After Assistant District Attorney Mark Haase was assassinated in broad daylight, Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McClelland made a declaration:
District Attorney Mike McClellan has promised to "pull [the murderer] out of whatever hole you're in, we're going to bring you back and we're going to let the people of Kaufman County prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law."
Sadly, it appears the lawbreakers got to him first. Via TalkingPointsMemo:
A sheriff’s deputy says authorities are investigating the deaths of a North Texas county district attorney and his wife who were found dead in a home.
Kaufman County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Lt. Justin Lewis said Saturday that the county District Attorney, Mike McLelland, and his wife, Cynthia, were found dead in a home in an unincorporated part of the county. Authorities have blocked off the street where the couple’s last known address is located.
Lewis said he couldn’t discuss the investigation in further detail, including how the couple died and whether investigators believe their deaths are linked to the Jan. 31 slaying of an assistant Kaufman County district attorney, Mark Hasse.
In February, Dallas News followed up on the Haase case. At that time, the Aryan Brotherhood was the primary focus of the investigation:
In law enforcement circles, it’s well-known that many Aryan Brotherhood members live in and around Kaufman County.
“It’s really swimming with ABT members out there,” said one law enforcement officer who asked that his name not be published.
And Kaufman County prosecutors have a reputation for zealously prosecuting them.
In August 2011, an Aryan Brotherhood enforcer named James “Wreck” Patrick Crawford was tasked with meting out discipline in the case of a wayward member who wasn’t attending the gang’s regular meetings, known as “church.”
One gang associate kidnapped Jason Mask’s wife at gunpoint while Crawford drove to Mask’s trailer in Terrell and told him that they had his wife and he’d better come with him. They planned to cut off Mask’s gang tattoos.
A shootout erupted near Terrell during which Mask shot Crawford several times. Mask was shot but survived. A badly injured Crawford was taken into custody and sentenced in July to life in prison.
The Chicago Tribune adds this chilling detail:
Earlier this month, the Hasse slaying case took a new turn when the Kaufman police chief said the FBI was looking for any possible link between Hasse's death and the March 19 shooting death of Colorado prisons chief Tom Clements.
Evan Spencer Ebel, 28, a Colorado prison parolee suspected of killing Clements, died in a shootout with police in Decatur, Texas, on March 21. Ebel was a member of a white supremacist prison gang called the 211 Crew and had a swastika tattoo, prison records indicate.
It sounds like the FBI should stop worrying about who DDoSed the Koch websites and start putting some manpower into figuring out who is killing prosecutors instead.
