Trial of father of Marysville-Pilchuck shooter moves slowly

The father of a Washington state high school student who killed four classmates before committing suicide previous year was able to “slip” through the system to get the firearm his son used, media reports quoted federal prosecutors as saying on Tuesday.

The jury won’t be told that Fryberg’s son, 15-year-old Jaylen, last fall used one of the guns to shoot five of his friends, killing four, before taking his own life in a cafeteria at Marysville Pilchuck High School.The Frybergs gave police permission to search Jaylen’s room hours after the shootings.Investigators returned days later with a judge’s permission for a more thorough search.

During opening statements, Assistant U.S. Attorney Bruce Miyake told the jury Fryberg pleaded no contest in 2012 to violating that protection order.

Raymond Fryberg, 42, is facing six counts of illegal possession of firearms in violation of a 2002 court protection order that barred him from obtaining guns, an indictment shows. Fryberg bought the guns by answering “no” to a question on a firearms form about whether he was the subject of such an order.

Fryberg doesn’t face any charges related to the school shooting.

Browne also raised a conflict-of-interest claim about a tribal police officer. “Now we have 10 to 15 occasions where he was told by authorities he was not prohibited from having firearms”.

The problem started with the protection order, Browne said.

Fryberg’s former girlfriend, Jamie Gobin, received a temporary protection order from the Tulalip Tribal Court on August . 19, 2002, and hearings were set first for Aug. 27 and then for September 10 that year to consider whether to make the order permanent, according to testimony. The streets run parallel to each other.

Robart granted the prosecutor’s request to prohibit Fryberg from claiming that he didn’t know that he was prohibited from having guns because of the restraining order.

The officer who claimed to notify Fryberg was married to Gobin’s sister and reported serving the notice at a nonexistent address, Browne said.