20 years later: Remembering Jeremy, Melissa, Justin, Suzanne, Jason, and Christopher

Loved ones at a 2016 memorial for the victims in Volunteer Park (Images: ©ChrissyOne with permission to CHS)

It has been 20 years since a mass shooting at a Capitol Hill house party took the lives of six people and left two teens wounded. The gunman shot and killed himself, adding to the bloodshed at 22nd and Republican that morning. Those teens who survived have grown up. The house and neighborhood where it happened are full of life.

“I remember it all,” a neighbor told CHS ten years later about the terrible day. As she went outside to grab her morning paper, she noticed a man across the street spray painting “NOW” on the sidewalk. Minutes later, she heard gunfire and screams.

Further details about the shooter and how the tragedy that came to be known as the Capitol Hill Massacre unfolded were revealed in a report commissioned by Seattle Police. A small town loner who became obsessed, a search history filled with research, and, underpinning it all, mental illness, guns and gun culture — The ingredients of the violence that day have become familiar in the two decades of school, church, and events shootings that have followed.

The exact number of mass shootings in the United States since 2006 varies significantly depending on how the research is conducted.

The Gun Violence Archive puts the number of mass shootings across the country somewhere near 5,000 — just since 2014. The GVA has recorded 500 or more each year since 2020 — and 84 so far this year. There are grim distinctions. The AP/USA TODAY/Northeastern University Mass Killings Database classifies only deadly shootings in which four or more people die for its count, for example.

Others like The Violence Project take an even narrower approach, focusing on incidents with multiple deaths in public settings. The Violence Project has recorded just over 100 mass shootings in the United States since 2006. That means the country is living with about five Capitol Hill Massacres every year.

©ChrissyOne

A decade ago, loved ones gathered in Volunteer Park and remembered those who died with a DJ, balloons, and friends.

• Jeremy Martin, 26
• Melissa Moore, 14
• Justin Schwarz, 22
• Suzanne Thorne, 15
• Jason Travers, 32
• Christopher Williamson, 21

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