Somewhere along the 15th Ave E business strip between Harrison and Republican, there is a thief. This Seattle Police Department narrative of a New Year’s Day burglary investigation at a 15th Ave business is probably the most interestingly written SPD report we have ever seen. Blank spaces are redactions per SPD policy for publicly disclosing reports. Bold highlights are ours:
On 12/31/10, I was dispatched to 4 15 Av E ( ) to investigate a burglary. Upon my arrival I spoke to CV/ about the incident, he told me that the store was locked up at 1915hrs last night and opened this morning at 0900hrs. He then took me to the outer doors he believes the unknown suspect used to gain entry into the business. The steel doors showed no sign of a forced entry. It appeared the doors were left unlocked by an employee.
This in itself seems unusual that both doors separated by a 20′ hallway would be left unlocked. Once inside the last door leads to the storage area of the store. pointed out an empty steel box on the floor and told me that it had held a large drill. He then took me to the northwest corner of the storage room and showed me an old damaged safe. The safe looked like the suspect used the store’s drill on it to try to open the safe unsuccessfully. stated that the safe had no money in it and was of no value to him since it was already in the storage room when he took over the shop. also showed me a small quartered box which he stated held the store’s start up money for the next morning and that night take $570.00. While looking around the storage area, I noticed the whole scene looked out of place. First who would take the time to try to open a large old safe with a drill and how did the suspect known the money was in an old quartered box above eye level across the room without searching for it. Second the storage area was not ransacked; it was as if the suspect knew where the money was kept and drilled into the safe to cover up a theft by an employee, who would know where the money was kept.
The public version of the report says only that the business is in the 400 block of 15th Ave East. Don’t get too excited by the address we used in the Google map — we were just finding a good mid-block point to map. We haven’t heard of any arrests in the case but will check with SPD to see if these Sherlock Holmes-level deductions bore any fruit.
