This past May, the man who took the lives of Kissimmee Police Department officers Matthew Baxter and Richard “Sam” Howard officially received the death penalty from the Circuit Court.
I covered that hearing, as the editor of this paper, as I did the shooting on a fateful Friday night — five years ago today — as the News-Gazette’s lone reporter.
The knot in my stomach on those two days was very, very similar. The night of the shooting still has not left me, and I still recall the details, which I share on this anniversary.
We had a Saturday paper back then. With that edition long gone, Friday nights were for relaxation, hanging with family and looking forward to the weekend. As it was on Aug. 18, 2017 — until about 10:15 p.m., when phones and devices began chirping alerts. Officer-involved shooting in Kissimmee … which became Officers shot in Kissimmee incident.
Over about the next hour, details started coming in through my content channels — some fact, some unconfirmed. The initial mission was to decide which was which. Keep in mind, my background is in sports and I’d only been doing news full-time for about three years. After I’d confirmed two officers were shot, I had one thought at the front of my mind — Please guys, don’t die. We don’t have a playbook for this.
But who did?
Around that time, I had to make the “Get into town/report this from home (in Orlando)” decision — I had my keys in my hand. All roads into downtown Kissimmee were blocked off — OBT, 192, there was even a checkpoint on John Young I believe — so I backed off and leaned on my sources while updating any feeds I could from my home office. (In retrospect, I could have taken the Turnpike to Shady Lane to Neptune and come in the back way. It still haunts me a bit.)
Around midnight, when a stoic KPD Chief Jeff O’Dell announced that two of the city’s finest defenders had been shot, Baxter fatally, with Osceola Regional doctors working to save Howard — but “It didn’t look good,” the chief said, and Howard would pass away in the morning — my journalistic instincts kicked in. I worked to get an accurate account of the shooting on our digital feeds, and prepared for our coverage the following week. The week should have started Monday, but I got an extra dose that Saturday, when one of the cable news networks (Headline News, perhaps?) reached out to the paper for added comment, and I got told by our publisher and editor, “Do it.”
(I wouldn’t have if I didn’t already do radio. So I got the phone call, and recited, live, what we knew about the shooting about 18 hours afterwards. It was a very short interview, and when I look back, I bet it’s because I didn’t provide the “A gun killed two cops and guns are bad and guns make crime” narrative they wanted.)
After the interview, I made a salad — then could barely touch it.
The outpouring of public support for law enforcement the following days was both tremendous and memorable. That week included two events that affected me. The first was Baxter and Howard’s funeral, which filled the area’s largest church with police officers, all clearly with their burly, tough façade peeled away and in obvious grief.
The second was a barbecue the next day offered by a local restaurateur. He fed officers for free, and the public could come and eat and donate to various police funds. I saw all sorts of KPD folks I knew, who were still shaken, including Chief O’Dell. Like at he funeral, he was there, holding KPD together. We spoke for a bit, but his mind was elsewhere — another indelible moment.
In the five years that have passed, I’m happy to say that I still feel that same sense of “Back the Blue” toward our protectors with badges in the community. I also want to tip my hat to Sadia Baxter, Matthew’s widow — also a KPD alum and now an FDLE agent. She was present at all the court proceedings. While I’ve never spoken with her outside of interviews following those hearings, I’d like to send her a message:
You are a warrior.
The strength she has exuded, raising three daughters without her rock of a husband — teaching them to “forgive someone who did not ask for forgiveness … that hate toward law enforcement officers is not okay,” — is nothing short of unbelievable.
Often in the news business, you’re just waiting for the “next big thing” to have your full attention, and about three weeks later, Hurricane Irma struck Florida and our community with wicked force.
It’ll take something bigger than that for me to ever forget Aug. 18, 2017.
Ken Jackson is the News-Gazette's editor. He has also served as a sports reporter, senior news reporter and sports editor.
