Man Held In Slaying Of Omak Officer Had Been Deported Twice

OMAK - A man held in the shooting death of an Omak police officer and the wounding of another had been deported at least twice to Mexico, authorities say.

But Juan Duarte Gonzales kept returning to Omak.

Okanogan County Sheriff Jim Weed, whose department is investigating the shooting, said he wasn't surprised that the 41-year-old illegal immigrant came back.

"I think the expectation when someone is deported is that they are not going to pay the rent for a couple of weeks," Weed said. "But they will come back."

Investigators have identified Gonzales as the gunman who shot police officers Michael Marshall and Donald Eddy Jr. in an alley behind the Stampede Motel Wednesday night.

The officers were summoned by the motel owner, who reported that a man had threatened her after being told an ex-girlfriend who was staying at the motel didn't want to see him.

As the officers approached Gonzales, he pulled two guns from his pockets and shot Marshall in the head, Weed said. Eddy then shot Gonzales, and was trying to handcuff him, the sheriff said, when Gonzales shot Eddy.

Marshall died a few hours later after being airlifted to Seattle's Harborview Medical Center. His memorial service will be tomorrow.

Eddy is recovering at home from a bullet wound to his left thigh.

Gonzales, who was shot in the chest, was in satisfactory condition and under police guard at Harborview, a nursing supervisor said. He won't be charged in the shootings until he has recovered and can be returned to Okanogan County, Weed said.

Gonzales had been turned over to the U.S. Border Patrol and deported to Mexico twice in the past two years, authorities say.

In the most recent case, Gonzales was returned to Mexico last October after serving a sentence in the Okanogan County Jail for possession of amphetamines.

Eight days before Wednesday night's shootings, the state Department of Corrections obtained an arrest warrant for Gonzales that alleged he had not lived up the terms of his community supervision.

Those terms stemmed from his 1995 Okanogan County conviction for third-degree rape of a child and the March 1997 drug-possession conviction, said Mike Kropf, a regional corrections supervisor.

Weed said he does not know how long Gonzales had been back in Omak or where he was living.

Gonzales' 1995 child-rape conviction stemmed from his alleged involvement in a child-prostitution ring in Omak, according to court records. He was sentenced to two years in prison and completed the term at the McNeil Island Corrections Center. He was then turned over to the Border Patrol for deportation, court records say.

Court records show that Gonzales was convicted of possession of cocaine and possession of stolen property in Fresno, Calif., in the 1980s and early 1990s.