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BOOK: Head Shot
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The emergency room staff treated him for a broken jawbone, but wasn't buying the “I accidentally ran over my son's head with the car” story. The doctors' doubts turned to chagrin when a bruise unmistakably shaped like a tire track appeared across his left cheek.
The doctors reasoned that Webb's head wasn't crushed because the driveway was made of sand. The weight of the car simply pushed his head deeper into it, cushioning the head-popping pressure.
“When Andrew Webb gets under pressure as an adult,” ventured Marty, “he breaks into people's homes, puts a firearm in a person's face, threatening to shoot their head off, and slices people's throats because he fears they are going to rip him off. If anyone wanted to see Andrew turn into a violent madman, all you had to do was mix him with alcohol.”
Andrew Webb's alcoholism and chemical dependency came as no surprise to his wife, nor did it elude evaluation by the Tacoma Treatment Alternatives to Street Crimes (TASC) staff who evaluated him after his arrest. “We would be willing to work with this individual, based upon his substance use history,” reported TASC, affirming their commitment to helping Webb achieve ongoing sobriety, “though we are concerned about the alleged incident that brought him here.” Because of this evaluation, an additional legal requirement insisted upon by the judge was that Andrew Webb remain drug and alcohol free, not possess a firearm or dangerous weapon, and that he “stay out of trouble” until his sentencing.
“Andrew Webb was sentenced on those assault charges on June seventh,” recalled Detective Yerbury, “exactly two days before Paul St. Pierre shot him.” Judge Thompson, who sentenced him on the assault charges, didn't know Webb was involved in the Damon Wells homicide, and Andrew Webb wasn't about to tell him or Probation Officer Woolf. Had Judge Thom-spon known that Webb was involved in two murders, both of which happened while Webb was on probation, the sentence imposed would most assuredly not have been deferred, nor would Webb's debt to society have been paid by 700 hours of community service.
“Simply put,” commented Detective Yerbury, “I was of the opinion then, and I hold that opinion today, that Andrew Webb killed Damon Wells in a desperate act to avoid going to prison.”
Six
Charged with murder, and locked up in the Pierce County Jail, Andrew Webb and the St. Pierre brothers weren't speaking to the authorities, but they talked profusely to friends and family. “They were continually calling me on the phone collect from the Pierce County Jail,” remembered Marty Webb. “Each of them had a different story, and none of them were the same. I wasn't the only one they called. They were calling Mark Ericson, Jim Fuller, and all sorts of family members.”
In one version of the Salmon Beach events, Paul and Chris St. Pierre tackled Damon Wells, then held him down. “Chris said he had kicked the guy in the head a few times. They then held him while Andrew came up from behind, grabbed his hair, pulled back his head and, with the knife Paul had given him, drew it across his throat from ear to ear. Then Andrew turned and walked away. When Andrew called, he told me that he threw the knife down after that,” explained Ben Webb, “but Chris said that Andrew didn't throw it down. He said that Andrew turned back, threw the knife, and it stuck in the guy's back. Paul was the heavy that night, and I'm sure at this point he took a stab at Wells and he would have made Chris do the same. I think the idea was that doing that would link them all together—if one falls, they all fall.”
“Chris called me from jail, too,” recalled Mark Ericson. “He said that Paul killed that kid out there in Salmon Beach. ‘Paul killed that kid.' And then Paul would call me up and say, ‘Gee, those guys are nuts, man. Andrew killed that kid.' Chris said they'd beat him up, took him out there, but he didn't want to go. In one version, maybe Andrew's, Paul pulls his gun out and tells Chris to ‘take care of him.' Chris says, ‘No, you can't shoot him because it will make too much noise.' Paul goes, ‘Yeah, right,' puts the gun back, and Andrew and he chased the guy down. Paul pulls his knife out and says, ‘Andrew, you gotta take care of him.' I guess he handed the knife to Andrew, and Andrew slit his throat. But first Chris kept telling me that Paul slit Damon Wells's throat. All I know is what they said to me on the phone, and they all said something different. I hated even hearing about it. It was horrible and heartbreaking for everyone involved.”
Paul and Chris St. Pierre also shared their consistently conflicting versions with auto mechanic Jim Fuller. “Paul told me that he shot one guy in the head, but it was Chris who said that it was over a bad drug deal,” Fuller later told police. “Then Paul told me that Andrew is the guy who cut the guy's throat, and Chris backed that up with one of his phone calls. He told me they dropped him at Salmon Beach and that Andrew ran after him and pushed him down and cut his throat while Chris and Paul were looking on.”
“Jim Fuller was not involved in any wrongdoing,” confirmed Detective Yerbury. “He contacted us because he was aware that we were told that Damon Wells and he left the party together, and he feared accusations of being an accomplice.” When Jim Fuller saw the front-page headline of June 21, 1984—2
MURDER VICTIMS IDENTIFIED—
he picked up the phone.
Reporter Bill Ripple's compelling article in the
Tacoma News Tribune
named Damon Wells and John Achord as the homicide victims. Police would not release the murder suspects' identities until formal charges were filed in superior court. The savvy reporter, however, easily discerned and printed the two most probable names: Paul St. Pierre and Andrew Webb.
“That wasn't too difficult to figure out,” newsman Chet Rogers later commented. “The police released information that two of the guys were involved in an earlier assault incident where one of them hauled off and pumped hot lead into the other—not the official police wording, of course. Well, the only earlier Tacoma assault case fitting that exact description transpired at, amazingly enough, the same house next to Ericson's that the cops got the search warrant for. Our brilliant, analytical minds—Bill Ripple's included—quickly discerned that two of the arrested men were (a) the guy who pulled the trigger, and (b) the guy who caught the bullet—Paul St. Pierre and Andrew Webb.”
The news media also reported that police found the suspected murder weapon. Recovering the double-edged Gerber knife in a brushy area near the SR7 Freeway Interchange with South Thirty-eighth Street was not accomplished by simply foraging through the bushes. The successful search required thorough professional planning, including careful coordination of three distinct search groups under the direction of Officer Donald E. Moore, search and rescue (SAR) coordinator for the city of Tacoma.
Given the assignment, Moore teletyped a message to the Department of Emergency Management requesting an Evidence Search Training Mission Number, and the following search groups were called into action: Evergreen SAR Tacoma CB Radio Association, and Explorer SAR.
Detective Price took Officer Moore to the freeway interchange, and pointed out where Tony Youso allegedly threw the knife from a moving car. Moore returned Price to Central Station, ordered traffic barricades and
ROAD CLOSED UP AHEAD
signs, and contacted the Washington State Patrol.
“It was my intention,” reported Moore, “to block traffic completely from the ramp area to insure the safety of the volunteer searchers. The Washington State Patrol was further advised of the intention to close the ramp with an estimated start time of seventeen hundred hours.” The Tacoma Fire Department Station #11 became the search base, and it was here that the Tacoma Public Works Department delivered twelve traffic barricades.
“With the arrival of Explorer Search and Rescue, all search groups were briefed,” said Moore, “and all traffic onto the SR seven ramp was diverted with search base being moved onto the ramp. Using the streetlight standards, string gridlines were set in at the light standards,” he explained, “and halfway between each two light standards. Shoulder-to-shoulder grids were used, starting from the pavement and working northbound up the hill.
“Heavy rain and five-knot winds made the brush and grass wet enough to cause them to be laying down with the weight of the moisture,” Moore reported. “Searchers were on their hands and knees each time they went uphill.”
At approximately 1755 hours, Marvin E. Thompson, a member of the Tacoma CB Radio Association, located the double-edged knife. “It was not touched by any volunteer,” stated Moore, “and it was left in the field location until later when the knife was taken into evidence. At twenty-one oh-nine hours, the Washington State Department of Emergency Management was notified that the search was completed with positive results.”
Moore also arranged the equally complex same-day search for evidence at Salmon Beach. “The actual field operation started at seventeen hundred hours, and at seventeen twenty-five hours, we located a small white-and-black Nike tennis shoe approximately one hundred feet from the Upper Salmon Beach Road,” said Moore. “Per standard operating procedure, the shoe was not disturbed. The shoe was in reasonable condition with the shoelaces intact. The search continued for an additional three hours before the second tennis shoe was located approximately twenty-one feet, nine inches from the first find.”
Evidence searches and homicide investigations are invariably challenging and time consuming. They require teamwork, patience, dedication, and persistence. “It seems that when we get called to a homicide,” remarked Yerbury, “it's at three in the morning, it's an outdoor crime scene, and it's raining. Whatever the situation, you arrive at the crime scene, you get told the circumstances, and there are always lots of things that need to be done, and lot of doors that need to be knocked on. It's not uncommon to have to go back to the same door four or five times. You have to keep working at it and working at it. You never know when you're suddenly going to find out some important new piece of information.”
Captain William Woodard of the Tacoma Police Criminal Investigations Division announced at 1:30
P.M.
on June 22, 1984, that four suspects held in connection with the homicides of Damon Wells and John Achord were formally charged by the Pierce County Prosecutor's Office. The names of those charged—Paul and Christopher St. Pierre, Anthony Youso, and Andrew Webb—were officially revealed for the first time.
Stew Johnston of the Department of Assigned Counsel represented Paul St. Pierre, entering his plea of not guilty to all charges. On that same day, notice was sent to the Tacoma Police Department, the Pierce County Sheriff's Office, and the Pierce County prosecuting attorney that Paul St. Pierre was henceforth represented by the Department of Assigned Counsel. In addition, on that same June 22, 1984, Paul St. Pierre, as client, signed a notice that demanded legal representation during any contact with police authorities.
Stew Johnston filed the complete text of the notice with the court, saying, “My client is asserting in this notice his demand that legal counsel be present during any and all contacts by police authorities and their agents. All future contact can be made only through defense counsel, excluding contacts limited to administrative jail purposes. He does not wish to discuss waiver of his legal rights except in writing and in the presence of his or her legal counsel.” Paul St. Pierre's assigned legal counsel would be Ellsworth Connelly and Jeffrey Gross.
“The document may be filed,” said Judge Healy, presiding, “and the prosecutor's office is charged with the responsibility of notifying law enforcement agencies.”
Representing the prosecutor's office was Assistant Deputy Prosecutor Carl Hultman. He immediately accepted this court-ordered responsibility. “We'll do that. We'll do so, Your Honor.”
Less than a week later, Tacoma Police detectives took a sworn statement from Paul St. Pierre without presence of his legal counsel. Connelly and Gross were not present because the prosecutor's office did not bother to inform them.
“It was Paul St. Pierre who contacted us, not the other way around,” explained Detective Yerbury. “He sent a message to Detective Price saying that he wanted to talk to him. Before we talked to Mr. St. Pierre, we asked the prosecutor's office if it was permissible. We even talked to Carl Hultman's boss. Everything, they said, was OK.”
The Tacoma detectives' ethical action—seeking advice from the prosecutor—is admirable behavior. Many police departments simply go ahead with such interviews, and tell no one about it.
“Prosecutors are bound by ethics,” explained Mike Grimes, former head of the Anchorage, Alaska, elite Homicide Response Team, “but police have none. We're not obligated to adhere to American Bar Association standards—we're not lawyers. If we tell the prosecutor's office that a suspect wants to make a statement to us, the prosecutor is ethically obligated to inform the defendant's lawyer. We have no such obligation. In many police departments, the policy is to get the statement first, inform someone about it later.”
At 4:50
P.M.
on June 28, Paul St. Pierre supposedly said, “I hereby make the following free and voluntary statement to Detectives Price and Yerbury, who have identified themselves to me as police officers of the Tacoma Police Department.” The wording is a prewritten template fulfilling legal obligations, and not the spontaneous statement of Paul St. Pierre. The next paragraph contains other required identifiers.
“My name is Paul Joseph St. Pierre, I am twenty-five years of age, and was born in Bellingham, Washington. I am single and reside at [house number] South Pacific, Tacoma, Washington. I have lived in Tacoma for twenty-one years. For the last two months, I was employed at Royal Donuts in Tacoma.”
Paul St. Pierre's description of Damon Wells's Salmon Beach demise closely matched his brother's version. “Andrew Webb told me he was going to go grab my knife. The knife is a double-edged Gerber Fighting Knife. He went and got the knife.” Missing, however, was any reference to Wells's threats of retaliation or attempts to run away. Despite bragging to Roy Kissler about cutting Wells's throat, Paul St. Pierre gave all the credit to Andrew Webb.
“My brother, Andrew, and I were beating up Damon Wells. He was almost unconscious when Andrew took out the knife, grabbed Damon by the hair, and slashed his throat about four times and then stabbed him in the back.”
As for the death of John Achord, Paul St. Pierre said that Achord and he were watching the
Rambo
video
First Blood.
Everything was fine until, “John got up and started walking around my house. I told him to sit down and watch the movie. He just looked at me and pulled out his pocketknife. I told him he should sit down. At that point, I thought he was going to stab me. I had my forty-five in my hand and he could see it. He started coming at me with the knife. I told him to stop, but he wouldn't, so I shot him in the head in self-defense. The reason I'm telling you this is because I don't want to take a murder rap that I didn't commit, and I shot John Achord in self-defense. Sometime last year, I picked up this girl hitchhiking... .” Paul St. Pierre inexplicably segued directly into a brief narrative seemingly unrelated to the deaths of Damon Wells or John Achord.
“When we got to her apartment,” St. Pierre continued, “I dropped her off and she told me to come back later that night. When I returned, there were two Banditos that are in an outlaw motorcycle club. These two Banditos told me they were going to kill me and take my motorcycle. They started coming at me, and I pulled out my forty-five, which I have a permit for, but I did not shoot them because I felt my bike was not worth killing them over. So I let them steal my motorcycle. This is all I want to talk about, thank you.”
BOOK: Head Shot
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