He was shot and killed 21 years ago. But this Tri-Cities officer is not forgotten

Trooper James Saunders had been on the job for nine years when a traffic stop turned deadly.

After pulling over a small pickup on Road 28 in Pasco, the Washington State Patrol trooper called in the license plate and truck’s description to emergency dispatchers.

“Those words of professional precision were his last radio transmission,” said Chris Loftis, WSP’s communications director.

One minute later, dispatchers were alerted that Saunders had been shot. A witness used the trooper’s radio to call for help.

Saunders, 31, died about 9 p.m. Oct. 7, 1999.

He is one of 30 state patrol personnel who died in the line of duty since the agency was created in June 1921.

The first class of patrolmen were sworn in on Sept. 1, 1921, to enforce traffic laws across the state.

As the Washington State Patrol enters its 100th year of service with a “Centennial Year Celebration,” it is recognizing key historical dates and events in the agency’s history.

That includes remembering each officer who died, as their anniversary date approaches, by highlighting their life.

Saunders was the 26th WSP member to die while on the job, and the third to be fatally shot.

Every year, law enforcement officers from throughout the Tri-Cities gather at the time of his death for a memorial on Road 28, between Lewis and Hopkins streets, in front of Hillcrest Funerals and Cremation.

The spot is marked by a bench and granite monument engraved with Saunders’ likeness.

Loftis, in a news release remembering Saunders, said the trooper was survived by not only his widow and two children, but countless friends and colleagues, many still serving today.

“He also left behind a grieving state of Washington,” wrote Loftis, “well served by his nine years in the Washington State Patrol and honored by his selflessness.”

‘Lived life large’

Saunders, a native of Clarkston, graduated from high school in Leavenworth before getting an associate of arts degree from Wenatchee Valley College and a bachelor’s in political sciences from Spokane’s Whitworth University.

He joined the state patrol in January 1991 and was assigned as a trooper cadet to the Governor’s Mansion security detail. He was commissioned the following December, and assigned to the Kennewick detachment in 1996.

Saunders “lived life large, both in stature and in heart,” and “was well liked for his sense of humor and selfless nature,” said Loftis.

Billie Saunders was pregnant in 1999 when her husband died.

Four months later she had a boy and named him Jim Jr. after the dad he never got to meet. The couple’s daughter, Megan, was 2 1/2 at the time.

In the spring of 2019, following her graduation from the University of Washington, Megan Saunders was hired by the state patrol as a communications specialist. She now works for the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission in Burien.

Jim Saunders Jr. is in his junior year at UW, studying economics, according to the state patrol news release.

Trooper safety

After Saunders’ death, the state patrol started teaching cadets at the academy to approach stopped vehicles from the right passenger side, instead of walking up on the driver’s side.

That puts more space between the trooper and the driver, as well as increases the trooper’s safety by not being near the lane of traffic.

Nicolas Solorio Vasquez, the driver of the stopped pickup, took off after shooting Saunders several times.

Vasquez, who was 28 at the time, was a convicted felon who had been deported from the United States three times and was mistakenly released on bail for a Franklin County drug charge two months before he gunned down the trooper.

Investigators used fingerprints on the abandoned pickup to identify Vasquez, and he was caught after a 26-hour manhunt. He later pleaded guilty to aggravated first-degree murder.

Now 49, Vasquez remains in the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.

He tried unsuccessfully in 2002 to go back to Mexico to serve his prison term on the Pasco murder. Mexico does not have an equivalent sentence.

This story was originally published October 6, 2020 at 2:10 PM.