College Place man shoots himself rather than face arrest

Associated Press

COLLEGE PLACE — A 20-year-old man confronted by police seeking to arrest him on felony warrants shot and killed himself, police said.

Three Walla Walla officers and one from College Place went to a College Place apartment Tuesday to arrest Adam M. McBride.

Walla Walla police had learned McBride was at the apartment, and asked a College Place officer to assist them, Walla Walla Police Chief Chuck Fulton said.

A woman related to McBride opened the door and spoke with officers, College Place police detective Roger Maidment said.

McBride then came out of a bedroom with a 9mm pistol, Maidment said.

The woman stepped aside, and officers drew their handguns and ordered McBride to drop his weapon.

McBride instead backed out of view behind a dividing wall. Officers heard a single shot and McBride collapsed to the floor, Maidment said. The young man was pronounced dead at a Walla Walla hospital.

He apparently died of a single gunshot wound to the head, said Walla Walla County Coroner Stephen Ames. An autopsy likely will not be performed, Ames said.

McBride had been sought on two felony warrants from the Kennewick area, Fulton said. He also was sought in the theft of a pistol and a credit card from a Walla Walla home.

In June 1998, a story in the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin chronicled McBride’s troubled past and efforts he and his family made to overcome it. In high school, McBride had problems with drug and alcohol abuse, fighting and stealing, the article said.

"I hit rock bottom," McBride, then 17, told the newspaper. "I had a suicide pact with friends: death rather than jail."