EVERETT — Two teenagers have been arrested in an investigation of a downtown gun battle that left a Marysville teen dead.
One boy, 16, was arrested and charged this week in juvenile court. A second suspect, Angel Phoenix, 18, was booked into jail Thursday. They’re accused of committing an armed robbery on April 9 along with Tyverius Walburn, 18, who died after the targets of the robbery opened fire, according to police.
Walburn was the 16-year-old boy’s brother.
Many shots rang out around 2:35 p.m. that afternoon at the corner of Rucker and Everett avenues, near the Everett Public Library.
Bullets sprayed into cars, a house and a nearby business. Police arrived and saw about 15 shell casings on the ground, from 9mm and .45-caliber bullets — suggesting at least two shooters.
As officers swarmed the neighborhood, two wounded men were being dropped at Providence Regional Medical Center Everett, about 1½ miles north. One of them was Walburn. He died of a gunshot wound to the chest.
A second young man suffered bullet wounds to his legs. He lived.
According to Everett police, Walburn was part of a group of young men who set up a deal over Snapchat to trade guns in a parking lot off Rucker Avenue. Police believe it was planned as a ripoff and that it was the second time the 16-year-old boy tried to rob a gun from the same under-the-table dealer. (The first time, he stole a .357-caliber pistol, according to police reports.)
The seller had waited 90 minutes in the parking lot with a friend — his “backup,” who would be wounded in the gunfire — when a green Honda rolled up, according to the wounded man’s report. The man told police that three young men jumped out. Two of them, he reported, were wielding guns and ordered the pair not to move.
They moved.
Both sides opened fire.
One of the robbers jumped a fence and ran off.
The others got back into the Honda and drove north to the hospital, where security cameras showed the two suspects with Walburn. Moments later, a neighbor saw an 18-year-old man she recognized, Phoenix, wearing a red bandanna and running through the neighborhood “like a crazy person,” court papers say.
The neighbor looked in her backyard and discovered a black backpack, according to police reports. Inside were a .45-caliber Glock and a .357-caliber pistol.
Police tracked down the 16-year-old suspect around 9 p.m. Wednesday at his home off 32nd Street NE in Marysville.
He was booked into the Denney Juvenile Justice Center, then charged with first-degree assault and first-degree robbery.
The boy was also charged with underage possession of marijuana, for an incident a week after the shooting, on April 16, when police pulled him over for failing to signal on Walnut Street. An officer wrote that as he approached the car, he was met with an obvious odor of marijuana, and after the vehicle was towed, police found a plastic baggie of “dabs,” as well as the remains of a blunt.
On that report, police noted, “The victim of this robbery has received threats from (the boy) and his co-suspect which have caused the victim of that incident to flee the state.”
Superior Court Judge Millie Judge set bail at $25,000.
Detectives arrested the second teen suspect around 5:30 p.m. Thursday at his north Everett home, a mile east of the scene of the shooting. Phoenix was booked into the Snohomish County Jail, and an Everett District Court judge set his bail Friday at $250,000.
In a police interview, Phoenix acknowledged it seemed odd that a gun dealer would set up a gun trade with someone who had just robbed him. Phoenix reportedly denied being part of a plan to commit a robbery on April 9. However, police wrote, several times in the interview, he did admit he was lying.
Caleb Hutton: 425-339-3454; chutton@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @snocaleb.
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