A first-degree murder charge has been dismissed for a 61-year-old Custer man accused of killing Bellingham accountant Vaughn Hagen last August after forensic psychologists deemed him unfit to stand trial.
The defendant, Donald E. Malone, was civilly committed to Western State Hospital and could have the charge filed against him again, if released.
Judge Lee Grochmal made the ruling on May 14 in Whatcom County Superior Court after receiving a competency evaluation from the psychiatric hospital that showed Malone lacked the ability to assist in his defense and would likely not regain that cognition.
The 18-page evaluation, signed by psychologist Andreana Augustus, found Malone understood the nature of the proceedings, but that alone was insufficient if he could not support his public defenders.
Malone was arrested on Aug. 7, 2025, after walking into the Whatcom County Sheriff’s Office and allegedly confessing that he shot Hagen multiple times the day before. Hagen was the estate executor and former accountant for Malone’s mother.
On Aug. 6, Hagen approached Malone at Birch Bay Square and offered to help clean his garage, according to the charging documents. Malone was living in his mother’s Custer home, which Hagen oversaw as executor. Hagen’s family previously said Hagen met with Malone to discuss selling the house, but Malone didn’t like what he was hearing and biked home.
Hagen arrived in a U-haul to the Custer home in the 3000 block of W. 75th Street a few minutes after Malone. The charging documents allege Malone retrieved a .22-caliber handgun, and without saying anything, shot Hagen at least five times outside.
Malone awoke the next morning surprised that police weren’t surrounding his home. He ate breakfast, rode a bus 14 miles to downtown Bellingham and reported the crime to the sheriff’s office, court records show.
In the evaluation, Augustus opined that Malone displayed “prominent negative symptoms of schizophrenia” and had an unspecified neurocognitive disorder from a traumatic brain injury, among other diagnoses.
Augustus stated Malone showed active symptoms of psychosis, despite being committed to two 90-day periods of restoration. The evaluation cited recurring delusional beliefs of Malone’s that Mormons were influencing his life and legal case. At the end of the report, Augustus did not recommend more attempts to restore Malone’s competency.
Augustus expressed concern that Malone posed a high risk for reoffending dangerous behavior, and believed there was a strong possibility Malone would discontinue his medication out of the hospital.
The evaluation also showed forensic psychologists were concerned about Malone’s ability to live independently. If released from Western State Hospital, Augustus recommended Malone undergo an evaluation from a designated crisis responder.
Hagen’s loved ones previously described his death as leaving an irreplaceable hole in the Blaine area and greater Whatcom County communities.
The 67-year-old accountant had retired a month earlier, handing down his business to his daughter. He purchased a 1950 red Ford truck to celebrate the next chapter of his life that he drove in Blaine’s Fourth of July parade.
Hagen’s family were early settlers in Blaine and Birch Bay, including his grandmother who founded the Free Church Unitarian in Blaine. He reared his children, Matthew and Sarah, in Bellingham, and was a longtime president of the Sons of Norway. When he wasn’t working, he enjoyed watching sports and playing softball.
Hagen’s sister, Vernene Scheurer, previously told The Northern Light that her brother was “a man of great integrity and generosity.”
“Someone who accepted all,” she said. “And had a strong sense of right and wrong.”
