National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial

Officer Rank: Deputy Sheriff

Memorial Panel: 30-W: 22

Department: Scioto County, Ohio, S.O.

End of Watch: September 23, 1931

Cause: SHOT

Age: 51

Years of Service: 5

Description: Sheriff's Deputies Willis and John H. Bending responded to a battery call where two suspects were wanted for stabbing another citizen. When the deputies arrived on the scene, they failed to hear warnings from another deputy that both suspects were armed. Both deputies were ambushed before they could get out of their car. Deputy Willis was shot in the neck during an exchange of gunfire. Deputy Willis did not return to work. His health deteriorated until his death. The death certificate verifies the cause of death was a direct result of the gunshot injury to the neck that Deputy Willis received in 1928. Deputy Bending was shot in the head, and killed instantly.