Police Say Man Bilked 90-Year-Old Victim Says He Doesn’t Recall Withdrawing Sums For Suspect

The 90-year-old man looked at a bunch of photographs laid out by a Spokane police detective and pointed to a picture of James D. Colbeck.

The man, who is losing his memory due to senile dementia, told Detective Cheryl Graves that Colbeck was “someone I’ve seen lately. I don’t know where I’ve seen him.”

Graves believes she knows.

In court documents filed this week, she accuses Colbeck, 40, of stealing more than $22,000 from the elderly man and his wife over the past two months.

Police arrested the suspect at an Airway Heights motel Monday after police tapped the couple’s telephone and tracked down Colbeck.

On Tuesday, he was charged with first-degree theft and ordered held in the Spokane County Jail on $10,000 bond.

Colbeck has a long record, including convictions for assault, burglary, fraud and drunken driving, authorities said.

Graves said she received a tip recently that Colbeck was stealing from the couple.

Colbeck would pick the man up at his North Side home and drive him to various branches of Washington Mutual Bank, where the couple had an account, Graves wrote in an affidavit of probable cause.

Colbeck would then have the man withdraw cash, with amounts ranging from $1,500 to $5,000, the affidavit states.

The elderly man made seven such withdrawals at the drive-through windows of Washington Mutual branches throughout Eastern Washington, according to Graves.

Colbeck is accused of pocketing the cash.

Bank tellers told police they saw the alleged victim with another man in a Camaro or similar car on several occasions. Colbeck reportedly owns a 1983 Pontiac Trans Am, Graves states in her affidavit.

Trans Ams look similar to Camaros.

The elderly man may have had the impression he was investing in Colbeck’s company, Modeling International.

According to the affidavit, Colbeck told a witness that an elderly man was backing the business, which is registered with the city of Spokane.

Colbeck told police the business recruits women to pose for calendars.

The witness, Tracy Grabenstein, told police she overheard a telephone call in which Colbeck talked to someone with the same first name as the alleged victim.

Grabenstein told police she heard Colbeck, who was a guest in her house, talking about the business and reassuring the person on the other end that he had “nothing to worry about.”

The elderly man doesn’t remember agreeing to give Colbeck money for the business, police said.

“The victim vaguely remembers Colbeck, and remembers taking occasional car rides with him, but does not remember withdrawing any funds from his account,” Cottam said.

, DataTimes