Relatives wonder if shooting was necessary

By KYLE ODEGARD
Gazette-Times reporter

Relatives of Richard Dean Townsend said police told them the Corvallis man brandished a pipe before being fatally shot by officers Friday night.

Townsend’s family wondered why it was necessary for law enforcement to use lethal force against the 50-year-old mentally ill man, however.

“Even a metal pipe could have been taken away by three officers. … Why did they have to shoot him?” said Marlene Joan Fujii, 72, Townsend’s mother, who lives in Corvallis.

Two veteran Corvallis Police Department officers and a recruit officer have been placed on paid leave while the case is investigated by Oregon State Police.

The shooting took place after 8 p.m. on Harrison Boulevard near 15th Street as people returned home from a downtown Christmas parade.

A witness said police wrestled over an object with Townsend, shouting directions that were ignored. After the shooting, officers searched bushes along Harrison for something, said Brett Gallagher, an Oregon State University graduate student.

Benton County District Attorney Scott Heiser has said he will not comment about why the shooting occurred until the investigation is complete.

Fujii said that since Townsend moved to Corvallis nearly eight years ago, he had several contacts with police and has been in and out of mental institutions for bipolar disorder, also known as manic-depressive illness.

“The policemen knew he was a very sick little man and that he had a mother who cared for him, and all they had to do was call me,” Fujii said.

Townsend, who preferred to be called Dean, would do well for a while, but then stop taking medication and deteriorate, Fujii added.

“Always when Dean is in this manic stage, he gets a walking stick. It looks like a club. He waves it around while he’s out in the middle of the street directing traffic and doing his magic spells,” she said.

Lately, though, Fujii had seen a three-foot-long yellow pipe at Townsend’s apartment at 532 N.W. 10th St.

She knew her son’s condition was getting worse and said he was behaving childlike.

Neighbor Gwen Spencer said Townsend’s behavior became more erratic about two weeks ago, and he was contacted by police last week.

Fujii said she was frustrated that Townsend couldn’t get more help at mental institutions, which would keep him for half a day, a day, or maybe even a few weeks before releasing him.

And months later, he’d have another psychotic episode.

Louis Townsend of Baker City, Townsend’s father, said his son was an alcoholic and because of that the two hadn’t spoken in several years.

Townsend attended school in Baker City before joining the Army, but was discharged for his behavior, Fujii said. He later worked with his father on concrete and construction jobs.

Fujii said Townsend was drinking the night he was killed.

“I was always hoping that he could get the treatment he needed, stay on the medication and learn to live with his disease, who knows, maybe find a wife or a girlfriend,” said his mother.

“But he would always hit a wall. He was like a broken wheel.”

Kyle Odegard covers public safety, Philomath and rural Benton County. He can be contacted at kyle.odegard@lee.net or 758-9523.