Authorities recently identified the bodies of two people discovered by teenagers filming TikTok videos on a beach in Seattle last month.
“The two victims, Jessica Lewis, 35, and Austin Wenner, 27, were shot days earlier, according to the King County Medical Examiner’s Office. A family member said the two had dated for years,” Fox 8 reported.
The teenagers discovered the bodies stuffed in bags that had washed up on Alki Beach on June 19 and immediately called 911, according to KIRO.
Seattle Police Detective Mark Jamieson later confirmed that the video was not posted online until the following day.
“We’re glad the video is out there. We spoke to the people involved and they corroborated some of the information,” he said.
Lewis’s aunt, Gina Jaschke, expressed her disbelief Tuesday regarding the horrific discovery, according to Q13 Fox.
“I couldn’t believe that was their story, because I’d been it [sic] trying to look for them…not in a million years did I think that was them,” she said of the couple who had been together for eight years.
“I don’t want them to be remembered for the brutality, I don’t want them to be remembered in any violent way. I want them to be remembered for their humanity and their kindness,” she noted.
The couple shared a home in Seatac. Lewis, a mother to four children, had been working for her grandmother and helping care for developmentally disabled adults, according to Jaschke.
“They had their struggles like we all do, and that’s [sic] just shows how much they cared about each other. They didn’t leave or anything when things got rough, they always stuck it out together through the ups and downs,” she said, adding that she had no idea why anyone would do this to them.
“I don’t think anybody’s going be able to heal fully or even come close to it until these people are caught,” she continued.
In an update June 30, police said the case remained an active homicide investigation and urged anyone with information to call the Seattle Police Department’s Violent Crimes tip line at (206) 233-5000.