A suspect was identified in the murder of a 19-year-old man who died following a stab wound to the neck in a violent mid-day incident on Interstate 5 in Federal Way.
According to a press release from Washington State Patrol Trooper Rick Johnson, the suspect has been identified but still not named in the June 26 stabbing.
At around 3 p.m. June 26, state troopers found four people in a black BMW near the off-ramp to a Washington State Department of Transportation weigh station and rest area. One person was deceased and three were injured. The male driver was pronounced deceased from stab wounds. A male passenger was taken to the hospital with gunshot wounds. The two in the backseat — one male one female — were taken to the hospital with stab wounds.
As of July 1, there were no new updates in the case.
According to Johnson, none of the names of the four people involved would be revealed until the suspect, who was shot multiple times, is either booked or charged by the King County Prosecutor’s Office. Once he is discharged from the hospital, the suspect is expected to be charged with second-degree murder and first-degree assault, according to the state patrol.
A report from the King County Medical Examiner’s Office identified the man who died as 19-year-old Patriot Ryan Lemay. The medical examiner’s report said that his manner of death was a homicide, and the cause of death was an incised wound of the neck. When officers arrived at the scene, the driver had a large stab wound to his neck and was deceased, according to the state patrol.
The scene of the crime was described as a domestic violence call on northbound I-5 around South 375th Street in Federal Way. Further 911 calls reported that a black BMW involved was parked to the right side of the freeway in a ditch, and there were several injured people. According to the news release, further investigation from Washington State Patrol determined that there were four people involved. One was the driver, one was a person in the passenger seat, and two others were in the backseats.
According to the news release, when WSP arrived, an involved male and female had distanced themselves from the BMW, and a male was lying on the ground next to the vehicle with multiple gunshot wounds. The male with gunshot wounds was found to be the suspect.
According to the news release, the investigation is still active, and detectives are in the process of determining who fired the handgun. One of the people sitting in the backseat was determined to be the suspect who fatally stabbed the driver and stabbed the two other passengers.
“We know that this is a stolen vehicle, and there is a weapon at the scene, which is also stolen. That’s what we know right now,” Johnson said in a previous story from the Mirror regarding the incident.“We are trying to piece together what happened inside the vehicle. We are going to reach out to the 911 responders again and ask the public for any dashcam video that showed anything. The three surviving are detained in the hospital, and we are trying to figure out the sequence of events.”
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