Good Guy with a Gun #265: Seattle, WA
A stranger put himself between a pregnant woman and her attacker. He retreated fifty yards into the park before he fired. | Original incident: July 21, 2024
These posts are based on our Good Guy with a Gun calendar. Today’s post is somewhat updated from the calendar version.
For those of us who don’t know Seattle, the Lincoln Park area is nice, quiet, and peaceful, with a suburban feel despite being within city limits. Lincoln Park itself is supposed to be really nice.
Which is why it must have been startling when, at 10:30 AM on a Sunday, a woman burst from a car in the parking lot and ran, screaming for help.
A 30-year-old man, the son of a Seattle PD lieutenant, saw the woman — and then he saw another man coming after her.
He put himself between the woman and the other man. He told the other man to stop as he started backing up with the woman.
The other man didn’t stop.
The man drew his gun and raised it, warning the other man that he would shoot.
He didn’t shoot, though, not for a while. He and the pregnant woman continued to retreat slowly into the park, hoping the other man would stop. Twenty yards, then thirty.
The other man followed them. He wasn’t armed, but he wouldn’t relent.
The man and the pregnant woman continued, forty yards, then fifty, deeper into the park. That had to have taken some time: time to reconsider, time to back off, time for either one of them to change course.
Neither did.
The other man walked toward a drawn gun with his bare hands, the whole way, and never once let up.
Eventually, the stranger fired. He hit the other man in the hip, finally ending the confrontation.
The woman was four months pregnant. Police say the man “shielded and protected the woman as the suspect advanced on them” the entire way back through the park.
The other man — we only know his age, 27 — was taken to the hospital in critical condition. He survived, and by the next day SPD had booked him for second-degree assault and unlawful imprisonment — domestic-violence charges, with a felony domestic violence assault charge expected to follow.
The man who had defended an unknown pregnant woman was also arrested that Sunday afternoon. Thankfully, he was released later that day.
This story made an impression on Mrs. Good Guy with a Gun. A woman ran into a public park on a Sunday morning asking strangers for help, and one of them held his ground for half a football field’s worth of walking backward, until he didn’t have a choice left.
As is common with domestic violence stories — those that end well, at least — there’s essentially no detail to follow. I hope she and the baby are doing well.
Sources
MyNorthwest and KIRO 7 ran identical pieces, byline and all.
SPD: Armed good Samaritan saves pregnant woman from attacker (MyNorthwest)
SPD: Armed good Samaritan saves pregnant woman from attacker (KIRO 7)
West Seattle Blog did some great reporting, running two posts that carried every fact that mattered. Score another one for the locals. There are lots and lots and lots of comments, too — though of course you should never read the comments on most blogs.
UPDATE: Shooting at Lincoln Park, under investigation as self-defense (same-day live updates; first with the ages and the lieutenant’s-son detail)
FOLLOWUP: Man who shot domestic-violence suspect at Lincoln Park released from custody (next-day followup with the specific charges and the bystander’s release)