Friday marks a year since Canonsburg officer shot and killed in ambush
Canonsburg Police Department made a display out of tokens sent to the department from around the country.
From left are Sgt. Don Cross, Les Bashioum (holding his son, Scott Bashioum’s, cap) and Chief Al Coghill.
A hat that Scott Bashioum frequently wore sits on a conference room table as Scott's father, Les, speaks during a visit to Canonsburg Police Department. At right is Sgt. Don Cross.
Les Bashioum holds a cap that belonged to his son, Scott Bashioum.
Scott Bashioum's name on the Fallen Officers Monument in Washington, D.C.
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
Police officers stand outside Church of the Covenant in Washington at the funeral of Canonsburg police Officer Scott Bashioum.
Community members honor Officer Scott Bashioum during his funeral procession through Canonsburg.
{child_flags:featured}Friday marks year since Canonsburg officer shot, killed in ambush
{child_byline}By Kathie O. Warco
Staff writer
kwarco@observer-reporter.com
{/child_byline}
{child_flags:featured}Friday marks year since Canonsburg officer shot, killed in ambush
{child_byline}By Kathie O. Warco
Staff writer
kwarco@observer-reporter.com
{/child_byline}
When Scott Bashioum told his dad, Les Bashioum, that he was going to join the Canonsburg police force, the elder Bashioum had a premonition that one day he was going to get the dreaded call that something happened to his son while on duty.
The elder Bashioum told his son he did not want him to become a police officer. He also told R.T. Bell, who was the police chief at the time, that he did not want his son to join the department.
“I told him I was very proud of him, but I don’t want to get that call,” Bashioum said. “Scott said to me, ‘What in the world could happen in Canonsburg?'”
“Scott and my other son, Michael, both fought in the Gulf War, and I never had that feeling,” he added.
In the early morning hours of Nov. 10, 2016, Les Bashioum got the dreaded call, almost eight years after the conversation with his son. Scott Leslie Bashioum had been shot in an ambush while responding to a domestic call at a house at 120 Woodcrest Drive. Bashioum was pronounced dead at Canonsburg Hospital about an hour after the 3:15 a.m. shooting.
Fellow Canonsburg Officer James Saieva, who also was shot, was flown to Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh with serious injuries.
The two officers, along with Sgt. Donald Cross, were responding to a report of a domestic disturbance at the home of Dalia Elhefny Sabae that had been called in by a neighbor. The 28-year-old Sabae, a native of Egypt, had an active protection-from-abuse order against her estranged husband, 47-year-old Michael Cwiklinski.
As Bashioum approached the residence, Cwiklinski immediately fired at him with a high-powered rifle from a second-floor window of the residence. Bashioum, who was hit twice, returned fire, emptying his duty weapon as he fired multiple shots at and through the window. Saieva, who was still in his patrol vehicle, was struck by one round fired by Cwiklinski.
Cross, who arrived on the scene moments later, saw Bashioum on the ground and moved his vehicle through the line of fire and was able to get the fallen officer partially into his vehicle. Peters Township Sgt. Matthew Collins and Cecil Township Sgt. John Holt helped Cross get Bashioum into the patrol vehicle so he could be taken to the hospital.
The Canonsburg sergeant then drove another patrol vehicle to Saieva, who was sitting on a curb. The two officers took cover behind a vehicle, and Cross got Saieva into a patrol vehicle as Collins maintained cover for the officers as Cwiklinski fired at them.
Cwiklinski and Sabae, who was three months pregnant with a son whom friends said she planned to name Antonio, were later found shot to death in a second-floor bedroom. Also found inside the home were propane tanks and an acetylene torch. Cwiklinski also had fired at his vehicle, which he had loaded with gasoline, propane and acetylene tanks, in an apparent attempt to ignite it.
When the call was made to the 911 center that morning, police Chief Al Coghill said there was no indication that a weapon was involved in the domestic dispute.
“For whatever reason, there was no mention of a gun,” the chief said. “Had it been reported that way, it would have changed the whole outlook.”
Cross said they tried to do everything they could for Sabae, taking her to a safe house the previous weekend. She got an emergency PFA order against her husband that was served on Cwiklinski that Saturday or Sunday, and followed up by getting a temporary PFA order at the Washington County Courthouse.
Coghill recalls her listening as she worked as a pharmacy technician at Jeffreys Drug Store while he answered questions that the owner of the store, Gerald O’Hare, had about PFAs.
“I felt for her,” Cross said.
Cross and Coghill believed Sabae and Cwiklinski met online in Russia while she was working there for the Egyptian government. Both said she was an intelligent woman, working to get a pharmacy degree so she could work as a pharmacist in this country.
Cross, who returned to work earlier this year, said it has been difficult. Saieva also has returned to work.
“At first I felt unsafe and skittish,” Cross said. “I still feel more anxious, especially about some calls.”
The sergeant related a call last month for shots fired a block away from the duplex where Bashioum was killed.
“The call came in as shots being fired and a white sport utility vehicle fleeing the scene,” Cross said. “I had to answer it, but it was a reminder to me.”
Fortunately, the call proved to be unfounded. The woman who called it in was not sure she heard gunshots, but was scared.
Mayor David Rhome said what happened the morning Bashioum was killed brought the Canonsburg community together. But he said some still choose to run away from the issue of domestic violence.
“Domestic violence still gets shoved into the corner,” Rhome said.
Les Bashioum said he and his wife, Bobbi, still struggle with the loss of their son.
“He was a good kid and always there for us,” Bashioum said. “He remembered what he was taught. I told all my kids to always give a good, firm handshake. And love, honor and obey.
“When you lose that person, it is like you lose the left side of your heart. And my heart hurts all the time,” he added.
Bashioum said that when he comes to the police station, he loses all fear and finds some comfort.
“These guys love me for who I am,” he said.
Coghill said his stepson told him several years ago that he had met a Canonsburg police officer and wondered who he was.
“He told me how the officer squeezed his hand,” Coghill said. “I knew right away it was Scotty.”
During Bashioum’s pre-funeral viewing last November, his father said many people had stories and kind words about their encounters with his son.
“I told each of them, when you leave here today, find someone and tell them that you love them,” Bashioum said. “I didn’t realize how much he reached out and touched so many lives.”
In addition to his patrol duties, Scott Bashioum was the department’s motor carrier enforcement officer as part of the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program, inspecting trucks going through the borough as well as working with MCSAP officers from surrounding municipalities.
“He was one of the first in the area and often worked to train the others,” Coghill said.
It was only natural that he became a vehicle enforcement officer after spending years underneath rigs, working on his dad’s truck. Les Bashioum was a truck driver for 38 years.
“The certification was a formality for him,” Coghill said. “He could tell by looking if there was a problem with a truck.”
The chief said he was surprised by the outpouring of support from across the country after Scott Bashioum’s death.
“We had food piled as high as the ceiling,” Coghill said.
Lori Sheldon, the department’s secretary, helped tremendously in the hours, days and months after the shootings, “keeping (the department) together,” he said. She also made a collage of some of the cards sent from across the country on a cutout of the United States.
Bashioum will be remembered during a ceremony at 9:30 a.m. Friday when the South Central Bridge over Chartiers Creek is renamed for him. There also will be a candlelight vigil at 7 p.m. on the lawn at the Canonsburg Borough Building at 68 E. Pike St.