Swatting Call Leads to Arrest

At around 4PM, an officer located an unoccupied vehicle that was stolen out of Auburn on 4/23/23 near Minkler Blvd and Southcenter Pkwy. As the officer was investigating, he observed a male and female near the stolen vehicle who walked away from it once they realized that they had been noticed.

Shortly thereafter, a false report 9-1-1 call was placed reporting that someone had been shot a half a mile north of the location. The call was an attempt to divert the officer away from the stolen car so that the pair could retrieve it.

When said felony ruse didn’t work, the suspects doubled down with the male approaching and distracting the officer while the female jumped into the driver seat. The officer broke the window out and attempted to stop the female suspect from fleeing. Instead of stopping, she proceeded to ram several unoccupied vehicles in the parking lot before fleeing. The officer received minor injuries during the altercation and was transported to the hospital for treatment.

The male suspect upon being informed that he was not free to leave tried his luck at running from our officers but was quickly taken into custody. The suspect, a 42-year-old male from Tacoma with quite a collection of warrants was booked into jail. The female suspect was not apprehended but will be in the very near future and will be facing multiple felony charges.