Cool Was Problem For Bus Drivers -- Reports Of Strange Behavior Coming In

The man who fatally shot a Metro bus driver and then himself was elusive and largely invisible to many, but he was widely known among Metro bus drivers.

Seattle Police homicide detectives said this morning that Metro drivers throughout the area have been calling to say Silas Garfield Cool was a hostile, belligerent passenger. He was also known to be armed.

"He presented a front of rudeness," said Detective John Nordlund. "Bus drivers said he was a troublemaker. If the temperature was too warm, he'd run around opening all the windows. If it was too cold, he'd yell at the drivers."

Nordlund and Detective Stephen O'Leary said police are receiving calls about Cool from drivers of routes in Montlake, Green Lake, Wallingford, downtown Seattle and even Bellevue, among others places.

On Friday, without warning, Cool stood up on the Route 359 bus and fatally shot driver Mark McLaughlin, then killed himself, causing the bus to plunge some 50 feet off the Aurora Bridge before landing in the garden of a Fremont apartment building.

Thirty-three passengers were injured, including one who died Saturday at Harborview Medical Center.

Cool apparently was a habitual user of the bus system. When detectives searched his University District apartment, Nordlund said, they found "stacks and stacks of bus schedules," along with notes to himself with reminders that if he missed the No. 6 bus, he could catch the No. 40 a short time later. There were even bus schedules from other cities, Nordlund said.

Along with the schedules, police found an extensive collection of girlie magazines, knives, two pellet guns and an empty gun box.

They also found two guns - one at the accident scene with Cool's fingerprints and one on his body.

Nordlund said police have heard reports that Cool had been carrying one of the guns on the bus since last summer, when he reportedly displayed it to passengers. Bringing a gun on a bus is not illegal if the owner has a concealed-weapons permit, Nordlund said. But Cool had no permit. And whether he had one or not, Metro said there is little they could have done about it.

"We can't keep guns off buses any more than they can be kept out of schools or away from presidents," said Metro spokesman Dan Williams. "If we could, if we knew about every dangerous nut case, all of us would be a lot safer.

"This is as much about how a mentally disturbed guy can buy a gun and walk around with it as it is about Metro security," Williams added.

Police are still trying to determine when and from whom the elusive Cool obtained the guns.

Few records of his past exist. In a world where most people's very existence can be traced through credit-card and real-estate records, voter registration and other public documents, Cool was - until Friday afternoon - a nearly invisible man.

He hadn't worked in years. He didn't receive welfare, Social Security or state Labor and Industry benefits. His neighbors didn't know him. Neither did many of his high-school classmates from New Jersey. His teachers referred to him as a "straight arrow" and a "typical student."

Even his parents had little to say about him, except that he seemed depressed when he visited them in North Plainfield, N.J., five weeks ago and that they had been sending him money since he lost the last of a series of menial jobs in 1991.

According to police, Cool had boarded the bus on Aurora Avenue North Friday afternoon three or four stops before the bridge. He was sitting in the front right seat when he stood up and started firing.

Within seconds, the bus careened off the bridge. Transcripts of a call to 911 detail the horrified reactions of witnesses who saw it plummet.

McLaughlin, 44, who is the father of two sons, died at the scene; Cool was pronounced dead at Harborview Medical Center Friday night. A 69-year-old male passenger, Herman Liebelt, died Saturday, and at least 12 remain hospitalized.

In the north University District neighborhood Cool called home the past 13 years, a metal-railed staircase leads to the front entrance of the block-shaped Ponderay Apartments. Each floor of the four-story building has a distinctive odor, ranging from spicy Asian food to the smell of unwashed clothing.

Cool's apartment, No. 209, is at the south end of the building. It has two small windows in the back, facing west. The windows are mostly covered with aluminum foil, the drapes secured shut.

Police said the dreary, sparsely furnished apartment was lighted with just 40-watt bulbs. In the bedroom, Cool had leaned an air mattress against the wall, partially obscuring the centerfolds that hung there.

In the bathroom, hundreds of mini-bottles of cologne and lotions ring the sink and bathtub.

"My first impression was, it looked like he'd never used the sink," said Nordlund. The apartment "gave you a feeling that you didn't want to sit down in there."

Cool was rarely seen

University District neighbors speculate Cool must have used the building's back entrance to come and go since he was rarely, if ever, seen. Even those who live next door or down the hall said they had never seen the 6-foot, 160-pound man.

"I think it's weird that I've lived here 17 months and I've never met him and never even seen him," said neighbor Velena Bryant.

Neither had employees of some of the many restaurants and convenience stores in the area who looked at a picture of Cool but didn't recognize him.

For a time - between 1984 and 1987 - Cool apparently did have a steady job. According to sketchy county records, a person named Silas Cool worked in what then was called the King County Building and Land Use Department. But even that part of his past is not entirely certain.

Elaine Kraft, spokeswoman for the King County executive, said it's impossible to verify whether the Silas Cool in the records is the person who killed himself Friday because all that remains is a letter congratulating Cool on being offered the job, a letter saying he was voluntarily resigning, and some time sheets.

No address, birth date or reason for his leaving remains. Even the work he was doing isn't detailed, Kraft said.

Some time after that, Cool had several brushes with the law. In 1991, he was charged with theft in Seattle Municipal Court. The charge later was dismissed. Cool was charged with obstructing a public officer in the same court in 1994. That charge also was dismissed. In those incidents, he gave the name Steve Gary Coole.

He was last arrested Nov. 16 by Mountlake Terrace police who were called to the Mountlake Terrace Recreational Pavilion after a man complained Cool was leering at his daughter. Cool was arrested for giving officers a fictitious name and released the next day.

As police examine Cool's past, they are waiting for toxicology reports and ballistics-test results, hoping for explanations.

There may not be many. As Jeffery Martens, a former classmate of Cool's, said: "It seems to me like someone who got tired of life. Maybe too many bad breaks."

Conversations with former New Jersey neighbors also yielded few clues.

Nothing stood out

Elaine Wissow recalled that the Cool family stood out in the neighborhood by not standing out. When other families socialized together, the Cools kept to themselves. Daniel Cool, an auditor for asbestos maker Johns Manville, was often on the road; Ena Cool, his wife, was a younger woman and native of South Africa, Wissow said.

"We were never really that friendly," Wissow said. "I was never in her house, and she was never in mine. And that is not usual for neighbors."

In the 1973 North Plainfield High School yearbook, Cool gave his plans only as "playing golf at the farm." None of his teachers from the time know what that means.

Marilyn Birnbaum, Cool's journalism teacher, said Cool showed no indication that he might be in trouble down the road. She described him as "sweet, kind" but otherwise nondescript.

"He was quiet," she said. "I certainly remembered him, and partly because of his name."

Cool attended Middlesex County College in Edison, N.J., from September 1975 to June 1978, when he received an associate degree in applied science. He got an A in statics, the study of forces in structures, but otherwise didn't stay on the radar screen of Frank Rubino, professor of the class.

"No one remembers him specifically," Rubino said this morning, "but when they check back in their record books, everybody finds him."

This morning, a Seattle church volunteer said she encountered a man she now believes was Cool just one day before he gained the attention in death he did not have in life.

It was Thanksgiving Day and Dorna Stone was serving free meals at the University Temple United Methodist Church. A neatly dressed man carrying a backpack came in and sat down at the table where Stone was sitting with other volunteers.

Stone said the man mentioned to them that he knew which churches served free meals and which dumpsters to mine for food.

He left after 10 to 15 minutes, she said, stopping on his way out for more food, which he took with him. He struck her as a nice guy, someone who showed no signs of stress.

"He didn't look like a street person to me."

Later, she said, she recognized him as Cool from pictures she'd seen in news reports.

Police said Cool's family has indicated they will not come to Seattle to pick up the body. Nordlund's understanding is that a local funeral parlor would cremate the body and send the ashes to New Jersey.

Funeral services for McLaughlin have been set for Thursday. Williams, the Metro spokesman, said many drivers want to attend and that Metro officials are trying to determine how to make that possible without crippling local bus service.

Transit agencies around the state have asked what role they might play in the service. Williams said Metro officials and union representatives are talking with McLaughlin's family to determine whether a procession of buses might be possible.

Nordlund and O'Leary say they are continuing to search for a motive, not just because they want it to complete their investigation. "We know who did it," said Nordlund. But the motive, he said, "is important to bus drivers. It matters to them."

Seattle Times staff reporters Nancy Bartley, Arthur Santana and Peyton Whitely contributed to this report.