MILL CREEK, Wash. — Apartment residents in Mill Creek are concerned after several of their garages were hit during a break-in over the weekend. One of the residents, Sean Donovan, says the plastic covering on the garage door locks was pried off. By Tuesday, the apartment complex had replaced the locks with steel on Donovan’s and his affected neighbors’ doors. Sean first noticed it after batting practice with his son on Saturday.
“My first thought was my stuff was missing, then my son noticed the lock was laying on the ground and the wires were hanging out of the garage,” Donovan said. “My son checked the three locks for the rest of the [garages] and they were already taken out.”
The plastic around the lock had been broken, with steel plates replacing it to add some security. The Donovans had all their fishing gear stolen, along with tools and thousands of dollars worth of car parts that Sean was installing as he worked to restore a 1984 Chevy Blazer S10. The project had been a passion and a way to cope with his daughter’s death in 2009.
“It frees your mind of everything,” Donovan said. “After my daughter had passed, I needed to figure something out to do with my time, so I started building that.”
Donovan has been working through insurance to try and file claims, and other residents have reported car break-ins at the apartments as well. One Resident, Gabe, is hoping for more cameras around the complex.
“Lots of people have had break-ins. If you have footage, you can actually take it to the police,” Gabe said.
Apartment complexes are generally required to have “reasonable” security measures, according to Sean Flynn, the chair and executive director of the Rental Housing Association of Washington.
“The question really is, what’s a reasonable way to secure that piece of property at any given moment? You can think of different ways people can secure it, but you can also think of different ways of thieves breaking into those places, right?” asked Flynn.
Flynn says decisions are often made based on locations and trends in different areas. An apartment complex in Belltown in Seattle may have security guards patrolling the halls, but that may not be ‘reasonable’ in an apartment complex in Redmond.
“This is why it’s not a set rule, right? It’s what’s reasonable in that given situation,” Flynn said.
Mill Creek Police offers that residents buy flood lights to act as a deterrent or request more security measures from their apartment management. Security cameras or Ring cameras can be helpful as well.
“Lights are always good, right? Like, it’s areas where people are congregating that tend to see lower crime. Cameras are good, but only if the prosecutor’s willing to prosecute the crimes,” said Flynn.
©2025 Cox Media Group
