As the 25th anniversary of the shooting approaches, federal investigators say the case is still very much alive — and they are renewing their public appeal for anyone who knows the truth to come forward. Wales was shot on October 11, 2001, and died at a hospital early the next morning. No one has ever been charged.
A Killing That Still Haunts a Queen Anne Block
Wales was 18 years into his career as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Washington when he was shot, according to FOX 13 Seattle. A gunman standing in the backyard of his home fired multiple shots through the basement window where Wales sat working, the station reports, and he died at a hospital the following morning. Investigators have never been able to charge anyone with the crime, as KIRO 7 News Seattle has reported in its ongoing coverage of the case.
Neil Floyd, now First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Washington, said the killer stood in the backyard directly outside the window where Wales was sitting. Floyd said investigators have not closed any avenues and continue to examine potential leads and people of interest, cautioning that investigators could still be wrong about something or have failed to consider an angle. Reports at the time suggested a lone male gunman was seen running from the scene.
Why Investigators Say This Is Not a Cold Case
Mike Herrington, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI's Seattle Field Office, said the passage of two and a half decades can actually create new opportunities to gather evidence, and he said the people responsible for the killing should be concerned. According to KATU, Herrington stresses the case is not a cold case and remains under investigation by a joint task force made up of the FBI, the Seattle Police Department, the Department of Justice, the U.S. Attorney's Office, and the King County Prosecuting Attorney's Office. The FBI still has agents assigned to the case, the station notes, with a combined $2.5 million reward now on the table.
Floyd said investigators maintain an active focus on people of interest, and he put it plainly: at least one person knows who killed Tom Wales. Floyd said when investigators call the case active, they mean they are doing stuff — continuing to push the investigation forward rather than simply waiting on tips, per the same FOX 13 Seattle account. The FBI is using artificial intelligence and other new technology to reexamine decades of evidence, the station reports, and the case file has swelled to more than 51,000 reports and thousands of interviews over the past 25 years.
New Technology, Old Evidence
The Spokesman-Review reports that investigators are applying technologies that simply did not exist in 2001 as they comb back through the case, as described in its account. That outlet also describes a current working theory that a low-level drug dealer out of Snohomish County, in debt to a cartel, was coerced into shooting the prosecutor — though the evidence behind that theory, including the identity of anyone involved, has not been independently verified. The FBI's so-called Makarov Project, tied to the type of handgun investigators have linked to the shooting, resulted in testing over 2,000 replacement barrels across the country, according to FOX 13 Seattle.
Mike Herrington told reporters that investigators remain actively working and following every avenue they can, underscoring that the task force views the case as a priority rather than a dormant file.
The Reward Has Grown Over Two Decades
The federal government is now offering up to $2.5 million for information leading to an arrest and conviction, a figure confirmed by both FOX 13 Seattle and KATU. The reward has grown substantially since the case began. In 2021, the Department of Justice announced that the $1 million reward had been doubled. Anyone with information about the case is asked to contact the FBI.
A Daughter's Statement on Her Father's Legacy
Amy Wales, Tom Wales's daughter, issued a statement about her father's career and legacy, saying she has now lived more years without her father than she ever did with him. She said Tom Wales believed deeply in the U.S. Constitution and the rule of law, and that he pursued those ideals throughout his career and his community service. Wales never lost a case he tried as a federal prosecutor, served as a member of the Seattle Planning Commission, and sat on the mayor's citizen advisory committee, according to the seed reporting cited by KIRO 7 News Seattle. Amy Wales said she believes her father may have died for those very ideals, and she expressed hope that justice would still be served.
