Police seeking convenience store robber

After four holdups in one week, Spokane police are looking for a white, mid-height man in his 30s with a keenness for convenience stores and a fear of folding stepladders.

Three robberies and one attempted robbery occurred at night and all of the cashiers described a similar-looking man, about 5 feet 7 inches with a medium to stocky build and short brown hair. Detectives believe the incidents could be related, said Spokane police spokesman Dick Cottam.

On Oct. 13, a man walked in to Empire Foods at 5434 N. Nevada and took cash from a register drawer. The man’s face was covered with a bandana and he held his hand under his sweatshirt as though he had a weapon, Cottam said.

Three days later, on Sunday, a knife-wielding man sharing the description of the earlier robber demanded cash from the Conoco convenience store at 3219 N. Nevada.

On Tuesday, a similarly described man demanded money at Monroe Qwik Stop, 2202 N. Monroe, Cottam said.

The clerk refused, and when the robber asked again, the clerk brandished a folding stepladder from behind the counter and raised it above his head, Cottam said. The would-be thief fled.

Thirty minutes later, a man walked into the Conoco Mini-Mart at 2020 W. Francis, displayed a knife and demanded money. After grabbing some cash, the man ran, Cottam said.

Interviewed at the Qwik Stop on Thursday, the ladder-wielding clerk, who identified himself only as Joel, said he’s been the victim of three robberies, but has now thwarted four. “If a guy’s got a gun that scares me,” said the former Navy sailor and Vietnam veteran.

One of Joel’s colleagues said clerks now keep an aluminum baseball bat behind the counter – an addition since Tuesday’s attempted robbery.

“We don’t want to harm anyone but sometimes people try to scare us,” said clerk, named Cal. “We have to do something to protect us.”

Despite the number of crimes, the robberies netted only a small amount of money, Cottam said.

Anyone with information is asked to call the TIPS line at 242-TIPS.

Armed robbery trial ends with hung jury

The trial of a Spokane man charged with participating in a May 31 armed robbery at the Bayou Bar & Grill in Spokane Valley ended Thursday with a hung jury.

Kenneth Harold Crause, 35, may be tried again on charges of first-degree robbery, three counts of first-degree kidnapping, two counts of second-degree assault and one count of car theft.

The robbers, who held three people at gunpoint during the holdup, were masked. Authorities are relying on circumstantial evidence to link Crause to the robbery in the bar at 4511 N. Barker Road.

Hanford ‘cocooning’ work past halfway point

Richland A decades-long project to decrease risks at nine nuclear reactors along the Columbia River by “cocooning” them has passed the halfway point, officials said Thursday.

Hanford’s H Reactor, which operated from 1949-1965, is the fifth former Hanford Nuclear Reservation plutonium-making reactor to be cocooned.

The Reactor Interim Safe Storage Closure project – called cocooning – involves demolishing nonradioactive portions of the reactor buildings down to the four-foot-thick concrete shield walls around the reactor cores. All openings in the core building are sealed and a new roof is constructed. Temperature and moisture sensors remotely monitor conditions inside the “cocoon.”

Demolition of the H Reactor’s auxiliary buildings began in December 2001.

The nine plutonium reactors operated along the Columbia River from 1945-1986.

The 586-square-mile nuclear reservation was created as part of the top-secret Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb. Today it is the nation’s most contaminated nuclear site, with cleanup expected to continue until 2035.

The C Reactor was the first to be cocooned in 1998. The DR, F and D reactors came next. The K West and K East reactors are scheduled to be demolished by 2011 and the N Reactor is scheduled to be cocooned in 2012. A decision on whether to cocoon the B Reactor, the first operating reactor at Hanford, is pending while authorities consider whether to preserve it as an interpretive center.

Rock slope stabilized, I-90 lanes reopened

Hyak, Wash. Emergency repairs to stabilize a rock slope at the site of a fatal rockslide along Interstate 90 were completed late Thursday and all three westbound lanes were once again open, the state Transportation Department announced.

The $1 million project took 27 days, spokesman Mike Westbay said.

Contractor Scarsella Brothers installed 45 giant rock bolts – some 40 feet long – to hold rock slabs in place in the cliff about two miles west of Snoqualmie Summit.

Workers also installed about 9,000 square feet of rock protection fencing and removed 1,500 tons of rock and debris, the Transportation Department said in a statement.

Hundreds of tons of rock fell onto the westbound roadway on Sept. 11, crushing a Volvo and killing three 28-year-old women as they returned from a weekend concert at The Gorge Amphitheater near George.

On Sept. 12, another large slab of rock fell in the same area, landing on the shoulder at the edge of the right westbound lane. No one was injured in that rockfall.

Westbound traffic was restricted to one lane while the repairs were completed.

Transportation Department experts have assessed the recent repairs and will continue to monitor the area, Westbay said.

More than 2,500 unstable slopes are being monitored statewide, the Transportation Department said.