Car was in traffic stop before deadly trip to Lake Ballinger

Edmonds police pulled over a car containing17-year-old Britney Galindez and five others shortly before the group drove to a South Snohomish County lake where the girl was killed, according to charging papers filed Friday.

During the traffic stop, Galindez became ill and vomited in the lap of Robert Langendoerfer, 21, the charging papers say.

Snohomish County prosecutors allege it was anger over the stop, as well as the vomiting, that prompted him to kill Galindez at Lake Ballinger in Mountlake Terrace.

Langendoerfer, of Edmonds, was charged Friday in Snohomish County Superior Court with one count of first-degree murder in the death of Galindez, whose body was recovered from the lake Oct. 21, several days after her death.

The charging papers contain information police obtained during later interviews with several of the car's occupants.

They told police the car was stopped by Edmonds police just after midnight Oct. 14 and that Galindez vomited while the officer was back at the patrol car. The driver received a ticket for driving without insurance.

However, the night the car was stopped, police did not attempt to detain or question the passengers.

An Edmonds police administrator said he would not comment on the ongoing investigation but said that because of Washington state Supreme Court rulings, police are no longer allowed to ask to see IDs or contact passengers in a vehicle unless there is evidence that they are participants in a crime.

The driver later told Mountlake Terrace detectives that everybody in the car, except for him, had been drinking and smoking marijuana.

After police allowed them to drive off, five of the car's occupants were angry, screaming or crying about the ticket and "the puke," according to several of the young men in the car.

Galindez "was crying and saying she would take the blame for the ticket," prosecutors wrote in charging documents.

A short time later, according to charging documents, the group pulled into the parking lot of the Silver Dollar Casino in Mill Creek, where security officers asked if there was a problem.

They gave the group paper towels and water to clean up the mess.

The group then headed for Lake Ballinger, prosecutors said.

One of the young men had passed out drunk in the front seat.

Three of the others walked down the dock and Galindez and Langendoerfer followed, prosecutors said.

According to police, the three said they turned around when they reached the end of the dock and saw Langendoerfer "going crazy."

He was "wrestling" with Galindez, strangling her and stabbing her in the neck with a screwdriver he'd taken from the car, the witnesses said.

She was trying to hit Langendoerfer when he picked her up and threw her into the water, prosecutors say.

Langendoerfer then took off his shirt and waded into the lake where Galindez was trying to swim, prosecutors say.

They said Langendoerfer caught Galindez and held her under water for what they estimated was about five minutes.

Police and prosecutors said Langendoerfer told the others he would kill them if they spoke of what they'd seen.

Langendoerfer, who is being held in Snohomish County Jail on $1 million bail, has a criminal history that includes convictions for assault, driving with a suspended license, theft and disorderly conduct.

According to police, Galindez had been missing from her home since Oct. 12.

She was reported missing Oct. 19 and found in Lake Ballinger two days later.

Christine Clarridge: 206-464-8983 or cclarridge@seattletimes.com