On Monday morning, Anchorage police responded to a reported shooting in a vehicle near Creekside Park at 7122 E. 6th Ave. Two people, a man and a woman, were found with at least one gunshot wound each to their upper body and were taken to the hospital.
Then it got even more interesting. Local schools went into stay-put mode as police searched for the gunman, who was located in the 700-block of Muldoon Road. The man shot at police, and an officer was struck by a bullet in his leg. He was taken to a local hospital and is expected to survive.
For a time, access to Muldoon Elementary School was limited as police blocked the roadway on 6th. Also impacted by the stay-put orders were Bartlett High School and Creekside Elementary. Police staged around the mobile home park and fired nonlethal projectiles at the mobile home where the man was barricaded. A large police presence was augmented by firefighters and medics, as well as an Alaska State Troopers helicopter and drones.
The Anchorage School District reached out to parents on Tuesday and reassured them that it was safe to send their children to schools in the area of the shooting.
Unlike the situation in North Pole last week, where administrators would not allow a parent to pick up his child during a tense conflict of unknown importance somewhere else on the campus of North Pole High School, the Anchorage Police updated the community repeatedly throughout the situation through postings on Facebook.
Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance did not offer an immediate public apology to the officer’s family for his sacrifice in the line of duty, unlike in August, when immediately after an officer-involved shooting, LaFrance apologized to the family of the deceased individual, a teenager who had been witnessed threatening people with a knife. LaFrance then said the shooting of the menacing individual should not have happened and said she would launch an investigation into the police.
LaFrance and the Anchorage Assembly’s liberal majority have been highly critical of police in Anchorage for using lethal force to stop violent criminals, which have become an increasing problem in Anchorage.
It is unclear if the pressure from the Anchorage Assembly and the mayor led to the use of less-lethal response in this incident, which may have then led to the officer being shot.
The Anchorage government leadership has the same underlying dysfunctional incompetence as our Pentagon and State Department. Leading to creating unnecessary conflicts but resulting a lot more people getting killed and injured.
What is this supposed to mean?
If LaFrance deplores using lethal methodology to deal with and take down a person who is actively shooting people, then maybe she should put her money where her mouth is, and set an example by showing up at the active scene, and talk the shooter down face-to-face.
Just sayin’……
The new mayor has numerous deaths on her watch between police shootings and pedestrians challenging cars and top it off the city snow removal department is broke just before snow fall.
She gets an F grade as her promises are all false.
Let’s spend snow removal money on half million dollars homeless toilets instead of taking care of the taxpayer.
I bet she can’t wait for a sales tax to cover city misuse and waste of tax dollars.
LaFrance might need the police on her side if someone tries to break into her home. Apologizing to criminals and their families is not very intelligent for a mayor who only thinks she is intelligent.
Officers being wounded or killed in the line of duty will increase with the LaFrance administration bowing and cow-towing to the members of the public who are calling police shootings murder. The entire planet knows that if you are in the US and you’re a bad guy and you come at a cop with a gun, or point a gun or weapon of any kind at a cop, that you’re going to be shot dead. As you should. Unfortunately this leads to families who inevitably jump in front of a camera for their 5 minutes of fame to say their babies didn’t do nothing. And news outlets like the Anchorage Daily News and Channel 2 will repeat the victim’s families’ braying to order to add fuel to the outrage machine, and at the same time sell subscriptions.
Don’t shoot at the cops.
I wonder what his rap sheet looks like.
Why not round up these criminals threatening police and drop them off at the next Assembly Meeting? We could all apologize for the criminals taking it out on city government officials and admonish the police to not intervene. The public would stop showing up and Czar LaFrance wouldn’t need to illegally close meetings to the public. Win, win, and win.
“It is unclear if the pressure from the Anchorage Assembly and the mayor led to the use of less-lethal response in this incident, which may have then led to the officer being shot.” Wow, some more stellar journalism from MRAK. This is pure, useless speculation. Why not wait for the details to come out and then report the facts? Suzanne, you’re just muddying the waters when you write like this. Try being a journalist, not a gossip columnist.
That is absolutely correct Bill.
This is pure useless speculation.
Which by the way has been a proven factor in every democrat run city in the lower 48 including Hawaii where the brains in charge of dictating the use of public friendly police tactics have had a negative impact on criminal behavior leading to much more violent crime on innocent victims as well as a marked increase in gang violence across every racial diverse city in the country.
It really helps to remove the blinders once in awhile to look at what happens in every other city before going public and announcing “outrage” and “disbelief” over the use of force before a proper investigation has even begun.
Suzanne didnt “muddy any waters” that were already thickened in the first place.
It all started at the top…if you were awake that day.
Sadly, Police and Fire union PACs endorsed LaFrance. These folks tend to vote ‘their paycheck’ and turn out at a much higher rate than the GenPop. I know some good people on these forces and it disheartens me to say, “you got what you wanted.”
In the end, we all have to deal with it.
Well at least LaFrance and her sidekicks on the Assembly accomplished something positive already.
The narrative they spoke about in her public address after the shooting of the knife wielding individual may have saved the life of the deranged individual who shot a man and a woman in a car as well as a policeman responding to the shooting.
Given enough money maybe the Department of Corrections with the help of a liberal judge can rehabilitate this fellow and return him to the streets of Anchorage soon.
While we are praying for the speedy recovery of the shooter’s three victims we dont have much faith in the recovery of the gunman as the DOC doesnt have a very good track record of rehabilitation.