Mayhem Stalks The Early-Morning Dregs Of An All-Night Party

SEATTLE -- Jesiah Martin was ready for bed. He'd been partying all night, first at a rave a few blocks from his house, then with friends -- new and old -- at his Capitol Hill home. But before crashing, Martin went to the kitchen to check e-mail. That's when it all started.

He heard loud bangs and thought they were firecrackers. Then he heard the screams.

He peeked through the blinds to see 6-foot-5 Aaron Kyle Huff, with a look of contentment -- almost a smile -- unleashing his homicidal mayhem.

In police reports, 911 calls and interviews with witnesses, the chilling details of Seattle's worst crime in 23 years are coming forward.

Huff, a former pizza delivery man and art student, killed six people ages 14 to 32, two more were injured. Scores more will carry wounds less apparent: nightmares and images of friends being shot.

Early Saturday, at a "Better Off Undead" party on Capitol Hill, Anthony Moulton offered an afterparty invite to Huff, who had been hanging out by himself.

The invite wasn't unusual. Ravers said it's common to make new friends at a rave, where young people dance to bass-laden electronic music and embrace an inclusive philosphy of peace, love, unity and respect, known among the crowd as PLUR.

Huff was one of the first to arrive at the afterparty at the blue-and-white bungalow in a quiet residential area a few miles east of downtown.

There, Moulton said, Huff kept to himself, was quiet and polite, and took part in some friendly small talk.

There was no argument, nothing obvious that would have set Huff off, police said.

But a few minutes before 7 a.m., Huff quietly stepped out of the party where people were chilling out. Some slept, others were getting ready to find a ride home.

The linebacker-sized man walked half a block to his black Dodge pick-up truck. In it, he may have surveyed his massive arsenal: a pistol-grip shotgun, a semiautomatic handgun, a rifle, a baseball bat, a machete, two five-gallon cans of gas, hundreds of rounds of ammunition.

Then he picked up the shotgun and the handgun, draped two bandoliers of shotgun shells over his shoulders, filled his pockets with more ammo and grabbed a can of red spray paint.

A neighbor looked out her window and saw Huff bend over to write "NOW" on the sidewalk. He would write the same cryptic message twice more before ditching the spray paint and pulling out his handgun.

The right-handed Montana native walked up six steps to a landing near the front porch and opened fire.

Albert Sbragia heard the shots and looked out his bedroom window. He saw Huff firing at the front of the house. His wife Dawn called 911.

"Lay down on the floor," she told her eight- and 11-year-old children.

She looked out the window again to see Huff reloading his shotgun.

Across the street, William Lowe was just getting up. He heard shots too, and dialed 911.

Shotgun blasts at 2112 East Republican, a man down, he told dispatchers.

Huff walked up the steps past his first victims. Police said two people were found dead on the porch, one on the stairs, the other in the doorway.

People inside the house tried to block the door, police said, but Huff, at a burly 280 pounds, overpowered them and entered the front room.

Huff walked calmly through the house, witnesses told police, firing both guns at everyone he saw. He shot a male victim near the front door who collapsed. Huff went up to him and shot him again in the head.

The Sbragia family heard screaming and more shots inside their neighbors' house.

Other neighbors saw people fleeing the house, some through the back door, others out windows.

Cesar Clemente woke up to the sound of guns shots. He called 911 too, went to his door and saw two injured people fleeing into bushes.

"You guys come over here," he said.

One man, shot in the arm and side, made it across the street and into Clemente's home. The other person collapsed in the bushes.

Inside the house, people were scrambling to find a hiding place. Alissa Dunn and her boyfriend Gary Will were in an upstairs bathroom. When they heard the shots, they locked the door and hid in the bathtub.

Huff went upstairs looking for more victims.

He tried the bathroom door and when he found it locked, he fired a round through the door, missing the couple crouching in the tub.

One witness hid under a bed and saw the shooter's feet as he walked into the room.

"I've got enough ammunition to shoot everybody," the person heard Huff say.

By then, dispatchers were flooded with 911 calls, some from people inside the house.

A dispatcher asked a female caller if the shooter was still there.

"I don't know," a hushed, frightened voice says. "We're hiding."

Officer Steve Leonard was on patrol in the neighborhood. Police officials say he heard the shots himself, almost simultaneously with the first dispatch calls.

Within 45 seconds Leonard was on the scene.

He saw two people, one hurt, and told them to get down and stay where they were as he approached the house.

Then Leonard saw Huff carrying the shotgun.

Witnesses said Huff left through a back or side door and walked toward the front of the house along a side path.

Before Leonard could finish telling Huff to drop his gun, Huff put the shotgun in his mouth and pulled the trigger.

Dawn Sbragia looked out her window again and saw Huff on the ground.

Lowe saw the whole thing.

"Ooh, he just shot himself in the face," Lowe told 911.

While the shooting spree had ended, the terror continued.

People inside the house stayed on the line with 911.

Sbragia said she saw swarms of police approach the house guns drawn, shouting.

At about 7:13 a.m., someone tells 911 he thinks he hears police in the basement.

By 7:17 a.m. police had cleared the house.

Over the next few minutes, about 30 people were ushered onto the street and were wrapped in police blankets.

As TV cameras approached, they hid from view and made obscene gestures trying to render videotape unfit for broadcast and thus maintain their privacy.

Still dressed in costumes from the zombie-themed rave the night before, fake blood mixed with real.

But the terror, pain and grief left an indelible mark on the neighborhood and the rave family.

As police swept through the house, they found three more victims dead in the front room.

Three wounded victims were taken to the hospital; one died. As of Thursday, one remained in the hospital in satisfactory condition, said Susan Gregg-Hanson, a spokeswoman for Harborview Medical Center. The other patient asked that their information not be released.

The victims were: Melissa Lynn Moore, 14; Suzanne Thorne, 15; Christopher Williamson, 21; Justin Schwartz, 22; Jeremy Martin, 26; and Jason Travers, 32.

Why Huff set out Friday night with a truck full of weapons and unleashed his rampage may never be known.

"We may be asking these questions over the next year or two," Deputy Seattle Police Chief Clark Kimerer said. "Hopefully we will find some answers."