News and stories

A Kent woman was found murdered in her home.  An examiner recovered prints from a dresser believed to contain the victim's prescription medication and money.  A search of these prints allowed the examiner to provide the detective with a new name for the investigation.  The suspect was arrested, confessed to the crime, and provided the names of two other suspects.  He was charged with Murder First Degree.

A large-scale fraud investigation conducted along the west coast revealed the use of high-dollar fraudulent checks and false identifications in a home escrow scheme where homes were being sold without the owners’ permission.  A check was submitted to the lab to be processed for prints. An identification was made to a subject that matched the video surveillance at the bank where he was seen attempting to cash that same check.

In 1991 a young mother in Seattle was raped at knife point in her own home by a masked individual.  Both latent prints and DNA evidence were recovered.  The crime was investigated but did not yield a suspect that could be tied to the scene.  In 2019, the recovered latent prints were re-analyzed and searched in local, state and national AFIS databases, something that was not possible in 1991.  Two latent prints recovered from the scene were identified to two previously unassociated subjects.  Given these identifications, a nearly 20-year-old rape case has new leads.

After receiving a tip, Burien deputies made a traffic stop and used a Mobile ID device to determine the subject was lying about his identity.  The subject was one of Washington's Most Wanted fugitives and had numerous felony warrants.  He was a violent offender wanted by the Department of Corrections in King County after a previous conviction for punching his girlfriend in the face.

This case started with a callout for a carjacking/homicide. Latent Print Examiners processed the vehicle and a gun box that was later determined to be the box of the murder weapon. They recovered the only print identified to the suspect from the support bar in the trunk. An examiner identified prints of both the mother and the son on the gun box and the prints of the son and the alleged shooter on the inside of the trunk.

The mother pleaded guilty after the gun was found and a witness had come forward. The son was found guilty and sentenced to 25 years. In the son’s trial, the actual vehicle was brought into the courtroom and the examiner crawled into the trunk to show just how far in the trunk the alleged shooter’s print was discovered. The alleged shooter pleaded guilty as charged to Murder First Degree with a firearm and was sentenced to 25 years.

An SPD Latent Print Examiner assisted in a burglary investigation at Safeco Field. A person broke into display cases, stealing rare Seattle Mariners memorabilia. The examiner processed items from the scene and identified an individual. In less than 12 hours the memorabilia was recovered and the suspect was arrested, keeping part of Seattle’s sports history from being lost forever.