Alaska man charged in shooting of Fairbanks police officer
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - The 29-year-old man charged with opening fire on an Alaska police officer has a lengthy criminal history in Anchorage and Fairbanks tied to alcohol consumption but just one previous felony conviction.
Anthony George Jenkins-Alexie was charged Wednesday with attempted murder in the shooting early Sunday of Sgt. Allen Brandt, an 11-year veteran of the Fairbanks Police Department.
Jenkins-Alexie also is charged with six other felonies: assault, theft of a firearm, theft of a patrol car, evidence tampering, possession of a firearm as a felon and firing a gun at a building.
Brandt is recovering at an Anchorage hospital.
Fairbanks police Tuesday morning arrested Jenkins-Alexie as he walked in the same neighborhood where Brandt was shot, an area of older residential homes mixed with a few businesses east of the city's downtown commercial district.
The incident started shortly after midnight Sunday when Brandt responded in his patrol car to calls of shots fired and a man yelling.
Brandt's dashboard camera records him slowing down as he approached a man walking on the sidewalk toward the car. As the patrol car stopped, the man moves his right hand toward his coat pocket but continues out of the picture.
A few seconds later, the man, gripping a handgun with both hands, runs around the front of the car.
Brandt was struck four times in the lower body and once in the chest, which was protected by body armor. He fired back at the suspect.
Police say Jenkins-Alexie drove off in the patrol car. Brandt was able to move off the street and call for assistance by radio.
A second dash-camera video shows the patrol car coming to a stop and the suspect striding away. Police found the patrol car two blocks away.
Brant's injuries include wounds to his legs and bullet fragments in his eye.
Acting Fairbanks Police Chief Brad Johnson said after the arrest that Jenkins-Alexie had made threats toward law enforcement.
Court records indicate Jenkins-Alexie's adult encounters with police began in 2007, when he was charged at age 19 with criminal trespass and consuming alcohol as a minor. He pleaded no contest to the trespass charge. The charge of consuming alcohol as a minor was dismissed. However, he pleaded no contest to two more charges of consuming alcohol as a minor later that year in Fairbanks and Anchorage.
He pleaded no contest to misdemeanor theft in Fairbanks in 2008. He pleaded no contest in 2009 to misdemeanor assault. In 2010, he pleaded guilty to driving with a suspended or revoked license in Seward.
He was arrested in March and April 2013 in Anchorage for driving under the influence of alcohol and convicted after guilty or no contest pleas. Arrested again in June 2013 in Anchorage, he was convicted of felony driving under the influence.
He pleaded guilty in February 2015 in Anchorage to a misdemeanor escape charge.
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Associated Press researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed to this report.