On the evening of January 17, 2022, 53-year-old Earl Harris III was at his home in Tacoma’s Hilltop neighborhood with friends when a man knocked at the door. When Harris opened it, the visitor immediately began beating him, pushed him against a wall, produced a pistol and shot him multiple times in the torso and hands. Witnesses fled and Harris managed to call 911; first responders arrived around 5:40 p.m. and transported him to a hospital, where he died of his wounds.

Investigators were led to 34-year-old Antione Lavar Larkins through surveillance footage, anonymous tips and statements from Harris’s friends, who identified the assailant as Harris’s drug dealer and said Harris had not been paying for drugs. Larkins was arrested January 25 and initially charged with second-degree murder. He gave conflicting accounts during questioning; witnesses said Larkins was the aggressor. Larkins later pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter and received a sentence of 20 years and five months.

Family remembered Harris as a father of three and a grandfather, a former network engineer who had worked at Microsoft, active in his church and known for cooking for family and friends. Did anyone in the Tacoma area know Earl or have information about his final evening?