Each week, the Shreveport-Bossier Journal’s Tony Taglavore takes to lunch a local person – someone who is well-known, successful, and/or influential, and asks, “What’s Your Story?”
By TONY TAGLAVORE, Journal Services
After just two months working violent crimes, the detective got his first big case.
A real whodunit.
Late at night, a woman was getting out of her car at an apartment complex when three men opened fire. She was dead at the scene.
It was Thanksgiving week, and the detective was home on vacation when he got the call. So much for vacation.
“This is my first one,” he thought. “This is a bad deal.”
Sometime between three and four o’clock in the morning, Shannon led his team to a place where the victim’s estranged husband lived. There were other people in the house as well. They were all brough to headquarters.
“One individual stood out to me. I don’t know if it was intuition – a gut feeling. I thought he was going to be the toughest to break. That’s who I wanted to talk to. We don’t try to profile, but he had tattoos – a big, muscular guy. I said, ‘Let me interview him first and see what I can get.’”
The “interview” didn’t last long.
“Five minutes after questioning him, he tells me the whole story. I’m trying to hold it in. ‘Oh my God, I got him.’”
The man who swore to protect and to serve wasn’t the only one surprised.
“I come out and get my supervisor and the other investigator who was seasoned. He had been there a little while. I said, ‘I got it! I got it!’ I wish I had a camera to see their faces. Their jaws just dropped.”
Turns out, the case was a murder-for-hire. The estranged husband wanted to collect an insurance policy on his wife. He paid someone to pull the trigger. There was an accomplice. All three were at the crime scene. They all went to jail.
“As a freshman at Shady Grove playing basketball, I hit a game-winning shot that sent us to the state quarterfinals. That’s what it felt like.”
Seargeant Shannon Washington of the Bossier City police department told me that story, and his story, during lunch at a place of his choosing, David Beard’s Catfish King. Shannon had I both had the Regular Catch – five pieces of fish, fries, hushpuppies, and pinto beans. Shannon had sweet tea to drink, while I had water. While we ate, I couldn’t help but notice the gun on his right hip – a Glock 43. There was a magazine on his left hip.
“You don’t have to have any enemies. There are people out there who will hurt you just because.”
Shannon grew up in the safe haven of a barely-a-dot-on-the-map place called Shady Grove. His mother was just 16 years old when she had her son. They lived in a house with 10 relatives.
“My grandmother was really, really big on education. Just because you’re pregnant doesn’t mean you’re going to stop going to school. Basically, I was raised by her until my mom (who graduated from Grambling State University) started her professional career teaching.”
And grandma was no softie.
“She was a hard worker. She worked at a sawmill pulling lumber. I remember her coming in – she had on overalls and a hard hat from working in the plant.”
When Shannon wasn’t in school or sleeping, he was hooping.
“All my uncles were from 6’2-6’11. We were all good basketball players, so that’s what we did. We would find somebody’s house to go play basketball. We were always working on our games . . . . That’s all I did. That’s all I knew. Basketball, basketball, basketball.”
But eventually, Shannon wanted to be known for his play, not that of his uncles.
“I loved my uncles, but I wanted my own name. I knew I was going to have to work hard and be special, so they would remember Shannon Washington. ‘Oh, he is the Martin boys’ nephew, but he is Shannon Washington.’ My name had some validity on its own. It pushed me through in everything.”
Shannon was also good in the classroom, graduating in the top three of his class at Saline High School, after Shady Grove’s school closed. Shannon’s reward was earning an athletic scholarship to Centenary College. He played basketball from 1989-1993 and is listed ninth (since 1986) on the school’s list for the most made three-point field goals (161).
But Shannon was short on hours and didn’t graduate. Dating the woman who would become his wife, Shannon needed a job. He wanted to join the Bossier City fire department, and asked a police officer he knew if the officer could help him get on with the BCFD. But the officer tried to convince Shannon to join him on the force.
“There was a stigma back then. You had the riots in Cedar Grove. I thought, ‘Man, that’s kind of dangerous. I don’t know if that’s something I want to do.’”
But one ride-along with the officer changed Shannon’s mind.
“We went on so many different calls. The adrenaline rush got to me, and I was sold. I was like, ‘You know what? I want to do that.’”
And Shannon has been doing “that” for 30 years. He currently oversees juvenile investigations, domestic violence, and sex-offender registration.
And boy, has Shannon seen some things.
“I can’t tell my mom half the stuff. I wouldn’t want to tell her.”
For example . . . .
“Last year we had an incident where a guy basically kept his girlfriend and her four-year-old daughter captive in an apartment for a week. He allowed the mother to go to work every day, and he stayed home with the little girl. He videoed himself physically assaulting the baby. By the time we got involved and was able to get them and get them help, the baby had been through . . . .”
Shannon’s voice trailed off.
“You never get used to some of it when you see it so bad. But I have to get past it.”
Not wanting to keep Shannon any longer from catching the bad guys, I asked my final question. As always, what is it about his story that might be influential to others?
“That a small kid, a small, shy kid, from a small community, can make something out of himself – and a name for himself – with hard work. I always try to treat people fairly and treat people right. If they can grasp that, the sky is the limit. My mom used to always say, ‘Never walk with your head down. Walk like you’ve got a million dollars in your pocket.’ The one thing I’ve learned is if I treat people right and stay positive, it works to my advantage.”
And always trust your gut.
Do you know someone with a story? Email SBJTonyT@gmail.com.
The Journal’s weekly “What’s Your Story?” series is sponsored by Morris & Dewett Injury Lawyers.