Wanted to publish this separately since as mentioned this morning, an e-mail claiming a teen burglary gang is active in West Seattle seems to have ricocheted around the peninsula: Southwest Precinct Lt. Norm James has talked with detectives – the people in the precinct who work burglary (among other) cases – and they are NOT dealing with anything resembling what was described in the widely forwarded e-mail from a burglary victim. Burglaries, yes; organized gang of students, no, he says. The confusion, says Lt. James, might be arising from ongoing followup to the arrests late last year of several teenage burglary suspects, but he stresses there are no “burglary patterns” of any kind active in West Seattle right now.

Out of the WSB inbox, from Kevin:

Someone driving a late model white Volvo wagon just sideswiped my truck in the Alaska Junction, parked on Rutan Pl SW [map] at approximately 8:00 PM. Driver continued down Rutan (a dead end street), turned around and sped past my neighbors who were trying to get the plates on the car. Seattle Police are out looking for the vehicle as it sounds like the driver may be intoxicated. Any info would be great as I am about to move out of state and this is really bad timing for me!

At last week’s West Seattle Crime Prevention Council meeting (WSB coverage here), the crime trends discussed by local police indicated car prowls had been on the decline lately. Today, though, we have reports of at least three incidents since then, west and southwest of The Junction – read on:Read More

We are at Seattle Municipal Court, where a brief hearing for 31-year-old Ryan Joshua Cox, arrested twice last year for serial vandalism in West Seattle – graffiti that usually included a three-word anti-gay slur – has just concluded. The goal of the hearing was to determine if he was competent to stand trial on the 10 counts of property destruction with which he was charged after his December arrest. After Cox’s first arrest last year, similar charges were dropped because he was found not competent, and the case was not determined to be one in which authorities might consider trying to “restore competency” through forced medication. This time, there was discussion that might be possible. But what just happened is that Cox was brought into the courtroom – thin and trembling in a brick-red jail jumpsuit – and asked if he knew why he was here; here is our transcription of what followed:

Cox: “I was being harassed by my relatives … to strike back at them (I did) anti-gay graffiti.”

Judge Edsonya Charles: “How does that strike back at them?”

Cox: “(unintelligible) The goal of the cult is to force me to commit suicide or turn gay, so I strike back by discriminating against all gay people.”

It was subsequently pronounced that he was determined — through his behavior in court as well as a report that was presented to the court — to be incompetent to stand trial. The city attorney who is here told the judge they believed “restoration is not possible in the time we have” (we are waiting for her to become available after other cases, to explain what that means). So the charges are to be dismissed and Cox will be referred to Western State Hospital for “possible civil commitment.” Asked if he understood what that meant, Cox replied, “I could use the 40 bucks.” Judge Charles said, “I don’t know what that means, but …” Cox replied, “That’s the walking money they give you … when I was dismissed before.” And with that, officers led him back out of the courtroom. ADDED 3:06 PM: Per the city attorney’s rep – In a misdemeanor case, they are only given three weeks to try restoring competency; for felonies, the time frame is longer. The evaluation in this case suggested doctors saw little chance that Cox would respond to treatment in that time. So now instead, he will be referred for civil commitment, which we had discussed before with Mike Finkle, the city attorney’s office Mental Health Court expert. He explained that the hospital has 3 days for an evaluation and then the state can file a petition to have him involuntarily committed for 2 weeks inpatient or 90 days outpatient, after which the state can petition for a full hearing that could result in another 90 days of commitment and so on, up to, potentially, six months at a time. “Every six months, they either file a new petition, or release you,” it was explained.

From a burglary victim who asked to be anonymous, but wanted to share advice that might help others:

We were burglarized on Friday afternoon. We live in a townhouse east of the Alaska Junction. The intruder came in through the window on the ground floor. They took a number of things, including my beloved camera, all my lenses and some of my wife’s jewelry. Fortunately everything is replaceable and nobody was hurt, including our cats. Everyone should take a second look at their ground-floor doors and windows and reinforce them. A number of things could have prevented this from happening. Most of them very cheap solutions. I’ve spent most of the last two days making the house more secure and we will be getting an alarm system. It’s frustrating.

Here’s the official Seattle Police advice on burglary prevention; it’s perma-linked in the resources list at the bottom of the WSB Crime Watch page.

Good news from Siobhan, who sent a Crime Watch report on a stolen red Neon a week ago: The car’s been found:

I am happy to be able to say that it has been recovered and has very little damage. They broke the keyguard on the door handle to get the lock opened, and then broke off the bottom plastic piece on the steering column to get it started. They rummaged through everything, including the trunk, figuring out that the back seats folded down from inside. They took a few things, but nothing that I really care about, except for the fact that they were my items and they took em. Nothing valuable.

My birthday was January 6th and I kept hoping they would call me… all day long.. nothing.. then at 6pm I got the call that my car was at the TBT Towing impound lot on 1st ave. What a great birthday present. :)

If you think you can leave something of value in your car, maybe because it’s someplace so visible thieves wouldn’t dare try anything, consider the lesson AJ and fiancé just learned. AJ, who’s in the 7500 block of 34th SW (map), shared this note sent to neighbors late last night.

Just wanted to alert you that my fiancé’s car was broken into tonight. We aren’t sure when the exact incident happened but we estimate somewhere around 10- 11pm. His car was parked right in front of our house and the burglars broke in from the street side (his passenger side of the car). They rummaged through his glove compartment before grabbing his book bag (that had his Mac book in it.) Worst part was, we were sitting right in our living room when this happened. Please keep an eye out for your valuables, as we unfortunately learned the hard way.

We start tonight’s Crime Watch roundup with some information on an incident that several people have e-mailed tonight to ask about – another guns-drawn arrest on The Bridge late this morning. We started checking on it after one note then, but didn’t get enough details to report until we saw Southwest Precinct Lt. Norm James and Lt. Steve Paulsen at tonight’s Southwest District Council meeting (separate report to come). Lt. James says it started as a domestic-violence incident in northeast West Seattle – the call went out to watch for a certain vehicle with a suspect who apparently has had encounters with police before; after a brief pursuit the vehicle was stopped on The Bridge, and the numerous police vehicles that had been engaged in “containment” to try to catch the suspect pre-bridge flocked to the scene. The domestic-violence victim, Lt. James says, was not seriously hurt. Now, on to several reports including graffiti – with a request for ideas – a car theft, and a car break-in:Read More

Brief followups tonight on two weekend incidents. First, several people e-mailed us Sunday afternoon about an incident early that morning in the 4500 block of 40th SW (map), involving police using a bullhorn to call to someone. We got a bit of info today from Southwest Precinct Lt. Norm James, who says it was ultimately a false alarm of sorts, first called in as “a burglary in progress where the complainant did not know the address. Officers arrived in the area but the witness refused to come outside to contact the officers. A loudspeaker was used to try to contact the witness and have him come out. Once the officers made contact with the complainant, it was determined that there was no burglary or any other type of criminal activity.” Second, we also asked a question brought up by several commenters on Saturday – whether there are any indications that the two burglary suspects arrested on The Bridge (WSB coverage here) were linked to other burglaries beyond the one in which they’re suspected of involvement that day; so far, says Lt. James, no.

Siobhan first reported this tonight as a comment on another story but has since sent the photo you see at left, along with details: The red Dodge Neon Sport with a trunk fin and Idaho plate 1G55739 was stolen very early New Year’s Day from a carport behind an apartment building by Pizza Hut on the SW corner of 35th/Morgan (map). Siobhan adds, “The back bumper has two Scottish stickers on it. One is the St. Andrew’s Cross and the other is an Oval with a St. Andrews Cross the letters SCO and the Rampant Lion. It also had a Jolly Roger License Plate in the back window. If anyone sees it PLEASE have them call 911.. it has already been reported stolen so it’s in the Police System on their ‘Hot List’.” And a side note – a minivan stolen from Georgetown the same morning was found in the alley nearby (its owner had arrived to pick it up); Siobhan says the speculation is that the thief or thieves ditched it and took the Neon – which police have said before (see this report from October) is not unusual.

3 Crime Watch reports to share tonight – 2 cases of vandalism at local homes – one that happened earlier tonight – plus a car prowl. First, from FH in the 3400 block of 45th SW [map]:

I wanted to report that our front door window pane was smashed at a little before 6:00 pm tonight. A neighbor walking by heard a crash and then saw a kid run from our front yard across 45th Ave SW to Madison Middle School. He called the police who came, reported in the incident and provided a case number. … The neighbor said he also heard a crash of glass from the corner of Spokane and 45th Ave SW.

A North Admiral resident reports:

Writing to report that our house on 46th Ave and College [map] has been vandalized twice in the last week. December 25th and December 31st after dark our house was egged and mail removed from a locked mailbox and strewn across the porch. The vandals had to climb very steep stairs and the house is not surrounded by trees or bushes, it is out in the open. Report filed with the police department and they will be patrolling more frequently in the next weeks. Hope neighbors will keep a look out and report suspicious people, especially after dark. The postman observed that other houses were not egged so this feels like a repeat-targeting of our house. Wondering if there have been other reports such as this.

And from Annamarie in the 6900 block of 25th SW [map], who reports several cars were prowled in her neighborhood Wednesday night; she discovered she was among the victims after a neighbor’s phone call:

We both had not locked our doors and they did not break anything. I am missing CD’s, tools, etc. My car is parked right outside my bedroom window with security lights and all…but I did not hear them. I just want to get out a warning. I normally lock my car doors but must have not remembered …