Kent Police officer’s shot killed man at Madison Plaza Apartments

A shot fired by a Kent Police officer killed a man on Aug. 28 at the Madison Plaza Apartments in Kent.

The King County Medical Examiner’s Office ruled Friday, Aug. 30 that Christian Demetri Moshofsky, 33, died from a gunshot wound of head and the manner of death a homicide.

Homicide is an act in which a human causes the death of another human, according to legal experts. Homicide itself is not necessarily a crime—for instance, a justifiable killing of a suspect by the police or a killing in self-defense, depending what police investigations determine.

Initial Kent Police reports indicated that the man reportedly died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound based on a interview at the apartment complex by officers with a relative of the man. If the medical investigation had shown that, the Medical Examiner’s Office would have ruled the death a suicide.

The King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, which tracks officer-involved shootings, confirmed Moshofsky died from a Kent Police shooting.

Officers responded at about 12:40 a.m. to the apartments after a 911 caller reported sounds of six to seven gunshots being fired, according to a Aug. 28 Kent Police news release. The seven-story complex, which opened in 2022 at 102 Madison Ave., sits just east of Highway 167.

Officers arrived in the area and were outside of their patrol vehicles when they heard more gunshots that were believed to have been fired at them, according to the news release. One officer returned fire towards the suspect who was on an upper story of the apartment complex.

The Valley Independent Investigative Team, which includes the police departments of Auburn, Des Moines, Federal Way, Tukwila, Renton and Port of Seattle, was called in to conduct the investigation of the officer shooting, which will exclude the Kent Police from investigating its own officer. The Port of Seattle Police Department is leading the investigation, but has not yet issued an update.

No officers were injured, and the involved officer will be placed on administrative leave, following standard protocol, according to Kent Police.

A resident of the apartment complex told the Kent Reporter that as many as 14 police vehicles were present. Although the resident didn’t hear the gunshots, he said another resident told him she heard a first round of shots and called 911.

The woman told the resident that police arrived and another round of shots went off from the apartment complex before police returned fire by shooting at or into the apartment. She said the man was shooting out his open sliding door from an upper apartment and she thought maybe he was intoxicated or under the influence of drugs. She told her fellow resident she didn’t think he was firing at police.

Kent Police Chief Rafael Padilla said in a brief media press conference Aug. 28 that a lot of the initial information was tentative and the Port of Seattle Police Department will investigate to determine what happened. He said the Port of Seattle Police had detectives at the apartment complex trying to figure out the trajectory and angle of the shots and the number of shots fired.

“Our officer did fire in the direction of the person shooting,” Padilla said.

Padilla said an officer or any person is justified by law to fire shots to protect himself or others.