seeing me with that baby."

Knowles said she knew if she wasn't careful, the gunman would target her.

"I would have been dead," she said. "I would have been on that ground there."

Knowles was able to get the deputy's child and herself to safety. But the horror of the events sticks with her.

"I was scared," she said. "The scene I saw, there was no words for it. None at all. There is no describing what I saw."

McLendon then shot and killed two bystanders in Samson before heading to Reliable Metal Products. There, he exchanged fire with Myers and another officer in the parking lot before entering the building, where he shot and killed himself.

"We truly are shocked at this," said Col. Christopher Murphy, the director of the Alabama Department of Public Safety. "This event formed the single deadliest crime recorded in Alabama."

Samson Mayor Clay King said he knew McLendon and all of the victims in the small southern Alabama town.

"I coached him in both T-ball and Little League baseball along with my two sons," he said of McLendon.

McLendon worked nearly two years at food manufacturer and distributor Kelley Foods in Elba, about 25 miles north of Samson.

He quit his job last week, the company said. The company didn't specify what his position was, but said he was a "reliable team leader" who was well-liked.

"I can't describe what happened, why it happened," Geneva County Sheriff Greg Ward told CNN affiliate WTVY. "It's just a sad day for Geneva County."

"He was shooting at just ordinary people going about their business," said Alabama state Sen. Harri Anne Smith.


Smith represents Geneva County, where all but one of the victims were killed. Smith said she had been briefed about the incident by state and local law enforcement.

Another mass killing occurred in southern Alabama in 2002, when Westley Devon Harris gunned down six members of his 16-year-old girlfriend's family at their farm in Luverne. Harris was convicted and sentenced to the death penalty in 2005.

At Least TEN Dead in Alabama Shooting Spree

HORROR IN ALABAMA

(CNN) -- At least 10 people were killed Tuesday in a shooting spree that spanned two small southern Alabama towns, state officials confirmed. The gunman, who turned the gun on himself, and the wife and child of a sheriff's deputy were among those killed.

The shooting started in a neighborhood in Samson, a town of about 3,000 about 15 miles north of the Florida border, just after 4 p.m. (5 p.m. ET) and ended 12 miles away at a manufacturing plant in Geneva, said Alabama state Sen. Harri Anne Smith, who represents Geneva County.

"He was shooting at just ordinary people going about their business," Smith told CNN, saying she had been briefed by state and local law enforcement.

The gunman, whose identity was not disclosed, shot himself at the Reliable Metal Products plant, state public safety spokesman Kevin Cook told CNN.

Authorities are also investigating an arson at a residence in neighboring Coffee County, where a body has been found. That incident is believed to be related to the shootings, Cook said.

Authorities said the wife and child of a Geneva County sheriff's deputy were killed in the shooting spree.

Investigators are trying to determine whether the shooter knew any of the victims.

State police Cpl. Steve Jarrett told reporters that the shooter killed six adults and one child in three residences in Samson before heading down state highway 52, firing at least seven bullets into a state trooper car. The trooper sustained minor injuries from shattered glass.

The shooter then killed another person at Samson Pipe and Supply and then another at a service station -- both on highway 52, Jarrett said.

A witness told CNN Radio she saw a woman's body at the Big-Little Store service station off the highway as people gathered at the crime scene.

The shooter ended up at the Reliable Metal Products plant in Geneva, where he fired a 30-round burst, injuring the town's police chief, authorities said.

"Then the subject entered the business. Within minutes, shots were heard ... Law enforcement officers found him dead," Jarrett said.

"There are believed to be additional people shot and wounded during these episodes," he said.

Sheriff's officials says the shooter was a former employee of Reliable Metal, CNN affiliate WEAR-TV reported.

The FBI bureau in Mobile, Alabama, sent an agent to assist the Geneva County sheriff's office and local police, a spokeswoman for the FBI said.

Col. Christopher Murphy, head of the Alabama Department of Public Safety, called the south Alabama shooting spree "the worst that DPS has a memory of."

Another mass killing occurred in south Alabama in 2002, when Westley Devon Harris gunned down six members of his 16-year-old girlfriend's family at their farm in Luverne. Harris was convicted and sentenced to the death penalty in 2005.