http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/crim ... 46806.htmlWhy the bounty hunters killed Robin HoodSEAN ROBINSON;
sean.robinson@thenewstribune.com Published: August 17th, 2008 01:05 AM | Updated: August 17th, 2008 10:12 AMThe bounty hunters didn't set out to kill Robin Hood. That's just how the thing went down. Robin Hood was Roberto Pupo Roque, 34, a Cuban immigrant who compared himself to the outlaw of medieval folklore. He was a gun-packing drug dealer, a liar, a thief and a father.
He was wanted and unwanted. He was a fugitive with an active warrant for his arrest. He was a police informant who traded a missile for freedom and ran from a business called Liberty.
He died May 22 in Lakewood, shot and killed by bail recovery agents.
Roque was a casualty of a criminal justice system working against itself. Police wanted him free. Prosecutors wanted him jailed. The agents were caught in the middle, tethered to $150,000 in outstanding bail bonds.
They have been cleared of wrongdoing in Roque's death. Lakewood police concluded the shooting was self-defense. In June, Pierce County prosecutors declined to file criminal charges.
The bail agents are relieved, but bitter.
“It was ridiculous,” said Byron Gross, who fired one of the shots.
“It didn't have to happen,” said Mike Beakley, a bail agent and retired Tacoma cop who partnered with Gross that day and fired two shots at Roque.
“All of us kept telling each other we shouldn't be doing this,” said Mike Savant, another bounty hunter in on the chase.
“My mind-set the whole time was, ‘Why are we doing this?'” said Forrest Gary Marshall, owner of Liberty Bail Bonds and boss of the quartet that trailed Roque for weeks.
The agents say they were driven to the hunt, hamstrung by a prosecutor who wouldn't look beyond the letter of the law. The prosecutor, Mark Von Wahlde, says he went by the book and acted based on what he knew at the time.
Public records and interviews reveal a knotty, bureaucratic snarl.
THE ROBBERY
The trouble started March 30, when Liberty's office in downtown Tacoma was robbed.
The safe had been pried open. Police investigated, and quickly arrested Shelby King, a Liberty employee. Court records say she confessed. A guilty plea and a conviction for second-degree burglary came six weeks later.
King told police she worked with an accomplice: Roberto Roque.
Roque was already in trouble. He had three criminal charges against him dating back to January and February – two for drug dealing, one for unlawful gun possession.
He had bailed out on all three. Liberty had posted the bonds. It looked as if Roque had ripped off the company that sprang him from jail.
Marshall, Liberty's owner, had two problems. The robbery was one, but an employee and a client had been in on it. That was a potentially bigger deal.
He went through Liberty's books, and looked at Roque's bail contracts. King had signed all of them. The total risk was $150,000.
A bail contract is a bit like an insurance policy. A defendant pays a bail company a small sum and promises to appear in court. The bond company pays the court a fraction of the bail – typically a tenth of the actual amount.
If the defendant shows up in court as promised, the company gets its money back. If the defendant doesn't show up, the bond company has to corral the defendant, or pay the full freight for the bond.
The transaction rests on the defendant's credit. Marshall's run through the books showed Roque's credit was phony. He had offered a house as collateral for bail, but he didn't own the house. Other information in the records hinted at more falsehoods.
Marshall weighed the prospects. Roque had lied about his credit, and he was a suspect in the robbery – a new, serious crime. If he jumped bail, Liberty would be on the legal hook for a six-figure bill.
“We immediately instituted a search for the defendant in order to absolve ourselves of liability,” Marshall stated in court documents.
So far, Roque had been a model client, attending all his court dates without a miss. He hadn't jumped bail – but his original agreement with Liberty was a sham. By itself, that was enough to justify revoking the bail; and Marshall, freshly robbed, wasn't feeling charitable.
He and his partner, Savant, decided to pick up Roque at his next scheduled court appearance and take him to jail. Police records say Marshall called officers beforehand and explained his plan.
On April 8, Roque showed up at the Pierce County courthouse. Marshall and Savant were waiting for him, along with police detectives Cassie Hayes and Ed Baker.
They took him across the street to Liberty's office to fill out the paperwork. The detectives interviewed Roque. Marshall and Savant listened.
THE OFFER
“I got caught up in this. I made a bad judgment – I'm a screw-up,” Roque said, according to a police report.
He admitted robbing the safe. He said he pried it open with a screwdriver. The scheme was King's idea, he said.
The take was about $6,000 in cash. Roque split it with King, and used some of his half to bail her out of jail. She was a friend, he said – he just wanted to help her.
“Asked what he did to earn an income, Roque reluctantly said he was a drug dealer,” the police report states. “He said, ‘I don't fight or destroy people.' He said that he had a lot of friends and that they owed him.
“He portrayed himself as a modern-day ‘Robin Hood.' He said that he is known on the street as ‘Cuba.' He said that he helped people in various ways to include paying their rent and that his assistance was sometimes offered via illegal activities.”
Roque cried about his daughters. He didn't want to go to jail. He offered a trade.
“Roque said that he could provide information on organized crime, narcotics and other illicit activity,” the police report states. “He said that he also had information on the whereabouts of what he described as a United States Army missile.”
The detectives called the FBI.
THE DEAL
Half an hour later, two federal agents arrived at Liberty's office.
Marshall could see this was turning into something bigger than a simple robbery, but his chief concern was the outstanding bonds.
Roque had to go to jail. Under the law, that meant Liberty wouldn't have to eat the debt.
The jail is across the street, adjoining the courthouse. Typically, bail agents delivered their defendants straight to the door.
That wouldn't happen now, not with the feds getting involved and talk of a hidden missile – but Marshall still had to settle his books.
“Detective Hayes informed me and Mike Savant that she was going to take defendant and book him into Pierce County Jail,” Marshall stated in a court affidavit. “I overheard her ask one of the unknown (federal) officers to book defendant into jail on her behalf.”
Roque was in police custody – no longer Liberty's prisoner. Marshall locked the moment on paper, and had the detective sign formal affidavits of surrender.
“Liberty Bail Bonds personnel relinquished custody of Roque to us and we were allowed to transport him to Tacoma Police headquarters to meet with federal agents,” the police report states.
Marshall was relieved. Liberty was in the clear. Police had taken Roque into custody, and officers would take him to jail.
Except they didn't. At headquarters, police and federal agents grilled Roque about the missile. What was it? Where was it?
“Roque agreed to assist on the condition that he could be at home with his daughters,” the police report states. “We explained that we could not make any promises to him and he was told that even if he didn't go to jail, state charges could be filed later.”
The report states that one of the FBI agents, Todd Bakken, spoke to a federal prosecutor, who agreed not to file charges against Roque if he helped investigators find the missile.
The detectives spoke to a county prosecutor, Frank Krall, and explained the situation. The deal was struck.
Roque had been hand-delivered to police. Already charged with three crimes, he had confessed to a fourth: robbing Liberty's office. Now he was free, still riding on Liberty's credit.
Nobody told Forrest Marshall.
THE MISSILE
The next day – April 9 – investigators, following Roque's tip, found the missile in Edgewood at a vacant address.
It wasn't a missile. It was a practice rocket, model number M29A2: “a 3.5-inch bazooka rocket practice round with motor,” according to Fort Lewis spokeswoman Catherine Caruso.
A county bomb squad found the military-grade rocket, and a Fort Lewis explosives team dismantled it, Caruso said.
The find was peculiar, but it didn't lead to a cache of munitions. Police spokesman Mark Fulghum said no other explosives were found at the site.
Other details are unclear. Police declined to release the incident report to The News Tribune, saying the case was still under investigation.
The M29A2 is 1950s technology, standard-issue ammo for target practice with a shoulder-fired rocket launcher. It does not blow up.
“It wasn't designed to produce a major explosion,” Caruso said. “It had a certain amount of propulsion, just enough explosive material to propel it some distance for training. It was not an immediate threat.
“I don't want to underplay the danger – but it's unlikely that there was an immediate danger to anybody in the neighborhood.”
The rocket did not come from Fort Lewis or the United States, Caruso added. The explosives team could not pinpoint its origin.
The rocket could have been new. It could have been a paperweight. Military buffs sell M29A2 rounds online for $50. People find them in attics and garages.
Roque's promised missile was little more than a blank – and he was still free.
THE HARD LINE
Marshall was watching Pierce County's online jail roster, waiting for Roque's name to appear – final proof that Liberty was off the financial hook.
The name never showed up.
For Marshall, that was bad. If Roque wasn't in jail, Liberty's debt was still hanging. Marshall called Kim Shomer, Liberty's attorney.
Shomer called Von Wahlde, the deputy prosecutor who handled bail issues.
Shomer explained the circumstances: Liberty had done its duty, and delivered Roque to police. It seemed reasonable to forgive the bond. What would it take?
Von Wahlde wasn't going for it.
“Mark came back and said to me, ‘Well, I'm not signing off on this,'?” Shomer said in a recent interview. “He told me that there was no way that he was in agreement that this was a valid surrender.”
THE LETTER OF THE LAW
Marshall couldn't understand it. Roque confesses to robbing his office. Marshall hands him over to police. Police promise to take Roque to jail. They sign a piece of paper that says so, an affidavit of surrender. That wasn't good enough?
“In this particular case, I didn't think it was worth letting go of a good bond,” Von Wahlde said in a recent interview. He added that he had to protect the court's interests.
Von Wahlde points to state law – right there in the books, Revised Code of Washington, 10.19.160. The law explains how bail bond companies are supposed to deliver fugitives to jail.
“The surrender shall be made to the facility in which the person was originally held in custody or the county or city jail affiliated with the court issuing the warrant resulting in bail,” it states.
Von Wahlde hangs his argument on three words: “to the facility.” In his view, that means the bail company makes the delivery, at the jail, in person.
“Once the bondsman surrenders the defendant at the jail, the bondsman is off the hook,” he said.
The law doesn't mention affidavits of surrender. It doesn't include provisions for police informants who confess to crimes and make creepy promises to lead investigators to military munitions in exchange for release.
Liberty hadn't played by the book. The company hadn't surrendered Roque “to the facility.”
In hindsight, attorney Shomer thinks her counterpart took a stringent view too far.
“You've got a prosecutor who doesn't see the gray in the world,” she said of Von Wahlde. “He's never worked on the other side to experience and understand the street smarts of it, how things work. The letter of the law doesn't necessarily incorporate the practical application of things.”
Von Wahlde said he didn't hear anything from police or other prosecutors regarding Roque's case. He adds that Liberty hadn't filed any motions with the court asking for forgiveness of the bond. His talks with Shomer were informal.
Shomer agrees, but she points out that going to court wouldn't have changed anything. Von Wahlde would have argued against Liberty.
With that promised opposition, taking the debate to a judge was a gamble. There were no guarantees.
“There was too much money in the street,” Shomer said. “I wish it was only $10,000, and we could have rolled the dice and let a court of law decide – but it was $150,000 – and with that comes consequences.”
Roque's next scheduled court date was April 22. He didn't appear. The court, following routine procedure, issued a warrant for his arrest.
It didn't mean anyone would rush out and grab him – it did mean Liberty was still on the hook for the bond.
The safest option was rounding up Roque – again.
THE HUNT
Marshall needed help. He called on a pair of contract bail agents – Mike Beakley, 56, and Byron Gross, 35.
All the hunters had decades of experience. Beakley was an ex-Tacoma police officer who'd retired in 1990 with a gunshot wound. Gross had logged 12 years as a bounty hunter in America and Europe.
Savant, 58, had worked in law enforcement and corrections. Marshall, 71, had a business that reached into 22 Washington counties, and he'd made thousands of arrests over the years.
None of the agents could recall a scenario to compare with the confusion surrounding Roberto Roque.
For the next four weeks, the hunters and Roque played cat-and-mouse. They thought they had him cornered in an alley in South Tacoma, but he slipped away in a car.
Roque was using false identities, the agents discovered. For official business, he carried a fraudulent driver's license with the name “Juan Alvarez.”
Informants familiar with Roque told the agents that the fugitive was carrying guns. Gross talked to Bernice Aguaro, the mother of Roque's children, who warned the bail agent to wear a bulletproof vest.
“My husband will shoot and kill you,” she said. “He will shoot you.”
The hunters tried a different angle – Roque's family. In mid-May, Gross visited Aguaro at her home on South Cedar Street in Tacoma.
Roque was gone, avoiding the hunters. Aguaro said he'd cried and kissed his daughters before fleeing.
Gross looked at the home and saw shoddy wiring, jury-rigged electrical connections. That was unsafe, he told Aguaro – grounds for a child-neglect complaint to the state. Gross could make that call, he suggested – unless Roque wanted to show himself.
The ploy worked. Aguaro broke down. Within five minutes, Roque was on the phone to Gross.
“Show us how much you care about your kids,” Gross said, angling for a meeting at the house.
“I'll be there in five minutes,” Roque said. “I'm gonna kill you, you son of a bitch. You touch my family, I'll kill you.”
Gross waited three hours. Roque didn't come.
On May 14, Liberty's attorney, Kim Shomer, filed a motion in court to exonerate the bail bond. The filing included an affidavit from Forrest Marshall, who described his interations with Roque: the phony credit, the confession to the robbery, the hand-off to Tacoma police. A ruling would require a hearing in front of a judge. Meanwhile, the hunters kept searching for Roque.
Their next try came May 18. The agents traced Roque to a duplex in South Tacoma.
They spotted him on the porch, wearing a disguise: a gaudy red cone hat and a braided wig. Other tough-looking sorts were with him.
The hunters decided to try for the capture. They called police to let them know what was coming. Police, citing standard procedure, said they couldn't assist – the agents were on their own.
Roque escaped again. He and his friends drove off in separate cars, and the agents weren't sure which one to follow. The hunters started from scratch again.
Roque was switching vehicles and addresses at dizzying speed. One rumor held that he'd stolen a car at gunpoint. Another said he was staying awake on doses of methamphetamine.
“This guy was never in one place for more than 10 minutes,” said Beakley, the retired cop.
With help from an informant, the hunters tracked Roque down once more. The search led to a pair of cars. One belonged to a girlfriend Roque kept on the side.
The agents split up. Marshall and Savant followed one vehicle. Gross and an informant followed the other. They couldn't tell which one Roque was using, but during the chase, Gross saw the flash of a gun and heard two shots.
Gross had to keep his informant out of harm's way. He gave up the chase. Marshall's pursuit went nowhere.
The agents still had a line on one of Roque's cars. It was parked at a car lot in Lakewood, waiting for repairs. A check with the business revealed that Roque planned to pick up the car May 22.
THE TRAP
The setting was perfect – “a tactical dream,” Gross said in reflection.
The agents had little time to figure it, but the plan was obvious. The fenced lot was crammed with vehicles. A narrow gate was the only way in. The only way out was backward.
The hunters could roll up with a car and block that route. Roque would be boxed between the wall of cars and the agents.
All they had to do was wait.
Gross and Beakley, younger and fitter, took the action duty. They would drive the blocking car and confront Roque. Savant and Marshall parked on the other side of the street.
The hunters watched.
Roque appeared on schedule in another bad disguise: a wig with fake dreadlock braids. He got into the car.
The trap snapped shut. Gross and Beakley rolled up, leaped from their car and rushed to either side of Roque's, guns drawn.
Both men said they shouted, “Bail recovery agent!”
All Roque had to do was give up.
He floored the gas pedal. The tires howled and spat smoke. The car lurched backward.
Gross saw Beakley stagger. It looked like Roque's car had hit him.
Beakley raised his gun and fired twice. At almost the same moment, Gross fired his weapon.
The car stopped.
Beakley, unhurt, saw Roque twist toward the passenger seat, reaching for something. Gross, on the other side, grabbed Roque's wrists through the open window.
Roque gurgled, then coughed, coating Gross' arms in a spray of blood.
Gross knew what that meant – a lung shot.
“Call 911,” he shouted.
All four bounty hunters were cuffed and stuffed – taken in by Lakewood police, seated in separate cells, interrogated. They told their stories. They were released later that day.
Roque was dead. A search of his car revealed a duffel bag under the passenger seat. Two guns were inside.
Roque's sister claimed his remains, according to the Pierce County Medical Examiner's Office. The agency would not disclose her name, or the funeral home that received the remains – the information is exempt from public disclosure.
Roque's girlfriend, Aguaro, couldn't be reached by The News Tribune. A phone number provided by one of the bounty hunters rang to a disconnection message.
THE FINAL ARGUMENTS
Liberty's debt to the court died with Roque. The bonds and the outstanding warrants were officially quashed in June.
Marshall has no quarrel with the investigators who let Roque roam free.
“I don't have any problem with anything TPD and the FBI were doing,” he said. “They thought they were fixing big things.”
He's more concerned about mistaken impressions: the idea that reckless bond agents killed Roque out of revenge. If a prosecutor had been willing to forgive the bond on a police informant, Marshall wouldn't have chased Roque.
“What about my rights?” Marshall said. “Why does the prosecutor get to let this guy walk after he admits he robbed me? Somewhere along the line I got screwed.”
Von Wahlde has had time to reflect in the two months since Roque's death.
He said he considered giving Liberty some slack at the time. He still believes he had a good argument. It was a question of policy versus circumstances.
“If I was to do it all over again, I'd balance the two together,” he said.
Sean Robinson: 253-597-8486
What happened that day
1. Two bail agents wait for Roque to pick up his car.
2. A friend drops off Roque at the corner by the repair shop and he walks to the office.
3. Roque goes to his car and gets in.
• The agents pull in to block the exit from the lot, then go to either side of Roque's car and identify themselves.
• Roque throws his car into reverse, and backs into the agents' car. Then he puts his car into drive and heads toward one of the agents.
• The agents fire three shots into Roque's car.
Roberto Roque’s final days
JANUARY 3 Roberto Roque arrested and charged with drug possession and gun possession.
JANUARY 19 Roque bails out of jail, bond posted by Liberty Bail Bonds.
JANUARY 22 Roque arrested on suspicion of drug possession and gun possession (he’s charged a month later).
FEBRUARY 1 Roque arrested and charged with gun possession and drug possession.
FEBRUARY 12 Roque bails out on Feb. 1 charges, bond posted by Liberty Bail Bonds.
FEBRUARY 23 Roque bails out on Jan. 22 charges, bond posted by Liberty Bail Bonds.
MARCH 30 Liberty Bail Bonds office robbed by a company employee and Roberto Roque.
APRIL 8 Liberty Bail Bonds discovers Roque’s earlier bonds are based on phony credit; agents, accompanied by Tacoma police, detain Roque.
• Roque admits robbing the Liberty office.
• Roque offers to lead police to a “U.S. Army missile.”
• Police take custody of Roque, sign affidavit of surrender.
• Roque released in exchange for information.
APRIL 10 Pierce County deputy prosecutor Mark Von Wahlde indicates he will oppose forgiving Liberty’s bond for Roque.
APRIL 22 Roque fails to show up for court; arrest warrant issued.
LATE APRIL, EARLY MAY Agents from Liberty Bail Bonds begin searching for Roque.
MAY 13 or 14 Roque threatens to kill a bail recovery agent.
MAY 21 Agents chase Roque into South Tacoma; shots fired from one of the fleeing cars.
MAY 22 Agents track Roque to a car-repair lot in Lakewood; they corner him. Roque tries to flee, but is shot and killed.
