SEATTLE — About 300 people gathered in downtown Seattle with their signs and anger at 11 Saturday morning at the corner of Fourth Avenue and Lenora Street.
The signs got wet in the June drizzle. One said, in part, “If Seattle ‘loved’ Eina Kwon, this would not have happened in the first place. Seattle enabled this to happen.”
This was the same corner right outside a CVS pharmacy where four days earlier, at just about this time, Kwon, eight months pregnant, and her husband were stopped in their white Tesla. They were shot multiple times in an apparently unprovoked attack.
Kwon died, and doctors could not save the baby in an emergency delivery. She was 34. Her husband, Sung Kwon, 37, was shot numerous times in the arm.
Video showed a man breaking into a run toward the car with an outstretched gun, then firing into the Tesla.
On Friday, Cordell Goosby, 30, was charged with first-degree murder and first-degree assault.
The protest came together quickly when Susanna Keilman, a Korean American, messaged around 30 others in what she describes as her Asian American Pacific Islander community.
“We were texting that we have to do something. This isn’t right. We have to be loud and make some kind of statement, some kind of peaceful gathering,” she said. “What happened is not new to Korean women and senior citizens.”
Keilman is a former U.S. Air Force medic who in 2022 was the unsuccessful Republican candidate for the state House of Representatives 28th District, which extends from Fircrest to DuPont in Pierce County.
She said the protest cuts across political lines. What she and those showing up expressed was unfiltered anger. The death, she believed, could have been avoided.
“The sad thing about this is that it was 100% preventable,” said Keilman. “It was preventable because of policies recently passed that have now legalized crime. If crime and drugs were still illegal, this would have been preventable.”
She said she was tired of hearing politicians’ “virtue signaling.”
“Hashtag ‘We support women.’ Hashtag ‘Stop Asian hate.’ Hashtag ‘Thoughts and prayers,’” Keilman said. “Just listen to your constituents and do your job.”
Jane Powers and Tom Graff were among those who showed up. She’s a residential broker at Ewing & Clark, which has offices next to where the Kwons owned the Aburiya Bento House at Western Avenue and Lenora. Graff is president of the real estate company.
Powers held a handmade cardboard sign that said, “Andrew Lewis: How many have to die?”
She had used a felt pen to highlight Lewis, she said, “Because he voted against enforcing laws against open drug use.”
In a 5-4 vote June 6, the Seattle City Council rejected a bill that would have given the city attorney the authority to prosecute drug possession and public drug use cases, after nearly three hours of public comment.
Lewis was the swing vote. Looking drained, an emotional Lewis said about approving the measure, “ … I just can’t do it today. I just can’t.”
Since that vote, Lewis became part of a working group formed by Mayor Bruce Harrell to tackle public drug use.
Police have not said whether the suspect was under the influence of drugs at the time of the shooting.
Graff remembered Eina Kwon. “The woman only ever had a smile on her face.”
His anger spilled out: “We’re done with the violence against women, the misbehavior in the streets. We’re done with the public crime. The public isn’t going to accept it anymore.”
He talked about the alley behind the CVS. “Tents and drug use. One hundred feet from where the murder took place. I’ve been working here 33 years and have never seen street behavior this bad. We have complained to the City Council, directly to the mayor’s office. No action.”
It’s a four-block, maybe six-minute walk from the CVS to the Kwons’ restaurant.
The 300 who gathered began their trek to pay their respects, the crowd stretching out over a block. A patrol car and officers on bicycles followed along to keep traffic away.
Keilman talked to the crowd, urged them to sign a list with their contact information “to stay involved.” Seattle police Chief Adrian Diaz showed up and stood on the sidelines. He talked about making sure the Kwon family gets the support it needs. Asked about the City Council, Diaz demurred.
On Friday, Diaz announced a new task force of 50 officers who will focus their efforts in areas where gun violence has become widespread.
The event had an impromptu end when Rick Sader, a retired chemical engineer who lives in a condo near the restaurant, stood on a grassy median on Western and played his trumpet. He had chosen “Some Children See Him,” the 1951 Christmas song recorded by James Taylor.
He wanted a serious song to play in respect. “I was in shock. It makes no sense. It’s all senseless,” Sader said about the shooting.
In front of the restaurant, flowers and notes had been left: “We will miss your smile.”
Prominent also was, “Closed until further notice.”
