A 60-year-old man who pleaded guilty to fatally shooting a woman at a homeless encampment in Tacoma was sentenced Tuesday to 18 years in prison.
Randy Douglas Brown pleaded guilty in Pierce County Superior Court in August to second-degree murder for the March 27 killing of 38-year-old Yinairy Medina Castro. According to court records, Brown and Castro were living in tents in the encampment near Tacoma Avenue South and Delin Street when the shooting occurred.
Charging documents alleged that Brown shot the woman after she told others at the encampment that he had been touching her.
Tacoma Police Department detectives learned through witnesses that Castro told the boyfriend of one witness that Brown had been touching her. According to the probable cause document, the boyfriend confronted Brown and asked, “Really, you did that?”
Brown reportedly did not respond to the man and walked toward his tent. A few seconds later, the man who’d confronted him heard gunshots. Investigators later learned that Castro was sitting on a couch when Brown shot her.