SULTAN — An 81-year-old Sultan-area woman broke no laws when she shot and killed a home intruder in April, officials have determined.
Barbara Moles had “an absolute right” to defend herself, Snohomish County deputy prosecutor Craig Matheson wrote in his decision not to file criminal charges.
“She had no option but to use deadly force,” he wrote.
An investigation by sheriff’s detectives wrapped up in August and was forwarded to Matheson for review. The Daily Herald recently obtained his decision letter through a public records request.
Moles asked for privacy in the days after the April 28 killing. She later told TV news that she did what she had to do to protect her family. She did not return a phone call for this story.
The intruder, Steven Sheppard, 25, of Gold Bar, had targeted seniors before. He had spent time in prison for a robbery after he repeatedly struck a 60-year-old store clerk in the head with a metal bar.
Sheppard’s history indicated that “selecting the elderly couple as the victims of a potential robbery was no accident,” Matheson wrote.
That night near Sultan, Sheppard was walking around the neighborhood looking to buy methamphetamine, according to the police report.
He was armed with a knife and a “metal piece of rebar that was bent into the shape of a crowbar,” the report says.
He broke in about 8 p.m. through the kitchen window of the home along Woods Lake Road, west of town.
Moles’ husband, 75, confronted him. The older man had a rifle but couldn’t get it out of the case in time.
Sheppard was demanding keys. He hit the older man in the head with the bar and stabbed him in the abdomen, causing serious injuries.
Barbara Moles heard the commotion and came to see what was happening.
“Her husband is on the floor by that point bleeding and there is a guy raging through the house,” Sultan Fire Chief Merlin Halverson said in an interview the next day.
Sheppard stepped over the man on the ground and at some point began rummaging through the medicine cabinet.
Moles went to a back bedroom and pulled a .38 caliber revolver from the closet.
Sheppard was advancing on Moles when she opened fire, according to Matheson’s letter. He was struck multiple times and collapsed. He had pills spilling from his pockets.
Moles called 911. She stayed on the line for more than nine minutes before help arrived. The recording of her call was obtained by the newspaper.
She told the dispatcher: “This guy broke into our back room, stabbed my husband and beat him up, and I went and got my gun and he was ranting and raving and I shot him four times.”
She said she was afraid to put the gun down, though Sheppard looked “deader than a mackerel.” She said she would shoot him again if he moved.
Though tearful and worried, Moles was able to follow the dispatcher’s instructions to try to stanch her husband’s bleeding.
According to the fire chief, she was calm as police and medics converged on the house. She cried describing to detectives what had occurred.
Her husband was taken in a helicopter to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, where he spent time in intensive care. The family later sought donations through an online fundraiser for medical expenses and home repairs related to the violence.
In the autopsy, Sheppard tested positive for methamphetamine. His family told police he had been acting paranoid in the days before the shooting.
In many cases of home invasion, police determine the intruders were after drugs or drug money and chose known targets.
Yet there have been other times in the county over the years where homeowners have confronted and shot strangers during break-ins.
That includes an August shooting in Mountlake Terrace. The intruder allegedly was armed with a crochet hook while climbing through a window. He remains in long-term medical care. Police recently decided not to seek charges against the man who shot him.
In 2012, county prosecutors declined to file charges in two shootings of intruders. In one, a burglar was in the home and had a hammer. The other burglar had kicked down the front door.
A home intruder also was killed along Gothic Way in the Eastmont neighborhood of unincorporated Everett in June. He allegedly wore a mask and used pepper spray to demand money from people in the house.
The circumstances of that killing remain under investigation by the sheriff’s office. Few other details have been made public.
Rikki King: 425-339-3449; rking@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @rikkiking.
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