By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
The Thurston County Sheriff’s Office says it thwarted a plot to murder one of their own detectives with an arrest this afternoon.
Royce Lynn Baxter, 59, of Long Beach, Wash., was already in the Thurston County Jail for burglary and stalking, and was planning to kill or have killed the detective who put him there, according to the sheriff’s office.
Royce Lynn Baxter
Baxter had been arrested in December for first-degree burglary and stalking in connection with a woman who lives outside Tumwater, a woman he’d been infatuated with some dozen years, according to Lt. Greg Elwin.
The detective was tipped on Wednesday about Baxter’s plan, Elwin said.
“From jail, he was trying to, first of all, put in motion a plan from jail so once he made bail, to kill one witness and the detective in the case,” Elwin said.
Elwin said Baxter made arrangements to get an untraceable cell phone, a car not registered to him and to get guns to Olympia.
An undercover sheriff’s deputy acted as the potential hired killer during the investigation, Elwin said.
Elwin said the investigation showed at first Baxter wanted to do it himself, targeting detective Dave Haller and the husband of his stalking victim.
“But he didn’t have enough money to pay for both, so he called off the hit on the husband and put all his resources on Haller,” Elwin said.
Elwin said the investigation revealed Baxter had taken significant steps to include other people in his plan.
Baxter relayed a request to the person he thought he was hiring – which was actually an undercover deputy – to retrieve three guns from his home in Long Beach and put them in a car he could use to flee the area, according to Elwin. The firearms were seized.
Baxter was arrested about 4 p.m. today for conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.
Tags: By Sharyn L. Decker, news reporter