Drugs behind bloodbath in Seattle

Associated Press

SEATTLE — A drug-fueled rampage that left two men and a toddler dead and another child injured began as an argument between friends, relatives and neighbors said Tuesday.

The suspect, identified as Devon Jackson, was visiting his friend, Donte Coleman, at Coleman’s south Seattle apartment Monday night when a fight broke out, neighbors said.

Jackson was described by those around him as paranoid and very angry after 10 days of smoking PCP-laced, formaldehyde-dipped marijuana cigarettes, police chief Gil Kerlikowske said Tuesday.

Police called to the scene found the body of Coleman, 20, in one upstairs unit, and 23-month-old TreVieon Spruel in another. They also found 6-year-old Samunique Wilson, who is Jackson’s niece, in the unit with the toddler. She had multiple wounds to the head but was recovering.

Police later shot and fatally wounded Jackson, 20, who they say confronted them with a gun.

The toddler’s body was so bloody officers thought he had been shot, but the chief told reporters Tuesday that a .45-caliber handgun had been used to beat both children in the head. Police displayed the gun, its barrel tip coated in dried blood.

The toddler died of trauma to the head, the King County Medical Examiner’s Office said Tuesday. Coleman died of gunshot wounds to the head and chest.

Devon Jackson, 20, died of a gunshot wound to the abdomen.

"We looked out the window, and he was out on the balcony trying to shoot at somebody down below, but the gun was jammed," said Mary DeLora, 14, who lives next door to the Rainier Beach building where the killings took place. "The kids were inside jumping up and down, crying and screaming, and he was just telling them, ‘Shut up, I’ll shoot you, I swear to God.’

"Five or 10 minutes before he left the house, the baby stopped screaming and crying, and that was really weird because they had been crying the whole time," she said.

A 911 operator who heard gunshots in the background during a call dispatched officers to the residence at about 7:15 p.m. Monday.

Police saw Jackson on the balcony of an apartment. The man’s gun didn’t discharge, but he "appeared to be going through the motion of firing at officers," police spokesman Clem Benton said.

Jackson then jumped off the second-floor balcony and began running, Kerlikowske said. Officers chased him, and Jackson turned, pointing the gun at them, the chief said. Three officers fired about eight rounds, he said.

Jackson’s gun, recovered near his body, was empty, but Kerlikowske defended his officers’ decision to shoot, saying Jackson had "dry-fired" the gun at them from the balcony, so they knew it was either jammed or empty. He had then appeared to reload at the apartment before fleeing.