Updates from the streets of the East Precinct, below. By the way, if you’re interested in how we gather these reports, here’s an interesting post on the updated Seattle Police Department system for crime reports. We’re please with the new system here at CHS. Sure, it would be great to just have the SPD hand you the news — but it’s never worked that way. The new system is a good start on making the report process much more accessible and, in the long run, much more useful to everybody. Not just fancy pants neighborhood journalists. Want to see the latest SPD reports for Capitol Hill? We map everything available from the police on the SeattleCrime map.

• CHS has more info on the armed robbery we reported just before Memorial Day weekend at Bellevue Ave’s Harry’s Fine Foods. In the robbery, the suspect was armed with a knife and sparked a manhunt in the area around 8:30 PM on May 27. We learned from CHS comments that the shop keeper came through the ordeal fine but lost out on some cash. From the newly release report on the incident, we know how much — $600. We also have learned that an empty house in the area played a part in the search for the suspect after the robbery. According to the SPD report, police found two men squatting in an abandoned property on E. Mercer. One of the men was carrying multiple IDs in his wallet. The officer said that the person pictured on the extra ID in the man’s wallet matched the description of the robbery suspect — a white male in his 20s, around 6’1″, and 170 lbs. According to the report, the men told the officer they found the ID in the house and didn’t know who it belonged to.
• In another late May robbery, an off-Hill hold-up went down on May 31 at the Shell station at the intersection of Lake Washington Blvd and Madison. According to the report, a man entered the gas station store just after midnight, ran around the counter and said he had a gun as he pushed something against the side of the employee. The man told the employee to give him all of the cash in the register — except for the one dollar bills. The suspect fled with around $200 in cash. According to the report, a check of the area was not successful. The man was caught on video at the gas station, however. He is described as a white male, in his late 20s, clean shaven, with short brown hair.
• An apartment building in the 1700 block of Belmont Ave needs new locks after a June 2nd break-in. According to an SPD report, somebody broke into a room in the building and stole the machine the building manager uses to make keys for the building and several boxes of blanks. No fingerprints could be found at the scene.