BROOMFIELD, Colo. — The suspect in a fatal triple shooting outside a Broomfield Walgreens store over the weekend claims he fired in self-defense, according to an arrest affidavit released Tuesday.
Witnesses told police that Trevor Woodruff, 19, claimed he shot and killed a man and wounded a woman, 18, and a juvenile male after the victim pointed a gun at him and “racked it,” the affidavit said.
The shooting occurred around 11:30 a.m. Saturday inside a BMW in the parking lot of a Walgreens, located at East Midway Boulevard and Zuni Street. Woodruff was arrested later the same day after turning himself into police.
The victims were found inside the BMW, aside from the woman who was found just outside the vehicle when police arrived.
A man sitting in the driver’s seat, identified as Javier Garcia Jr., 19, was shot in the chest and head, according to the affidavit. He was pronounced deceased at the hospital. Paramedics found what looked like a 9mm semi-automatic handgun after pulling Garcia out of the car.
The 18-year-old woman was sitting in the front passenger seat and was shot in the neck and wounded after getting out of the vehicle, the affidavit says. A juvenile male sitting in the back of the vehicle was shot in the chest and face and remains hospitalized in critical condition.
The female victim identified the suspect to police. She said she didn’t know Woodruff all that well, but her boyfriend, Garcia, did. She told them they stopped at the Walgreens before Garcia was to drive her to Denver International Airport where she works, the affidavit says.
According to the affidavit, witnesses told police that Woodruff was meeting with Garcia to sell him a gun. Surveillance video of the Walgreens parking lot showed Woodruff entering the back seat of the parked BMW just before the shooting.
Witnesses told police that after the shooting, they overheard Woodruff tell his mother over the phone that he “f—ked up” and that he was going to jail. Woodruff was heard telling his mother say “someone had pointed a gun at him and racked it, so he shot in self-defense, indicating, ‘it was him or me,’” Broomfield police wrote in the affidavit.
Police said Woodruff lives with his mother in a mobile home park across the street from the Walgreens. They said Woodruff has had several run-ins with police at his mobile home, including incidents involving handguns in March of 2019.
The gun believed to be involved in the shooting was recovered at a home in Thornton. Broomfield police had pinged Woodruff’s phone, indicating he was at the Thornton address after the shooting, the affidavit says.
The suspect was dropped off at the Broomfield police station where he turned himself in later in the day Saturday. He was arrested without incident, police said. Woodruff did not speak to investigators as an attorney was not present, the affidavit says.
Woodruff is being held at the Broomfield Detention Center on suspicion of first-degree murder, two counts of attempted first-degree murder, and two counts of assault. He is scheduled for court on Dec. 10.
Police said no one inside the Walgreens was injured, and investigators do not believe the shooting was in any way connected to the store.
A GoFundMe has been set up for Garcia's family for his funeral.
