RENTON, Wash. — A teenager was killed outside a Renton sporting goods store after an altercation Wednesday evening.
According to the Renton Police Department (RPD), the 17-year-old was shot at a Big 5 Sporting Goods parking lot around 7:45 p.m.
According to the RPD Communications Manager Meeghan Black, the victim and two other 17-year-olds were walking into the store when there was an altercation between them and a 51-year-old man.
The man told police he had just finished working as a "licensed" and "armed" security person before driving to the parking lot to pick up his son from a martial arts class. The man told police he has seen numerous crimes occur in the parking lots and conducts "overwatch" there to ensure his son is safe.
According to court documents from the suspect's first court appearance, he claimed to have seen the teenagers walking into the store with what he believed was a firearm and thought they were going to commit an "armed robbery."
The man told police that he approached them with his gun down, telling them to drop their weapons and put their hands up. According to the documents, security camera footage shows him confronting the teens with his firearm pointed at them. The teen can be seen throwing what is actually an airsoft gun to the ground.
The man said he had restrained one teen and saw another put his hand on the handle of the gun once, then a second time. At this point, the man told police he thought the teen was going to shoot and the man believed he had a "duty to act" to protect lives. Police said footage showed the teen only briefly lowering his hand towards his waist and said throughout the interaction, the teen's hands were empty.
Investigators said the footage they watched contradicted the man's statements in his police interview, according to the first appearance document.
The other teenagers in the group told police they were at the sporting goods store to exchange the airsoft gun because there was a functional issue with it. According to the teens, they told the suspect "numerous times" that the gun was not real.
The initial investigation revealed the suspect allegedly shot the victim during the altercation. He is being held in King County Jail on $2 million bail for second-degree murder.
The King County Sheriff's Office was having a training exercise in the same parking lot and was able to respond to the scene quickly. Deputies tried to perform lifesaving measures, but the teenager died at the scene.
Black said detectives would also ask the King County Sheriff’s Office deputies who were on the scene during their training exercise whether they saw or heard something.
“It just goes to show you that we have a crisis and epidemic in our communities all around the country, really, and that is with this gun violence,” Black said.
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