Firing an AK-47 semiautomatic pistol through an opening in the door to his south side flat, suspected gun dealer Jordan P. Fricke killed Milwaukee Police Officer Matthew Rittner with a shot that pierced his aorta and both lungs, a criminal complaint filed Sunday said.
Fricke fired the Serbian-made weapon through the hole — opened by Rittner with a battering ram — despite officers repeatedly yelling “Police!” and “Search warrant!” the complaint said.
Fricke, who said he had been in bed with his girlfriend and was awakened by loud noise, admitted hearing the shouts at least twice but said he didn’t think it was actually the police trying to enter his flat, according to the complaint.
The 26-year-old man, described by friends as an unemployed “couch potato” who lived in his grandmother’s duplex, and by authorities as a gun peddler and small-time marijuana dealer, appeared in court Sunday on charges of first-degree intentional homicide with a dangerous weapon. He also is charged with maintaining a drug trafficking place and with first-degree recklessly endangering safety, both felonies.
Court Commissioner David Sweet raised Fricke’s bail to $1 million. He is being held in the Milwaukee County Jail.
Fricke stands accused of killing Rittner, a 17-year member of the Milwaukee Police Department and a two-tour Iraq veteran, as Rittner and a team of officers served a search warrant in an investigation of illegal gun and drug sales.
For the department and for Milwaukee as a whole, Rittner’s shooting adds to a terrible eight-month stretch that has seen three officers killed in the line of duty — after no such deaths over more than 20 years.
Rittner, the latest to fall, leaves behind a wife — he and Caroline Rittner were married in September 2017 at Miller Park — and a young son. A former U.S. Marine deployed twice to Iraq, he was in vehicles hit by roadside bombs three times and joined in a four-and-a-half-hour firefight in which a fellow Marine was killed.
On the Police Department, he was cited for meritorious service for his work on the Tactical Enforcement Unit and was awarded a medal of valor after helping free hostages from a gunman in 2015.
The complaint paints a picture of Fricke, meanwhile, as someone involved in straw purchases of firearms that he and a friend later would resell at a profit. An informant told police that Fricke and his partner had others buy 13 to 15 firearms for them over the last five months.
According to the complaint, investigators found at least eight other firearms in Fricke’s flat besides the AK-47 pistol, along with a Taser and parts for assault rifles. In a safe, officers recovered $3,000 in cash.
Police feared it would be dangerous to enter Fricke’s upper flat, in the 2900 block of South 12th Street: They sought and obtained a “no knock” search warrant because they were told he might have firearms inside.
The complaint describes this series of events:
Last Dec. 27, police investigating a shots-fired complaint about eight blocks from Fricke’s home arrested a convicted felon who had a 9mm handgun, cocaine and the drug ecstasy. Checking records on the gun, Officer Rodolfo Ayala and Detective Edmund Fitting of the MPD’s special investigations division found it had been purchased at a gun show 13 days earlier by someone else. The purchaser, they believed, was an associate of Fricke.
An informant later told Ayala and Fitting that Fricke and his partner were using straw buyers to acquire firearms and then were reselling them. The informant also said Fricke dealt marijuana.
Alaya and Fitting had the informant buy marijuana twice from Fricke — on Feb. 1 and Feb. 4. At one point, Fricke asked the informant to go to a gun show and buy firearms.
Armed with the information, police obtained a search warrant and, on Wednesday around 9 a.m., executed it.
Nine members of the Tactical Enforcement Unit, all wearing black vests with “POLICE” written in white across the chest, back and shoulders, approached the duplex from the alley. Wielding a two-person battering ram and yelling “Police, search warrant!” they broke down the rear entrance door.
The team climbed the rear stairs to the upper flat, where Fricke lived. Officer Lane Grady, armed with a rifle, took the lead. Rittner followed with a one-man battering ram. Officers yelled out as they approached the landing.
Rittner hit the door three times with the battering ram, opening a large hole as another officer again hollered “Police!”
Then, from inside, came four gunshots. Only one struck Rittner, but it hit him in his left upper chest. Grady saw him fall, then moved to the hole in the door and aimed a rifle with a mounted flashlight through it and into the kitchen. There he saw Fricke with his hands in the air.
Rittner was carried to the backyard, where medics tried to keep him alive as ambulances raced to the scene. The 35-year-old officer was taken to Froedtert Hospital but did not survive.
Also in the flat with Fricke was his girlfriend, who was not named. She said she too had been awakened by the yelling and banging. She said she was standing next to Fricke when she heard police identify themselves twice but that Fricke opened fire anyway.
Fricke admitted to selling small amounts of marijuana and said he assembled rifles and sold them at gun shows.
Fricke said he never heard the words “search warrant.” He said he heard someone yell “police” at least twice but didn’t believe that was who was battering his door. He said he saw someone through the hole in the door, aimed his pistol there and fired.
“After shooting,” the complaint concludes, “the defendant stated he saw another person come to the door with “POLICE” written on his chest, and claimed that this was the point at which he realized it was the actual police.
“The defendant did admit that he knew that AK-47 ammunition was ‘devastating ammunition’ and that hitting someone in the chest with that round would probably result in that person dying.”
Until Sunday, Fricke had no adult criminal history in Wisconsin, according to online court records. In January 2015, his driver’s license was revoked for six months after he was found guilty of first-offense operating a vehicle while intoxicated.
Milwaukee police had confiscated a firearm from Fricke last summer after a shooting outside his home. But in that case, he was determined to be the victim — he was not hit — and had fired his own gun in self-defense, Chief Deputy Milwaukee County District Attorney Kent Lovern said Saturday. Fricke had called the police to report the shooting, Lovern said.
Fricke filed a petition in late January seeking the return of his gun. A hearing on his petition remains scheduled for Feb. 25 in Milwaukee County Circuit Court.
His preliminary hearing on Sunday’s felony counts is set for 8:30 a.m. Thursday.
The visitation and funeral services for Rittner have been scheduled for Wednesday at Oak Creek Assembly of God Church.
The public visitation for Rittner is scheduled from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Wednesday at the church, 7311 S. 13th St., in Oak Creek, with the service and military honors to follow. Rittner will be taken by procession afterward to Krause Funeral Home at 21600 W. Capitol Drive, in Brookfield.
A private visitation for Milwaukee police officers and firefighters and military personnel will be from 3:30 to 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the church.
The only way that Rittner’s Iraq War record is important is to show where this, now hometown violence, is getting it’s start.
As long as we are treated as occupied citizens, we are bound to act like hunted animals. There are very few people left who don’t , at least secretly, tense up when a cop is in their presence or behind them in traffic.
The cops could teach classes at the local community college called, Self Destruction- 101
They’ve gone from Barney Fife to Gestapo in my lifetime. I have to wonder if this can be corrected in my lifetime.
“Milwaukee police had confiscated a firearm from Fricke last summer after a shooting outside his home. But in that case, he was determined to be the victim — he was not hit — and had fired his own gun in self-defense, Chief Deputy Milwaukee County District Attorney Kent Lovern said Saturday. Fricke had called the police to report the shooting, Lovern said.
Fricke filed a petition in late January seeking the return of his gun. A hearing on his petition remains scheduled for Feb. 25 in Milwaukee County Circuit Court.”
This is why the pigs get smoked. In what world is this justifiable and he knew justice was never to be found in an admiralty court.