A driver towing a box trailer behind a Ford F-550 was allegedly shot at on westbound Interstate 90 near Issaquah, and Washington State Patrol detectives are now asking anyone with dashcam footage of the encounter to come forward. No one was hurt, but investigators say the passenger in another vehicle displayed a gun several times before firing toward the driver's side of the truck.
According to KOMO News, the driver first noticed a dark gray Infiniti G37 at a traffic light near Front Street before both vehicles entered westbound I-90. Authorities say the Infiniti then continued westbound at a high rate of speed. State patrol communications received a 911 call at about 11:05 a.m. from the driver reporting he had been shot at by another vehicle, with the shooting occurring somewhere between State Route 900 and the West Lake Sammamish Parkway exit in King County.
A state patrol release reported no injuries from the incident, which happened on westbound I-90 in the Bellevue area. Detectives are asking witnesses and anyone with dashcam footage from the area between 11:00 a.m. and 11:15 a.m. to contact Detective Judah Bergeron at [email protected].
A Detective With a Full Caseload of Highway Gunfire
Bergeron is no stranger to these cases. He served as primary investigator on a January road-rage drive-by shooting on northbound I-5 in Seattle, in which a passenger in a minivan shot a driver in the back, according to the Washington State Patrol. Hoodline previously reported on Bergeron's work investigating a fatal hit-and-run near Preston and a shooting investigation on I-405, and the same westbound I-90 corridor near Preston was also the site of a fatal June 2025 incident in which an impaired driver struck a disabled motorist before attempting a carjacking and fighting responding troopers.
The pattern extends well beyond this one detective's docket. Washington State Patrol logged 129 freeway shootings statewide in 2023, up from 33 the year before, and had tracked at least 60 more through mid-September 2024, according to MyNorthwest. In King County specifically, state patrol officials investigated 57 confirmed freeway shootings in 2023 and 55 in 2022, per KIRO Newsradio.
Reports of Roadway Gunfire Keep Climbing
King County residents made 577 gun-related roadway crime calls to state patrol dispatch between February 2023 and February 2024 — a 70% jump over pre-pandemic 2019-2020 levels, according to dispatch records reported by KING 5. Nationally, a gun violence analysis by The Trace found that road rage shootings causing injury or death surged 450% between 2014 and 2023, while a separate Forbes study ranked Washington 9th among all states for confrontational drivers, as noted by Axios.
What the Law Says About Shots Fired From a Moving Car
Under Washington law, recklessly discharging a firearm from a moving vehicle is classified as a drive-by shooting, a Class B felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $20,000 fine. The statute also creates a legal inference of recklessness for anyone who fires a gun from a car, shifting the burden to the defense to prove otherwise. If prosecutors determine a suspect's conduct doesn't meet every element of a drive-by shooting, state law allows for a lesser gross misdemeanor charge of reckless endangerment, carrying up to a year in jail and a $5,000 fine.
King County prosecutors have said they aggressively pursue shots-fired cases even when no one is hurt and no property is damaged, using ballistics evidence and shell casings to link suspects to broader patterns of violence before someone gets killed. Whether investigators recovered any casing or ballistics evidence from the Ford F-550 or the roadway in this case remains unknown. It's also unclear whether WSP or regional camera networks have located the Infiniti entering or leaving I-90 between the two exits, or what exchange between the vehicles preceded the passenger pulling out a gun.
