911 tapes detail Eatonville shootings — and teen's bravery

Excruciating moments passed at the Pierce County sheriff's communications center after an unidentified deputy interrupted radio traffic to exclaim, "I have been shot!" and then fell silent.

"Who has been shot?" a dispatcher asks on newly released 911 tapes of the Dec. 21 Eatonville, Pierce County, shootings that resulted in the deaths of a deputy and the suspect, and left another deputy wounded.

The tapes reveal details of the horrifying minutes after David Crable, 35, opened fire on Sgt. Nick Hausner and Deputy Kent Mundell Jr. Mundell died at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle a week after the shooting. Hausner was wounded, but his injuries were not life-threatening.

In the moments after the shooting, Crable's 16-year-old daughter, Bryona, tells 911 dispatchers that she had tried to take a .45-caliber handgun from her father as he fired away at the deputies.

The tapes and printed dispatch records also show that the two deputies were told that there were firearms in the house before they arrived at the address. David Crable's brother, Edward "Jason" Crable, had told the dispatcher he had a .45 handgun and a rifle, but that they were secured in a bedroom.

Pierce County Sheriff's Department spokesman Ed Troyer says the handgun that was used to shoot the deputies was owned by David Crable, who purchased it from Federal Way Discount Guns.

According to the sheriff's office, the deputies had offered David Crable a ride when he pulled a handgun that was wrapped in a spare shirt and started shooting. Mundell returned fire, killing Crable.

The wounded Hausner was reportedly pulled into another room by Crable's brother and the daughter, who then ran to the neighbor's house for help.

The first 911 call came from Jason Crable, who told the dispatcher his brother had been living with him. David was drunk — his daughter said he'd downed nearly a bottle of tequila — and Jason said he wanted him out.

"Yeah, um, my brother won't leave my house," he told the dispatcher. "He's been staying here for a couple of weeks. It's verbal right now. I just want him removed."

Mundell and Hausner were dispatched on a call of an unwanted guest at 9:48 p.m. and arrived 11 minutes later.

Ten minutes elapse before the dispatch center received a call from a neighbor, reporting that there were two patrol cars next door and that she'd heard shots. The neighbor said a girl next door was yelling that her father had just shot a cop.

Back in the sheriff's communications center, dispatchers had heard someone exclaim "I have been shot!" and then fall silent. An agonizing on-air roll call ensued while a dispatcher calmly repeated, "County inquiring. Which unit has been shot?"

More than a minute passed before Hausner interrupted, "Two officers down!"

While the dispatcher is contacting medics, Bryona, Crable's daughter, arrived at the neighbor's house and can be heard crying in the background, "My dad just shot a cop!"

She's surprisingly calm when she is put on the phone. She describes her father to the dispatcher, and when asked if she could tell how the officer was doing, if he was OK, she responded with a hitch in her voice: "No, he was laying on his stomach on the floor. I think he shot him a couple of times," she said.

Her dad "came out of the living room just shooting randomly, then he took down one cop and I was trying to grab the gun from him," Bryona Crable said.

Sheriff's officials have credited Bryona and her uncle with saving Hausner's life. Troyer said the girl threw herself on her father and wrestled with him even as he was dying from his wounds.

"We believe he would have shot others if not for her," Troyer said.

The tapes indicate that the girl didn't know her father had been shot until a neighbor went next door and came back to tell her.

The third 911 call came from the brother. The shock is evident in his voice as he tells the dispatchers, "There's an officer down," and that the suspect is "on the ground" and looked dead.

Who did this? the dispatcher asked.

"Who? My brother," Jason Crable said. "We had a (expletive) problem here and he started shooting.

"Everybody's (expletive) shot," he said.

Mike Carter: 206-464-3706 or mcarter@seattletimes.com