Officer who shot Carnegie woman resigns

Friday, April 7th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

CARNEGIE, Okla. (AP) -- A Carnegie police officer has resigned, three weeks after being involved in a fatal shooting that local Indian leaders suggested was racially motivated.

Officer Russell Williams said he has received death threats since the March 21 shooting of Carmen Ybarra. He shot the woman three times after she failed to stop charging at him with a broken shovel.

Ybarra was Kiowa-Apache, and the shooting raised questions of racism by local American Indian leaders.

On Thursday, nearly 200 angry Kiowa tribal members marched on City Hall to demand the town council fire Williams and Police Chief Randall Hileman. They carried 692 signatures and racial accusations against the Carnegie Police Department.

Williams, 30, chose to resign.

"The main reason I'm resigning is because of the death threats coming in," he said. "This is a small department -- this is a small town -- and I would never know if I were to go out on a call if I were going to get ambushed.

"My fiancee works here in town. We shop here. We get our gas here. If we ever wanted to go out to eat, there's only three places in town to go. We just don't want to live in fear."

Maureen Yeahquo, an outspoken tribal member, said she doubts the story of the death threats.

"I believe they're just trying to build their case," Yeahquo said. "If they are getting death threats, they are not coming from the Indians. Indians don't write letters like that."

Williams said accusations that he is a racist have bothered him greatly.

"Nobody came down here to ask anybody, but I'm part Cherokee Indian," he said. "And if I was such a bad person, why then has the Kiowa Tribe employed me as a security guard at the Kiowa Game Casino? I work part time as a security guard for the tribe."