Walking Couple Threatened With Handgun
An 18-year-old man was arrested early Saturday by Spokane police after a couple was threatened with a handgun.
The couple told police they were walking along First Avenue near Altamont Street about 2 a.m. Saturday when a man jumped out of a parked van and demanded money.
The couple said they ignored the man and kept walking but heard a gun’s trigger click several times behind them. Both told police they expected to be shot.
A few minutes later the victims were able to flag down a passing patrol car.
While the couple were talking to police, the suspect’s van drove by. Police stopped the van at Altamont and Pacific.
Police found five people and a BB gun that looked like a semiautomatic handgun inside the van.
After talking with the two victims, officers arrested Timothy D. Price, 15307 E. 15th. Price was booked into jail on two counts of intimidation with a weapon.
Passenger taken to jail
The driver of a Suzuki Samurai was ticketed by a sheriff’s deputy after the vehicle rolled through a stop sign at 63rd and Pittsburg early Tuesday, but a passenger with an apparent penchant for invention was taken to jail.
After stopping the vehicle, the deputy noticed that the passenger was not wearing a seatbelt, a violation.
When the officer asked the passenger for identification, the man said he wasn’t carrying any. He did, however, give a false name and then changed his story and gave his correct name, but an incorrect date of birth, said sheriff’s spokesman Dave Reagan.
The man then volunteered a second date of birth, changed his mind and finally gave the officer a third date, the correct one, deputies said.
The deputy discovered that the inventive passenger, Russell J. Hitson, 43, was wanted on two outstanding felony warrants: one for first-degree theft and another for possession of stolen property.
Hitson, 108 N. Walnut, was also charged with possession of a controlled substance. During the arrest, officers found a small baggy containing an off-white substance, later identified by police as methamphetamine.
The driver, Shannon L. Brabury, 20, 422 S. Chronicle, was cited on charges of driving with a suspended license and failing to stop at a stop sign.
Unfinished house burglarized
It’s almost spring, and construction-site theft is on the rise, Reagan said.
Someone broke into an unfinished residence in the 10900 block of South Degray Lane sometime between 6 p.m. Feb. 23 and 3:30 p.m. Feb. 25.
The burglar apparently crawled through an unsecured window at the site and took two saws, a drill, a propane heater and 10 20-foot pieces of copper pipe. Total value of the missing items was estimated at $700
“If you can’t lock up your tools, take them with you,” Reagan said.
, DataTimes