Detectives piecing together what led to shootings

The chaotic series of events started with a man lost in the fog. It ended with a respected King County Sheriff's deputy dead Saturday, and his alleged killer also dead inside a White Center house.

Detectives are still piecing together the events that led to the fatal shootings. Sheriff's Deputy Steve Cox, 46, was killed with a single gunshot to the head, his gun holstered.

Cox's death adds to the grief of local law enforcement, which has lost three officers as a result of the actions of convicted felons since August. "Right now everyone is still pretty numb," said Sheriff Sue Rahr.

The events began to unfold in White Center at 1:42 a.m., when a man, apparently lost, crashed his black pickup into a parked car outside a house party at Southwest 104th Street and 12th Avenue Southwest, according to Sheriff's spokesman John Urquhart. He said partygoers jumped the man, beating and shooting him twice in the head. The man's injuries were not life-threatening.

A neighbor called 911 and, within minutes, Cox and four other deputies arrived and began interviewing about 15 people at the house. Cox, who was assigned to the White Center precinct, knew several witnesses and began interviewing them one at a time in a back bedroom.

At about 2:50 a.m., two other deputies heard a single gunshot from the bedroom, Urquhart said. A man identified by sources as Raymond O. Porter, 23, of Burien, a convicted felon, emerged with a gun in his hand and opened fire.

He and the other deputies traded a fusillade of bullets before the Burien man was killed on the spot, Urquhart said.

Cox was rushed to Harborview Medical Center, where he died about three hours later. He is survived by a wife and a 1-year-old son.

Saturday, sheriff's deputies — their shields covered in black tape as a symbol of mourning — closed two blocks around the White Center home and seized several cars. Detectives are examining what gang ties Porter may have had, and have questioned about a dozen partygoers at a nearby Seattle Police precinct. No arrests have been made.

The deputies who fired the fatal shots were placed on routine administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation, Urquhart said. Although there are no living witnesses to Cox's death, investigators are confident that they killed Cox's attacker, he said.

Detectives are also investigating whether Porter shot the pickup driver. The injured man returned to the scene Saturday afternoon, his head swathed in bandages, in a futile attempt to retrieve his cellphone from his pickup.

"I don't remember anything. I'm tired and I need to go home," said the man, who declined to give his name.

Urquhart declined to confirm Porter's identity. He said the man had last lived in Burien and was not a resident of the White Center house. The King County Medical Examiner is conducting an autopsy and is expected to release his name Monday.

Porter has a long criminal history dating to 1997, including convictions for drug manufacturing, assault, escape and being a felon in possession of a gun. He had been sentenced to jail or prison nine times, and was most recently released from prison in August.

He was being supervised by the Department of Corrections (DOC) at the time of his death. He had been ordered to undergo drug testing, and had tested positive for cocaine and marijuana since his release from prison, according to a DOC source. He last met with the DOC on Thursday. He had missed the previous appointment, according to the source.

The corrections department was also supervising two other felons whose actions resulted in the deaths of law-enforcement officers in separate car crashes in the past few months: Seattle Police officer Joselito Barber in August and Seattle officer Beth Nowak in November. The DOC is still investigating its supervision of the man linked to Nowak's death, and plans to look into Porter's supervision, said Gary Larson, a DOC spokesman.

"These are all separate events. What happened here is very tragic," Larson said.

It was unclear on Saturday whether anyone checked Porter for weapons before Cox took him to an isolated room to be interviewed.

Urquhart said Cox would have needed "reasonable suspicion" that the man was armed before frisking him.

"I don't know what happened back there or what was going through Deputy Cox's head. All things being legal, he wouldn't have a right to a pat down," Urquhart said.

"It is difficult to separate people when you interview people in a group like this. I don't fault him [Cox] for this."

Staff researcher David Turim contributed to this report.

Jennifer Sullivan: 206-464-8294 or jensullivan@seattletimes.com. Jonathan Martin: 206-464-2605 or jmartin@seattletimes.com