Man who shot Anchorage police officer identified and charged with assault, not attempted murder

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A man who is accused of shooting an Anchorage police officer and two other citizens has been identified as 23-year-old Jalen J. Baker. He is now lodged with “three hots and a cot” at the Anchorage Correctional Complex on charges of three counts of Assault 1, one count of Assault 3, Misconduct Involving a Weapon 2, Misconduct Involving a Weapon 3, and Reckless Endangerment. The motive regarding the shooting remains unclear, police said.

Why he was not charged with attempted murder after shooting at and hitting a police officer with a bullet is also unclear.

The incident unfolded near Creekside Park on Monday, when Baker allegedly approached a car and shot two people inside of it. Then he hunkered down into a nearby trailer home and barricaded himself in. From there, he shot a police officer, who ended up in the hospital with a bullet wound, along with the other two people the man had shot earlier.

Police used nonlethal projectiles to try to bring the matter to a safe conclusion. Six people have been shot by Anchorage police during the past three months, but Baker was not the seventh.

According to sources, Baker had others at gunpoint but the gun jammed on him before he could get shots off. For as young as he is, Baker has a long rap sheet of prior felony charges against him involving assaults and threats.

As of Wednesday, Mayor Suzanne LaFrance has made no public statement about the officer who was shot.

Baker’s court arraignment continues on Wednesday.

35 COMMENTS

  1. I’ll make a statement for the citizens of Anchorage, and Mayor LaFrance: “Thank you police for your hard work and professionalism in keeping us safe. Our hearts go out to the policeman who was shot. May he heal quickly.”

  2. I am sure the Assembly is working hard to get him back on streets. Where, by the way he is more likely to be hit by a car than die in prison.

    • I see the new pedestrian laws as a “culling of the herd” but unfortunately innocent motor vehicle operators get targeted as victims as well.
      That must be a way of dealing with excess traffic on the streets of Los Anchorage.
      Who can afford insurance after being charged in the death of an ignorant pedestrian in a blinking “nowalk” crossing?

      • “That (sic) must be a way of dealing with excess traffic on the streets of Los Anchorage.”

        The assembly and mayor solved the excess traffic problem by reducing the number of traffic lanes in downtown Anchorage.

      • You do realize, that the Assembly will use these fatalities as an excuse to render downtown as a NO car zone, right? That IS the plan. They want anchorage to be another 15 minute city.

    • If the driver stays at the scene of the accident, and if that scene is a distance from a crosswalk, the driver will most likely walk (and drive) again. No intent, no negligence (except by the victim), no assault.

  3. Wait, what?!!!!
    I can shoot three people, try to shoot others, lock down thousands of frightened students, prevent people from heading home or heading to work, disrupt an entire city and NOT get charged with attempted murder?!!!
    He shot people! The wild, Wild West….

  4. Well of course it wasn’t “attempted murder”.
    He was precise in his aim.
    He only wanted to wound the officer so he could get away without being shot.
    Which he was very successful at.
    Now we get to pay for his rehab and continued treatment until we can get him back on the street ASAP.
    It will be the success story of the year that LaFrance can use for her re-election campaign. Duh!

  5. The mayor is busy trying to do traffic control and has no time to waste on the attempted murder.
    Shoots three people and the DOJ can’t do their job.

  6. If you intentionally shoot at somebody in other than self defense, the charge should be attempted murder or manslaughter, and the defendant should bear the burden of convincing a jury that he/she did not intend to kill. This is especially true in light of the North Pole High School affair regarding assault charges against a man who is charged with simply causing another to fear injury with anger and foul language. Even the accidental discharge of a firearm can kill. Foul language? “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me”……….

  7. The initial charge is to keep him in jail while the more serious charges are being investigated. Hopefully MRAK will report the follow up charges

  8. This is full on BS. If you shoot a cop and the cop survives, you have attempted murder. What kind of mayor doesn’t come to the aid and defense of her own police force? A plague on LaFrance’s home. Cops need not come to rescue.

  9. How is this NOT attempted murder.
    I was taught you never point a gun at anything you don’t want to kill or destroy.
    Is this more of the Obama Policies to make the perpetrator more employable????
    Sarc……

  10. Let’s all watch this case and see what his bail amount is. Most of the time bail is $50-$500 and that’s it these days. Case # 3AN-24-05789CR

    This guy has been a catch and release felon over and over. Let’s see how this new case goes.

  11. Who makes the determination of the charges? NOT the Mayor! It is not ok to shoot a gun unless your life is threatened. This guy should be charged with attempted murder of 3 individuals.

  12. Our esteemed President Biden and prophetic VP Harris are now on the warpath for gun control. So, besides Hunter Biden and Alec Baldwin this is a great place to start. Will they pursue this guy? Probably not as the reasoning will be gun violence, it’s the gun’s fault.

  13. The district attorney, not being an eye-witness, obviously must rely on police incident reports to decide what charges to assert. At what point to those police reports become public information? If, to protect due process, public disclosure happens only after adjudication, then it would appear such withholding is a weakness in the system of due process itself…. as it relates to government transparency.

  14. I seen and heard alot of Anchorage citizens complaining about the assembly and socialist mayor. How many of you actually voted in the last election? I believe the turn out was 30%.

  15. Disgraceful. There will never be justice as long as the justice system continues to protect the perpetrators. The lack of courage and desire to what is right is pervasive from the top down.

  16. “Baker has a long rap sheet of prior felony charges against him involving assaults and threats”

    Ah yes. Poster Child for the social justice movement.

    He needs to be freed in time to be available participate in a “mostly peaceful” protest of similarly credentialed miscreants if Cackles loses the election.

  17. This, ladies and gentlemen, is how you turn Anchorage into Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle. It’s clear that this should have been an attempted murder charge. This is a death by a thousand cuts – and it starts small. I got the treat of looking outside my eatery window last week to one of the people that LaFrance, the Assembly and the (D)ems love so much dropping his drawers and taking a dump on the sidewalk in front of Town Square. We’re get more and more of this. And more and more of much worse thanks to the Administration.

    Make no mistake: LaFrance and Company don’t give a squat about the voters and conservative voters in particular. The homeless, the drunks, the bums, the hobos and crackheads are here constituents. In fact, I’m surprised she didn’t re-purpose the magically-found money for snow removal equipment and give it to the homeless.

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