aggiehawg said:
Quote:
.On November 15, Moscow police said they preliminarily "believe this was an isolated, targeted attack and there is no imminent threat to the community at large," and that "evidence indicates that this was a targeted attack."
Yet the following day, police backtracked some of that, saying they couldn't actually say whether there was a threat to the public."
When the FBI shows up with 2 serial killer profilers in tow, tends to change perspective of the local law enforcement, maybe?
Unless there's a federal crime involved, the FBI doesn't just show up. Even given the proximity of Moscow, ID to the WA state line, murder is not a federal crime unless it took place on federal property - a military base, national park, inside a federal building, etc.
So, absent a federal crime that the public isn't being told about, the Feds are there because their presence was requested by the local or state authorities. They're there in a support role, most likely mainly in the area of forensic analysis, plus they'll have much better access to be able to look for similar incidents across the country. The Feds have resources that the locals simply don't, especially in a small town like this. Heck, even Brazos County, which is 10x as big as the locality here, doesn't have it's own crime lab, and all the LE agencies there have to send stuff to the DPS labs in Austin or Houston. Idaho may only have one full up crime lab for the whole state.
Honestly, the biggest challenge for a PD the size of the Moscow PD, in a small town, is going to be public affairs/media relations, and we're seeing that in spades. I guarantee you that public affairs is not the primary job of whomever handles it, it's an additional duty, and that person probably deals with maybe 3 reporters (local paper, local TV, maybe a student reporter for the campus paper) on a regular basis. Now they've got national and international media camped out on their front lawn demanding updates every time anyone enters or leaves the building.