A Seattle man was carjacked; the attack ended up saving his life

SEATTLE – Tom Ogren was on his way to return two books to Seattle Public Library’s Northgate branch when two guardian angels carjacked him.

After Ogren chased the gray Hyundai Tucson that had rear-ended his silver Lexus SUV shortly before 11 a.m. on Dec. 16, two men in the Hyundai pulled him from his car and beat him.

The men then stole Ogren’s wallet, cellphone and key fob, jumped into his Lexus and sped off, according to Ogren and a Seattle Police Department report. The 79-year-old was left bloodied and bruised at the University of Washington Medical Center’s emergency room.

But the incident, Ogren said, saved his life.

Ogren was recovering on Friday, two days after undergoing a successful angioplasty – a procedure to place stents in four blocked arteries in his heart.

After the attack and in a subsequent visit to the hospital, doctors detected Ogren’s irregular heart rhythm. He was referred to a cardiologist who in May told him that he was on the precipice of a fatal heart attack.

“The cardiologist says, ‘Oh man, I would give you two to three months to live if you hadn’t come in here,’ ” Ogren said. “I called him full of bananas and said, ‘I’m healthy as a horse,’ and he said, ‘No, you’re not.’ “

Ogren’s journey to the cardiologist began when the Hyundai slammed into the back of his Lexus at a red light by the Interstate 5 exit near First Avenue Northeast. Ogren watched in disbelief as the Hyundai drove around him and raced through the red light, turned left and disappeared from sight.

Chasing after the Hyundai for about a mile, Ogren spotted the car winding through a nearby residential neighborhood, its radiator steaming, where it eventually pulled over near North 107th Street and Whitman Avenue North. The Seattle resident of 55 years parked behind the Hyundai and rolled down his driver’s-side window, as two men got out of the car and approached him.

“You got your insurance card?” Ogren remembers asking, before leaning toward his glovebox to get his own.

That’s when Ogren said he heard his own car door open and felt a pair of hands grabbing his sweater.

“He grabbed me and threw me down on the ground and started beating on me, kicking me, hitting me and smacked my head against the pavement,” Ogren said. “I still got a big knot on the back of my head from that.”

After the attackers fled, neighbors who heard Ogren screaming for help called 911 and gave him a chair to sit on while they waited for officers to arrive. As warm blood trickled down his face, Ogren said he realized his mistake.

“I totally missed the signals – the body language, the way they were approaching me, the way the whole thing was going down – I should have known, but I was just naive,” Ogren said. “I was operating in good faith that we would trade insurance and be on our way.”

Law enforcement agencies in the region have warned against what Renton police called “staged vehicle collisions,” where a driver rear-ends another vehicle before carjacking.

Firefighters arrived and treated Ogren, who took an Uber to the hospital and underwent a “battery of tests.” He said he was expecting to hear he might have a broken rib when a doctor entered the room to discuss his results.

That’s when his mistake transformed into a miracle.

“I had an (electrocardiogram) and they detected an ‘afib’ (irregular) heart rhythm,” Ogren said. “I’m 79, and I’ve never had a notice or indication that I had a heart issue.”

Ogren went home with his scrapes bandaged and a recommendation to talk to his primary care doctor about a possible heart condition. His doctor referred him to a cardiologist who detected Ogren’s blocked arteries after conducting two angiograms in May.

The cardiologist told Ogren he needed to either undergo open heart surgery or have an angioplasty, which Ogren underwent Wednesday.

“The procedure went very well,” Ogren said on Friday. “I’m on the mend, and it looks like things are coming around.”

Seattle police have not identified the suspects, who spent more than $600 at a 7-Eleven, Macy’s and Foot Locker using Ogren’s credit cards, according to the police report.

The day after the attack, Ogren said his grandson tracked his stolen phone’s location to an apartment complex near Renton, where King County sheriff’s deputies found his Lexus. The car was towed back to Seattle and had sustained about $11,000 in damage, Ogren said. He has since traded in the car for a Honda CRV, he said.

But Ogren said he only thinks of one word when he reflects on the two men who attacked him and stole his car that day in December: “grateful.”

“I could’ve gotten shot, I could’ve hit my head on something and been killed – all those were possible, but none of it happened,” he said. “And I’m going to live another day.”