Deafweekly FLASH NEWS August 30, 2010

deafweekly

~~ flash news ~~

August 30, 2010
Editor: Tom Willard

Hoonah, AK
2 POLICE OFFICERS FATALLY SHOT IN TINY ALASKA VILLAGE
A standoff was under way Sunday in a tiny southeast Alaska village after a man fatally shot two of the village's four full-time police officers the night before, then barricaded himself in his home, local officials said. Hoonah police officers Tony Wallace and Matt Tokuoka died after the shooting late Saturday, and the suspect, 45-year-old John Marvin Jr., barricaded himself in his home. Wallace was originally from Ohio and one of the few hard-of-hearing officers in the nation, according to officials at Rochester Institute of Technology in upstate New York, where he attended the National Technical Institute for the Deaf. / The Associated Press

SUSPECT IN KILLING OF HOONAH OFFICERS ARRESTED
A man who troopers say shot and killed two police officers in the Southeast village of Hoonah was captured after leaving his house shortly after 9:30 a.m. today. John Marvin Jr., 45, is being charged with two counts of first-degree murder, said troopers spokeswoman Megan Peters. The arrest ended a standoff that forced school officials to call off classes and led authorities to vacate surrounding houses as Marvin barricaded himself in his home, residents said. "It's over," interim city administrator Bob Prunella said this morning. / Anchorage Daily News

FATAL ALASKA AMBUSH WITNESSED BY ONE COP'S FAMILY
The scenic Village of Hoonah, Alaska is a small Tlingit community of 800 — the Tlingit are an indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast — that lost two of its three full-time police officers to gunfire late Saturday night. In yet another law enforcement ambush, the officers killed in the attack were Sgt. Tony Wallace and Officer Matt Tokuoka, ambushed by a 45-year-old Hoonah resident identified as John Marvin Jr. Marvin shot Tokuoka in front of his wife and children. To add to the outrageousness of this act, Wallace’s mother, who was up from Florida visiting her son, also witnessed the shooting. / PoliceOne.com

Rochester, NY
RIT GRAD TONY WALLACE ONE OF 2 OFFICERS FATALLY SHOT IN ALASKA
One of the two police officers fatally shot in a tiny Native village in southeast Alaska was a 2003 graduate of Rochester Institute of Technology's National Technical Institute for the Deaf and a former campus security officer. Tony Wallace, 32, left RIT in 2006. He has been an officer in Hoonah, Alaska, since 2008. He was on duty late Saturday when he was shot. Wallace died during surgery in Juneau, 40 miles to the east. / Democrat and Chronicle

MESSAGE FROM PRESIDENT DESTLER CONCERNING DEATH OF ALUMNUS ANTHONY (TONY) WALLACE
It is with a heavy heart that I announce the passing of Anthony (Tony) Wallace, an RIT/NTID alumnus and former officer with RIT Public Safety. Tony died Saturday night while on duty with the Hoonah (Alaska) Police Department, where he served as an officer since 2008. According to officials, Tony and a colleague were confronted by a lone gunman, and both officers died as a result of injuries suffered in the attack. On behalf of the RIT community, I extend condolences to Tony’s family, friends and colleagues. / NTID News

RIT GRAD AND POLICE OFFICER KILLED, BUT HIS LEGACY REMAINS
It is always jarring to hear that a police officer has been killed, but this morning, it was even more of a shock for me. That's because one of the most memorable stories I remember doing was with the officer, Tony Wallace. I met him in 2003 when he was helping lead a class for Rochester police officers. Back then he was a recent graduate of R.I.T. and was working campus safety. Tony was deaf, and with such a large local population of deaf and hard-of-hearing, police wanted to learn how to better interact with people in this population. Tony was a natural choice to teach them. / 13WHAM

RIT ATHLETICS MOURNS THE LOSS OF HALL OF FAMER TONY WALLACE
The RIT Athletics family mourns the passing of former wrestler and member of the RIT Hall of Fame, Anthony (Tony) Wallace. Tony was an All-American wrestler at RIT from 1998-2002. He was just the third member in the history of RIT wrestling to earn three All-American honors, finishing his career with a 108-27 record. / RIT Athletics

Franklin, OH
FRANKLIN WRESTLER-TURNED-OFFICER KILLED
A Franklin High School graduate-turned-police officer was killed during a standoff in Alaska. The Hoonah, Alaska police department is not commenting right now but a television station in that area reported that two police officers were killed when a gunman ambushed them late Saturday night. One of the two was 32-year-old Tony Wallace who graduated from Franklin High School in 1997. He was known as a competitive wrestler but his coach at the time told 2 NEWS Wallace excelled in everything he did and he did so with a disability. He was deaf. / WDTN

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