Seattle Shooter Found Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity in Pregnant Woman's Death

Both the prosecution and defense experts reached the same conclusion about Cordell Goosby: he was legally insane on June 13, 2023, when he sprinted toward the driver's side of a white Tesla at Fourth Avenue and Lenora Street in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood and emptied a 9mm handgun into the car. That rare agreement between opposing sides meant the case never went to a jury. A King County court found Goosby not guilty by reason of insanity for the killing of Eina Kwon, 34, who was eight months pregnant, and her unborn child, and the shooting of her husband, Sung Kwon, who was struck in the arm and survived.

The couple had been stopped at a red light around 11:15 a.m., on their way to open Aburiya Bento House, their Japanese restaurant in Belltown. Goosby, then 30 and described by prosecutors as a convicted felon from Chicago with a history of hard drug use, approached them at random and opened fire. Neither Eina nor her unborn baby survived.

Goosby had been charged with first-degree murder and first-degree attempted murder. He went through competency proceedings before the case could move forward. "Mr. Goosby previously did have competency issues and went through competency restoration," said Gabrielle Charlton, chair of the Felony Competency and Forensic Mental Health Unit at the King County Prosecuting Attorney's Office. He was eventually found competent to stand trial, but the insanity plea addresses something separate: his mental state at the moment of the shooting itself.

Because both the defense and prosecution experts concluded he was insane at the time, prosecutors did not take the case to trial. Had the state's expert reached a different conclusion, the case would have gone to a jury. As it stood, the court permitted the not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity plea. Under King County court system rules, that plea carries a specific legal consequence: "by presenting a not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity defense, Mr. Goosby admits that he committed the crimes and agrees to commitment a state psychiatric hospital such as Western State."

Goosby will be committed to a psychiatric facility, likely Western State Hospital, potentially for the rest of his life. The maximum term he faces under the insanity disposition is life. Any future release would require approval from multiple state and court entities; the King County court system and prosecutors retain the right to object before any release by the Department of Social and Health Services moves forward.

Prosecutors declined to file a homicide charge for the unborn child, citing Washington state law that does not permit such a charge unless the child is born alive. They also said there was insufficient evidence to support a manslaughter charge because nothing in the evidence indicated Goosby knew Kwon was pregnant. Authorities noted Goosby had no prior cases referred to the King County Prosecuting Attorney's Office.

"These cases are tragic all around," Charlton said. "Obviously, they involve a horrific incident and someone who is severely mentally ill."

Flowers and signs filled the front of Aburiya Bento House in the days after the shooting as neighbors and regulars mourned the loss of the restaurant's owner. Sung Kwon, who watched his wife killed in the seat beside him, survived with a gunshot wound to the arm.