King County prosecutors have filed hate crime charges against a 47-year-old Seattle man for allegedly threatening to kill a gay man and a grocery store employee in Downtown Seattle earlier this week.
Prosecutors say that on June 29th, Michael A. Grundstrom approached a gay man outside of Site 17 Grocery on Western Avenue and Wall Street and began harassing him.
According to a Seattle Police Department probable cause document, the man was talking on his phone about a pink bandana he owned when Grundstrom approached him and asked "pink bandana, what, are you some kind of fag?"
The man told Grundstrom he was gay, the document says, and Grundstrom responded by stating that "all fags are child molesters and if I had my way I would kill all of them" and told the man that "if I ever see you with a child I'm going to kill you."
The gay man believed he was about to be attacked by Grundstrom and pepper sprayed him. Grundstrom then fled into the Site 17 grocery store and attempted to wash the pepper spray out of his eyes with a bottle of water.
Documents say Grundstrom then demanded an employee in the store give him some napkins and threatened to kill him. The employee refused and told Grundstrom to leave the store. Grundstrom again threatened to kill the employee and called the employee, who is Asian, a chink, and fled the store.
Grundstrom was arrested minutes later.
Court records say Grundstrom—who is being charged with Malicious Harassment, the state's hate crime statute—has previously been charged with multiple counts of burglary and drug possession, as well as theft, two DUIs and a hit and run.