Highway honors fallen Springdale officer

NWA Democrat-Gazette/DAVID GOTTSCHALK Toni Boone, John T. Hussey's widow, wipes away a tear Thursday while speaking during the Springdale Officer John T. Hussey Memorial Highway dedication at Springdale's City Council chambers. Hussey was killed in the line of police duty in 1975. The new U.S. 612, the northern bypass of Springdale, was dedicated in honor of Hussey.
NWA Democrat-Gazette/DAVID GOTTSCHALK Toni Boone, John T. Hussey's widow, wipes away a tear Thursday while speaking during the Springdale Officer John T. Hussey Memorial Highway dedication at Springdale's City Council chambers. Hussey was killed in the line of police duty in 1975. The new U.S. 612, the northern bypass of Springdale, was dedicated in honor of Hussey.

SPRINGDALE -- Toni and John Tillman Hussey were married for 13 months and 13 days when the worst happened.

John Hussey, a Springdale police officer was kidnapped and killed Dec. 21, 1975, after pulling over a car with an expired license plate for speeding near the Northwest Arkansas Mall. His backup arrived just four minute later and found Hussey's police car with the lights on and the door open, but Hussey gone.

Springdale and the Arkansas Department of Transportation honored Hussey on Thursday in an afternoon ceremony at City Hall. Officials presented a sign dedicating U.S. 612, Springdale's northern bypass, as the John Tillman Hussey Memorial Highway.

"This will forever stand in memory to John," said his widow, Toni Boone. Boone and her husband traveled from Wilsonville, Ore., for the ceremony. Hussey's brother Ross and family came from Little Rock.

"I remember the knock on the door when it came 43 years ago," said Ross Hussey. "I could hear the voices when dad opened the front door, and they told him John was missing.

"He was three years younger than me, and we were very close. I miss him."

Former Springdale Police Chief Mike Blocker, then 27 years old, served as lead detective in the case, working closely with Richard J. "Dick" O'Connell, a 30-year-old FBI agent assigned to Fayetteville. Both recalled those days with voices that cracked with emotion.

O'Connell detailed the investigation, from finding a burned van on Arkansas 16 to being led by a hunter to Hussey's body a few yards away. The investigation spread across the country, with help and tips from other many agencies, as they chased and arrested two men for the crime. James Renton was captured in Colorado, and Harold Cassell was caught in Montana. Another suspect committed suicide, and the other was never found.

Both Renton and Cassell were found guilty of capital murder and sentenced to life in prison. Renton died Oct. 16, 1996, in a New Mexico prison. Cassell died Oct. 7 of natural causes in the Cummings unit of the Arkansas Department of Correction, confirmed a spokesman with the department.

"No one else could have done more than they did," Boone said of O'Connell, Blocker and the rest of the Police Department. "The right people were put in jail, and they died there. They lived decades beyond what they gave John and what they deserved."

Hussey was 22 years old when he was killed.

"Springdale always has the right people at the right time," said District Judge Jeff Harper. "Somebody's always willing to step up."

Harper served the department as a dispatcher in 1975. He came to work and wondered why so many cars were in the parking lot because the calls usually came pretty slowly on a Sunday.

"We are thankful we know John's fate," said Mayor Doug Sprouse. "He's been entrenched for a while in a much better place than us."

Boone shared some stories about John she thought most didn't know. She talked about his impish grin, horrible puns and rampant practical jokes.

He wanted to be a pilot in the Air Force, she said, but his vision was too weak. He was then torn between music, for which he had a great talent, and law enforcement to follow in the footsteps of his father.

Hussey was the music leader at their church and was to direct and sing for the church's Christmas cantata, scheduled for the day after he died. "That cantata didn't take place," Boone said. "His death didn't just impact the Police Department. It impacted our church."

Boone also shared that Hussey had been sick the week before his shooting and lost 11 pounds. But the sergeant called, waking the young patrolman up, saying the department was short-handed. "He said, 'The sergeant really needs me,'" Boone recalled. "He got up, got dressed and went to work. That's the kind of man he was.

The highway dedication in honor of Hussey started several years ago, when Teresa Hudson, Springdale police dispatch manager, saw similar dedications to fallen officers while she and her husband were on vacation. Knowing Springdale had a highway under construction, Hudson got the ball rolling, pulling the Springdale Fraternal Order of Police, the City Council and Washington County's Quorum Court on board for support.

The signs already stand in place near both entrances to the northern bypass, thanks to the Public Works Department, Sprouse said. "I told them about it, and in three days they had the signs made and in place."

Boone said she hadn't seen the signs yet, but that would be her next stop after the dedication.

"As the wife of an officer, I hope this never ever happens again," Hudson said. "The price they pay."

NW News on 10/19/2018

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