Local News

Bellevue police are investigating the death of a man whose body was found near the 11700 block of Northeast 12th Street.

Foul play is not suspected. Someone called 911 just before 2:30 p.m. Thursday and police located the man’s body beneath Northeast 12th Street, close to some train tracks, Officer Seth Tyler said in a news release. Cold weather may have played a role in the man’s death, Tyler wrote, explaining that the man was wearing only jeans and a light layer of clothing.

With nighttime temperatures expected to plummet over the next week, Tyler said police are encouraging those who need shelter to go to the Eastside Men’s Shelter at the International Paper Plant Building, 1899 120th Ave. N.E. The Bellevue shelter opens nightly at 8:30 p.m.

Update| 1:43 p.m.

Bellevue police report the man and his two children who went missing Friday night have been found safe today.

The infant twin boys are back with their mother while the 26-year-old father was taken to a hospital for mental evaluation.

Earlier, we reported that Bellevue police were asking for the public’s help in locating the Bellevue man and his sons.

Laura Torres reported to police that her fiance has been depressed due to the recent death of his brother and that she worried about her sons’ well-being.

She last saw him and the twins at her workplace, where he brought her coffee at 4:30 p.m. Friday. Torres said her fiance wasn’t acting unusual and that he planned to go to the mall and later to her grandmother’s apartment to pickup their 3-year-old daughter. He didn’t show up at the grandmother’s residence and when Torres arrived home, he and the boys were missing.

A 29-year-old motorcyclist was killed in Bellevue tonight when he was hit by a car whose driver is suspected of drunken driving, Bellevue police said.

Bystanders attempted to resuscitate the motorcyclist at the scene before medics took him to Overlake Hospital, where he was pronounced dead, Bellevue police spokeswoman Carla Iafrate said.

The crash happened around 6 p.m. at the intersection of Northeast 10th Street and 102nd Avenue Northeast, about two blocks north of Bellevue Square, Iafrate said.

The driver of the car, a two-door sedan, has been arrested in suspicion of DUI, and the investigation is ongoing, she said.

The intersection was expected to be closed for several hours as police continued their investigation.

Two Seattle cousins accused of hiring an undercover police officer to attack, and possibly kill, the girlfriend of one of the suspects will appear before a judge for a bail hearing this afternoon.

According to Bellevue police and law enforcement sources, the men, ages 39 and 23, were arrested Wednesday for investigation of conspiracy and solicitation of assault in the first-degree.

Eastside Narcotics Task Force started investigating the men in early September after receiving information about a possible murder-for-hire plot. Task force members set up surveillance and an undercover officer met with the two men, pretending to be a hit man, according to police.

The two men wanted the woman to be assaulted with a deadly weapon. The two men ”displayed indifference if the mother of two children were to die in the process,” according to a news release.

“The suspects gave the hit man a picture and pertinent information on the girlfriend and confirmed they wanted the hit done this weekend,” police said. “The payment for the hit was heroin and cash.”

The older suspect, who is married, allegedly wanted his girlfriend dead because he thought she was cheating on him, police said.

Police have also arrested one of the cousins’ brothers for investigation of rendering criminal assistance.

More details will be released after the 2:30 p.m. bail hearing.

UPDATE 3:45 p.m.: Darby Gerking, known around the area as the children’s music performer “Mr. Darby,” has been charged with two counts of first-degree child molestation, domestic violence.

Gerking, 57, was booked into the King County Jail on Tuesday, but has since bailed out.

According to charges filed by King County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Carol Spoor,  Gerking inappropriately touched two girls he knew several years ago. Bellevue police do not believe there are other victims

On Gerking’s website said that “Mr. Darby’s Music with Friends” was established nearly 15 years ago. Gerking travels to nearly a dozen schools and child care centers in the Seattle-area each week where he plays an array of musical instruments, sings, reads books and performs with puppets, according to the site.

ORIGINAL POST: A Bellevue man who works as a children’s music performer has been arrested for suspected child molestation.

He was booked into the King County Jail on Tuesday for the alleged molestation and on Wednesday, King County District Court Judge Arthur Chapman found probable cause to hold him on $150,000 bail, according to court documents. The man posted bond last night and was released.

Dan Donohoe, spokesman for King County Prosectuor Dan Satterberg, said his office could file felony charges as early as today.

The man is accused of molesting two young girls between 2008 and 2010, according to a Bellevue police report. The girls told police that the man touched them inappropriately, when they were each nine or 10 years old, according to the report.

Bellevue police Officer Seth Cyler said detectives do not believe there are other victims.

Bellevue police on Wednesday announced a 56-year-old sexual predator who is behind bars on McNeil Island has been charged with an unsolved rape and murder from 1980.

Susan Barbara Lowe was 19 when she was strangled to death with pantyhose in the bedroom of her apartment. Michael Allan Halgren, 56, was recently linked to the cold case through DNA, according to Bellevue police.

Halgren is a sexually violent predator who has been held under civil commitment at the Special Commitment Center on McNeil Island since 2002. He had previously been convicted of the 1989 rape and kidnapping of a woman in Bellevue and other sex crimes in Seattle, police said.

Halgren was charged today with first-degree murder. He faces up to life in prison if convicted.

Police spokeswoman Carla Iafrate said the case took so long to solve because DNA testing of civilly committed predators had not been performed until recently.

This post will be updated.

A nearly nine-month investigation into alleged prostitution at massage parlors in Bellevue has netted 55 arrests and resulted in the closure of a dozen businesses, according to Bellevue police.

This morning, police announced the recent busts of two parlors, one near Bellevue Way and Main Street, and another in the 16400 block of Northeast 8th Street. Four women were arrested for allegations ranging from investigation of massage without a license and prostitution, said Bellevue police spokeswoman Carla Iafrate.

Police have been investigating massage parlors in Bellevue since November, Iafrate said. Since January, 12 businesses  have been closed and 55 people have been arrested on allegations that include massage without a license, prostitution and obstruction. Iafrate did not know if any of the cases had been forwarded to prosecutors for charging nor did she release information on how long the investigation will continue.

She said that the department’s vice unit was working on the investigation part-time.

Andrew S. Muñoz, spokesman for U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement, said that agents are assisting police with the investigation.

“We’re looking at any possible connections to human trafficking,” he said. “We do see that massage parlors and those types of businesses often have links to human trafficking and human smuggling.”

The state Department of Health is also assisting in the investigation, police said.

Bellevue police have purchased three Chevy Volts (Photo / Bellevue Police Department)

The Bellevue Police Department is going electric with the purchase of three $40,000 Chevy Volts.

Volts can go 35 miles purely on electric battery power. Any more requires an onboard gasoline-powered generator that can create enough electric power for another 340 miles.

Going electric, of course, is going green, or at least greener, according to the city, which has 120 hybrids. They make up half of Bellevue’s 230-vehicle fleet.

A woman hit by a bus in Seattle yesterday morning is listed in serious condition in the intensive care unit at Harborview Medical Center this morning.

The a 51-year-old woman stepped off the curb on Third Avenue at Pine Street at 8:30 am. and was struck by a northbound bus.

Seattle police said the bus driver had the green light and the right of way.

Last night a 48-year-old Bellevue woman died after she was struck by a different Metro bus.

The woman, a regular on the Metro route, stepped off the bus at her usual stop in East Bellevue at Northeast 10th Street and Northup Way after saying good-bye to the driver and several other passengers, according to police.

The bus driver began to drive away “when he heard a thump, thump,” said Bellevue Police Department spokeswoman Carla Iafrate.

He stopped immediately, Iafrate said, and found the woman in the roadway.  He and several passengers called 911 shortly after 6:30 p.m., Iafrate said. The woman was pronounced dead at the scene.

Iafrate said there was no evidence drugs or alcohol were involved in the accident, but, as per protocol, tests will be run on the bus driver.

The woman has not been formally identified by police.

Video image of man who held up Bellevue Nordstrom (courtesy of Bellevue Police)

An armed man held up the Bellevue Nordstrom’s customer-service desk Friday night, according to Bellevue police.

A clerk told officers that the man came up to the counter just before 8:15 p.m. and showed a firearm he had tucked into his waistband. He then demanded money. He left through the west door of the store with an undetermined amount of cash.

Police described the man as being dark-skinned and in his 30s or 40s, wearing a black beanie, large glasses, a plaid shirt and jeans that were faded in the back. His image was captured on surveillance video.

The man was last seen in the west parking garage at Bellevue Square.

Bellevue police ask anybody with information on the robbery to call 425-577-5600.