Father’s Day Standoff: ‘This is the Way I Want to Die’

It was a warm afternoon and the sounds of outdoor gatherings could be heard around the region. It was Father’s Day 2012.

For first responders, both on and off duty, it was another day.

For Army Gulf War veteran Richard Klementovich, it was the day he planned to die.

At around 2 p.m., a Doylestown Township police officer responded to 25 Bittersweet Drive and found a manila envelop sitting in the driveway of the large, well-kept home.

Inside, the patrolman found a note from Klementovich, a nearly 20-year veteran of the Clifton, N.J. police department, stating he had two rifles with scopes and 2,000 rounds of ammunition.

Shots rang out a moment later. A message from the Doylestown Township officer then went across the county-wide emergency radio system calling for additional units to assist.

Doylestown Borough police Cpl. William Doucette was among the first arriving units. His marked Ford Explorer took several hits from Klemntovich’s weapons. The officer was injured when a bullet kicked-up a piece of concrete.

A Doylestown Township police car took 50 rounds. Later an armed SWAT vehicle became the target, as Klementovich shot at police multiple times throughout the standoff, which garnered international news coverage.

Amazingly, no one was killed.

The 10-hour standoff required police and emergency personnel from nearly every department in Bucks County.

Police convinced the disgruntled father of young children to surrender. Shortly after, media gathered at the nearby Doylestown Township got their first look at the beefy, tattooed police officer covered with tactical paint as he was lead in handcuffs for processing.

Klementovich was convicted of turning his estranged wife’s house into a place that no one – residents or police – will soon forget. He was convicted and will now serve between eight and 20 years in prison.

Court documents and statements from police later painted a clearer picture of what caused Klementovich to go on his rampage.

“I get angry. Angry at this job and law enforcement,” he wrote to his estranged wife in an email. “And it’s them who I will take out my anger on. They will do the job I couldn’t and take my life.”

“This is the way I want to die,” he said.

On a day many were off celebrating the beautiful weather, officers rushed from Levittown, Quakertown, Bensalem and numerous other towns to help keep the peace.

It was an event that police, firefighters, EMTs, reporters and residents will talk about for years.

Instead of enjoying a cold frozen treat from Dairy Queen with my father like I planned to on Father’s Day, I rushed to Doylestown to tell the story of the men and woman impacted by Klementovich’s attempted suicide by cop.

I arrived moments behind some of the first responding officers, ducking behind a car as shots rang out a few blocks away, and spending the next several days – along with some excellent colleagues – chronically the events of that warm Father’s Day.

Aside from just being another story, it became a moment in my life when I really was able to appreciate the sacrifices and risks that first responders take every day. For that, I am forever grateful.