Category: Wisconsin

Let me assume that everybody with an Internet connection has already seen the video clip of police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, firing seven shots while attempting to detain a man identified as Jacob Blake:

Kenosha police shot a man Sunday evening, setting off unrest in the city after a video appeared to show the officer firing several shots at close range into the man’s back.
The shooting [victim] has been identified as Jacob Blake, a Black man, by Wisconsin officials.
Police had been called to a domestic incident in the 2800 block of 40th Street at 5:11 p.m. where the shooting later occurred.
Officers provided immediate aid to the shooting victim, who was taken by Flight for Life to Froedtert Hospital in Milwaukee, Kenosha police reported.
The man was in serious condition at Froedtert.
“Tonight, Jacob Blake was shot in the back multiple times, in broad daylight,” Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers said in a statement. “While we do not have all of the details yet, what we know for certain is that he is not the first Black man or person to have been shot or injured or mercilessly killed at the hands of individuals in law enforcement in our state or our country.”
The Kenosha News reported that neighbors said Blake was trying to break up a fight between two women. Bystanders said he was Tased and then shot several times.
A video circulating on social media shows a man in a white shirt and black shorts walking to a gray van, followed by two male police officers with weapons drawn. The video does not show what happened before the man walked away from the officers, nor what was said, if anything.
As the man opens the door to get in, an officer grabs his shirt to hold him still, then appears to shoot him in the back at close range. Seven shots are heard, followed by a car horn, presumably from the man’s head falling forward. A woman who followed behind the police can be seen screaming and jumping up and down.

There is a lot we don’t know yet. Why was Blake trying to evade the officers? Did the cop think Blake was getting a gun from vehicle?

But of course it’s racist to ask questions like that, or just to wait until we find out the full story. Everybody must riot now!

Protesters threw a Molotov cocktail at police in Kenosha. pic.twitter.com/ROcGx96PqD

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) August 24, 2020

Kenosha pic.twitter.com/wRqmIFVrYx

— special agent viti (@selfdeclaredref) August 24, 2020

Thirteen-year-old Jayme Closs was found alive last week, nearly three months after being kidnapped by the 21-year-old man who murdered her parents. Today a Wisconsin judge ordered Jake Thomas Patterson held on $5 million bond, and details of the crime emerged:

A Wisconsin man accused of abducting 13-year-old Jayme Closs and holding her captive for three months made up his mind to take her when he spotted the teenager getting on a school bus, authorities said Monday.
Jake Thomas Patterson, 21, told detectives that “he knew that was the girl he was going to take,” and he made two aborted trips to her family’s home before finally carrying out an attack in which he fatally shot Jayme’s mother in front of her, according to a criminal complaint filed hours before Patterson’s first court appearance.
Prosecutors charged him Monday with kidnapping Jayme and killing her parents Oct. 15 near Barron, about 90 miles northeast of Minneapolis. He was also charged with armed robbery.
Investigators believe Patterson hid Jayme in a remote cabin before she escaped on Thursday. Police have said the two did not know each other. . . .
The complaint said Patterson went to the home twice intending to kidnap Jayme, but broke off one attempt because too many cars were in the driveway and called off another because the house was too active.
On the night she was abducted, Jayme told police, she was asleep in her room when the family dog started barking. She woke her parents as a car came up the driveway.
She and her mother, Denise, hid in the bathroom, clutching one another in the bathtub with the shower curtain pulled shut. Her father, James, went to the front door. They heard a gunshot, and Jayme knew that James had just been killed, according to the complaint.
Denise Closs started to call 911. Patterson broke down the bathroom door. Jayme said he was dressed in black, wearing a face mask and gloves and carrying a shotgun.
Patterson told her mother to hang up and ordered her to tape Jayme’s mouth shut. Patterson told detectives that Denise Closs struggled with the tape so he wrapped the tape himself around Jayme’s mouth and head. He then taped her hands behind her back and taped her ankles together, pulled her out of the bathtub and shot her mother in the head.
He dragged Jayme outside, nearly slipping in blood pooled on the floor. He threw her in the trunk and drove off, pausing to yield to three squad cars speeding toward the house with flashing lights. . . .
Patterson told investigators . . . he assumed he had gotten away with the slayings and kidnappings after two weeks went by. . . .
Authorities have not said whether Jayme was sexually assaulted. The complaint does not charge Patterson with any form of sexual assault.

The documents explain something that otherwise made no sense: How did Patterson, who lived an hour’s drive north of the Closs family home, find this girl?

Patterson told investigators that he worked at Saputo Cheese Factory, south of Almena for two days before quitting.
On his drive to the cheese factory on one of the two mornings he worked there, he had stopped behind a school bus on U.S. Highway 8, where he watched Jayme Closs get on the bus.
Patterson told investigators that he had no idea who she was, nor did he know who lived at the house, according to the complaint.
When he saw Closs, “he knew that was the girl he was going to take,” according to the criminal complaint.

So it was his job in Alemena, where he worked for only two days, that explains how Patterson — who attended high school in Minong, more than 50 miles from Barron County — located his prey. More details:

A man suspected in the kidnapping of Jayme Closs planned the crime methodically after he spotted the Wisconsin teenager getting onto a school bus. . . .
The complaint says Patterson didn’t even know Jayme’s name until he abducted her.
The complaint says Patterson used his father’s 12-gauge Mossberg shotgun because it is commonly used and he thought it would be more difficult to trace. It says he chose the gauge to do the most damage, and wiped shells and shotguns free of fingerprints and wore gloves to load the gun.
The complaint also says Patterson shaved his face and head and showered prior to the attack. He was dressed all in black. It says he took the license plates off his car, put stolen plates on and disconnected the dome and trunk lights.

And also this:

A Wisconsin man suspected of abducting 13-year-old Jayme Closs washed out of the U.S. Marine Corps after little more than a month.
Jake Thomas Patterson wrote in his high school yearbook that he planned to join the Marines after graduation. But military records show he lasted for only about five weeks before being prematurely discharged in October 2015 at the rank of private.
Marine spokeswoman Yvonne Carlock said by email that Patterson’s early discharge indicated “the character of his service was incongruent with Marine Corps’ expectations and standards.”

He couldn’t make it through basic training and never held a steady job, but when it came to kidnapping and murder, his planning was “meticulous.” Too bad they don’t have the death penalty in Wisconsin.

Thirteen-year-old Jayme Closs escaped with her life Thursday after being held captive for nearly three months by the man who police say murdered her parents James and Denise Closs. The suspect, 21-year-old Jake Thomas Patterson, specifically targeted the Closs home Oct. 15 with the intention of kidnapping Jayme, according to authorities in Wisconsin:

Barron County Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald said Patterson had ‘zero’ criminal history, but said he had “specific intent” to kidnap Jayme Closs, during a 4 p.m. press conference Friday.
Fitzgerald said the suspect used a shotgun to shoot open the door to the Closs family home on Oct. 15 and then used the gun to kill James and Denise Closs before kidnapping Jayme. Fitzgerald said law enforcement recovered a gun that is consistent with the gun used at the crime scene. Investigators are waiting on forensics to prove that it is the same weapon.
Patterson planned his actions and took significant steps to hide his identity from law enforcement, according to Fitzgerald. Those steps included shaving his head so he would not leave trace evidence of his hair at the crime scene.
Jayme escaped from Patterson’s home in Gordon, which is in Douglas County, Thursday afternoon when Patterson was not home, according to Fitzgerald.
“Jayme is the hero in this case, there is no question about it,” Fitzgerald said.
She left the house on foot and was found around 4:30 p.m. Thursday, a short distance away from Patterson’s home, after approaching a woman who was walking her dog. The woman took Jayme to a neighbor’s home and the homeowner called 911.
Douglas County Sheriff Tom Dalbeck said his deputies responded and quickly identified Jayme. They soon located a vehicle matching the description of the suspect’s vehicle given to them by Jayme. Police believe Patterson was out looking for Jayme when they made contact with him. Patterson was arrested 10 minutes after Jayme was found. Officers interviewed Patterson and then brought him to Barron County.

The place where Jayme was found was about 70 miles north of where she was kidnapped, and at this point we don’t know how or why Patterson choose her as the target of what was evidently a crime he had planned carefully. We know almost nothing about Patterson, but there must be something unusual in his background to explain the level of evil required to do what he is accused of doing. Details of her escape:

On Thursday, Closs was able to escape from a cabin before flagging down a person walking a dog in Gordon and asking for help. Jeanne Nutter, the woman who first spotted Closs, told The Associated Press she “was terrified” but wanted to “get her to a safe place.” She recalled the teen looked disheveled, dirty and thin. She also noted Closs was wearing shoes too big for her feet.
“She [Closs] just yelled, ‘Please help me, I don’t know where I am. I’m lost,'” Nutter recalled.
The two went to the home of Peter and Kristin Kasinskas who called 911.
Kristin Kasinskas told The Associated Press she did not know why the teen was targeted. She said Closs told her that the suspect “killed my parents and took me.” Kasinskas said she didn’t know Patterson, although he lived three doors down from her. She said she taught him science in middle school but remembered him as being quiet. She said she did not see him during the months Closs was missing.

Another “quiet loner” type.