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December 30, 1978, Saturday, Final Edition
Caretaker at Fairfax School Slain by Police;
Police on Stakeout Slay Custodian at Va. School
BYLINE: By Athelia Knight, Washington Post Staff Writer
SECTION: First Section; A1
LENGTH: 589 words
There had been a series of burglaries at the secluded,
red-brick Talent House Private School off Arlington Boulevard, troublesome
enough for owner Eldon Merritt to offer a $500 reward to his employes for help
in stopping the crimes.
In the early hours of yesterday morning, part-time school
custodian John Jackson, 33, of Manassas, armed with a 22 caliber revolver,
returned to the darkened school building, drove up its long, tree-lined
driveway and let himself through the kitchen door.
According to accounts pieced together yesterday, Jackson, a
trusted worker at the school where he had been employed for six or seven years,
believed the single-story structure was empty. It was a fatal mistake.
Waiting quietly inside, unknown to Jackson -- and to do the
school's owner -- were two Fairfax County police officers staking out the
premises.
Police said yesterday that the two, Offices David Lubas and
Nancy Lutz, both in plain clothes, confronted Jackson and ordered him to put
down his weapon. Jackson raised his hand, police said, Lubas fired three times,
striking Jackson twice in the torso and once in the hand.
Jackson, who did not return the fire, was taken to Fairfax
Hospital where he died at 3:37 a.m.
Lubas, a three-year veteran of the county police force, was
placed on administrative leave yesterday pending the completion of an internal
police investigation of the incident.
Merritt said yesterday he was shocked by Jackson's death.
"I thought he was a terrific man. I thought the world of John. He would never
take anything. I trusted him."
David Feldman, an attorney and friend of the Jackson family
who said he had been asked to look into the death, said. "I just can't
understand how the man got killed. I don't know whether it was somebody got
trigger happy or what. It's one damn terrible mistake."
According to police and Merritt, the school, located at 9211
Arlington Blvd., had been burglarized five times between Oct. 20 and Nov. 5.
Television sets, money and food were taken in the burglaries.
Officers from the Mason District station had staked out the
school on 20 nights since Nov. 5, police said.
"I don't know why it happened,"
Merritt said, however, that he was unaware of the stakeouts.
He said police apparently were given a key to the school by an assistant
director on the staff. Merritt said Jackson was unaware of the stakeout.
said Merritt, who closed the school yesterday because of the
shoting, "A good man's life was lost."
According to the police accourt, Lubas and Lutz arrived at
Talent House after midnight. Officers on the stakeout generally went to the
school after the cleaning crew had left, police said, and stayed until about 5
a.m.
Jackson, who also held a fulltime job as a laborer for
Vepco, had cleaned the school, with this wife's help, on Thursday night. Then
he drove his wife to Manassas and left her with the couple's 2-year-old
daughter before returning to Fairfax.
Jackson arrived at the school about 1:30 a.m. He let himself
in the back door with his key and walked in the back the ktchen. Lubas and Lutz
stood silently in the main office where they could watch both the front and
back entrances.
Police said Lubas then appeared at the kitchen doorway,
indentified himself as a police officer and ordered Jackson to drop his gun.
When Lubas fired. Police did not say whether the rooms' lights were switched
on.
Deputy Police Chief Kenneth R. Wilson yesterday declined to
comment on the case.