A 38-year-old man has been sentenced to nearly two decades in prison for armed robbery and manslaughter in what a Pierce County judge called a one-man crime wave.
Donald Salave'a was convicted in a jury trial of stealing a man's car at gunpoint last year in University Place. He crashed the Lexus into a motorcyclist on South 19th Street and then fled, crashing into another driver and disabling the vehicle. Later that night, after spending about an hour in police custody, according to police reports and court records, Salave'a went to Reagan Kimbrough's Eastside home and killed him with a bullet to the head.
Salave'a was arrested four days later, May 23, 2022, and charged in Superior Court with two counts of second-degree murder, first-degree robbery and first-degree unlawful possession of a firearm. In July, jurors acquitted him of the murder charges but found him guilty of first-degree manslaughter, a felony that means he recklessly caused the death of another person.
On Friday, Judge Angelica Williams handed Salave'a a high-end sentence of 231 months, which included a firearm sentencing enhancement. She cited the violent facts of the case and the defendant's criminal history, which includes convictions in Pierce County for eluding police in a stole vehicle, unlawful possession of a firearm as a convicted felon and juvenile convictions for child rape and molestation.
"Somebody died, and that warrants a lengthy sentence," Williams said.
When Salave'a was arrested for Kimbrough's murder last year, the facts of the case raised questions. Salave'a was in police custody less than an hour before the 46-year-old victim was killed. Could the fatal shooting have been avoided?
Hundreds of pages of investigative documents and court filings reviewed by The News Tribune last year suggested police might have had probable cause to arrest Salave'a on suspicion of hit and run, if not for the armed robbery involving the Lexus.
After Salave'a was detained following the hit and run on South 19th Street, University Place deputies contracted through the Pierce County Sheriff's Department released him instead of booking him into jail. At the man's request, according to police reports, a Fircrest sergeant drove him to a convenience store in Central Tacoma, dropping him off about four miles away from Kimbrough's home.
Law enforcement didn't know with certainty Salave'a stole the vehicle at gunpoint. Deputies had only been advised that the car was taken in an armed robbery, according to court records, and, when they found it, Salave'a was the driver.
At the time, COVID-19 protocols also prevented deputies from jailing suspects for misdemeanor hit and run, spokespersons for the Sheriff's Department have told The News Tribune. Deputies could ask for exceptions, but police records don't indicate that any peace officer called to ask about booking Salave'a.
As far as the armed robbery, deputies wrote they didn't have probable cause to arrest him because the victim hadn't cooperated.
"We have no crime if we cannot contact him," a University Place deputy insistent on interviewing the robbery victim in person messaged to dispatchers, who said they didn't have a phone number for him.
By the time deputies arrived at the victim's home to interview him, Salave'a had already been released from custody.
As the deputies left the scene, they learned Kimbrough was shot in the head.
Court records don't provide a clear-cut motive for why Salave'a killed Kimbrough, but police reports indicate the defendant suspected Kimbrough had molested his daughter. The reports released to The News Tribune present no evidence to support the allegation.
At Salavea's sentencing hearing Friday, the man asked for mercy from the court, requesting a low-end sentence. He said he had been in and out of prison as a juvenile, and he said he now had a beautiful family, gesturing to those who had come to court to support him.
"I believe that the state did not prove their case," Salave'a said.
