Police were called to Tacoma man’s house 10 times in week before deadly shootout
Before a 41-year-old Tacoma man reportedly shot at officers last week at his South End home and was killed by return fire, police had been called to the same address 10 times in the previous five days.
Cody Kuzior died Aug. 8 of multiple gunshot wounds, the Pierce County Medical Examiner’s Office said in a news release issued Friday. His death was ruled a homicide. It was the first fatal police shooting in the city this year and the second in the county.
No officers were injured. The Pierce County Force Investigation Team, which investigates police uses of deadly force, has released few details about how the incident unfolded, and it has not yet identified the officers who shot Kuzior.
Tacoma Police Department officers were first called to the 9400 block of South D Street at about 3:10 p.m. after it was reported that a person had fired gunshots and struck two occupied houses multiple times, according to PCFIT. The SWAT team was soon called to the scene. Officers requested the additional assistance because the suspect, Kuzior, wasn’t cooperative.
Investigators said law enforcement tried to verbally de-escalate the situation with Kuzior, but those efforts weren’t successful. At about 4:38 p.m., Kuzior allegedly shot at police, and they returned fire, killing him.
It’s unclear why Kuzior would have been shooting at neighbors’ houses, but police calls for service indicate that officers had been called to his address for reports of gunfire, welfare checks, a neighbor dispute and other complaints since Aug. 3. Court records show his behavior had frightened family members in recent years.
A neighbor said Kuzior was firing gunshots in the days before he was killed, and another said the man put caution tape around his yard and a string of razor wire on the street in front of his house. The police calls for service included three reports of gunfire, three welfare checks, a noise complaint, a neighbor dispute, a follow-up call and a traffic hazard, according to records obtained by The News Tribune through a public disclosure request.
One of the shots-fired calls made the day before the police encounter led to a formal report, but the previous calls were either determined to be unfounded or were canceled after the call for service came in. The most recent call before the shooting was the traffic hazard call at 10:26 a.m. Aug. 8.
Kuzior does not appear to have any felony criminal history in Pierce County. In 2020, he filed three domestic-violence protection orders against a man with the same last name as him, all of which were ultimately dismissed. In the latest, Kuzior alleged that the man had harassed him, trespassed on his property and made threats. He submitted photos depicting the alleged trespassing.
In a sworn affidavit filed in 2021, that man called Kuzior’s accusations “bizarre.” Kuzior had lived on South D Street since 2010, he reported, and the “trespassing” photos showed the man at a rental property he managed in the Summit area, where Kuzior had apparently installed cameras and “listening devices.”
In another affidavit submitted by a man who identified himself as Kuzior’s brother, the man reported an incident from 2020 that he said made him “scared for his life.” He said he and his friends were visiting his brother to say hi, but Kuzior answered the door with a loaded pistol pointed at his chest.
This story was originally published August 14, 2023 at 12:41 PM.
