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TACOMA, Wash. — Tacoma businessman Ray Stebbins was found shot to death in his car in the 1200 block of South 28th Street on Monday.
His daughter, Tabitha Gorin, spoke to KIRO 7. Police initially believed her father had committed suicide, she said. He was found with a gunshot wound to the head.
Investigators later found more bullets in the car door and a second gunshot wound right next to the first, according to court documents, and a homicide investigation ensued. Tacoma police plan to arrest Jerry Davila on suspicion of murder on the 22nd.
Stebbins parked outside the A to B Auto Sales office in Tacoma around 6 a.m. Monday. Documents say a minivan pulled up in front of Davila and a black dog got out. Stebbins’ daughter said the minivan belonged to her father and was parked across the street.
Court documents indicate that the dog helped connect him to the crime, and it was not a police K-9.
Court documents say Davila opened the driver’s side door of Stevin’s car in an “obvious act of obstruction.” The dog flinched twice and then ran away. Investigators say the dog’s fear was in response to gunshots. The same dog was hit by a car at a nearby intersection and was taken to a humane society, where the owner was contacted.
The owner, who was Davila’s ex-girlfriend, took Davila to pick up the dog. Tabitha says she is lost without her father.
“We were the only survivors in our family,” Tabitha said. “We did everything together and knew where each other was going.”
Tabitha says that after her mother passed away in 2022, all she had left was her father, Ray. Her sister passed away suddenly in 2014.
Around 7pm on Monday, someone called her from her father’s store and said that her father had not come to work. Then she received her heartbreaking phone call.
“Thirty-five minutes later I got a call saying my dad had passed away,” she said. “Many of the details were initially up in the air.”
Court documents show security camera footage that clearly shows Davila’s face. Police arrested Davila on the spot at the Humane Society where he and his ex-girlfriend had gone to pick up the dog.
She also had an order of protection against him on previous charges of second-degree assault and felony harassment stemming from a 2021 incident. Her court documents say he threatened to kill her.
“The gunman apparently shoved my father into the passenger seat and tried to pull himself up first. He got into the driver’s seat and dumped him blocks away,” Tabitha said.
Davila is charged with two counts of murder in addition to a charge of unlawful use of a firearm. A GoFundMe has been set up to support Tabitha’s father’s ministry.
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