Construction Crane Helps Police Catch Fugitive

The tower cranes in downtown Bellevue, Wash., don't just help with construction projects. On Monday, one helped police capture a fugitive. 

At about 10:25 a.m., a 35-year-old Bellevue man wanted for violating probation jumped out of a window of his second-story apartment to flee from police and corrections officers at his door. With police in pursuit, he ran across a construction site at the corner of 112th Avenue Northeast and Northeast Fourth Street.

Construction workers pointed out where the suspect had run, but one police officer realized the crane operator 200 feet above the site could help even more. With carpenter Dennis Austin relaying radio messages from crane operator Bill Davenport, police quickly closed in on the suspect about four blocks away.

Originally convicted of second-degree robbery, the man was arrested and booked into King County Jail for the warrant and obstructing a law enforcement officer.