Man dies after being pushed down stairs in Tacoma bar, but no one will face charges
A mix-up over a wad of cash got Frank Hahn killed.
The 64-year-old broke his hip and later died after being shoved down two steps inside a Tacoma bar. Medical examiners ruled his death a homicide, but Pierce County prosecutors in October declined to file charges.
That’s because the incident did not rise to the level of a felony, said Adam Faber, spokesman for the Prosecutor’s Office.
Hahn wasn’t in the best of health. He suffered from hypertension, cardiovascular disease, emphysema, diabetes and hepatic cirrhosis but couldn’t give up drinking, records say.
His live-in caretaker told police he had two glasses of vodka on April 10 before heading to a bar in the 4000 block of McKinley Avenue. Hahn usually carried large amounts of cash because he liked to play pull-tabs, a gambling game where you pull back a tab to reveal a row of symbols with prizes for matching symbols.
Hahn frequented the bar about once a month, and that night, karaoke was in full swing.
The bartender later told detectives it was “a normal Saturday night,” according to a police report.
Hahn ordered a vodka drink, chatted briefly with the bartender and slid onto a bar stool near the karaoke host’s stand.
Four surveillance cameras inside the bar recorded what happened next.
About 11:20 p.m., Hahn dropped a wad of bills on the ground just as a 47-year-old man walked up the stairs to speak with somebody. As Hahn leaned down to pick up the money, the other man saw him, patted his pants and walked toward Hahn, gesturing at the money.
“At that moment, (Hahn) appears to have a smile on his face and appears to try to give (the other man) a high five or a handshake by holding out his hand, though (the other man) does not reciprocate,” a detective who watched the recordings wrote in a police report.
The men stood face-to-face but did not fight. Two minutes passed. The other man returned to his table but after another minute, walked back to Hahn’s stool.
Hahn appeared to hug the other man, who pushed him away. The cash fell out of Hahn’s hand. A woman picked it up and started to hand it back to Hahn, but the other man also grabbed for the money. Hahn knocked his hand away.
The other man “immediately thrusts that same hand upward, grabbing (Hahn) by the throat and pushing him backwards,” according to a police report. Hahn “trips backwards over the chair he had been sitting on and falls down the stairs.”
Several people rushed to help Hahn up and onto a stool at the bar. He sat there alone for about a half hour before calling his caretaker, telling her he was hurt and couldn’t leave the bar.
She hurried to the bar and was appalled when she discovered nobody had offered him medical aid. She called 911 and an ambulance arrived about midnight to take Hahn to Tacoma General Hospital.
Doctors wouldn’t let Hahn’s caretaker see him that night, but he allegedly called to tell her he had a concussion and broken hip. She was shocked when the hospital called April 12 to tell her Hahn had died. He wasn’t strong enough to undergo surgery for the broken hip, records say.
Two days later, Pierce County medical examiners requested police attend Hahn’s autopsy because he told paramedics in the ambulance that he’d either tripped or been pushed. They ruled his death a homicide on April 20.
A detective then returned to the bar to watch camera recordings of the confrontation and speak with the bartender and other witnesses.
Bartenders there keep a log of whatever they see or hear during their shift.
The man on duty April 10 wrote in part, “I didn’t witness the accident but I believe he was standing at the top of the steps when another customer grabbed and pushed him down the stairs.” In the middle of the entry, a sentence had been crossed out. It read that Hahn “got bumped, and fell backwards down the steps.”
The bartender, who had worked there more than a year, told police he changed the version of events after hearing from others what happened.
He described Hahn as a “peaceful old guy” and the man who pushed him as a weekly regular who “can sometimes have an attitude” but typically doesn’t cause trouble, according to police reports.
Detectives interviewed the other man April 27 after he retained an attorney.
He expressed sorrow that Hahn had died, saying he only found out days after they had squared off in the bar.
In his version of events, he dropped money while pulling his cell phone out of his pocket and then spotted Hahn picking up the cash. When they both grabbed for the bills, he said Hahn spit on him, which especially concerned him during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“He said that he then pushed (Hahn) away from him because he didn’t know if (Hahn) was going to spit on him more or worse,” police reports say.
It’s unclear how much money the men fought over or who ended up with it.
Hahn is one of 28 homicide victims in the city so far this year.
This story was originally published December 2, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
