I’m glad these families changed their minds about the lawsuit. I’m sure they had the best of intentions, and I don’t think it was about greed for the women, but to include the $182 million dollars in claims was NOT a good idea. I hope that they can regroup and come back to this issue of the reforming the jails in a different, more positive manner.
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Tears rolled down the tired faces of three women who sat side by side on a family-room couch Friday afternoon in Puyallup. They were the two widows and a sister of three of the Lakewood police officers gunned down by Maurice Clemmons four months ago in a coffee shop.
They announced plans to file multimillion-dollar claims against Pierce County, hoping to spark jail reforms and create a safer community. When the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department and many in the community verbally attacked them, they were shocked. Much of the public, which had sympathized with these mourning families, now seemed to vilify them.
“We thought this would help with healing,” Kim Renninger, widow of Sgt. Mark Renninger, said of the claims. “But it has opened a wound I never expected. What hurts most of all is them calling me greedy.”
Bitter comments came from talk-radio callers and anonymous commenters on newspaper and television Web sites.
