Ex-soldier tells court why he shot man

PHOTOGRAPHER: Steven Cook

A former Army sergeant stood in Schenectady County Court Monday and attempted to explain why he shot and killed a man last December.

Raymond Van Clief told the court that he believed his children were in danger. The man he shot, Elijah Trainer, whom his wife had taken up with while Van Clief was overseas, made a threat that Van Clief took seriously, he said.

The shooting happened after Trainer went inside the Paige Street home where Van Clief’s children lived with their mother and then came back out, and he and Van Clief had words.

“Having my kids hurt, it’s not an option,” Van Clief told the court Monday morning.

In sentencing Van Clief, Acting Schenectady County Court Judge Richard Giardino responded to Van Clief’s comments.

There were options for Van Clief other than shooting Trainer, the judge noted. No gun was found on Trainer, authorities have said.

“I look at this case as something that did not have to happen,” Giardino said. “I know in your heart you felt you had no other choice. In reality, you had other choices.”

Van Clief, 27, an Albany native, was sentenced to 23 years in state prison after pleading guilty earlier to first-degree manslaughter.

He admitted in September that he killed the 28-year-old Texas-native Trainer. Trainer was shot fatally on Dec. 23, 2009, on Paige Street.

The September admission concluded a complicated case that involved a soldier who served two tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan as an ammunition supply sergeant.

Van Clief returned home to a wife who had taken up with Trainer. Later, there was at least one documented case of domestic violence between Trainer and Van Clief’s estranged wife.

Van Clief’s comments came after comments from his estranged wife, Melissa Roddy Van Clief.

She gave her own brief statement, pausing several times to compose herself then ending her statement when she couldn’t speak anymore.

Raymond Van Clief and his wife had three children, two of whom were in Van Clief’s car during the shooting. The third was in the house.

The shooting caused the two children in the car to scream, Melissa Roddy Van Clief recalled. It’s also resulted in other difficulties for them.

“It didn’t have to end like this,” she told the court, “and then to do it in front of his two children …”

“They have nightmares,” she added later. “We have nightmares.”

Though the victim was the boyfriend of Van Clief’s estranged wife, Van Clief’s attorney Cheryl Coleman argued that the shooting was not the result of a “love triangle.”

Van Clief had already given up on his estranged wife, Coleman said.

“But he did not give up on his children,” Coleman said.

Trainer’s family lives in Texas. They had planned to make the trip to Schenectady for the sentencing, but ended up not being able to, Trainer’s twin sister, Mary Gaines, said Monday.

Gaines has said previously that the family didn’t agree with the plea deal and sentence. She said by phone Monday that they realized there wasn’t much they could do about it.

Gaines did try to refute claims by Van Clief that he was trying to protect his children. Trainer’s family believes Van Clief was acting as a “scorned man.”

“If [Trainer] didn’t have a weapon on him, how could [Van Clief] be protecting his kids from an unarmed man?” Gaines asked.

Gaines said the family also intends to take the case to civil court in a wrongful death suit. She said they were waiting for the criminal case to conclude before filing. Nothing has been filed yet.

After the September plea, Coleman indicated she had been prepared to argue self-defense. She also intended to argue that Van Clief suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, affecting his ability to judge danger.

In the end, Coleman said, there were problems with the self-defense approach.

She believed they could have proved that Van Clief believed he was protecting himself or his children. But the second part of the defense, that a reasonable person in that situation would have believed that as well, would have been problematic.

The night of the shooting, Van Clief, based in Kentucky, was in town for a family funeral. He was picking up his children on Paige Street when he encountered Trainer.

Trainer, attorneys said, made reference to a gun, left and returned. Van Clief got his own disassembled gun from his car and assembled it.

Trainer returned, and after more words, Van Clief fired, killing Trainer.

Van Clief then disassembled his gun and waited for police to arrive.

Van Clief’s actions after the shooting and since then helped prompt prosecutors to agree to the manslaughter plea, rather than murder and a possible life sentence.

Schenectady County District Attorney Robert Carney said after the September plea that they agreed to the resolution because ultimately they don’t believe that in 23 years Van Clief will be a threat.

He pointed to the Army sergeant’s actions immediately following the killing and since. Van Clief disassembled the gun and waited for police to arrive. He has since told the same story, not appearing to embellish it further in his favor.

Prosecuting the case in court was Matthew Sypniewski.