Spokane Man Charged In Seattle Killing

Thu., Nov. 14, 1996

Adam Lynn Staff Writer

A Spokane man was charged this week in the 1995 killing of a Seattle recording studio owner.

Shawn D. Swenson, 25, is being held in the King County Jail on one count each of first-degree murder and first- and second-degree robbery. Bail is set at $2 million.

Seattle police allege Swenson, who lives in an apartment in the 400 block of West Belwood in Spokane, helped kill David Loucks in March 1995. Loucks was found hog-tied and strangled in his studio.

Police say Swenson and two other men killed Loucks in order to steal recording equipment from him.

Swenson, an unemployed disc jockey, admitted to detectives that he was part of a ring of thieves that stole commercial recording equipment from small studios throughout the Seattle area.

Swenson said he posed as a musician interested in recording a song in order to gain access to Loucks’ studio, but he denied killing the man.

He told Seattle police one of the other men with him that night strangled Loucks as he watched.

“The defendant stated that he could see the victim’s face as he was being strangled and that the victim was completely helpless,” prosecutors said in an affidavit.

Swenson was arrested in Spokane in October on an outstanding King County theft warrant and sent to Seattle, where detectives questioned him about the Loucks murder.

He is scheduled to be arraigned Monday.

, DataTimes

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