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Law

Families Of Slain Lakewood Officers Settle With DOC For $12.5M

The Washington Department of Corrections will pay $12.5 million to the families of three of the four Lakewood police officers killed by parolee Maurice Clemmons. The settlement announced Friday comes nearly three years after the Thanksgiving weekend shooting at a coffee shop.

The money will go the families of Sgt Mark Renninger and Officers Gregory Richards and Tina Griswold. They each left behind a spouse and children. The family of Officer Ronald Owens was not a party to the settlement.

The Washington Department of Corrections admits no wrongdoing in its supervision of Clemmons. He was an Arkansas parolee who had moved to Washington years earlier. At the time of the killings Clemmons had just bailed out of jail. He was supposed to be under Washington supervision.

Attorney Jack Connelly, who represents some of the families, calls the settlement “terrifically important.”

“The Department of Corrections came out afterwards and there was sort of this idea that they had done nothing wrong, but that it had been all Arkansas’ fault," Connelly says. "But you don’t pay $12.5 million without acknowledging that there’s a basis for liability.”

In a statement, the Department of Corrections says it hopes the settlement helps the victims’ families, particularly the children, overcome their loss.

Copyright 2012 Northwest News Network

 The Lakewood Police Department Fallen Officer Memorial, which honors the victims of the November 29, 2009 Lakewood police officer shooting. Photo by Marques Hunter via Wikipedia
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The Lakewood Police Department Fallen Officer Memorial, which honors the victims of the November 29, 2009 Lakewood police officer shooting. Photo by Marques Hunter via Wikipedia

Copyright 2012 Northwest News Network

Since January 2004, Austin Jenkins has been the Olympia-based political reporter for the Northwest News Network. In that position, Austin covers Northwest politics and public policy as well as the Washington State legislature. You can also see Austin on television as host of TVW's (the C–SPAN of Washington State) Emmy-nominated public affairs program "Inside Olympia." Prior to joining the Northwest News Network, Austin worked as a television reporter in Seattle, Portland and Boise. Austin is a graduate of Garfield High School in Seattle and Connecticut College in New London, Connecticut. Austin’s reporting has been recognized with awards from the Association of Capitol Reporters and Editors, Public Radio News Directors Incorporated and the Society of Professional Journalists.