Officer killed in shootings loved animals

Forks Mayor Nedra Reed remembers going on a ride with U.S. Forest Service Officer Kristine Fairbanks and her patrol dog, Radar, into the woods around the small town on the west side of the Olympic Peninsula.

"I was so impressed with her knowledge and her skill and her care and concern as a law enforcement officer," Reed told the Peninsula Daily News. "It was a blessing to ride with her that day, because that's the way I will remember Kris."

Fairbanks, 51, and Richard Ziegler, 59, were killed Saturday by Shawn M. Roe, 36, who was wanted by the state Corrections Department for failing to appear at a meeting with his probation officer in August.

The probation officer had requested an arrest warrant in Mason County Superior Court for Roe, who died Saturday in a shootout with Clallam County sheriff's deputies, but no warrant was issued, department spokesman Chad Lewis told The Seattle Times.

At the time of his death, Roe was carrying three handguns, including Fairbanks' service weapon, Washington State Patrol Trooper Krista D. Hedstrom said.

The shootings occurred Saturday on the northern Olympic Peninsula near Sequim, about 50 miles west of Seattle.

Neighbors said Ziegler, a retired California corrections employee who moved to the area in May, had recently gotten approval to begin construction of a house. His body was found in a fifth-wheel trailer where he was living.

"He was really upbeat," neighbor Arthur Foster told the Seattle-Post Intelligencer, adding that he and his wife heard shots from Ziegler's property about 5:15 p.m.

Fairbanks leaves behind a husband who works for the state Fish and Wildlife Department and their 15-year-old daughter. The family lived in Forks and was well known around the peninsula. The officer, with her German shepherd dog in tow, often visited schools to talk about her job.

She mainly investigated timber theft and illegal harvesting of salal, ferns, mushrooms, moss, cedar bark and grass in the nearly 1,000-square-mile Olympic National Forest.

As recently as late year, she was the only Forest Service officer in the state and one of just 40 nationwide who worked with a trained police dog. Radar was found uninjured in her vehicle after she was shot.

Roe was convicted in 2007 of unlawful imprisonment, a felony, and malicious mischief, a gross misdemeanor, Lewis said. In September 2006, Roe's ex-wife, Mary Catherine Roe, carried a gun to her teaching job at Nisqually Middle School in Lacey, saying he had threatened her with a gun and she was afraid.

Her mother, Patti White, said he once threatened to burn down her home.

"We're relieved that we're safe and we don't have to be afraid anymore," White told The Seattle Times.

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