Surveillance footage shows the victim moments before the shooting (Images: CHS)
Seattle Police have released new information in an unsolved Capitol Hill murder including surveillance video showing the victim just moments before he was shot and left dying on the Harvard Ave sidewalk behind Seattle Central Community College — and what is believed to be the suspect’s getaway car speeding away from the scene.
The scenes caught on the school’s cameras do not directly show the suspect but in one segment provided by police, the single muzzle flash of the shot that killed 49-year-old Darek Darewski can clearly be seen through the college’s windows. In another, Darewksi is seen walking on Harvard Ave and stopping to light a cigarette just prior to the shooting.
Darewski died of his wounds at the scene as police attempted to resuscitate him. Police have not yet provided any possible motivation for the crime though more information should be released later today. The incident came just two weeks after Darewski served one day in jail following his guilty plea in a 2010 harassment case stemming from an incident at a Seattle sobering center. He pleaded guilty in early January to the harassment charge and was sentenced to the single day in King County Jail and 24 months of community custody.
Darewski’s last known address at the time of the November 2010 incident was a low-income housing facility in Pioneer Square. Police say he was also a part-time Alaskan fisherman.
In the Tuesday, January 17 homicide, police found Darewksi dying on the sidewalk in the 1700 block Harvard Ave around 11:16p behind Seattle Central with a single gunshot wound to the chest.
Witnesses offered differing accounts of a vehicle seen in the area at the time of the shooting. One vehicle has been described as a white Crown Victoria with a wood or dark brown interior that looked like an “old style” police cruiser. Meanwhile, another witness reports seeing a car that looked more like a KIA.
The video clips released today show a vehicle most similar to the larger car description arriving in the area before speeding away minutes later.
If you recognize the vehicle or have information to add, call the Seattle Police Homicide Tip Line at (206) 233-5000.
this car is def not a KIA or Crown Victoria. Looks something more like a 2-door lowered car with black lines across the body on each side.
it looks to me more like a 1998 Buick Riviera. I wish I had better software so I can see that plate better. Light is too bright.
have a better video camera than these crappy surveillance cameras?
Your mobile phone is subsidized by a company that charges you about $800 per year for network access, is only a couple years old, and doesn’t capture and store the past couple weeks of images passing by its lens.
Looks like a 2 door toyota solara or maybe a two door saturn. Def not a crown vic.
Because the camera on your phone is meant to actually record images.
Security cameras are meant to look like security cameras and somehow magically prevent crime.
Pause at 5 seconds – definitely a 4 door; you can make out handle. Window goes back to form a triangle – crown vic from 93-97 looked that way. Long low trunk, squared tail. Rear wheel is almost fully under the windows. And looks longer than the RAV4, Altima (?) and Metro (?) parked on the street.
Somewhere there is a guy reading this or the KOMO website thanking their deity that the security camera did not record them clearly enough (at all?) to be identified.
I can see why the police received so many different descriptions of the car. I hope they find the person who killed Darewski; may Darewski rest in peace.
I have a crap tiny laptop monitor but the car looks like a BMW either a 5 or 7 series and of course it’s a white car. If you can look at the tail lights wrapping around the car in the second video (where it turns right on Harvard) it looks like a 7 series beamer.
Even more persuasive, in my opinion is the fourth video. At 6 seconds into the 17 second clip, as the white sedan is heading north on Harvard it appears to be a large 500 or 550 series Mercedes -Benz. If you can pause the video while the car is passing between the SUV and the car in front of it, it looks like a Mercedes-Benz from behind as it drives away from the camera.
Doubt it is a BMW – all of them have the signature Hofmeister Kink, where rear window angles back towards the front. The Benz is possible – also long and square like the crown vic. It might have a strong foglamp in the air dam – at 4 seconds there seems to be some light in the front corner coming from below the headlamp. Some of Benzes had big fog lamps.
Not sure about the Hofmeister kink but it does look like a Benz or BMW to me. The car looks too square on the corners to be a Crown Vic.