Creepy Cassette Tape/Greenwood/Thurs June 1/5:00 pm: Today, a woman who lives on Bagley Ave N opened her mailbox and found a letter containing a 60-minute cassette tape. She played the mysterious tape on her stereo: It had Jimi Hendrix on one side and Lou Reed on the other. The woman called the police, and when they arrived, explained that she was upset about this "homemade mixed tape" because she didn't like that kind of music--it's weird, and the lyrics are "creepy." She handed the officers the cassette tape to keep as evidence, and they handed her a report to keep as an official police record of her musical preferences.

"Too Much Police Involvement"/Ballard/Thurs June 1/11:35 pm: An alert loss-prevention officer caught two young women (one wearing a white shirt, the other a multicolored shirt) stealing Chinese food from a grocery on 15th Ave NW, and took them into custody. When the police arrived, they searched the purses and pockets of the young women and found a pipe containing what appeared to be marijuana resin on the young lady who wore the white shirt. Noticing the deeply concerned look on the officer's face as he inspected her precious pipe, the young woman became "excited" and asked, "You aren't gonna take my pipe are you? At least I only smoke pot, so what? At least I'm not doing crack or heroin or something like that. This is way too much police involvement for $4.50 worth of Chinese food." The R.O. (reporting officer) rejected her reasoning, and requested that charges be brought against her if lab tests prove that the pipe contains the remains of an illegal substance. The grocer, however, is determined to pursue the theft charges "civilly."

A Room with a Gun/Pioneer Square/Sun June 4/11:30 am: At 5:30 am, the night manager of a hotel in Pioneer Square called the police to report noise disturbances coming from a room occupied by a man who obviously made his living by illegal means. The manager also reported that the entire floor where the man was staying smelled of marijuana. Indeed, complained the manager, this once respectable room, in this fairly respectable hotel, was now despoiled by this inveterate criminal. The police promptly came to the hotel and talked with the man in question. The criminal decided he didn't want to deal with the heat, and so offered to leave the hotel peacefully. He packed his belongings, went to the front desk, threw the room keys at the meddling night manager, and left the hotel. Like any true criminal, he did not settle his account.

Later, an employee of the hotel was cleaning his room when she found a loaded Intratec 9mm handgun between some phone books on the nightstand. This discovery, however, did not surprise anyone (the cops or the night manager or Police Beat), because if a CEO checks out of a hotel room, he may forget his briefcase, and if a tennis player checks out of a hotel room, she may forget her tennis racket. If a hardcore criminal checks out of a hotel, it stands to reason that he may forget his "piece."

The Bad Beach/West Seattle/Mon June 5/12:46 pm: Two friends were strolling along Alki Beach, enjoying the moment: The tide was out, the sun was high in the summer sky, and birds were making their happy bird noises. Suddenly the two came across a nickel-plated, 9mm, semi-automatic handgun, two empty magazines, and a Supershocker hand-held electric stun gun. The identity of the sunbathing or vacationing criminal who left these weapons ("the tools of the trade") on the beach is unknown.