In the quiet community of University Place, Washington, a dispute between roommates over borrowed clothing escalated into a fatal encounter on December 7, 2014. Cory Page, a 32-year-old Black male, was shot and killed in the home he shared with his roommate, Cory Randon Lewis. The two men, who also shared a passion for music, had been living together for about a year.
The deadly confrontation began with an argument over some clothes that Lewis had borrowed from Page.
According to court records, the argument intensified, and at one point, Page waved a handgun at Lewis and challenged him to a fistfight. After Lewis returned the clothing, Page went into his own room, seemingly ending the immediate threat. However, what happened next would turn a simple disagreement into a homicide. Lewis, who was not legally allowed to own a firearm due to prior felony convictions, retrieved his own handgun. He then walked into Page's room and shot him once in the shoulder and once in the chest. A prosecutor would later tell the court that after the first shot, Page was heard saying either "Stop playing" or "chill."
For several days, Cory Page's body lay undiscovered in their home in the 5400 block of Cirque Drive West. It was Lewis himself who eventually called 911 on December 11, claiming he had just returned home after a few days away to find his roommate dead. When sheriff's deputies arrived, they found Page on the floor with two gunshot wounds and a handgun near his body. Initially, Lewis was not arrested. His story began to unravel the following month when he contacted detectives to inquire about retrieving a computer they had seized as evidence. Investigators asked him to take a polygraph test to clear himself as a suspect.
Lewis agreed to the polygraph examination and subsequently failed. Confronted with the results, he confessed to killing his roommate. He told detectives about the argument over clothes and admitted to shooting Page after he had retreated to his room. Lewis also revealed that he had disposed of the murder weapon by throwing it into Snake Lake in Tacoma. He was then arrested and charged with second-degree murder.
At his trial, Cory Randon Lewis's defense attorney argued that the shooting was an act of self-defense, stating that Page was a man who angered quickly and that Lewis was afraid. The defense also suggested that Lewis's initial flight and lack of trust in the police stemmed from the difficult relationship between young Black males and law enforcement. The prosecution countered that if it had been self-defense, Lewis would have contacted the police immediately instead of fleeing and disposing of the gun. They argued that Page was no longer a threat when he was shot in his room. In April 2016, a jury found Cory Lewis guilty of second-degree murder and unlawful possession of a firearm. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
