Crime Weekly - S3 Ep317: Firefighters Ambushed While Attempting to Control Fire

Episode Date: July 2, 2025

On June 29, 2025 two veteran firefighters - Frank Harwood and John Morrison - were ambushed and killed, with a third critically injured on Canfield Mountain near Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. The suspect, 20‑year‑old Wess Roley, reportedly set a brush fire to lure first responders, then opened fire from a concealed position before taking his own life. We're coming to CrimeCon Denver! Use our code CRIMEWEEKLY for 10% off your tickets! https://www.crimecon.com/CC25 Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod   

Hey everyone, welcome back to Crime Weekly News. I'm Derek Lavassar. And I'm Stephanie Harlow. And we're going to be discussing a shocking act of violence in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho where firefighters responding to a brush fire on Canfield Mountain were ambushed. Two brave heroes lost their lives and the third was critically injured after a man they say intentionally set ablaze to lure the first responders into a sniper style attack. Authorities tracked the suspect via cell phone data and found him dead

with his rifle hours later and confirmed this was a premeditated ambush. This story is extremely close to me. For those of you who don't know, my brother has been a firefighter for 12 years. Originally, when I started my career in Central Falls, Rhode Island, I was a police officer. My brother was a firefighter, and we had a unique situation where we were in the same building. So the fire station and the police station are attached to each other, and our parking lots are actually connected. So many times I would come out to the back lot, and I'd be going to my cruiser in the

middle of a 95 degree day with my bulletproof vest on, and my brother would be cooking on the grill or shooting hoops in the backyard with his buddies and I would always make fun of them and be like, oh you guys are really busy today and they would say hey you took the wrong test and it was a lot of like fun and games and you know we bust each other's chops but I will tell you those were the things I remember but the things that really scared me were when I'd be driving around the city and I'd hear over the radio that there was a structure fire or there was some type of an emergency that fire was needed and

instead of being the person running into it, I would be the person setting up a perimeter and watching my brother gear up and go into this house that was on fire 50 feet in the air. And it was some of the worst days of my life. And it felt like, minutes felt like hours. And I would sit there and as his older brother, you know, I know he's an adult and I know he can do what he's trained to do.

And he's a badass, right? He has no fear, but I couldn't help, but literally be petrified every time he would go in there and my knuckles would be white. And I'm sitting there trying to you know direct traffic when knowing my brother is inside that building right now and it took everything in my power not to go through an oxygen tank and go in there with him so this story you know when I first heard about it and this isn't the first

time something like this has happened it makes me emotional because I always knew the risks that I was taking when I ran into a building and like it's easier for you to justify it when it's yourself. But when it's someone you care about, it's 10 times worse. I'm not in law enforcement no more. I'm not in public service anymore.

My brother is still an active firefighter in one of the busiest departments in our state. And every time I hear about these stories, it sends a chill up my spine because the reality is it happened here in Idaho, but it can happen anywhere. And these first responders, especially firefighters, are at such a tactical disadvantage because most of the time, people are happy to see firefighters, not cops, right? They're the good guys. They're the heroes. Nobody hates firefighters. Now you have these imbeciles, these monsters out there who,

for whatever reason, are deciding to attack the people who are literally coming there to risk their lives for you. And these cowards are calling the firefighters over the cops in some cases, because they're not even giving them a chance to defend themselves because they know they're not showing up with guns. Cause this guy didn't have the balls to call the cops. He could have probably taken out a couple of them as well,

because they wouldn't have been aware of it, but at least they could have shot back. But these poor firefighters, three of them, some of them have families, are going there to try to help people to try to protect property. And this scumbag's in the middle of nowhere from however far away, shooting them at a distance because

He's too scared to face them himself So and then on top of all that he shoots himself But at least what it looks like like the ultimate coward move so I do apologize for getting a little fired up But I heard this story last night I didn't even mention it to you You just said to me in a text like we, we're covering this today. And I'm like, absolutely. I've been following it. Yeah, and it's crazy.

And I wish I could say this was like an anomaly and it's the first time it's ever happened, but we know that's not the case. And it's probably gonna happen again. And candidly, I don't know if we can fix this, but we still have to talk about it. So I just gave the overview. Maybe you can give more of the details on this because it's still kind of an evolving situation and there's not a ton of information

out there, but every hour something new is getting released. There's a lot of rumors and speculation at this point. But basically the facts are that on Sunday, June 25th, 2025, a brush fire broke out on the slopes of Canfield Mountain, just north of the usually quiet town of Coeur d'Alene in Idaho. Now this kind of call is pretty routine for fire crews during the summer. It's hot, dry, dangerous, but nothing they haven't handled before. What the firefighters didn't know as they headed up that mountain was that this fire had been set deliberately, not as an act of arson, but as a trap.

So just before 2 p.m. fire crews from Coeur d'Alene and Kootenay County, they arrived at the scene, they began assessing the terrain, prepping for containment. That's when the first shots rang out. Without warning, a high-powered rifle opened fire from a concealed vantage point in the rugged brush. It was a sniper attack, well-pl planned, methodical, merciless. The scene exploded into chaos. We've got calls and transmissions coming in and out from there. Firefighters scrambled for cover. Radio calls to dispatch were frantic. One chilling 901 recording captured this moment where they said two battalion chiefs down or pinned down. It was set to intentionally draw us in. so they knew what was happening when the fire when the firing started they they realized

what was going on by this time the first wave of gunfire ended two firefighters were dead one from Coeur d'Alene a fire department another from Cunani County Fire and Rescue a third was critically injured and rushed to surgery looks like he might make it thankfully yeah he survived he's in stable condition now. Law enforcement from every direction descended on the mountain more than 300 officers, snipers, helicopters, SWAT teams, FBI tactical units. A shelter-in-place alert was issued for the surrounding area obviously because they hadn't caught anybody at that time so they don't know like what is this person's motive? What is he doing this for? Is it just random acts of violence? He doesn't care who he hurts, or are they purposely and intentionally targeting firefighters?

Residents were told to stay indoors, lock their doors and wait. The mountain was at that point an active war zone. Now the shooter's identity was still unknown, but authorities did have a lead. Like Derek said, they used a cell phone tracking and they located an inactive device deep within the fire zone.

Just before nine p.m., a tactical team moved in and there near the origin point of the fire, partially surrounded by scorched earth and encroaching flames, they found the body of 20-year-old Wes Rowley. Next to him lay a high-powered rifle. He was dead. Like we said, we don't know if this was intentional,

if he did it to himself, or because of return fire, that's still being determined. It could have been a return fire, he could have done this to himself, we don't know. No, no, I mean, that is a good point. I know what you're saying there, like was he shot by an officer that was returning fire, or did he kill himself?

Yeah, because they brought in tons of law enforcement agents at this point, yeah. Initially, it felt to me like they had, he just killed himself, it was self-inflicted, but I could be wrong there. I hope one of us took him out. But I have a feeling when the gunfire started being returned in his direction,

he wasn't gonna give them the satisfaction and he probably took the coward's way out, but that remains to be seen. Yeah, I don't know. And obviously it's pretty easy to figure out once they do an autopsy Oh, yeah, they'll know from trajectory and ballistics whether who you know, they'll know within a couple minutes. I Would be leaning more towards that it was return fire

I hope so based on the type of weapon he was using I don't know you'd be better versed at this but a kind of assault rifle Would it be not To do that to yourself, you know, I don't want to describe it too much, but I will You could just put it under your chin pull the trigger and it's game over Yeah, yes, just put that since it'd be simple if they you know, listen this Idaho for anybody who doesn't know it I'm I'm not, Idaho is a beautiful state, but it's the origination, location of the Aryan nations.

Like, there's a big white nationalist population out there. I'm not saying most of Idaho is amazing, but that's where it originated. And there's a lot of anti-government sentiment out there. And we have to wait to see what happens here as far as the mental situation going on with this person and what they were going through, what their background is. Are they someone who is radicalized based on some certain ideologies? We have no clue at this point. I mean, he's so young. And if you see this picture of him that Shannon will be putting up, he looks like a little boy.

He looks so so. I mean, he's 20, but he looks even younger than that and obviously based on the timing and what you just said about the Aryan Nation there are Speculations that this does have something to do with that apparently good this shooting on Sunday happened 24 years to the day after a 2001 burning of an Aryan Nations compound in Hayden Lake, which is just seven miles Oh interesting. Uh-huh. I did not know that, okay. Of Coeur d'Alene.

This was a fire training operation, and the cabin and its compound had been sold to the department after the Arian Nation's national leader, Richard Butler, filed for bankruptcy over a settlement involving the shooting of a Native American woman and her son. And that site was torched by, guess who,

the Coeur d'Alene Fire Department during a training exercise. Okay. So the timing of that, having it, the Coeur d'Alene Fire Department during a training exercise. So the timing of that, having it be the anniversary, 24 years to the day, many people do not believe this is a coincidence, but as far as Wes Roley, we don't know, was he radicalized? Was he a part of the Aryan nations? Looking at his picture, maybe seems like he could be,

but we don't know anything about him yet, and obviously the investigation into his background, what his motivations may have been. There's even some rumors and speculation that he was born in Russia and lived in places like Florida and New York before he settled in Idaho. We don't really know anything about him at this point, but there are speculations, there are rumors, and he had to have had some motive, right? Unless this was just, like I said, a random act of violence, but why the fire department, why firefighters? Well, part of that could be that

they didn't call it into anybody. This kid could have set this fire knowing that both police and fire would respond and he was just gonna take out anybody who showed up. So it might not have been directed specifically at firefighters, but unfortunately, they were the first ones to get there. And then knowing by taking them out, law enforcement would respond. Maybe this person was planning on just like an all-out war. And it got, there was a lot

of people involved right off the rip. I was watching it late at night and law enforcement did the best job they could as far as getting in there and finding out where he is. But you're at a complete tactical disadvantage. This person knows the topography, they know the layout, and they know where you are, but you don't know where they are. And they could be hidden on an area where it gives them an advantage point to take these shots, especially if they're someone who's trained, or it could be a complete novice who doesn't have any clue what they're doing.

That's what I was just going to ask you, though. Do you think that it would suggest training that he was able to hit two people so quickly to them arriving? That's the scary thing about rifles, right? And I'm someone who owns a rifle and I know there's a lot of people don't think civilians should own AR-15s.

One argument you could make for that is that Stephanie, within one day, I could teach you to shoot an AR-15 from 100 to 200 yards away, and I could get you zeroed in, or I could let you hit a post-it from that distance. No problem, repetitively. Because the gun does all the work itself.

It's going at such a high velocity, you're using a scope. I could teach you within a day to be very proficient. So we don't know a lot yet, but that's something that almost makes it more difficult. Here's another scenario, right? Like if you're playing poker, there's statistical probabilities of what a professional poker player would do at each situation. Professional poker players have more trouble with the newbies than they do with other players because they're less predictable. Because they don't know what they're doing, so how can you

predict what they're going to do next when they don't even know what they're doing. So how can you predict what they're going to do next when they don't even know what they're doing? So from a law enforcement perspective, you're trying to figure out who you're dealing with here. You're trying to develop a profile as quick as possible. And I was starting to research the area because I'm thinking to myself, okay, if I was in charge of the command center here on this particular incident, how would I handle it? And based on where it is, and I don't know all the details, it seems like it's more of

a rural area. I don't think it's like a densely populated neighborhood. Very rural in this area. Yeah, Camp Field Mountain, yeah. I would imagine very quickly that they would be able to determine what owners live up in that area. Like who owns the properties up there? And what I would do is one, call every one of those properties to see if they answer

to make sure first that they're okay. But secondly, to see if any of them don't answer or if they answer and there's some type of hostility behind it, which may suggest that's who we're dealing with, right? Those are the things that I would start with. Because the number one thing is identifying who you're up against. So you can do a background on them and find out how do you approach it? How do you get to them before they get to any more of you? And then you want to set up a perimeter because you don't want this person to be in an area

where they're able to take out a couple people and then get outside that perimeter and escape out into the middle of nowhere without being caught. Because once they're gone, it's going to be very difficult to prove it was them if you don't have a gun and you don't have a location of where they are. Plausible deniability is not going to be the easiest thing to do here, but it makes it a lot harder for law enforcement to pin someone down on this crime. So there was so many things running through my head late last night when I was trying to play out how would I handle this.

And fortunately, unfortunately, however you want to look at it, if this guy took himself out he probably did us a favor because he probably would have gotten to a couple more people before we got to him unless They brought in some like excellent snipers who were able to draw fire to a different location And then you would eventually see the muzzle flash and once this person gives away their location from the muzzle flash Snipers are gonna take him out within a matter of minutes But it's drawing him in to shoot at something else. And the question is, who's gonna be that moving target? So, it's... it was a scary situation all the way around, and looking at it more from, like, a macro level,

you think about how easy it is for one person with this deranged idea to kill a lot of people very fast, and to put themselves in an advantage over an entire police department. So it can happen anywhere and it kind of sets up a blueprint. It's just disgusting to target first responders in any way. It's like firefighters don't do anything wrong. Yeah, leave the firefighters alone.

Nobody has a problem with firefighters, you know, this is not It's not like a political thing. It's not a legal thing or something that people have. Obviously people have issues with law enforcement. Who has a problem with firefighters? Like this is bananas. Speaking of politics, here's the bigger issue because some people are gonna make this a gun control issue and I kind of brought it up as well.

I don't know if we know the exact style gun that was used yet. If it was an AR-15, that's one conversation. Just says assault rifle, that's all it says so far. So that's probably an AR-15, but I would also argue that a hunting rifle, which is not on the table of being taken away from anyone, is even more lethal in this situation.

That's what it's used for. Yeah, depending on the ammo, yeah. Yeah, so I mean, if you had a 223 or a 305 or even a 300 Winchester, I use a 6.5 Creedmoor, which is another round, extremely accurate from long distances and a lot of the guns that you would shoot that from are not even in the conversation

as far as being taken away because the argument is it's for hunting. So I don't know, what are your final thoughts on this? There's really, there's no positive spin on this, right? There's no way to say like, oh, this is the good thing out of this two people lost their lives one person's in stable condition But their life is forever changed and you have multiple family members and friends who have lost a loved one now who? Are just within a matter of minutes their whole life has changed. Yeah, it's I mean they haven't named the firefighters yet. I've been

changed. Yeah it's I mean they haven't named the firefighters yet. I've been looking for that and kind of hoping that they would so that we could you know name them give them their names tell their families that our thoughts and prayers are with them but even if we don't have their names our thoughts and prayers are absolutely with them. So it's just it's really really difficult right now and you know I never know We're gonna have more information coming out, I would assume. I'll end it like this, because I think there's always a lesson

we can take from all of this. And I know with my shooting that I was involved in as a police officer, life is a light switch. One minute's on, the next minute it's off. That was the one thing, well, many of many things. But one of the biggest things I took out of that situation as a 23 yearyear-old was, you're not promised tomorrow.

And these firefighters and these police officers know the risks they run every day, but it can happen to any one of us. And it doesn't even have to be a situation like this, so don't sweat the small stuff, go out there and live every day like it's your last, because you're not promised tomorrow, and these stories are just constant reminders of that. So, like you said, our thoughts and prayers are with the family and friends of everybody connected to this, that entire community. If there's a major update in this case, if it takes a turn, we'll definitely update you guys. But that's it. Just everyone, as always, stay safe out there. We'll be back later this week. We're going to actually have a special announcement. It's a positive announcement regarding CrimeCon on Friday., it's a positive announcement, regarding Crime Con on Friday.

So it's going to be Darlie Routier part seven, the seventh and final part of the series where we kind of just break down and kind of go over everything we've discussed. And we talk about the interview with Danelle, which had a lot of high praise from you guys, so we really appreciate that. So again, everyone just stay safe out there and we will see you later this week. Yes, have a good day. Bye.