14 Replies to "West Seattle Crime Watch: Burglary suspects nabbed"

• Rhonda Porter March 14, 2008 (7:04 pm)

  This is a great reminder to get your Block Watch active!

• CandrewB March 14, 2008 (7:05 pm)

  Cool, here’s hoping the prosecuters can be tough.

• GenHillOne March 14, 2008 (7:10 pm)

  WSB, does Lt. Paulsen send you this kind of update unsolicited? I know you check in with him regularly but if he thought to pass this along, well that’s just really cool. A great example of a relationship that benefits us all.

• Bonnie March 14, 2008 (7:17 pm)

  Are these the ones involved in the Fauntlee Hills/Fauntleroy area?

• Aim March 14, 2008 (7:43 pm)

  Nice! Good job to everyone involved in catching these clowns. Were they the ones with the rock-through-window method of entry? If so they may be the ones who burglarized my place a year ago. I’ll see if I can’t check in with the precinct tomorrow. Our laptop is exceptionally distinctive.

• Rick March 14, 2008 (8:59 pm)

  YAY!

• WSB March 14, 2008 (10:14 pm)

  GHO – yes, when there’s something major to pass along, I hear from Lt. Paulsen and his team. They are great to work with. Otherwise I get down to the precinct as often as I can to review reports, between one and three times weekly lately – and of course, the reader reports sent by WSB’ers make a big difference too. Aim and Bonnie, I’m sorry I don’t have any additional details on this, but we’ll find out from SWP as soon as more info’s available, I’m sure.

• Bernicki March 15, 2008 (8:14 am)

  As a block watch captain, I am e-mailed a monthly Southwest Precinct Public Safety Newsletter to share with my block. (The precinct used to deliver paper copies to the entire block, but had to stop for budget reasons.) The newsletter features tips on how to reduce crime in your neighborhood, and sometimes contains “breaking news” such as burglary suspects being caught. You can find last years’ archived at
  http://www9.seattle.gov/police/precincts/southwest/prevention.htm

  A link to Tracy and the WSB is featured on these newsletters as a place to keep updated about West Seattle crime! The WSB is certainly keeping me up-to-date on local crime and how I need to adjust to keep safe. Sometimes, it’s more than I want to know! :)

• Indaknow March 15, 2008 (1:11 pm)

  The rock through the window really seems to be in vogue right now (or maybe just convenient?). That was the method of entry into my Mother’s house on Fauntleroy and then my Grandmother’s house on Gatewood Hill a few weeks later. Glad to hear some of them get caught.

• Gina March 15, 2008 (2:33 pm)

  How are the burglars gaining entry once the window is broken? Just curious as to how one might thwart them once they’ve done this.

• WSB March 15, 2008 (2:48 pm)

  People with direct personal knowledge (like Indaknow’s family, so sorry to hear that) can elaborate but from the police reports we see, there’s a variety of things, such as, if you smash a sliding window, you can then reach through to the lock to open it the rest of the way. Have also seen a fair amount of reports where the burglar(s) get cut on the glass and leave blood behind. Bad move, that’s DNA evidence right there …

• Indaknow March 15, 2008 (6:03 pm)

  At my Grandma’s house they broke the window to the furnace room (facing the backyard). Once the glass was out they reached in, pushed a wooden dowel that was wedged between the door and wall (in the hopes of preventing it from ever being forced open) unlocked the door lock and deadbolt and let themselves in. The house was unoccupied, so they went from room to room dumping drawers and looking for items.
  —

  At my Mom’s house they broke a window in the daylight basement. This was an old window located under the deck in the backyard. Once they broke it, they reached in to unluck the window, opened it and crawled through. Nobody would have seen them under the deck. They then went through the house, much like at my Grandma’s, dumping drawers and looking for bars of gold or something! They left behind some latex gloves that were turned in to the police (they can still lift prints off latex gloves). With the sheer volume of break-ins, I’m not sure that would be a high-priority but if someday it helps them catch someone all the better.
  —-
  Both break-ins happened weekdays during daytime hours. Neither of the houses was occupied at the time, neither had an alarm, neither had a dog. Actually, neither had anything worth much money either. What a mess to clean up after!

• Gina March 15, 2008 (7:55 pm)

  Indaknow that sucks and I’m sorry your family had to deal with it. Hope all is well with you now.

• Aim March 16, 2008 (10:21 pm)

  In our burglary a year ago, they smashed the back window but didn’t get through the second pane. Then they went to the side and smashed the double-pane window there. Both looked like a rock. With the second window they created a hole *just* big enough for a child or very small adult to get through – about 12″ by 18″. It appears that person then went to the front door and let a second person in.

  Yes, there was blood. I was told by one officer that they would come by and get it (I found the blood a few days after and none of us had cut ourselves or somehow splattered blood on the chair that was under the broken window. After a couple of weeks of not hearing from the police, I called in and reminded them we had the blood evidence. I was told that they don’t even always get approval to run DNA in rapes and murders due to the cost, so there was no way they’d do it for a burglary.

  When I asked if it made a difference that we’d had a huge rash of burglaries in the area, the detective sighed and said as much as he hated to say it, it didn’t matter. Our burglary was categorized as a hate crime. I’d have thought it would have qualified for a little more sleuthing as a result, but no such luck.

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