SNOHOMISH – He told a friend the city owed him a living.
In the middle of the night, he allegedly broke into a hair salon, antique store, other businesses and homes. He took whatever he could carry on this back and brought it back to his downtown apartment.
Some things – hair-styling products and a floral rug – he kept. He fenced the rest in exchange for drugs, according to a police affidavit filed Monday in Everett District Court.
Snohomish police caught up with the 50-year-old Snohomish man Sunday. Officers say he is the leader of a burglary ring that has plagued the city for at least two months.
They believe the man, a convicted burglar, was planning more break-ins.
“He was escalating and getting closer to people,” Snohomish police officer Kendra Conley said. “He’d had two homes picked out and a business. He definitely was getting braver.”
The man was booked into the Snohomish County Jail for investigation of five counts of burglary and one count of residential burglary.
Police also arrested two other men, 45 and 27, in connection with at least 10 different burglaries that began about two months ago.
The break in the case came Saturday when Conley began speaking with an informant, who provided details about the burglaries around town.
The informant told police that the man picked businesses he knew didn’t have alarms, court records show. He used a lookout while he forced his way inside, sometimes throwing rocks through windows or kicking open doors.
He took whatever was handy – T-shirts, sweatpants, boat motors, antique furniture, costume jewelry and purses.
“He was taking anything he could carry or trade right away,” Conley said.
He hit one house where the owner, a visually-impaired woman, was away. He broke into an outbuilding at another location when the property owner was inside the house.
Police believe he may have boosted thousands of dollars in property. Some of it was recovered when officers searched the man’s apartment on Sunday.
Police found more than 50 items, including construction equipment and antique furniture.
Two other locations also were searched on Sunday.
Officers plan to return the property to its owners but aren’t hopeful that they’ll be able to find all the victims’ belongings.
“He’s been trading it for drugs so it’s moving fast,” Conley said. “We’re pretty excited we stopped him when we did.”
Reporter Diana Hefley: 425-339-3463 or hefley@heraldnet.com.
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