Brazen thieves ripped an entire ATM from a Seattle bank, shocking photos show – as business owners fed up with repeated break-ins in the Emerald City say that defunding the police has “failed miserably.”
Police say that the ambitious robbers used a truck and a heavy chain to yank the ATM away from the exterior of the bank on Washington Federal Bank in the Rainier Avenue area early Friday morning, KIRO 7 reported.
Photos from the scene show the chain and the ATM abandoned in the parking lot. The would-be thieves sped off in a red Ford pickup truck after apparently failing to access the money machine’s safe, which remained unopened, the outlet said.
As of Friday afternoon, the criminals remain on the run.
The early morning robbery attempt also comes as Seattle businesses struggle to keep up with the area’s crime wave – with many slamming pushes to “defund” the city’s dwindling police force.
“The glass on our front door was smashed on Monday night, Tuesday morning, around 3 or 4 a.m. I believe,” Alysson Holt, who works at the Vixen Collection boutique in the Magnolia neighborhood, told KOMO News.
“It’s the second time we’ve been broken into. We were broken into the same time last year.”
Vixen Collection and other nearby businesses have resorted to boarding up their doors and windows, the outlet said. Holt lamented that there are “no consequences” for break-ins.
“I care a lot about this place. I’m very angry. I’m sad. I want to see change,” she said.
Owner Courean Napolitano added that responding officers sometimes take hours to show up to a crime scene – and are often quickly called away to another, more serious incident.
She attributes the scanty aid to the Seattle Police Department’s ongoing staffing crisis: Last year, police numbers in the city dwindled to a 30-year low as officers decamped in “droves” amid calls to “defund” law enforcement, Fox News Digital reported at the time.
Now, desperate business owners like Napolitano are calling on civic leaders to step up.
“I want to say that your experiment in trying to defund the police has failed miserably. We are here paying taxes and, in my case, supporting my community in big ways. We’re not supported whatsoever,” Napolitano said.
Deb Bluestein, who owns nearby Modele’s Home Furnishings, shared similar frustrations.
“I think there’s a feeling that yes, I have a case number, or this is being reported, and there’s a sense that nothing is going to be done, nothing is going to happen,” she explained.
“Our leaders, please help the small business community.”
Complaints about robberies and break-ins in Seattle come just a few months after reports that the city’s morgue was running out of space amid a surge in fentanyl overdoses.
The problem became so pressing that local officials were considering keeping bodies on gurneys and partnering with local funeral homes for storage.
