After refusing to get back together, Crystal Hawkins was lured by her ex-boyfriend to a Kent apartment, where he fatally shot her and then left her body at St. Francis Hospital in Federal Way in 2017, according to prosecutors.<\/p>\n
King County prosecuters charged Richard Nelson, 41, with second-degree murder May 19 for the October 2017 death of Crystal Hawkins. His arraignment is scheduled for June 1 at the Maleng Regional Justice Center in Kent.<\/p>\n
Nelson is already being held at King County Jail for a second-degree domestic violence assault case, in which he is accused of strangling and threatening to kill his current girlfriend April 30 at The Union Apartments in Federal Way.<\/p>\n
“The defendant’s physical violence and threats to kill this victim with a handgun are even more chilling given the defendant’s homicide of his previous partner with a firearm,” the charging documents state.<\/p>\n
According to the charges, details of Hawkins’ death are as follows:<\/p>\n
On Oct. 25, 2017, Federal Way police were dispatched to St. Francis Hospital around 4 a.m. regarding a female victim, later identified as 27-year-old Hawkins, who was found near the building’s main entrance bleeding and unconscious.<\/p>\n
A hospital employee arriving at work had initially found Hawkins’ body lying on the curbside, shortly after seeing a vehicle leave that area of the hospital, and called for help. Later, it was discovered Hawkins had been fatally shot in the back of the head.<\/p>\n
A few hours later, a blue 2005 Volvo registered to Hawkins’ mother was found at a Kent mobile home property. After a search warrant was obtained, police found “a heavy concentration of blood in the passenger seat, but also noted blood throughout other parts of the vehicle,” charging papers state. A spent 9-mm bullet casing was found in the car. Nelson’s fingerprints were also later found on and inside the vehicle.<\/p>\n
Hawkins’ mother confirmed the Volvo belonged to her and said she last spoke with her daughter, who also lived with her, around 1 or 2 a.m. Oct. 25. Crystal Hawkins told her mother she was going to visit a friend at a nearby apartment complex.<\/p>\n
Federal Way detectives were able to find Nelson had created a fake email account and had lured her to a Kent apartment, where he fatally shot her in the back of the head, then dumped her body in Federal Way, according to charging documents.<\/p>\n
Just days prior to her death on Oct. 22, 2017, Hawkins and her ex-boyfriend met at a Renton bar where Nelson asked to get back together.<\/p>\n
The two previously dated for about a year and had broken up in September 2017. At the time, Hawkins was in a relationship with a man in California.<\/p>\n
According to documents, Hawkins refused to get back together with Nelson and later told a friend Nelson was having a difficult time with the separation and couldn’t let go of her.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Richard Nelson, 41, fatally shot 27-year-old Crystal Hawkins and then left her body outside St. Francis Hospital in Federal Way in October 2017. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":665,"featured_media":45956,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,4],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-45955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-home","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45955"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/665"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45955"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45955\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45955"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=45955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}