Authorities found five people shot to death inside a southeast Seattle home Monday morning and arrested a teenage boy in connection with the killings, police said.
The Fall City, Washington, killing was the 25th mass murder in the United States so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive. The nonpartisan archive defines mass murder as a murder in which four or more victims are killed.
The incident was among more than 425 mass shootings (in which four or more victims were killed or injured) across the United States so far this year, according to archives.
King County Councilwoman Sarah Perry said in an emailed statement Monday night that seven members of the family were involved in the shooting. Three of the people found murdered on Monday were teenagers and two were adults. A sixth person was injured.
Neighbors told local television news station KING that a couple and their five children lived in the house where the mass murder occurred.
King County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Mike Mellis said at a news conference Monday afternoon that several people in Fall City called 911 around 5 a.m. to report a shooting.
When deputies arrived, they immediately took one teen into custody, and the other injured teen was taken to a Seattle hospital, Mellis said. The two teens reportedly lived in the home.
Officers then entered the home and found five bodies, Mellis said. Two were adults and three were young teenagers, Melis said. The name has not yet been released.
“Once the body was found, it was clear that this was a very serious crime scene,” he said.
Mellis said there is no ongoing threat to the community.
“There is no reason to believe there will be any additional arrests,” he said.
The juvenile in custody was being held at the King County Juvenile Hall, Mellis said. A spokeswoman for the county prosecutor’s office said in an email that the boy will appear in his first court appearance on Tuesday or Wednesday.
Neighbor Lynne Trowane told KING. “I’m in complete shock and I’m in tears the whole time.”
Local Sheriff Patricia Cole-Tindall told KING she was “very sad and very upset” after learning of the shooting.
The Fall City murders seem to pretty much fit the definition of a type of crime known since the 1980s as a family massacre. These incidents often involve a person with a gun killing multiple close family members.
There is a tendency in American communities to interpret family separation as an isolated tragedy. But a 2023 Indianapolis Star investigation found they were occurring on average once every five days across the United States.
As the Star investigation pointed out, the United States probably does not have a good understanding of family murders because there is no centralized database that provides insight into the characteristics and prevalence of such crimes.
Mass shootings and mass murders occur at a high rate every year in the United States, leading to calls in some parts of the country for stricter federal gun laws. But Congress was unable or unwilling to implement such measures.
The Associated Press contributed reporting.
