Community Police & Fire
Gig Harbor Police Blotter | Driver offered a homemade license during traffic stop
Editor’s note: The Blotter is written based on information provided by Gig Harbor Police , Gig Harbor Fire & Medic One and the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office.
Gig Harbor Police cited a 52-year-old man for obstructing an investigation after he refused to answer questions or exit his vehicle on the morning of Feb. 8.
An officer spotted the man driving on Kimball Drive. His white pickup bore a license plate that read “traveler” and was marked “exempt.” The officer wrote that it was a “fraudulent license plate used (by) constitutionalist and sovereign citizens.”
The driver refused to give officers a state-issued drivers license, offering instead a homemade license and a black book that he identified as his passport. He also attempted to cover up the VIN number on the truck’s dash and refused to exit the vehicle. Officers dragged him out of it instead.
The man’s wife, who had got out of the truck and walked into a nearby coffee shop at the beginning of the traffic stop, soon returned. When asked by officers, she promptly shared the man’s name and date of birth. A check of state records indicated that he has a valid state-issued drivers license — in addition to his homemade one.
Officers cited the man and provided a court date. They tried to book him into the Kitsap County Jail, but he “failed booking … for failing to comply with corrections staff and jail procedures.”
Break-in at pizza restaurant
Unknown suspects broke in to the Round Table Pizza on Olympic Drive early on Feb. 8, apparently stealing an ATM in the process.
Video footage from a nearby business showed the suspect vehicle in the parking lot at about 5:07 a.m. It left nine minutes later. The Gig Harbor Police report did not describe the vehicle.
Inside the restaurant, officers found several arcade games damaged, an apparent missing ATM and a chain that had been left behind. Bolts had been cut away from the ATM.
The restaurant owner and owners of other businesses in the complex promised to get security footage to police. At least one business’s surveillance camera had been spray painted over a couple weeks earlier. The investigation continues.
Shoplifter injures store security
A shoplifting suspect ran over a store security guard with a shopping cart at about 11 a.m. Feb. 7 at Target, leaving the guard with bruised ankles and legs.
The suspect escaped with about $700 worth of merchandise, including a Kitchen Aid Mixer, prenatal gummies, Plan B contraception and more. Officers were unable to identify the suspect, described as a woman in her mid-30s.
Because the suspect injured the guard, if officers find the suspect she could be charged with second degree robbery.