Suspect in fatal shooting of Idaho firefighters left note about going ‘into battle’

The man who authorities believe fatally shot two Idaho firefighters before killing himself had once tried to enter the military and left a note addressed to his father in which he wrote he would "go into battle,” the Kootenai County sheriff said Tuesday

The man who authorities believe fatally shot two Idaho firefighters before killing himself had once tried to enter the military and left a note addressed to his father in which he wrote he would "go into battle,” the Kootenai County sheriff said Tuesday.

Wess Roley, 20, set a brush fire on Canfield Mountain near Coeur D’Alene on June 29 and then opened fire on responding firefighters, authorities said, in what they have described as an ambush. He later killed himself.

Roley had tried to enter the U.S. Army in Arizona in 2023 and again in Idaho in 2024, but he never followed through on appointments and was disqualified, the Kootenai County Sheriff's Office said in a news conference Tuesday.

He'd also entered a Coeur d’Alene fire station in May and asked about becoming a firefighter, believing he'd be able to start that day, Kootenai County Sheriff Bob Norris said.

When told there was a process, including tests and interviews, Roley became frustrated, and "it was described to us as he left there in a very, very frustrated and agitated state," Norris said.