Wah Mee massacre
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The Wah Mee massacre was an incident on February 18, 1983, in which Willie Mak, Tony Ng, and Benjamin Ng gunned down 14 people in the Wah Mee gambling club on Maynard Alley S. just south of S. King Street in Seattle's Chinatown/International District ("the I.D."). Thirteen of their victims lost their lives, but one survived to testify against the three in some of Seattle's highest-profile trials ever. It remains the worst mass murder in the city's history, challenged only by the March 25, 2006, Capitol Hill massacre.
The Wah Mee club operated illegally in a basement space in a predominantly Chinese neighborhood; despite some street drug dealing and a bit of prostitution, the area generally had a reputation for a low rate of violent crime. The club's regulars included many wealthy restaurant-owners, several of whom were among the victims. Security at the club was based in part on a system of passing through multiple successive doors, which had been used in similar I.D. gambling dens for generations, and had usually been quite effective. Mak and his accomplices defeated the system only because they were known and trusted by the people at the club. Their presumed intent was to leave no witnesses, since club patrons could readily identify them, as, in fact, the one survivor did.
External links
- Todd Matthews, "Whatever was happening was happening on South King Street . . . .", a detailed history of the club and the massacre.
- Wah Mee Massacre at HistoryLink.org, The Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History [1].