A city police officer and father of four was killed early Thursday while investigating a suspected stolen car at New Plymouth High School. A 14-year-old boy was charged with the slaying.
Officer Ronald Wade Feldner, 29, was wearing a bulletproof vest, but Police Chief Fred Coburn said he was shot in the face with a small-caliber handgun. He died at the scene about 2:30 a.m. Two spent rounds were found near the body.Feldner was a drug education officer at New Plymouth Elementary School and a night patrolman for the rural community of 1,300 people about 50 miles northwest of Boise.
James Robert Lee Moore, 14, of Boise, was being held without bond in the Payette County Jail on adult charges of first-degree murder and grand theft by possession of a stolen car.
Payette County Prosecutor Bruce Birch said two other Boise boys, 14 and 15 years old, were transferred to Ada County on undisclosed juvenile charges after appearing before Payette County Magistrate William Dillon.
The three youths were arrested in Ontario, Ore., soon after Feldner was shot. Ontario police spotted the small car Feldner was checking in New Plymouth and trapped it on a dead-end street.
Coburn said Feldner apparently was checking the car, which was backed into a parking space on the east side of the high school, when he was shot. Residents who heard the shooting called the Payette County Sheriff's Department.
Ontario Police Chief Mitch Lawson said the suspect car was sealed until a search warrant could be obtained.