Two men wanted in a deadly rush-hour mass shooting in downtown Seattle were arrested Saturday morning in Las Vegas, believed to have fled to an “associate” there after being identified by Seattle police as suspects in the high-profile crime, according to the U.S. Marshals Service.
The Jan. 22 shooting near busy Third Avenue and Pine Street left one woman dead and seven other people injured, including a 9-year-old boy, and it set off the latest round of public debate about safety in Seattle.
Marquise Tolbert and William Tolliver, both 24, were arrested “without incident” Saturday as they left the Rio hotel in Las Vegas, said Deputy U.S. Marshal Beatrice Pharr.
It was not immediately clear Saturday when Tolbert and Tolliver would be returned to Seattle.
In a news conference Saturday evening, Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best offered few details about the arrest.
“Personally, I’m glad they are in custody. … We know that after the mass shooting and the homicide, there was a lot of fear,” Best said.
Officials, including the U.S. Marshals, believe the pair may have been in Las Vegas since Jan. 26, Pharr said.
Tolbert and Tolliver were identified by Seattle police as suspects the day after the shooting. Both have been arrested multiple times, according to court records. Following the shooting, Best said one of the men had been arrested about 25 times and the other, who appears from court records to be Tolbert, had been arrested by Seattle police at least 50 times.
After the shooting, Best said officers recovered more than 20 shell casings from three different caliber weapons. A third suspect, Jamel Jackson, 21, was injured in the shooting and located by police at Harborview Medical Center afterward, police said. Jackson was charged with unlawful possession of a firearm, though police said he was not the aggressor in the fight.
Following the shooting, Mayor Jenny Durkan said the city would deploy more police patrols and a mobile precinct to the area near Westlake Park, the latest in a series of similar initiatives in recent years. Last year, violent crime declined in Seattle, with fewer murders, aggravated assaults and robberies. Reports of shootings and gunfire increased slightly.
The woman killed in the shooting, Tanya Jackson, lived in a nearby Plymouth Housing building and was remembered for the joy she brought others.
By Saturday evening, most people injured in the shooting had been released from the hospital, according to a hospital spokeswoman. A 55-year-old woman remained in intensive care at Harborview Medical Center.
