Unknown to the border agent, James Edward Childress, 20, was wanted on a murder charge in Canada. Childress had tripped a sensor as he walked across the border from Canada into the U.S. near Sumas, Washington and was confronted by border agents. Three agents responded.
The agent who shot Childress, identified in the report only as Agent Lulow, engaged the Canadian and told him not to spray him with the bear spray. Prosecutor Dave McEachran found that the fugitive yelled at the agent “Kill me” and “You better (expletive) kill me pig!” and as he continued to approach the agent, the man sprayed him with bear spray.
Almost backing into a drainage ditch, and with a cloud of spray around him from which he could not see through, and fearing his assailant could soon be upon him, the agent fired twice. One of the bullets missed, the other hit Childress in the left temple, killing him.
“The officer was sprayed before he fired,” McEachran told the Bellingham Herald. “The officers could see this huge cloud sprayed. It was coming right at his face, he shot his gun at that point, then was overcome by the spray,” McEachran said.
“These are always really traumatic things for everybody, certainly for the officers,” McEachran added. “It’s always tragic to lose life.”
Childress, from Prince George, was wanted for the first-degree murder of 18-year-old Brando Walker, who was killed in Calgary in February. Walker’s body was found some two weeks after his death, on March 7, and a warrant for Childress and three others was issued.
The prosecutor found that Agent Lulow first tried to deescalate the situation by talking with Childress, to no avail.
