Two men injured in separate assaults in Pioneer Square

Police are investigating two separate assaults that took place just a few hundred feet apart in Pioneer Square early Saturday morning.

In one attack, detectives are investigating what led to an assault that left a 24-year-old man with at least nine stab wounds.

He’s expected to survive, despite injuries to his chest and head.

Officers say the incident started as a report of gunfire, around 4:30 a.m., near a parking garage known as the “sinking ship,” on Yesler Way, between 1st and 2nd Avenues.

They found a big crowd there.

But police say no one reported seeing or hearing a shooting.

They also did not locate any shell casings on the ground.

Later a 24-year-old man showed up at Harborview with several stab wounds.

Police believe he was stabbed near the parking garage where the shooting was reported.

Doctors at the hospital discovered he had been stabbed four times in the back, three times in the scalp, once in his rib cage, and once in the arm.

But amazingly, emergency medical staffers don’t consider any of his wounds life-threatening.

Police believe the man stabbed tried to break up a fight between two groups.

They say he was with friends who were followed from a nearby nightclub by a group of unknown people.

When a fight broke out near the entrance of the parking garage, witnesses say the victim tried to break up the confrontation.

That’s when he was reportedly stabbed several times by an unidentified assailant.

The Seattle Police Department’s Homicide/Assault Unit is leading the investigation into the brutal attack.

In a separate incident nearly three hours earlier that took place about a block away, Seattle police arrested a Pioneer Square nightclub security guard.

Officers say in that alleged assault, members of the police department’s Joint Enforcement Team were already in the area, at around 1:45 a.m., when they heard gunfire.

They quickly moved to the scene, a spot outside a nightclub near 1st Ave. and Washington St.

They found a 27-year-old man had been shot in the leg.

Officers started talking to an on-site security guard about what happened.

Witnesses then told police the security guard had fired his weapon.

It’s not clear why the 27-year-old man was shot.

The 25-year-old security guard dropped his gun, removed his bullet-proof vest, and surrendered to officers without incident.

Since the officers were the first to the scene, they provided medical care to the man shot until medics with the Seattle Fire Department arrived.

An ambulance transported the man to Harborview Medical Center where he’s reported to be in serious condition.

Gun Violence Reduction Unit detectives arrived shortly after, to process evidence.

They are questioning the security guard at Seattle Police Headquarters and interviewing the man shot, at the hospital.

The security guard was booked into King County Jail for investigation of assault.

Police are asking anyone who may have information regarding either of these assault cases to contact them.

Witnesses and others with information concerning the stabbing or the shooting can call the Seattle Police Department’s Violent Crimes Tip Line at (206) 233-5000.