Port Angeles man facing murder charge

Published 1:25 pm Monday, May 18, 2026

PORT ANGELES — A Port Angeles man is expected to be charged with second-degree murder today during a hearing in Clallam County Superior Court.

Clinton Laverne King, 46, is scheduled to appear at 1 p.m. before Judge Brent Basden. He was arrested Thursday following a nearly three-month investigation that included 45 search warrants, the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office said.

King was being held without bail at the Clallam County Jail on Monday. He was arrested on investigation of the murder of Danny Steven Kendrick, 73, who was found Feb. 21 in the 6300 block of Deer Park Road east of Port Angeles.

Kendrick, found dead in the bed of the back of his pickup, died of multiple gunshot wounds to the head, according to court documents. The pickup was located over an embankment off Deer Park Road, the documents stated.

DNA evidence obtained from Kendrick’s pickup — including the steering wheel, a black glove and a screwdriver found near the tailgate of the truck — matched King after it was processed by the Washington State Patrol crime lab, according to court documents.

King denied being involved and repeatedly said “that’s not me” when questioned by law enforcement officers following his arrest last week.

Investigators located two separate scenes during their initial search on Feb. 21. One was about six miles up Deer Park Road, where Kendrick’s pickup was over the embankment.

Farther south, in the 7100 block of Deer Park Road, deputies located blood in snow on the road, a empty bullet casing that was the caliber from a pistol, a black glove and a small ring. Nearby, on the west side of the road, more blood was located in the snow, according to court documents.

Deputies established a timeline with Kendrick’s girlfriend and determined Kendrick had been concerned about lumber theft from one of his properties on Deer Park Road, which he typically checked at night twice a week, according to court documents. If he found wood recently stolen, he would check on the property more frequently, the woman told investigators.

About 11 p.m. on Feb. 20, the woman’s dogs woke up and she told investigators Kendrick got out of bed. When she woke up about 5:45 a.m. the next morning, Kendrick was still gone, according to court documents.

The woman drove from Kendrick’s house in the 3900 block of Deer Park Road to the 7100 block of Deer Park Road, where she located blood in the snow, according to court documents. She got out and looked around, but did not see Kendrick, the documents stated.

The woman then began to drive north on Deer Park Road and saw the top of Kendrick’s truck off the road. She saw Kendrick lying in the bed of the truck and noticed the truck’s taillights were missing, and she notified law enforcement, according to court documents.

Investigators processed both scenes and recovered two .45 caliber shell casings, a bullet fragment from the ground in an area with blood, a ring located near the first bullet casing and a black glove covered in white hair, according to court documents.

At the second scene, the missing taillights were located, one near the front of the hood of Kendrick’s truck and the other farther down the embankment, court documents stated.

Kendrick’s body was removed and an autopsy conducted on Feb. 25 determined he died of two gunshot wounds on the left back side of his head. He also had multiple blunt force injuries that included facial abrasions, lacerations and contusions. He had multiple rib fractures in addition to fractures of the cervical and lumbar vertebrae, and lacerations of the right lung, liver and right adrenal gland, according to court documents.

Detectives believe Kendrick was killed at the first scene and transported to the second scene, over the embankment, court documents stated.

Video obtained from a resident in the area identified several vehicles between 1:18 a.m. and 6:58 a.m. Feb. 21, when Kendrick’s girlfriend’s truck was seen traveling southbound.

The interior of Kendrick’s truck was searched on March 4, and several items were seized. DNA swabs also were taken and sent to the lab, according to court documents.

The lab returned results on April 2 with information that said there were three contributors to the DNA evidence. A male profile was designated and determined to match King through the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), according to court documents.

King’s DNA was on the black glove, the steering wheel and control arms inside Kendrick’s truck as well as the screwdriver found near the tailgate of Kendrick’s truck, court documents stated.

Detectives to conducted additional interviews with an informant at the Clallam County Jail, King’s girlfriend and another man who said he was with King when they drove up Deer Park Road in an attempt to steal wood and re-sell it. The man told detectives they pulled over at a gate and another vehicle stopped in the roadway north of the driveway in which King was parked. The man heard a horn multiple times and took off running into the woods, then reported hearing two to three gunshots about 20 seconds later, according to court documents.

The man said he kept running through the woods until he reached a motorcycle track on Deer Park Road, and it was daylight before he reached U.S. Highway 101, court documents stated.

Last Thursday, investigators located King along with two other men and King’s girlfriend, and they conducted surveillance as King drove a motorcycle along West Lauridsen Boulevard in Port Angeles. As detectives were obtaining a search warrant for King, they observed him replacing the tires on a white Subaru. Previous search warrants had been seeking photographs of the tire treads to compare to the crime scenes, court documents stated.

Once the search warrant for King was obtained, the Peninsula Crisis Response Team took him into custody in the 1300 block of West 16th Street — an event that led to a modified lockdown at nearby Stevens Middle School — and the Subaru was seized from a separate property in the 1300 block of West Ninth Street in Port Angeles, according to court documents.

The Subaru was placed into evidence storage as similar-looking tires were located but the rims were not, court documents stated.

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Editor Brian McLean can be reached by email at brian.mclean@peninsuladailynews.com.