Lifer gets two more life terms for drug killings
Published 9:00 pm Monday, January 28, 2002
SEATTLE — A man serving a life prison term without possibility of parole has been sentenced to two more life sentences for the drug-related killing of two men in 1997.
Duane Seraile, 40, who pleaded guilty last month to two counts of first-degree murder in the death of Ashante Elmore and Steven Deon Jones, was sentenced Friday in King County Superior Court.
In a signed confession submitted in court, Seraile said he shot Elmore and Jones, both 20, in the head at their West Seattle apartment on June 22, 1997, after they failed to deliver him some rock cocaine for which he had paid $225.
The case went unsolved until a Tacoma police detective gave Seattle police the name of an informer who directed them to Seraile in February 2000. By then Seraile was serving a life sentence at the state penitentiary in Walla Walla for a carjacking and killing in Tacoma in 1999.
Teen shot to death at party, man arrested: A teen-ager was shot to death after an argument at a party in the White Center neighborhood and a man was being held for investigation, police said. Police said an 18-year-old man died Sunday about two hours after being shot at a house where a crowd had gathered. A gun was recovered and a 24-year-old man was arrested in Shoreline. Sgt. Cynthia Tallman said the older man went to his car, got a gun and shot the younger man repeatedly in the torso about 1 a.m. Sunday after the two argued at a party.
Olympia
2-year-old dead, baby missing in trailer fire: A 2-year-old child was killed and a 3-month-old was missing and feared dead following a fire in a travel trailer Monday. The fire was reported at about 3:30 a.m. in the 2100 block of Maple Valley Road of Thurston County. The father suffered smoke inhalation when he tried to get back into the trailer and the mother’s hands were burned, the McLane Fire Department said. Both were taken to Providence St. Peter Hospital in Olympia. The family had been living in the 25-foot trailer parked on a relative’s property. Thurston County and state fire officials are investigating.
Port Angeles
Man held in fatal crash on Hurricane Ridge: A woman died when the Jeep Wrangler in which she was riding tumbled down a sheer 25-foot slope in Olympic National Park, and the driver was arrested, authorities said. Crystal R. Tetrick, 21, of Port Angeles, was thrown from the vehicle in the accident early Saturday on the Hurricane Ridge Road south of town, park spokeswoman Barb Maynes said. Two witnesses attempted cardiopulmonary resuscitation, but Tetrick was pronounced dead at the scene. Two other passengers and the driver, Arian K. Goodson, 26, escaped injury. Goodson was being held at the Clallam County Jail.
Tacoma
69-year-old sentenced to 68 1/2 years for rape-murder: A 69-year-old man has been sentenced to 68 1/2years in prison for abducting, raping, robbing and killing a woman who gave a friend of his a ride to his house. Prosecutors sought a longer term for Ray Saunders, but Pierce County Superior Court Judge Sergio Armijo told him Friday, "No matter what I do with you, Mr. Saunders, you’re being sentenced to life in prison." Saunders was convicted in November of first-degree murder, kidnapping, rape and robbery in the death of Marcia Carlson-Grissett, 48, but again told the judge he was innocent. Evidence showed Carlson-Grissett gave Leanna Bessie Williams, a stranger to her, a ride to Saunders’ house on March 1, 2000. Carlson-Grissett’s body was found at the house four days later. She had been beaten, shackled and raped, stabbed and strangled. Saunders, a drinking companion of Williams, wanted to watch the two women have sex and Carlson-Grissett was attacked when she refused, prosecutors said. Williams, 37, was convicted of the same crimes in March and was sentenced to more than 101 years in prison.
