Convicted triple murderer Brent Luyster appeared Friday afternoon in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to answer to his federal firearms case.
He was taken into federal custody earlier this week on a warrant that ordered he be brought before a judge. An inmate search shows Luyster, 38, is being held at the Federal Detention Center at SeaTac.
He entered a not-guilty plea to one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm in front of Magistrate Judge David W. Christel. His trial was set for Nov. 6, 2019, and he was detained after the hearing.
Luyster’s now-former girlfriend, Andrea Sibley, 29, was sentenced in May to about a year in federal prison for purchasing at least nine firearms for Luyster between March 2015 and May 2016 in Clark and Cowlitz counties. She had previously pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting a felon in possession of a firearm and making a false statement during the purchase of a firearm, according to court records.
Luyster — a violent, known white supremacist — allegedly used some of the firearms to assault a former girlfriend in May 2016 at his Longview home. He reportedly punched and pistol-whipped the woman, and fired shots at her as she ran from the home, court records say.
None of the nine firearms listed in court records were used in the July 2016 slayings of Luyster’s best friend, Zachary David Thompson, 36; friend Joseph Mark LaMar, 38; and LaMar’s partner, Janell Renee Knight, 43, at LaMar’s home southeast of Woodland. Luyster also shot Thompson’s partner, Breanne Leigh, then 32, in the face, but she survived. The firearm used in the shooting was never recovered.
He was sentenced in December to three life sentences without the possibility of parole in the triple homicide.
Luyster was also facing charges of assault, harassment and illegal firearm possession in Cowlitz County in connection with the alleged assault on his former girlfriend, but they were dismissed in April.
The firearms in his federal case were discovered after Cowlitz County sheriff’s deputies responded to Luyster’s home for the alleged assault and heard gunshots coming from a wooded area behind the house. They found Luyster there and convinced him to surrender. The deputies found three of the firearms near where Luyster was located and six firearms inside the house, according to the Department of Justice.
Luyster was arrested, and on June 7, 2016, his bail was reduced, and he was released based in part on a letter Sibley wrote on his behalf. A little more than a month later, on July 15, 2016, Luyster committed the Woodland shooting.
