Intruder was ‘just too weird’

The man who went on a wild crime spree in Edmonds, Woodway and King County exhibited some pretty strange behavior, including stealing a Cruella DeVille wig, one of the victims said Monday.

He stole a checkbook and a couple of envelopes of money from one unoccupied home in Woodway, then broke into Louise Halvorson’s unoccupied house and left them there, she said.

An image from the surveillance camera in a Far West cab shows a man police suspect in a series of home invasions in Woodway and Edmonds on Sunday.

While there, he took a jar of cranberry juice out of the refrigerator and put it in the hall closet. He took a beer out and left it on the counter.

He also grabbed some cough drops and a large, antique scale used to weigh food in stores, ripped Halvorson’s phone off the wall and took it all with him.

Also during the crime spree Sunday, he took her black-and-white wig fashioned after DeVille, the villainess of the movie “101 Dalmatians.”

“I’m sure he was drugged, ‘cause he was just too weird,” said Halvorson, who added that she was glad she wasn’t home at the time.

Edmonds police Sgt. Don Anderson wouldn’t speculate Monday whether the man might have been on drugs.

Anderson announced some new leads in the hunt for the man who broke into four homes in three cities, stole two cars and tried to steal a third.

The suspect is seen in photographs from a surveillance camera in the Far West cab he rode from the Shoreline home to Seattle’s Northgate area, Anderson said.

Police also found a cell phone in the pickup the suspect is believed to have stolen from Seattle before beginning his spree in Edmonds, Anderson said. That phone is believed to belong to the man.

A search of the pickup revealed evidence that the suspect had earlier burglarized a home in Kenmore, Anderson said.

Also, an ATM receipt was found in the truck, and an ATM card stolen in the Kenmore burglary was used at a Frontier Bank in Lynnwood, Anderson said.

The woman in the bank surveillance photo is believed to be the same one who accompanied the suspect when he tried to steal a car in Edmonds Sunday morning.

The episodes began with that incident about 9:30 a.m. Around 10 a.m., the suspect apparently broke into at least two unoccupied homes in Woodway. He then went across the street to Edmonds, where he kicked in the front door of a home and struggled with the 58-year-old resident, who suffered minor injuries in the scuffle. Claiming he had a gun, the intruder demanded and received the keys to the resident’s minivan.

He drove it to Shoreline, where he ran into another car at NE 145th Street and 15th Avenue NE, injuring the other driver. Anderson said he didn’t know the extent of that person’s injuries.

The suspect then broke into another occupied home, where he shaved his head and called the cab, which picked him up and took him to the Northgate area, police said.

“Thank goodness there were no serious injuries,” Anderson said.

Halvorson said the man rifled through her entire home in less than 15 minutes. The man was seen going around to the side of her house about 10 a.m., and when she arrived at home at 10:15, the stolen pickup was parked in front “and the Edmonds police were in my driveway.”

The man also had taken Halvorson’s credit cards, the key to her Lexus and some jewelry. The latter two items were the only things she didn’t get back – the rest was found dropped in her back yard or across the street, she said.

Halvorson said she’s not angry.

“It’s kind of sad that drugs are causing kids to do this,” she said.

The man is described as white, in his mid-20s, about 6 feet 2 inches tall with a lean build and a recently shaved head. The woman was described as Asian, in her 30s, with red highlights in her dark hair.

Anyone with information on the case is asked to call 911 or the Edmonds Police Department tip line at 425-771-0212.

Reporter Bill Sheets: 425-339-3439 or sheets@heraldnet.com.