Wednesday 4/16, 12:34 p.m.
A Seattle City Light employee called police after finding a small 3-year-old boy playing in the street in front of a South Benefit Street house. The worker was there to issue notice that the power was going to be turned off in 24 hours. The boy was climbing on top of a retaining wall that had a 4-foot drop-off onto a hillside laden with blackberry bushes.
At the scene, officers knocked on the open front door and announced who they were. When they heard no answer, the officers decided to go inside to do a welfare check. They were met with the smell of mold and urine, and soiled diapers and molded food were strewn throughout the house.
The officers found four people sleeping on a soiled mattress lying on the floor in an upstairs bedroom. They knocked, yelling their presence, and a 13-year-old girl sat up and shook her mother until the woman, age 34, woke up.
The woman told officers she was up all night with her month-old baby, and she told her teenage girl to watch the other three children (including the dangerously wandering boy) while she took some medicine to fall asleep. Officers noticed an empty Nyquil bottle in the bedroom.
The mother said she has nine children ages one month, 3,4, 6, 8, 9, 11, and 13. In addition to four who were with the mother when the police arrived, four were at school and the oldest was living with the grandmother.
The mother told officers she cleans the house regularly and had just steam cleaned the carpets a month ago. When the officers asked her if she had any food in the house for the children, the woman said there was not much but she would go to McDonalds in the evening to feed them all.
The officers checked and found there was almost no food in the refrigerator and a good amount of mold. They also found there wasn't enough food in the house to feed half of the woman's children for even a day. The carpet, they noted, looked like it had not been vacuumed for about a year, and, along with the used diapers throughout the home, there were patches of fecal matter ground into the carpet.
Only one of the bathrooms in the house worked. The others had clogged toilets with urine and fecal matter spread around the nearby ground. When the officers first entered the home, they forced their way into one of the bathrooms that was locked to check on the welfare of anyone that may have been inside; there was no one.
The officers called in Child Protective Service (CPS) personnel. The CPS team took the woman's four children at the home, and her four children at school, into protective custody. CPS officials also took pictures of the home.
While CPS was taking the children, the father of the woman's one-month old infant arrived at the home. He told the officers and CPS officials he doesn't live at the home but is staying with a friend in the South End after returning from Alaska after a month-long work stint.
After the children were gone, the officers impounded two vehicles that were found on the property.
Trespassing
Thursday 4/17, 3:52 p.m.
Officers responded to a call of a possible car prowl in progress in the 6700 block of Rainier Ave. S. At the scene, officers found a Plymouth van parked in front of the complainant's residence.
According to the complainant, a child in the house watched an unknown woman get into the car. Officers checked and found a 26-year-old woman lying down in the van's front passenger seat, apparently asleep.
Officers noted the woman is a transient and has been known by them to find shelter in vehicles and various structures in the area. The woman told officers she was able to get into the van through an unlocked door and that she did not intend to damage the vehicle or take anything from it. She was given a verbal trespass warning and released from the scene.
Burglary
Friday 4/18, 11 a.m.
A woman, age 57, left her home in the 3300 block of South Holly Street and drove to the intersection of Martin Luther King Jr. Way S. and South Henderson Street to run an errand. She was gone for only 12 minutes, and when she returned the woman noticed her garage door was open.
She parked the car on the street and went to her front door. It wouldn't open, and when she looked through the door's window, saw two men in their late teens or early 20s inside her home. She watched as they came down the staircase and walked toward the back door of her home.
The woman walked away from her house, screamed for help and then called 911 on her cell phone. A man, who was doing construction nearby, came to her aid. Both the woman and the witness watched the two suspects walk down South Holly Street. The witness followed them in his vehicle and watched the two get into a 1989 Honda Civic that was driven by a third person.
Officers cleared the house before the woman went inside to see if the two young burglars took anything. She noticed a laptop computer in a case that had been dropped by the stairs, and in an upstairs bedroom the woman found her purse had been rummaged through.
Officers also checked the address of the suspect vehicle's registered owner, but didn't find the car.
Robbery
Saturday 4/19, 4:38
A man started to put his daughter in the back seat of his sport utility vehicle that was parked near the intersection of Rainier Avenue South and South Rose Street when he noticed a man sitting in the rear, drivers-side seat.
The man tried to detain the car prowler by leaning against his car's only functional rear door.
As he did this, a second suspect came from behind and pushed the man away from the vehicle. The two suspects ran west on South Rose Street.
The prowlers took a digital camera and the faceplate from the man's CD player.
Armed robbery suspect
Sunday 4/20, 1:40 p.m.
Officers were investigating a report of a large disturbance in the 3100 block of Airport Way S. when one of them noticed a 15-year-old boy who is a self admitted Holly Park Gang member.
The officer has had numerous previous contacts, and arrests, with the boy.
The officer recalled that he had been briefed that there was probable cause to arrest the boy in connection with a March 31 home invasion armed robbery.
In the March incident, the boy allegedly entered the home of a woman in the 7200 block of 38th Ave. S. without permission. He pulled a gun from his waistband, pointed it at her head and ordered her to sit down.
While the boy held her at gunpoint, other alleged, young gang members searched the house for other children they thought were in the home.
The young robbers took an iPod, DVD player and a house key during the home invasion.
The victim told officers the robbers were specifically looking for her house key. She also said they were upset that she had been hanging out with some rival gang members from the Central District.
The boy was booked into the Youth Service Center for investigation of home-invasion armed robbery.[[In-content Ad]]