Happy Valley apartment ‘SWATted’ after caller says he hit father with a frying pan
A resident in Bellingham’s Happy Valley Neighborhood appears to have been the unfortunate victim of a “SWATting” prank call incident Friday evening.
Bellingham Police received a report of an assault at 5:50 p.m. Friday, according to Lt. Don Almer. A man reportedly told 911 dispatchers that he had struck his father with a frying pan and that his father was not breathing and presumed dead.. The original cal into 911 came from a Washington State Patrol transferred call.
Officers responded to an apartment in the 1600 block of 22nd Street and contacted the residents, Almer said. The residents came outside and followed officer’s instructions, but none knew about the incident police thought they were responding to.
Officers learned that a former resident of the apartment had generated some 911 calls during his residency, Almer said, and contacted that person’s family, who informed police that the former resident now lives in Mount Vernon and had been on the computer all day.
While this was being investigated, other officers tried to find the source of Friday’s 911 call, Almer said. They found that the call originated from a business line with no caller ID and that it came into the State Patrol’s District 1 dispatch in the Olympia and Tacoma area. The call was then transferred to the State Patrol’s District 7 dispatch in Marysville and transferred to What-Comm (Whatcom County’s 911 dispatch center).
“With all the information at hand, this looked to the officers to be a ‘SWATting’ type incident,” Almer said. “(It) hasn’t happened a ton in Bellingham, but I know of at least two other incidents.”
According to a June 6 article by metro.us, “SWATting” involves reporting a fake emergency to get a law enforcement agency to send a large, armed response to a residence and create a scary or embarrassing scene for those inside. Investigating “SWATting” calls can be time consuming and expensive, according to the article, often costing a police force $100,000 to track down.
Last December in Wichita, Kansas, police shot and killed a 28-year-old man when he answered his front door after his roommate had gotten into an argument with a California man online while playing a video game. The prank caller in that case was charged with involuntary manslaughter, giving a false alarm and interfering with law enforcement. According to a 2013 story on the Verge.com, the FBI estimates there are about 400 “SWATting” attacks per year.
This story was originally published July 16, 2018 at 3:17 PM.