On the evening of February 25, 2019, 21-year-old Dustyn Hunt-Bagby, a male musician of mixed race known as PrettyBoi Nabii, was spending time with his girlfriend, 20-year-old Lauryn Heller, at her family's home in the Silver Lake area just outside Everett, Washington. The young couple was drinking wine and watching movies in her room. Her parents, Charles and Abby Heller, had a rule against overnight guests and had expressed disapproval of the people their daughter brought home.
After returning from dinner around 8 p.m., they could hear their daughter and her guest talking and laughing.
Around 10 p.m., Charles Heller texted his daughter, telling her that her guest needed to leave by 10:30 p.m. In an attempt to deceive her parents, Lauryn tried to sneak Dustyn out by having him hide under her bed while she left the room, a tactic she had apparently used before. Her parents, however, grew concerned when they knew someone was still in the house. Charles Heller, stating that "something didn't feel right about the situation," armed himself with a Sig Sauer semi-automatic handgun and went to his daughter's room to investigate, something he admitted he had not done on previous occasions.
What transpired next was a matter of conflicting accounts. After finding Hunt-Bagby under the bed, a confrontation ensued. Charles Heller, 49 at the time, claimed that Hunt-Bagby reached for him and that he feared he was going to be choked. He stated he intentionally shot Hunt-Bagby once in the chest in an act of self-defense. Lauryn Heller, however, maintained that her boyfriend did not attack her father in any way and was merely trying to move the gun away as it was being pointed at them. The struggle resulted in all three falling onto the bed, at which point Charles Heller fired the fatal shot. Lauryn would later tell authorities her father was racist and that this was the motivation for the shooting.
When sheriff's deputies arrived, summoned by separate frantic and calm 911 calls from Lauryn and her mother, they found Lauryn hysterical on the front porch, exclaiming, "My dad shot him." Inside, Charles Heller was applying pressure to Hunt-Bagby's chest wound. Dustyn Hunt-Bagby was not breathing, and despite attempts by deputies to revive him, he died at the scene. His only words after being shot were, "I've been shot." Heller was not arrested that night, and all the adults present cooperated with the investigation.
For nearly two years, the case remained unresolved, causing immense frustration and pain for Hunt-Bagby's family and friends. They felt his death was being ignored and organized demonstrations outside the Snohomish County Courthouse, creating a "Justice for Dustyn Coalition" Facebook page to keep his memory alive and demand action. The delay in the investigation was attributed to a backlog at the Washington State Patrol Crime Lab, as investigators awaited evidence processing. Finally, in January 2021, Charles Frederick Heller III was charged with second-degree murder. He remained free pending the trial.
In November 2023, Charles Heller's trial concluded. After a week of testimony, a Snohomish County jury deliberated and found him not guilty of second-degree murder. However, the jury also determined that he had not acted in lawful self-defense, a finding that could have implications for any future civil proceedings.
