2 charged with nearly beating Gig Harbor man to death during burglary
Two men have been charged with nearly beating a 67-year-old Gig Harbor man to death while burglarizing his house, court records say.
Pierce County prosecutors on Thursday charged Taylor Miles, 27, and Samuel Stacy, 23, with attempted first-degree murder, first-degree assault, first-degree burglary and first-degree trafficking in stolen property. Neither has been arraigned.
Miles is in custody in Kitsap County, and Stacy is serving time for an unrelated crime at a state prison.
The attack and burglary occurred Oct. 2 on 112th Street NW.
The victim suffered a traumatic brain injury, fractured sinuses, crushed bones in his nose and cheeks, as well as significant bruising to his hips and chest. He was in a coma for weeks and released from the hospital in January. He will require a caregiver for the rest of his life, prosecutors said.
Charging papers give this account of the crime:
The victim lived next door to a family-owned business he managed.
When the victim didn’t answer his phone the morning of Oct. 3, his sister-in-law and and an employee went to check on him and found the victim lying on a bathroom floor.
The front door had been left open, the house was ransacked and someone had tried to clean up puddles of blood with bleach.
Pierce County sheriff’s detectives found two shoe prints — one in dust and one in blood — and determined they came from two different running shoes, one of which was later linked to the suspects. They also found a bloody bat believed to have been used in the beating.
An anonymous tip led investigators to Stacy, who was arrested Oct. 9 after a pursuit in Kitsap County. Inside the vehicle were items taken from two burglaries, including a wallet from the victim’s Gig Harbor home.
Detectives discovered Miles had picked up Stacy from jail recently and linked him to Gig Harbor attack after finding he had pawned stolen silverware from the victim’s house.
Cell phone records later placed Miles at the victim’s home for about four hours on the night of the burglary.
Someone who lived near Miles’ mother also told investigators he had talked about beating an older man.
“She described an incident where Miles’ mother came to her and was crying and upset saying she needed to get her son off of the property,” according to charging papers. “The mother eventually relayed to the witness that her son told her that he assaulted/beat up an older gentleman.”
Miles is believed to have cased the victim’s house in September, records say.
A pastor who was staying with the victim for a few weeks remembered a man coming to the front door and offering landscaping services, which the pastor found odd since the house is very remote. The pastor later identified the man as looking similar to Miles.
This story was originally published March 18, 2021 at 3:23 PM.
