Woman was killed in set-up drug robbery in Tacoma. Now final defendant is sentenced
The last of three men involved in luring a 42-year-old woman to a South Tacoma parking lot under the pretense of a drug deal before two shot and killed her was sentenced Friday to 20 years in prison.
Michael Alan Deda, 44, received the shortest sentence of the three responsible for the Sept. 22, 2021 killing of Soohui Kim. He was accused of arranging a fake drug buy with Kim for $1,200 worth of methamphetamine so his accomplices, Cody Allen Smith and Michael Freeman, could rob her.
But within minutes of Kim parking at an apartment complex in the 4500 block of South Puget Sound Avenue, Smith and Freeman approached her vehicle, briefly spoke with her and fired gunshots from both sides of her vehicle, according to court records. Kim drove away, ran off the road and hit a utility pole.
Deda pleaded guilty March 20 to second-degree attempted murder. Prosecutors originally charged him with second-degree murder, first-degree assault, first-degree attempted robbery and first- and second-degree unlawful possession of a firearm, but charges were changed as part of a plea agreement.
Smith, 29, and Freeman, 41, had separate trials in March and May, respectively, and both were convicted of first- and second-degree murder, first-degree assault, conspiracy to commit first-degree robbery, attempted first-degree robbery and unlawful possession of a firearm.
Pierce County Superior Court Judge Michael Schwartz sentenced Smith to nearly 66 years in prison March 15, and Judge Sabrina Ahrens sentenced Freeman to 62 years in prison June 14. Some of their convictions were vacated at sentencing due to issues of double jeopardy and because prosecutors charged them with multiple crimes for the same criminal conduct.
On Friday, Deda received 248 months in prison, just a half-month longer than prosecutors and the defendant’s attorney agreed to recommend to Judge Matthew Thomas, according to court records. That amount of time is at the low end of the standard sentencing range for defendants prosecuted in similar cases.
The defendant was convicted of eight felonies in Pierce County between 1999 and 2017, including for second-degree theft, unlawful delivery of a controlled substance, and third-degree burglary, among other offenses.
Deda was the first to be arrested in the case six days after Kim was killed. According to charging documents, Tacoma Police Department officers arrested him after reviewing surveillance video of the shooting and cell phone records of messages sent between Deda and Kim.
In a message sent the day of the shooting, a contact listed as “Mike Stereo” later identified as Deda, asked Kim how much she would charge for a half-pound of “clear,” according to the probable cause document. “Clear” is a shorthand term for methamphetamine.
Deda was a new customer to Kim. A passenger who was with the victim when the shooting occurred later told detectives he knew Kim had “clear” with her, and it seemed to him she was trying to vet Deda before agreeing to sell him drugs.
It’s unclear why Deda would have set up Kim to be robbed or why it ended in gunfire. Prosecutors wrote in a trial brief for Smith that confidential informants and other street sources fed rumors to Tacoma detectives that indicated the killing was revenge for selling a lethal dose of drugs to Deda’s wife. But prosecutors said the woman didn’t die of a drug overdose.
Smith and Freeman were charged in the case in November 2021. At the time, Freeman, who had multiple prior felony convictions, including for first-degree robbery and first-degree assault, was already being held in jail on an unrelated matter.
The surveillance footage helped investigators identify them, and detectives placed all three defendants’ cellphones in the same area at the time of the shooting.
The night before, Kim picked up the passenger, a friend she’d known for about a year. According to the probable cause document, the two spent some time at a casino before going to meet up with Deda. The friend told police he fell asleep in the car and woke up as Kim was parking on the street about 4:40 a.m.
“Once there, he saw a dark figure behind their vehicle. He and the victim remained in the vehicle and he then heard four shots,” prosecutors wrote in charging papers.
The passenger was grazed by a bullet, and he went to a nearby convenience store where he called 911.
