The family of a Portland hiker who was found dead alongside his dog while on a remote Washington trail has sued the young man who admitted firing his gun nearby and the father who allegedly armed him.
Aron Christensen was killed by a gunshot wound to the chest while hiking the Walupt Lake Trail in the Cascade Range, but Lewis County authorities spent months suggesting the 49-year-old had died from a “widowmaker” heart attack or from tainted marijuana.
More troubling, sheriff’s deputies knew within 48 hours of the killing that then-19-year-old Ethan Asbach had admitted to firing his handgun at a “wild animal” in the dark and then saw a body lying in the trail.
On Monday, the two-year anniversary of Christensen’s death, attorneys filed a $3 million federal lawsuit against Asbach and his father, Michael Asbach, who they say gave his son the 9mm Taurus pistol and told him to carry it into woods for protection while hiking in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in 2022.
Lewis County Prosecuting Attorney Jonathan Meyer declined to charge Ethan Asbach with felony manslaughter last April, citing an error-prone investigation that began when a lone sheriff’s deputy decided the killing wasn’t suspicious and moved Christensen’s body without preserving the crime scene.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee rejected a request for an independent probe into the case last July.
Coroners have come to varying opinions about how Christensen’s 4-month-old puppy, Buzzo, died, with an initial necropsy determining the blue heeler had two small stab wounds, but later examinations suggesting Buzzo had been shot.
“Aron suffered severe pain and suffering before his death, and before he died, watched his puppy die in the woods alone and abandoned,” attorneys Lorenzo Leoni and Pilar French wrote in the lawsuit. “Ethan and Michael walk free with impunity.”
Meyer, the prosecutor, said last year he would consider filing misdemeanor charges against the Asbachs, as Washington law prohibits 18- through 21-year-olds from carrying a gun outside their homes or businesses. The two-year statute of limitations for gun charges has now expired.
Meyer didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The attorneys have also filed a $20 million tort claim notice against Lewis County, citing the initial response by Andrew Scrivener, a recently demoted deputy sheriff’s who spotted a “puncture wound” on Christensen’s body but packed the hiker in his own tarp and removed him from the trail without further investigation, according to the lawsuit.
The suit also faults Lewis County Deputy Coroner Susan Anderson, who assured Christensen’s family there was “no evidence of foul play,” as well as Chief Deputy Coroner Dana Tucker, who told family members Christensen had a bullet in him but died from a heart attack, according to the suit.
The investigation continued into September 2022, when Lewis County sheriff’s Detective James McGinty told family members that Ethan Asbach was “a good kid from a good family” and that Christensen might have died from tainted drugs, the suit says.
Toxicology reports later confirmed Christensen didn’t die from a drug overdose, the suit says.
Ethan Asbach and his girlfriend, identified in court papers only as K.A.B., were trying to meet up with Michael Asbach for a bear hunting trip at Sheep Lake when they took a wrong turn and ended up on the wrong trail. The lawsuit says Ethan Ausbach told investigators he heard a growling animal and fired at a pair of glowing eyes.
The couple abandoned the body and camped out overnight and then drove home to Tenino, Washington, where they informed Michael Asbach, the litigation says.
“But for Ethan’s decision to flee the scene and fail to seek help for more than 48 hours, Aron (and Buzzo) would not have died alone, suffering in the woods,” the suit claims, adding that Michael Asbach inflamed his son’s fears by telling him to carry a gun on a “heavily-trafficked public trail.”
The Asbachs were not immediately available for comment. It was unclear if they have retained a lawyer. Lewis County Sheriff’s officials didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
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