In the midst of a contentious divorce, 50-year-old Shinelle Stills, a Black/African American female, visited her former home in SeaTac, Washington, on the evening of October 20, 2017. The purpose of her visit was to see her 14-year-old son and tend to the family pets. An argument soon erupted between Shinelle and her estranged husband, Samuel Stills, in the living room of the apartment.
The couple had been married for 17 years, but Shinelle had moved out and filed for divorce months earlier.
The verbal altercation escalated tragically when Samuel Stills retrieved a handgun from his bedroom. In the presence of his own mother, he shot Shinelle in the back. After she fell to the floor, he stood over her and fired several more shots. The gunfire brought their son out of his bedroom, who then witnessed his father standing over his mother with the gun.
Following the shooting, Samuel Stills went into a bedroom and shot himself in the chin in an apparent suicide attempt, which he survived. His mother had called 911, and when police arrived, they found Shinelle Stills unresponsive on the living room floor. Medics pronounced her dead at the scene from multiple gunshot wounds.
Samuel Stills, who was conscious and alert when officers found him, was taken to a hospital for his injuries. He was subsequently charged with first-degree murder with a domestic violence designation and second-degree illegal possession of a firearm, as a prior conviction prevented him from legally owning a gun. He was ordered to be held on $2 million bail upon his release from the hospital.
