Stabbing is city’s fifth homicide of year

Vitaly M. Shevchuk headed out with a friend Monday night to buy a pack of cigarettes. He ended up stabbed to death.

The 24-year-old’s death is the fifth homicide Spokane Police Department detectives have investigated this year, officials said. It’s the third fatal stabbing.

Police continued Tuesday to investigate the crime and search for a woman they consider a person of interest – 23-year-old Savannah Frye.

Around 10 p.m. Monday, Shevchuk and a woman were leaving a home in the 400 block of South Greene Street to go to a nearby store. Three people in 2008 red Toyota Yaris were driving by about that time and the two groups began to argue, said Officer Jennifer DeRuwe. That exchange led to a fight.

Shevchuk reportedly picked up a rock slightly smaller than a brick and threw it through the back window of the Yaris, DeRuwe said. The three people in the Yaris apparently had knives, and fight became more physical.

Knives were recovered at the scene of the stabbing, DeRuwe said. It was unknown if the weapon used in the killing was among them.

After Shevchuk was stabbed, the trio drove away in the Yaris, DeRuwe said. A witness got its license plate number.

Police tracked the car to a home in the area of Denver Street and Carlisle Avenue, officials said. Frye owns the Yaris.

The relationship between the victim and the suspects was not known, DeRuwe said.

In addition to searching for Frye, police are trying to identify the two men who were with her.

Anyone with any information about Frye’s location is asked to call 911.

Anyone with information regarding the homicide is asked to call Crime Check at (509) 456-2233.