Seventh Tacoma Homicide of 2012: Sgt. Prince Gavin

Prince Gavin was a combat medic in the US Army. A sergeant. He was stationed at Joint Base Lewis/McChord. He'd done two tours in Iraq. He carried a .45 pistol for protection and had a permit to do so. As far as anyone can tell, he'd never pulled it on anyone. On Friday his ex-girlfriend was helping him move from his place on Mildred. He'd been recently been transferred to a base in Colorado. At some point there was an argument between the two or something happened that caused the police to respond. The officers arrived to the place on Mildred but found no one there. They had information that they may have gone to a house on the 0800 block of South M Street.

As Gavin and arrived in a truck on South M Street, a police officer pulled up. Reports say that Gavin ran from the truck towards the house. What happened next is unclear. There was some sort of confrontation between Gavin and the officer. The officer says he was in fear for his life and fired his service weapon twice killing Prince Gavin. Sgt. Gavin was 29 years old. Gavin's pistol was found near his body. Friends say that Gavin was likely trying to show the officer that he was armed and the officer misunderstood. It's unclear what exactly happened and the shooting is currently under investigation.

This is the second shooting this officer has been involved in. It would be easy to make the leap that the shooting was unnecessary and that this is just the latest in a recent string of questionable local police involved shootings over the past few years. However, as tempting as it might be to paint such a picture, doing so leaves out the fact that we don't actually know what happened. All we know is that two armed men had a confrontation and that one killed the other.

I've known many police officers. Some of them have been involved in shootings. Not one of them wanted to kill anyone. I think the same is true of Sgt. Prince Gavin. Given what information we have, it's difficult for me to see Gavin turning his weapon on a cop. At the same time, I have a hard time thinking that the responding officer's actions were malicious. This is a tragedy. And I hope that the resulting investigation will uncover more facts.

My heart goes out to Gavin's family and friends. And to the family of the officer involved in the shooting.

Sgt. Prince Gavin was the  seventh homicide in the city of Tacoma this year. As always, the comments section is reserved for those who knew Gavin to share their memories of the man and let the rest of us know who he was.

- Jack Cameron