Thief steals fire truck equipment for use in other crimes, prompting safety changes

COVINGTON, Wash. — King County Sheriff’s investigators are trying to track down whoever stole tens of thousands of dollars worth of equipment from a fire truck.

Investigators now believe those tools are being used to commit other crimes.

“There’s probably about $30,000 worth of equipment that we lost,” said Division Chief Pat Pawlak with Puget Sound Regional Fire Authority.

It happened after a crew parked their engine at a shopping center in Covington and left it momentarily.

That was just long enough for a thief to quickly get away with saws and hydraulic equipment known as the “jaws of life.”

“We just don’t have the stuff laying on the shelf and so now we need to order new equipment. But more important is the fact that that is equipment we use for life-saving operations,” said Pawlak.

Sheriff’s investigators released photos of the suspect vehicle – a silver Audi – seen in the parking lot.

That was back on June 14th.

Investigators believe those stolen items were used in burglaries the very next day and the day after that, in Snohomish and King Counties.

Pawlak says most of their fire engines do not have locks on compartment doors, in order to save time on getting equipment out during an emergency.

But after this crime and a couple of other thefts in recent months, they’re looking to make costly changes.

“We are now looking at retrofitting our fire engines with compartment door locks – still they’ll be able to unlock them quickly – but we also need to make sure that we preserve our tools and have them for when we need them,” said Pawlak.

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