Slaying Of Cabbie Shakes Drivers -- `Is It Worth Killing Someone?' Asks Frightened Taxi Driver

It was 4 p.m. Sunday when cabbie Don Kelly got the call from his dispatcher to pick up a fare.

"Seventy-two, occupied," Kelly responded, indicating he already had a fare.

That was the last time he was heard from.

About 16 hours later, Kelly's body was found slumped in the front seat of the cab idling in a parking lot near Denny Park, several blocks east of Seattle Center. He had been bludgeoned repeatedly.

A veteran of 30 years of cab driving in Seattle, Kelly, 67, had just picked up a "bingo," a flag-down fare, somewhere in the Broadway area, and was unable to take the dispatcher's call.

Kelly's slaying, the second killing of a Yellow Cab driver in less than four months, has other cabbies scared.

"I'm getting more apprehensive every day," Ray Paquette, 49, said during a ride downtown yesterday as he displayed an array of weapons he keeps in his cab. "What can someone get out of a cab driver?

"Is it worth killing someone?" asked Paquette, who works for Yellow Cab and has been a cabbie 14 years. "We don't carry much; it doesn't make sense."

Although Kelly's body was not discovered until yesterday morning, Yellow Cab officials became concerned Sunday night when Kelly couldn't be accounted for. They told other cabbies to be on the lookout but did not file a missing-person report with police.

Jeff Fairman, Yellow Cab's Seattle general manager, said cab drivers are shaken and some are afraid - because the assailant still is at large and because a veteran of the business like Kelly could get killed.

"It's very dangerous and getting more dangerous," Fairman, a former cab driver, said of the job. "The guy (Kelly) was an old pro and knew how to spot a good fare from a bad one.

"It doesn't happen to experienced guys."

Ron Ganje, who leased Kelly his cab, is angry about his killing. "It's just absurd," said Ganje, who also leased a cab to James Francis Lee, the last taxi driver killed in Seattle - March 13 during a robbery in the Central Area.

Ganje said Kelly wasn't well-known by other cabbies, which is not unusual.

"Everyone is competing with everyone for fares," Ganje said. "Don didn't have a lot to do with other guys.

"The flaw of this business is you can be here 25 years and dying in a hospital of cancer and you only get a visit if you owe them money," Ganje said.

He said Kelly never talked about retiring from the business.

"You don't retire if you drive a cab," Ganje said. "You drive until you die."

A Heavener, Okla., native, Kelly was single and lived in Seattle in the area near where his body was found. He had worked as a cabbie around town since the early 1960s and earned about $250 to $300 a week.

Kelly was a "real frail, little old guy," Ganje said. "He weighed 130 pounds soaking wet."

Ganje said Kelly took a break from cab driving last year when he worked as a census taker. When he returned, he worked about twice a week and two months ago began working five days, Ganje said.

"He's the kind of driver you love to have," Fairman, the Yellow Cab general manager, said of Kelly. "I'd say he was an excellent driver."

Meanwhile, in two other, unrelated cases involving cab drivers in Seattle:

A man wearing a trench coat assaulted and robbed a female taxi driver in South Seattle yesterday, escaping with about $50, police said. The driver, 48, suffered facial injuries and was treated at the scene by a Seattle Fire Department medic crew.

The driver told police she picked up the man, who appeared to be in his 20s, at a ferry dock early yesterday morning. He attacked her and took her money when they arrived in Holly Park, police said.

In the other incident, a cab driver said he was robbed of $115 early Sunday by a passenger who threathened him with a knife. The taxi was near 32nd Avenue South and South King Street when the passenger pulled out a knife, held it to the driver's neck and demanded the cash, police said. The robber then ordered the driver outside and drove off.