A Washington man faces felony charges after shooting himself in the butt at a gas station on Nov. 3. Police caught up with the victim/suspect at a local hospital where he promptly blamed the shooting on a stranger, but authorities were already the wiser.

Officers responded to a Shell gas station in Kent around 3:15 p.m. on Sunday after reports of a man shooting himself and then fleeing the scene. Speaking with the Kent Police Department, a gas station clerk explained that the man had stopped in to gas up and was browsing items on the shelves inside the convenience store when a gun fell from his pants. The suspect picked up the handgun and returned it to his waistband, only to have it fall several more times while he continued to fumble with it like Tim “Tampon” Waltz loading a shotgun. 

As the suspect continued to fiddle with the gun in his waistband, he ultimately discharged the weapon right into his own butt. After installing the new orifice, the man fell to the floor and stumbled out the door without saying a word or asking for help. That’s when witnesses told police he got in a car and was driven away by someone else.

The 43-year-old Ferndale man was dropped off at a hospital in Auburn by his girlfriend who left him there and drove away shortly after the incident. When authorities caught up with the man, he told them he was shot by somebody else as he walked out to the gas station parking lot, a statement easily dismissed by video footage of the incident. The man was eventually transported to Harborview Medical Center to undergo surgery.

Officers also caught up with the suspect’s girlfriend, pulling her over. She turned over the firearm in question, which he had stashed in the car. According to police, the man has a prior felony conviction for violating a domestic violence no-contact order, making it illegal for him to possess a firearm. In addition, the gun itself had been reported stolen.

Kent police say the man faces three felony charges once discharged from the hospital. 

It’s always a unique twist when the suspect is also the victim in a story. The irony of catching a triple felony case for shooting yourself in the butt doesn’t escape me either, nor does its congruence with the whole felon in possession of a stolen weapon dynamic. There are all sorts of lessons learned with this one, such as proper handling and holstering of a firearm, not lying to the police, not breaking the law in general, and definitely not shooting yourself. I wonder how many of these our suspect will learn, and I wonder if he’ll be allowed an inflatable butt cushion in prison. It’s a lot cheaper than a sex change operation…so I hear.