A 16-year-old Tacoma boy was arrested in Auburn and subsequently charged with the murder of a 15-year-old Tacoma boy.

According to the Auburn Police Department crimes log, at 7:22 p.m. March 2 in the 12000 block of SE 312th St., a juvenile was arrested in Auburn as a murder suspect, with other listed offenses of aggravated assault and a weapons offense. The teen is Jeremiah Wade, who will be charged as an adult for first-degree murder, second-degree murder — for the same victim — and second-degree unlawful possession of a firearm.

According to Pierce County Prosecutor’s Office spokesperson Adam Faber, the two charges are alternate theories of the murder, which is a normal practice. Faber said as a matter of state law, 16- and 17-year-olds charged with murder are auto-declined into adult court.

According to charging documents, on Sept. 14, 2024, at about 3:57 a.m., the Tacoma Police Department was dispatched to a shooting and found the victim unresponsive, and he was later declared deceased at the scene. According to a Sept. 19 Pierce County news flash, the victim was Moses Tillman, 15. The cause of death was a gunshot wound to the torso and the manner was determined as a homicide.

According to documents, Tillman’s cousin was with him during the shooting, and he would later admit that they were meeting with Wade to buy a firearm. The cousin was then shown a photo of Wade’s Instagram account where he posed with firearms, and he confirmed that it was him who shot Tillman, according to documents.

In an interview with officers about three and half weeks after the alleged murder, the cousin told officers that Tillman was going to trade his firearm and $300 for Wade’s firearm. The cousin told officers that before the incident, Tillman had his firearm tucked under his arm, and then Wade grabbed it, which initiated a tug of war before he took the gun from him and Tillman was shot, according to the documents. The cousin stated that a friend later showed him a photo from Wade’s Instagram where he was posing with the firearm he took from Tillman.