FAIRBANKS—Arvin Kangas is not on trial for murder, but his belligerent behavior and abusive attitude are front and center in the trial of his 22-year-old son, charged with killing two troopers in 2014 when they tried to arrest Arvin.
"I told Arvin that I hated him because he ruined my life," Judy Kangas testified Monday about comments she made to her husband two years ago, not long after the two officers had been slain.
She spoke of her husband as a tyrant who badgered his wife and sons and refused to work. "If I didn't have tea ready in the morning for Arvin, he'd holler at me," she said. "He demanded things from us."
"Two nights before this he hollered at my boys and they were out there cleaning the yard and they were crying. He didn't work anymore, so it was up to me to do two to three jobs if I could," she said.
There is no argument that the oldest of the two sons, Nathanial "Satch" Kangas, shot and killed Trooper Sgt. Patrick "Scott" Johnson and Trooper Gabe Rich, according to opening statements at the murder trial Monday. But they disagree about the mental state of the defendant, who opened fire as the troopers attempted to arrest Arvin Kangas on an assault charge.
District Attorney Greggory Olson said Nathanial "amubushed and slaughtered" the two troopers as they lay on the floor, while defense attorney Greg Parvin said it was an impulsive act that led Kangas to pull the trigger on a Ruger Mini-14, firing seven times in a couple of seconds.
He should not be convicted of first-degree or second-degree murder because there was no intent to kill the men, he said. "It was without forethought," said Parvin. "It was without any thought."
The defense attorney made frequent mention of the senior Kangas and his hostility, while the sins of the father came up with a couple of witnesses.
Judy Gau, a Tanana resident who saw Nathanial Kangas not long after the shooting, testified he was crying and saying, "Oh my God, I shot him, I shot him" and "See what the white man made me do."
"When Satch said, 'See what the white man made me do,' I said, 'Oh my God, this poor boy is brainwashed,' " she said. "That was my words."
She said she was referring to the group Arvin Kangas was involved in that called themselves the "Athabascan nation," which she said was "anti-white and anti-government."
Gau said Arvin Kangas "talked off the wall all the time" and she said she felt sorry for Nathanial. "My heart went out to him because he's such a good kid," she said.
Arvin Kangas, now serving an 8-year sentence for tampering with evidence at the scene of the trooper killings, tried to make it appear after the shooting that the troopers had drawn their guns.
Before the killings, when all the parties were still outside the Tanana house, Arvin Kangas demanded that he be allowed to go inside, use the bathroom and get his wallet and jacket.
Johnson refused permission as he wanted to keep Arvin Kangas in sight, according to opening day testimony. The officer gave Arvin's wife the OK to retrieve the items.
Judy Kangas said she went inside and saw Nathanial Kangas with a gun. She said she told him to put it down.
"Why didn't you take the gun away?" the attorney asked.
"I think about that every day. How come I didn't do this?" she said. "I think I was rushing myself to get his jacket and wallet," so that the officers could get Arvin Kangas out of Tanana.
While Judy Kangas was inside the house, Arvin Kangas decided he wanted to go inside against the wishes of the troopers, the prosecutor said. "At that point trooper Sgt. Johnson tried to stop him from going into the house," Olson said.
The officers and Arvin Kangas wrestled near the front door and they tumbled into the house, with the troopers telling him to stop. While that was happening, Nathanial Kangas stepped from a bedroom and shot the troopers.
"He fired those shots extremely accurately," Olson said in his opening statement. He said Nathanial was sober and should be convicted of both first- and second-degree murder. "The two can co-exist," said Olson. He also faces charges of tampering with evidence and assault.
Nathanial Kangas wore a dark blue shirt and sat quietly at the defendant's table, staring straight ahead as the trial opened Monday after a week of jury selection.
A jury of seven men and seven women, including two alternates, began hearing the evidence in a fourth-floor courtroom crowded with friends and family members of the slain troopers as well as by some off-duty law enforcement personnel not in uniform.
Mark Haglin, the village public safety officer for Tanana at the time, said that Kangas pointed the rifle at him after shooting the two troopers and that the officer said he believed he was "within a minute of dying."
He said he saw "intense hatred" in Nathanial Kangas' eyes and turned away because he said he didn't want to see a bullet coming at him. A moment later, Arvin and Nathanial Kangas struggled for the gun and the unarmed VPSO left the building and called the trooper dispatch office in Fairbanks.