On Aug. 7, Mercer Island Police Department (MIPD) officers made an arrest with the assistance of some vigilant residents who called in suspicious behavior of a person who turned out to be a burglar, according to Commander Leslie Burns.

Three officers, Scott Schroeder, David Canter and Dominic Amici, followed the incident as it unfolded and eventually located and arrested the suspect, a 25-year-old Bothell man, at the 3200 block of West Mercer Way.

A neighbor reported seeing a white male wearing a blue shirt and black backpack ducking in the bushes in the backyard of the house across the street. The neighbor also reported a blue and yellow motorcycle going back and forth in front of a house on West Mercer Way.

When the officers arrived, they looked in the backyard of the house where the man was last seen and noticed a broken sliding door. At the same time, Ofc. Schroeder contacted the driver of the motorcycle. He said he was driving around the neighborhood looking for his son, who was on foot in the area, and provided his son’s name.

While Officers Canter and Amici were clearing the victim’s house, Ofc. Schroeder spotted a subject matching the description of the burglary suspect hiding in the bushes. When Ofc. Schroeder turned around to contact the subject, he took off on foot. A perimeter was set up with the help of two other Bellevue officers and Sgt. Brian Noel.

A Kirkland K-9 unit arrived and Ofc. Amici ran with him to try and track the suspect. While Officer Amici was running with the K-9 unit, the officers were notified by dispatch that a subject matching the description of the burglary suspect was in the Starbucks in Tabit Square. Ofc. Canter went to the Starbucks and contacted the man, who matched the description of the burglary suspect and placed him under arrest.

Ofc. Canter found a small baggy containing a white powdery substance, which later presumptively tested positive for methamphetamine. The backpack the suspect was seen wearing was not with him at the time of arrest.

The victim of the burglary contacted MIPD and said that approximately $25,000 in jewelry and electronics were stolen.

At press time, MIPD was still looking for the backpack, which likely contains at least some of the stolen items.

“If you live in this area (3200 WMW), or between this area and Tabit Square, please take a few minutes to look around your property, under bushes, in garbage cans, etc for the backpack. If you locate a backpack, please call 9-1-1 and ask for a Mercer Island officer to come to your location/home to retrieve it. It would be most helpful if you did not open the backpack because there will likely be fingerprints on contents in the backpack from the suspect which we do not want to contaminate,” Burns wrote in a Facebook post for the Mercer Island Police and Emergency Management page.