911 calls describe night girl was randomly killed

Friends and family members of Molly Conley packed a Snohomish County courtroom on Monday, wanting justice for the man police say killed her.

To get that, prosecutors said, they needed to play 911 calls from the night the young girl was randomly shot to death while walking on a Lake Stevens street.

"Is she awake? Is she awake? Is she breathing?" one of the girls screamed on the phone for help.

As the calls described the drive-by shooting, many in the standing room crowd broke down: Molly's childhood friend, classmates at Bishop Blanchet High School, her siblings, her father.

"There was a group of girls hysterical," witness Dean Jenson testified about that night in June 2013. "I felt her with my right hand – then I knew it was real."

Another good Samaritan, Richard Reynolds, tried CPR. Molly's blood covered his hands.

He told jurors he was "just praying to God to save this little girl."

Deputy James Kunard heard the dispatch call and raced to the scene. He cut off her clothes to find her wound, and found she was struck in the neck. One of the Good Samaritans put his finger in the bullet hole until aid arrived.

But Molly was dead, a day after her 15th birthday.

Other shootings were reported that night, and in the weeks after the shooting the State Patrol crime lab worked on ballistics tests for some of the bullets found at the scene of Molly's shooting and the other shooting locations.

Detectives came up with a list of possible weapons, and a list of people in the area who had recently bought similar guns.

Nearly a month after Molly's death, police arrested Erick Walker, then a 26-year-old Boeing employee who was on that list. Detectives said his Pontiac G6 had damage consistent with the vehicle described at Molly's shooting scene. They also said bullets from all the shooting scenes were from the same Ruger-style gun and found a Facebook photo that showed Walker with the same style gun.

Prosecutors say it's clear Walker was the premeditated killer, and that he acted with "extreme indifference to human life" the night he killed Molly.

But investigators never found the bullet that killed Molly or the gun police say Walker used.

In court on Monday, Molly's childhood friend, Cassandra Osborn, testified she brought cake and marijuana to Lake Stevens for Molly's birthday celebration. Osborn said she inhaled twice at a park, but it didn't have any effect.

Walker's defense questioned why she didn't tell police about the pot that night.

Walker contends the damage was done in the Boeing parking lot. His defense claims detectives made assumptions that "leads to (an) innocent man arrested for crimes he didn't commit."

Molly's toxicology report didn't show signs of drug use.

Molly's mother, Susan, didn't hear all of what was said Monday. Because she testified later about her daughter, she couldn't be in the courtroom during earlier testimony.

On the stand, Molly's mother described her daughter as delightful and fun, so loving and sweet. Shortly before Walker was arrested, Molly's mother received a packet mailed from Bishop Blanchet High. It contained her report card and a letter Molly wrote to her class as part of a class assignment.

"We need to be kind to each other face to face and on the internet," she wrote. "All we have to do is respect each other. All we have to do to change is to be aware.

"So I pray that we will take these next few years together and make them great."