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P
eople who knew the two men shot and killed in Franconia on Friday night said it was a tragic end to a long, contentious relationship.

Friends and family of Liko Kenney said he was hot-tempered and defiant toward authority figures. They said Bruce McKay, a Franconia police corporal, had had many run-ins with the 24-year-old and other members of his family.

Kenney was convicted in 2003 of assaulting McKay and resisting arrest, Attorney General Kelly Ayotte said yesterday. She had no other details about the incident.

Meanwhile, Kenney's uncle, Bill Kenney, said his nephew tried to press charges against McKay several years ago, after Liko Kenney alleged McKay and another police officer had kicked him in the head and broken his jaw at an underage drinking party. Because there were no witnesses - other partygoers fled when the police arrived - Bill Kenney said nothing ever came of the allegations.

Bill Kenney called his nephew a "loose cannon" with a bad temper but also said that McKay was a "rogue cop" who had targeted his nephew and the family for years.
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One of Kenney's first cousins, ski champion Bode Miller, told Sports Illustrated last year that he, too, had a rocky relationship with McKay and believed that the local police watch him closely. He contested a $500 parking ticket and represented himself in Littleton District Court in October 2005, "to try and get my fine reduced and to antagonize McKay," he told the magazine.

McKay was the town prosecutor and represented the police department in criminal cases at Littleton District Court, Franconia Administrative Assistant Sally Small said. She declined to discuss the relationship between Kenney and McKay but said the officer was very professional.

Asked if McKay was well-liked, Small said: "It depends on who you talk to. Because there are a lot of people who think a lot of him, and I'm sure those who came up against him in court didn't think a lot of him."

Bill Kenney described Liko as troubled, but not violent.

"He was definitely part of the family, but we all had a little bit of a tenuous relationship with Liko," Bill Kenney said. "I consider him a loose cannon, volatile."

Liko Kenney and Bode Miller grew up together near the grounds of the Tamarack Tennis Camp in Easton, which their grandparents started in 1962.

Bill Kenney said his nephew had a tough upbringing. His parents, Dave and Michelle Kenney, run a coffee plantation in Hawaii, and for years the family spent their time split between Hawaii and New Hampshire. Liko was often in trouble at school and dropped out of Profile High School in Bethlehem by the time he was in 10th grade, his uncle said.

"He had a lot of anger," Kenney said.

He spent several years living in Las Vegas and Washington state before moving back to New Hampshire about three years ago, according to his uncle. He loved the outdoors, his ATV and hanging out with his friends in the small house he lived in on Easton Valley Road across from the tennis camp. He had recently found a steady job at Agway in Littleton.

Connie McKenzie, a longtime family friend who lives down the road, said Liko Kenney was a handsome, smart, good kid. McKenzie said she was driving into town Friday evening when she saw McKay and Kenney by the side of the road about a mile from her house. At the time, McKenzie said she told her husband, "We're going to be reading about that in the paper next week."

"I was really sorry I didn't stop and say, 'Oh, can we help out or something,' " she added. McKenzie said she knew Kenney and McKay "hate one another," and that Kenney had some emotional problems.

When she saw police lights as she approached her house, she said she knew something had happened between Kenney and McKay. The routine traffic stop had turned into a chase that ended across the street from her house, where Kenney shot McKay, who stumbled across the street and collapsed on her front lawn.

"This was an accident waiting to happen," McKenzie said.

She wondered yesterday why Liko Kenney felt he needed a gun to protect himself. Another family friend, Rob Hayward, said Kenney was afraid of McKay, and Bill Kenney said he thinks that is why his nephew carried the weapon.

"McKay was going to provoke him one too many times," Bill Kenney said.

Hayward said the situation between Liko Kenney and McKay had been simmering for some time, but nobody in the town had ever looked into it. Hayward's son, who was killed in a car wreck in 2005, grew up with Liko Kenney, and Kenney was always at Hayward's house. Kenney still kept in touch with Hayward, and visited him Friday morning.

"He was a good kid," Hayward said. "He was not a thief. He was honest."

Hayward said he was also a friend of McKay and has known him since McKay joined the Franconia Police Department in 1995. Hayward said he got along well with McKay, who gave his son a break when he was pulled over several years ago. McKay was always trying to do his job and treated him with respect, but he said young people in town complained about problems with the officer.

Liko Kenney was "very, very afraid of Officer McKay," Hayward said.

"He was a good boy and I can't understand what brought it to this," he added. "Officer McKay was a good officer. Those two had their problems, but I don't understand how it got so escalated."

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By KATE DAVIDSON

__________________
Well there's one thing to know about this town
Not a person doesn't want me underground