By Cameron Probert
Tri-City Herald
PASCO, Wash. — Franklin County prosecutors have charged a Hermiston, Oregon man with shooting a Pasco officer in the leg during a struggle at home in December.
Devontea Wright, 28, is charged with first-degree assault, disarming a police officer, unlawful possession of a gun and resisting arrest in connection with the incident outside Riverview Drive.
Wright has been in the Benton County jail for nearly six months on two unrelated assault cases, both of which have since been dismissed. A $500,000 warrant issued in Franklin County has kept him jailed.
A U.S. Marshals task force was looking for Wright in December on a $100,000 arrest warrant in connection to one of the cases that was dropped. He had been accused of pointing a gun at a woman inside the 3 City Sports Bar in Kennewick.
Pasco Officer Jeremy Jones and Kennewick Detective Randy McCalmant were two of the officers waiting outside 1927 Riverview Drive when Wright showed up as a passenger in a pickup, according to court documents.
Jones told investigators that other officers surrounded the pickup when he spotted and recognized Wright. He opened the passenger door and “took a hold” of Wright.
“He told Wright to exit and put his hands behind his back,” Franklin County Sheriff’s Sgt. Steve Warren said in his affidavit. “Wright replied, ‘You are going to have to f—g kill me.’ And Wright began to pull away.”
As Wright started struggling, they moved away from the truck and eventually ended up on the ground.
That was when Wright allegedly went for Jones’ gun.
Shot in the leg
McCalmant said he had Wright’s arm when he saw that Wright had a hand on Jones’ Glock .45 caliber handgun, and was trying to take it out of the holster.
The detective told other officers and about that time Wright allegedly pulled the trigger. McCalmant then focused on prying Wright’s hand off the weapon.
They were able to get control of Wright, and that was when Jones discovered he had been shot. Two tourniquets were used on Jones’ leg to slow the bleeding before he was taken to Kadlec Regional Medical Center in Richland.
Footage from the officer’s body cameras and patrol car dashboards corroborate what happened, Warren said in his affidavit.
“I could clearly hear the words, ‘He’s reaching. He’s reaching. He’s got Jeremy’s gun!” Warren said. “You then can clearly hear the gun go off followed by sounds of painful hollers of agony from Jones.”
The bullet did significant damage to Jones’ leg.
The 16-year veteran Pasco officer was released from the hospital the next day and given a police escort back to his Richland home, according to a video posted on Facebook.
Jones is the husband of Richland Councilwoman Jhoanna Jones.
He spent two months recovering before returning to work in February, according a Pasco police Facebook post.
Wright’s Past Crimes
While he has been accused of threatening two people in Benton County with guns, prosecutors have dropped the charges in both cases.
In 2011, he was 16 and living in Hermiston, Ore., south of the Tri-Cities, when he was sentenced to six years for sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl, according to the East Oregonian newspaper.
He had turned 16 less than month before the arrest for sexually abusing the girl while babysitting two younger children.
According to the Oregon State Police sex offender registry section, he is not compliant with registering since his release from a juvenile facility.
Since his release, he has two convictions for misdemeanor assaults in 2018.
He also was convicted for failing to appear at a court hearing in 2018, which is a felony in Oregon, and sentenced to nearly two years in prison.
Currently, he is still wanted in Oregon for failing to show up for a sentencing hearing in August 2021 after pleading guilty to attempting to commit a felony, fourth-degree assault and second-degree criminal mischief, all misdemeanors.
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