Rambo takes the stand

COEUR d’ALENE — When Tyler Rambo slipped the revolver he inherited from his grandmother into his jeans on the morning of July 4, 2019, he said he wasn’t expecting a fight.

Rather, he said he brought the loaded gun and extra bullets as a precaution. People of all different backgrounds would be at the celebration in Coeur d’Alene, he said, and there was no knowing what might happen.

The accused Fourth of July shooter took the stand Monday.

“I feel things need to be said in their entire order and their truth,” he said.

He is charged with attempted murder in the second degree and aggravated assault.

The charges stem from the July 4 celebration at City Park in Coeur d’Alene, when police said Rambo, who was 18 at the time, waved a gun and fired a round.

Rambo lost both legs as a result of the shooting.

In court Monday, Rambo said he went to Coeur d’Alene with his family — his mom, his stepdad and his sisters. His youngest sister, Deja Jones, was 7 years old at the time.

The family split up after a while, Rambo said. His mom and stepdad went home, while Deja and Rambo stayed together. He said they wandered through the park, singing and laughing.

“My focus was showing Deja a good time,” he said.

Deja said that when her legs got tired, she sat on her brother’s shoulders.

“I was laughing because I felt so tall,” she said.

They were passing a bike rack when a young woman approached them and shoved Rambo hard enough to topple him. Rambo said he fell onto the bike rack, while his sister fell over it and landed in the sand.

“I made sure (Deja) was OK,” he said. “She wasn’t bleeding anywhere.”

He then called their mom and asked her to come get Deja.

Nicole Ellis, Rambo’s mom, said Deja appeared to have been crying when she came to pick her up. She said she didn’t know her son had a gun on him when she left him in Coeur d’Alene.

Rambo said he stayed behind because he wanted to confront the woman who had shoved him.

Days later, he said, he learned the woman was an acquaintance he knew only through Facebook. He didn’t recognize her that night, but she later messaged him to apologize for pushing him.

He was looking for anyone who had witnessed the incident when he ran into Spokane resident Jawaun Anderson.

Rambo met Anderson about a week before July 4, at a house party in Spokane, where they had a physical fight. He said several people ganged up on him, including Anderson.

“I was getting the s—t kicked out of me,” Rambo said. “I was scared.”

When he saw Anderson on July 4, he said the same feeling went through him, because Anderson was “staring daggers” at him.

“I felt fear,” he said. “I thought I was going to get hurt again.”

Rambo threw the first punch, he said. Then someone hit him in the face, and someone else hit the back of his knee, he said, causing him to fall. He said he tried to cover his head with his hands as multiple people struck him.

Curled up on the ground, Rambo said he feared for his life. Punches and kicks landed all over his body, he said, and his head was bouncing off the concrete.

“I was going to lose consciousness and I wasn’t going to wake up,” he said. “I thought I was going to die.”

That was when he pulled out the revolver.

He said he pulled the hammer back, pointed to the sky and squeezed the trigger.

When he fired, he said, the alleged attack stopped abruptly. As he climbed to his feet, he said Anderson grabbed the barrel of the gun.

“(Anderson) was yelling, ‘Don’t shoot me — run,’” Rambo said, adding that he did not intend to fire the revolver again.

The pair struggled over the gun until Anderson suddenly let go and hit the dirt, he said.

Anderson testified last week that he dove to the ground after hearing another man, later identified as Spokane Valley resident Sam Henderson, shout a command to freeze.

Rambo denied pointing the gun at Jazmin Smith, who was dating Anderson at the time and was with him that night, before he ran from the scene.

Smith testified last week that Rambo waved the gun in her face before it went off. Rambo was standing when she saw the gun, she said, and she hit his arm.

“I believe (the gun) did fire when I hit his arm,” she said in court last week. “I don’t know if that’s what happened.”

Other witnesses, including Anderson, testified that the gun went off just once, while Rambo was on the ground.

Six witnesses testified Monday that they saw multiple people beating Rambo while he was on the ground before the gun went off.

Emilie Call of Midvale, Utah, was near the beach with her family when the fight broke out. It began as a verbal altercation, she said, and soon turned physical.

Before long, she said, Rambo was on the ground and several other people were attacking him.

“I thought, ‘They’re going to kill him,’” she said. “It was extremely brutal, like nothing I’d seen even on TV.”

A gun went off. Call said she saw the flash, though not the gun itself.

“To me, it was clear it was being shot in the air and not at anybody,” she said.

Call’s sister-in-law, Salt Lake City resident Mandy Coon, also testified. She said she saw people kicking Rambo, while others gathered around to watch.

“I haven’t seen a fight like that before in my life,” Coon said.

Then she saw Rambo point a gun in the air and fire once. The crowd scattered, she said, and she grabbed her kids and ran.

Neil Moore of Mead, Wash., was throwing away some garbage after the fireworks show ended when he noticed a scuffle. He said he saw at least two people kicking and punching Rambo, who was on the ground.

“(Rambo) was trying to fight them off,” Moore said.

Thinking he might intervene, he said he approached.

“I don’t like it when it’s like two or three on one,” he said.

That was when he saw a muzzle flash and felt the concussion in the air of a gunshot.

“It seemed to be in an upward direction,” he said.

Proceedings will continue this morning.