A 54-year-old former Seattle firefighter was sentenced last month to almost four years in prison for repeatedly raping a teen girl. The victim in the case supported a plea deal that would have sentenced Michael James Sulak to a year in jail as part of a special sex offender sentencing alternativ...
Instead of just enjoying fireworks while celebrating Independance Day, a Seattle man was arrested, suspected of firing off an AK-47 assault rifle. And, because the man has previous criminal convictions, he is now facing multiple charges in connection with the celebratory gunfire. The 29-year-old...
A husband-and-wife shoplifting spree near Seattle went awry when the man ran over his wife with his pickup truck as she fled from a security guard. The couple, and a second woman, went into a Kohl's store in Redmond, Washington, east of Seattle, equipped for the theft. The 49-year-old husband re...
Questions in an Oregon misdemeanor animal cruelty case lead all the way to the Supreme Court, where justices decided in June that the pet owner was rightfully convicted in the 2010 incident. It is the third animal cruelty case in two years to be decided by the state's high court. The basis for a...
A “smooth talking” former Seattle car salesman was arrested recently, charged with stealing two recreational vehicles, and police suspect he tried to steal a third. Police found the 33-year-old man unconscious behind the wheel of an RV parked in a lot in northwest Seattle. When officers woke the...
Two Eastern Washington teenagers charged with assault for releasing synthetic flatulence spray at their school will have their charges dismissed if they keep their noses clean for a year. The two boys, ages 15 and 16, were charged with second-degree assault after they sprayed the fake flatulence...
The Boise, Idaho, police department issued its first 30 body cameras earlier this month and it expects to roll out 250 more cameras within a year. The cameras will be turned on during traffic stops, arrests and other active investigations. The department's 300 officers already carry audio recorde...
A Christian school teacher from Seattle, Wash., was charged with sexual misconduct involving a child this month for an incident that allegedly occurred in 2012. Although he was only recently arrested, complaints about the teacher date back more than 15 years. The 45-year-old man is accused of in...
In an unusual move, criminal charges were filed in Washington State this month against a landscaping company as a result of the 2014 death of an employee. It is the first time in more than 20 years that the King County prosecuting attorney's office has criminally prosecuted a private company over...
The Oregon Court of Appeals recently ruled earlier this month that a man with his hand in his pants who aggressively confronted a woman and her son in a park did not commit a crime. In 2013, the 44-year-old man confronted a woman and her 7-year-old son at a public park by “shoving his hand insid...
A judge recently found probable cause to charge an Olympia-area man with four felony charges, including murder, even though a body has not been found. Bail was set at $2 million for James E. Stidd, 66, in the death of Gail J. Doyle, 60, according to The Seattle Times. The victim last was seen wi...
A suspect in a string of Seattle arson fires was arrested earlier this month after a witness used his cell phone to take photos of the man holding a lighter near one of the fires. The man was arrested and faces charges of second-degree arson, according to The Seattle Times. He is suspected of st...
Each year, about nine million people are incarcerated in local jails. Most are held for relatively low-level offenses -- such as drug misdemeanors, traffic offenses or nonviolent property crimes -- because they cannot afford bail, a new report shows. The Vera Institute of Justice reports that th...
A man in California was arrested recently after several women at an upscale restaurant saw him slip a drug into his date's glass while she was away from the dinner table. He was charged with one felony count each of administering a drug and assault with the intent to commit a sex crime. In Washi...
According to the Supreme Court, your right to a “speedy trial” under the Sixth Amendment of the Constitution does not include the time that it takes to receive a sentence after a guilty verdict or plea deal. Betterman v. Montana The Supreme Court of the United States issued a ruling on May 19, ...
Be careful what you post on the internet, even in jest, because you never know who may end up seeing it. This is a lesson that a 26-year old man from the United Kingdom learned the hard way on a visit to the United States in 2012. A week prior to hopping aboard a flight to Los Angeles, Leigh Van ...
There's no doubting the popularity of social media these days. One report stated that Americans check their social media accounts an average of 17 times a day. One of the most popular social media platforms is Facebook, with 57% of adults using the site. This use is increasing, according to the P...
In the summer of 2015, Phoenix, Arizona experienced a series of shootings on one of its freeways, Interstate 10. Authorities eventually arrested and charged 21-year-old Leslie Allen Merritt Jr. with the high profile shooting crimes. However, in recent months, there have been new developments in t...
Suppose you're out at for a small get together with friends. You have a few drinks, but not too many. You know your limits, and what it takes to get you impaired. You feel fine enough, so you have a few glasses of water and decide to chance it on the road. Midway through your drive, you suddenly ...
The popular live-streaming app Periscope was started in 2014 by Kayvon Beykpour and Joe Bernstein. The pair came up with the idea while they were traveling the previous year. The company was bought by Twitter in 2015 and officially launched March 26, 2015. After just one year, Periscope's users c...
In a criminal case, or any lawsuit, or even in any argument, one side has the burden of proof. They are the side that has to show that they are the ones that are right. The other side, the one without the burden of proof, can sit back, listen to their argument, and poke holes in it
All is quiet at the moment in the battle between Apple and the federal government. The tech giant and the feds, up until recently, were preparing to go to court to determine whether or not Apple could be compelled to assist the government in unlocking two iPhones seized during criminal investigat...
One of the essential things that makes a crime a crime is that the person committing the act intends to do it, at least to some degree. It seems especially harsh for the law to treat someone who made a mistake and caused an accident the same way it would treat someone who caused the accident on p...
An often overlooked and underappreciated fact of life is that businesses exist to make a profit. The more profit they make, the better the business is. Unfortunately, businesses recognize that there are two ways to make a profit: Increase income, and decrease expenses. In fact, a business is at i...
Ending one of the most public debates regarding cybersecurity and privacy in recent memory, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) dismissed its case against Apple over the government's ability to hack into a dead terrorist's iPhone for evidence, claiming that they had found a third party that...
