What is going on here? Early Saturday morning two people were shot, allegedly inside the CHOP zone. One of the people shot was a 19-year-old man who died from his injuries. The other person was a man in his 30s who was taken to the hospital by CHOP medics. That second victim has now come forward and spoken to KIRO 7 news. His name is DeJuan Young and he claims he was shot one block outside CHOP by either Proud Boys or the KKK.
He heard the first shooting and decided to leave. He reached 11th and Pike when a group of men intercepted him and shot him.
“So basically I was shot by, I’m not sure if they’re ‘Proud Boys’ or KKK,” said Young. “But the verbiage that they said was hold this ‘N—–’ and shot me.”
He says the force was so great it pushed him onto the hood of a car.
“And they stood over top of me and continued to fire,” he said. “I tried to protect myself and got shot in the arm. And they got away.”
Young made a point of saying the shooting happened outside the CHOP zone:
“I understand everybody’s going to say, ‘Oh, it was the CHAZ zone and ya’ll asked for the police not to be there, so don’t act like ya’ll need them now,” said Young…
“But technically I was outside that area,” said Young. “I was in Seattle streets. So what’s the excuse now?”
Before his interview with KIRO 7, Young made an appeal from his hospital room on Tik Tok seeking legal help and someone to tell his story.
A man who got shot in CHAZ now wants to sue the police for not responding fast enough to the "autonomous zone" where they have up barricades barring the police from entering.pic.twitter.com/6udR8zekik
— Jason Howerton (@jason_howerton) June 24, 2020
Before I say anything else about this, I want to say that Young’s injuries are serious. He posted an update today saying that last night his lung collapsed and he’s having other problems related to his injuries. He was moved back into the ICU. So he’s not out of the woods yet. I hope it goes without saying that whoever shot him deserves a long stint in prison for attempted murder. He has a GoFundMe page set up to help pay his medical bills.
That said, I’m not sure what to think about his story. He hasn’t provide anything specific to back up his claim that his attackers were white supremacists. In fact, he hasn’t even said how many there were or what they looked like. Presumably they were white but he hasn’t even said that directly.
I’m also not sure how this jibes with reports from Saturday about what happened. Apparently the 19-year-old was shot and died only about a block from where Young was shot.
One victim was reported undergoing CPR in front of the Rancho Bravo restaurant at 10th and Pine before he was transported to Harborview by the protest camp medical volunteers…
A security employee working in the area reported the shooter had been in a black SUV that arrived in the area on E Pine. A 911 caller told police a man carried a rifle out of the SUV before gunfire erupted, according to East Precinct radio updates. The man who was killed was hit by multiple shots on the southwest corner of E Pine in front of the Odd Fellows building. Camp security was reported following the suspect after the shooting. There have been no reported arrests by police.
The Washington Post published a different account of what led to the shooting:
After 2 a.m., the festivities turned violent. One eyewitness described an argument that escalated into a fight and resulted in 10 gunshots. The suspects fled while volunteer medics, who were stationed on the same corner, rushed to treat the victims. Upward of 20 “sentinels,” who provide volunteer security to the police-free protest zone, also responded to the scene.
What most accounts agree on is that the shooting happened near 10th and Pine where the 19-year-old victim was treated on a table in front of a taco restaurant. And Young says he was shot later at 11th and Pike. If you look at a map, this is just one block down away. It’s 0.1 miles according to Google Maps. That’s quite a coincidence to have two distinct shootings so close together within 15 or 20 minutes, each carried out by different assailants. At least I think that’s what Young is saying. I don’t want to put words in his mouth but I don’t see him claiming that the man who was killed was shot by the same people that shot him.
Here’s the KIRO 7 interview. I’m hoping to hear more from Seattle PD about what happened that night.
