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Another Arkansas ex-con involved in Washington police shootings

Darcus Allen

Darcus Allen

By James Jefferson
Arkansas News Bureau

LITTLE ROCK — An alleged accomplice of Maurice Clemmons, suspected of slaying four Washington state police officers before being gunned down himself, served prison time with Clemmons in Arkansas and is a wanted man in his home state.

Washington authorities filed rendering criminal assistance charges today against Darcus D. Allen, the alleged getaway driver for Clemmons, who police say shot to death four police officers early Sunday at a Parkland, Wash., coffee shop.

A lone police officer shot Clemmons to death early Tuesday in Seattle while investigating a stolen vehicle. Authorities today pressed charges against others accused of aiding Clemmons’ flight.

Also today, the governor of Washington said her state would quit taking parolees from Arkansas.

Allen served 14 years of a 25-year sentence in Arkansas for the murders of two people at a Little Rock liquor store in 1990. He was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder in 1991 and sentenced to two 25-year terms, to be served concurrently. He was paroled in December 2005 and was discharged from all restrictions in May 2006, state prison spokeswoman Dina Tyler said.

Unlike Clemmons, who became eligible for parole immediately after then-Gov. Mike Huckabee in 2000 commuted his 108-year prison sentence for robbery and other crimes, Allen “did his time,” Tyler said.

“(His sentence) was not commuted. He actually became eligible in 2000 and the Parole Board denied him all the way until the end of 2005,” she said. “He met the board every year and they said no, no, no, and finally they said OK.

“After May 4, 2006, he had served all of his time, paid his debt. He was under no supervision, he could go wherever he wanted to. He did not have to report to anybody. It was over.”

Allen was far from a model prisoner, Tyler said. He was involved in four dozen rule-breaking incidents ranging from insolence toward a staff member to assaulting a correctional officer, she said.

The latter offense drew a second-degree battery conviction and 30-month sentence, which Allen served concurrently with his murder sentence.

Allen and Clemmons were housed together in open barracks among 50-100 inmates at both the Cummins and Tucker units, for periods ranging from one day to just over one month, Tyler said.

Allen faces two warrants in Pulaski County, on an aggravated robbery charge and for a probation violation in connection with a 2008 DWI conviction, authorities said.

Two women accused of giving Clemmons first aid and rides appeared in court today.

Clemmons’ aunt, Letricia Nelson, was arrested late Tuesday in Pacific, Wash., northeast of Tacoma, for allegedly giving first aid to Clemmons, helping him change clothes and making arrangements to get him to other locations, authorities said.

Around the same time, Quiana Maylea Williams, an acquaintance of Clemmons, was arrested in Des Moines, Wash. Both women were being held in the Pierce County jail today.

Each was ordered held for 72 hours on $500,000 bail.

Three other people appeared Tuesday in Pierce County Superior Court. Two brothers, Eddie Lee Davis and Douglas Edward Davis, are charged with rendering criminal assistance. A third man, Clemmons’ half-brother Rickey Hinton, was ordered held pending charges.

Meanwhile, Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire said her state would not take any more parolees from Arkansas until she is assured of a better system for sending them back.

The Olympian newspaper of Olympia, Wash., reported Gregoire also was offended by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s initial reaction to the police shootings, in which Huckabee suggested lapses in the way the state of Washington’s judicial system had handled the case.

Huckabee said Sunday that if Maurice Clemmons is “found responsible for this horrible tragedy it will be the result of a series of failures in the criminal justice system in both Arkansas and Washington state.”

Matt DeCample, spokesman for Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe, said the governor understood Gregoire’s concerns.

“We understand her offense and her frustration with comments that a former governor of this state made about the law enforcement and judicial systems in Washington in this tragic time,” DeCample said.

“We understand she wants to review what happened and we hope when that review is complete they will see that we did things by the book here and that the relationship between the two states can be maintained,” he said.

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Arkansas News Bureau reporter Rob Moritz and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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