Mom and Pop's version: Early in the morning, Mom and Pop (who recently moved to Seattle from Wenatchee) met the woman (who is 30 years old and looks "trustworthy and nice") in the lobby of their apartment building. After light talk about the weather and such, the woman explained to them that she was going through hard times and desperately needed a job. Concerned, Mom and Pop suggested that she become their baby sitter. The young woman responded with a tepid "maybe." Hoping to persuade her, Mom and Pop invited her to their apartment to meet the kids. She met the kids, had a snack, and then left.
What the cop saw: Though Officer R. Ellis was moved by Pop's tears, what really impressed him was that Mom's "recollection of the incident appeared sincere and believable and exact each time she told the story to officers." Officer Ellis also checked on the kids and found them to be "bright and healthy," definitely not the sort you'd expect to find in a home ruled by sex fiends and drug addicts. In the end, the officer decided to make no arrests, and the fragile family was allowed to remain intact.
The Canadians/Downtown/Wed Feb 16/ 11:57 pm: Tonight, Officer Jess B. Pitts was dispatched to Pacific Place Cinema to investigate a "Suspicious Circumstance." On arrival, the officer met with a visibly concerned employee of the theater who told him this incredible story: A Motorola handheld portable radio used for "interagency communication" was stolen! The radio was left in one of the auditoriums by a neglectful staff member and picked up by a mischievous stranger who remained on the theater property, making several transmissions. The stranger managed to elude every attempt to capture him.
On February 16, a letter arrived at the cinema office that appeared to be connected to the stolen and abused radio. In the letter, which came from Delta, BC (a border city just south of Vancouver), an individual declared that it was he who had stolen the radio. To prove this, he provided the radio's model number (RADIUSP 1225) and serial number (75FYQ6511), along with the coded name of the person this radio was assigned to (Usher 3). The letter-writer then told Pacific Place Cinema that he would return the radio for "750 Canadian dollars" (which is roughly 500 American dollars); having established the ransom, the letter "rambled on" for a bit. The letter-writer claimed the radio was in fine condition, that he gave it fresh batteries regularly and wouldn't harm it in any way if the money was sent soon. In the end, the saucy suspect revealed his name and even gave his home address in British Columbia as the location for the drop-off. The report does not state if the American Embassy in Canada has been informed of this international incident.
Les Fleurs Du Mal/West Seattle/Tues April 11/10:55 pm: A Bellevue woman called the cops after she found an arrangement of black flowers--decorated with the red numbers 666, and with pitchforks made of pipe cleaners--on the doorstep of her business. Officer Berntson, who responded to her call, noted that the flower arrangement looked as if it had been done by a "professional." "The flowers and decorations," he reported, "were held together with florist wire [and] had been delivered in a gold florist box with a card that read: 'Thinking of you. With sympathy in a loss that is felt by many.'" Strangely, the word "many" had been crossed out. There was another piece of paper in this evil arrangement that read, "You may be a failure as a business person, but we make a great team. Cheer up, I'll always stand by you. Hope to see you soon! Yours truly, Satan 666." Seeing as the French poet Charles Baudelaire-- who was a Satanist and famous for his collection of poetry called The Flowers of Evil has been dead for over a 100 years, the cops have no suspects for this unearthly crime.
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. 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; 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."
They Call Me Mr. Bird Death/Downtown/Sun June 18/2:23 pm: Today, employees of a beauty supply store reported to Officer O'Connell that "a suspect was acting oddly" in front of their store. When Officer O'Connell showed up to talk with the odd suspect, the man asked how he could get his hands on the geese that are killed by the City Parks Department. Officer O'Connell advised the man to call the parks department for that information. The suspect thanked Officer O'Connell for the recommendation and walked toward the beauty supply shop, which was across the street, while Officer O'Connell returned to his squad car and drove off.
Moments later, customers and employees inside and out of the beauty supply shop witnessed the most bizarre thing: The odd suspect pulled on a pair of latex surgical gloves, caught a pigeon, pulled out a machete, and, in one clean motion, cut its head off. Shocked, a beauty supply shop employee again called the police.
This time it was Officer Wall who responded to the call. When he arrived on the scene, he found the suspect wrapping the dead pigeon up in a newspaper (The Seattle Times? The Stranger?). Officer Wall asked the suspect for his ID and the man handed it over. The fowl executioner then explained that he had thought that the bird was in pain, so he killed it "humanely." Officer Wall did a little investigating: Witnesses told him that the bird had tried to get away from the odd man, and that it had not been injured at the time. Officer Wall told the suspect he was under arrest; the suspect became upset and said, "[The people at the beauty supply shop] will pay [for this]."
An Officer Bowling read the man his rights and put him in the back of his patrol car. At the precinct, the suspect insisted he had only done what was necessary to end the bird's suffering. The suspect was hauled off to jail, where he told police that he had not killed the bird with a machete, but had taken it behind a newspaper box and pulled its head off with his bare hands.
The Evil Lily Pads/Haller Lake/Fri July 21/ 8:45 pm: Today, a 42-year-old man of muscular build drowned in Haller Lake. The man, who is known as "G," was happily swimming to shore when he became entangled in a small patch of lily pads near the west side of the lake. "G" tried to break away from the lily pads, but they wouldn't let him go; indeed, every time he moved and struggled with the water flowers, he sunk farther and farther. Soon, to the horror of witnesses along the lake's shore, all that was left of "G" were bubbles on the surface of the water.
The Prowler and the Cello Player/Aurora/Sat Nov 11/5:12 pm: On the listed date and time, Officer Sharp and his partner responded to a report of a prowler in the yard of a house on 140th Street. The man was described as a white male adult wearing a plaid shirt, blue sweat pants, and tennis shoes. When the police arrived in the area, they spotted a man matching that description emerge from a yard. "What are you doing?" the cops asked the suspect. "I'm just a man who had to go to the bathroom," he answered. "[My] home is in Shoreline and as I was driving home I suddenly developed an urgent need to urinate." The cops asked him where he urinated, and the suspect walked back into the yard and indicated the exact spot. "Although the day was dry," reports perceptive Officer Sharp, "we could discern no visible signs of moisture on the ground." Officer Sharp and his partner then located the suspect's car and searched it: They found a pair of binoculars on the passenger seat and a pornographic magazine under the driver's seat. When the neighbors were interviewed by the cops, they said the suspect was not urinating in anybody's yard but was secretly watching their neighbor, a 52-year-old woman, play her cello. "The house has no curtains on the front windows, [so] she was visible from outside the house as she sat inside and played her cello," they explained. The prowler, whose name is Shepard, was then transported to the North Precinct and booked by Sgt. Dixon.
