No arrests yet in November Capitol Lake slaying — but Jason Moline’s daughter isn’t giving up
It’s been nearly six months since Jason Moline’s body was found next to Capitol Lake, in an area of Olympia bustling with foot traffic. No arrests have been made, and no memorials can be held due to social distancing measures aimed at slowing the spread of COVID-19.
The pandemic may have sidetracked plans and hampered the investigation, but it hasn’t thrown Moline’s daughter, Lucie Luxilyn, off course.
“No matter how long it takes, I’m not going to stop fighting,” Luxilyn told The Olympian in a phone interview last week.
How Jason Moline died
Moline was homeless and had been living in Olympia for at least five years. He was found about 9:20 p.m. on Nov. 2, 2019, and his cause of death was initially shrouded in vague language due to the Washington State Patrol investigation into his death.
Thurston County Coroner Gary Warnock initially limited information to the fact that Moline died as a result of “homicidal violence.” State Patrol said Moline was shot, but that his gunshot didn’t kill him.
But, in early February, Warnock said his office updated the official cause of death on Moline’s death certificate, “so the family could move forward.”
Officially, Jason Moline died of “exsanguination” — he bled to death as the result of a stab wound on his right arm. A grazing gunshot wound to his right hand was a factor that “contributed to his death.”
His body was found at a geographic focal point of tension surrounding homelessness in the area — near the most visible unsanctioned homeless encampment at the time, under the Fourth Avenue bridge.
That encampment has since been cleared, but tension in that area persists: There’s an increasingly visible, growing encampment in the woods on Deschutes Parkway’s west side — a puzzle of state, city, and private property. And, the state is still in the early stages of considering restrictions on overnight parking in the area.
Very little has come to light about Moline’s death since it happened. Early on, WSP released a timeline of events it had pieced together:
8:04 p.m.: People observed just north of the train caboose on Deschutes Parkway.
8:15 p.m: An Intercity Transit bus, headed north on Deschutes Parkway, captures Moline on video standing at a southbound bus stop.
8:34 p.m.: Two gunshots fired in the area, but nobody calls 911.
8:40 p.m.: A witness drives by and sees a person lying/rolling in a parking lane near the scene of the incident, but does not call 911.
9:15 p.m.: An IT bus, headed north, captures video of blood on the curb near where Moline was found.
9:20 p.m.: A person with a backpack is caught on video running east through Marathon Park away from the scene of the incident.
9:23 p.m.: Thurston County 911 dispatchers receive the first call about Moline, found lying facedown near the lake.
9:30 p.m.: Emergency responders arrive on scene.
‘No one’s getting away with this’
Washington State Patrol is actively pursuing leads, spokesperson Sgt. Darren Wright told The Olympian this week. But, the investigating agency doesn’t have any updates it can release to the public at this point.
The COVID-19 pandemic has hampered detectives’ progress, Wright said, and they’re waiting on a search warrant they filed for records to come back. He would not confirm what the records were.
Meanwhile, Luxilyn, Moline’s 24-year-old next of kin, stands at the center of the aftermath of her father’s death — a coordinator of people who are grieving his passing and a contact for law enforcement.
“I think about this all the time, but thinking about my dad makes me angry,” Luxilyn, who lives in Lynnwood, told The Olympian. “I just sit here and, like, run it through my head over and over again and I’m just — I just don’t understand how it happened.”
She wants to get her dad’s name out there, she said, and for people to know he “wasn’t just another homeless person.”
But her plans to hold a second memorial have been sidetracked by social distancing guidelines, and her plan to spread her dad’s ashes at the top of a mountain that’s meaningful to her family are on hold, too.
She can get discouraged by the setbacks and the potential length of the investigation — but, she said, she won’t stop fighting. Her dad deserves justice.
“No one’s getting away with this,” Luxilyn said. “I don’t know who did it, I don’t know why they did it, but I’m not going to let them get away with it.”
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