Someone wrote fake parking tickets
September 28, 2009
By J.B. Wogan
New 1:55 p.m., Sept. 28
Someone went around posting fictitious parking tickets on cars in the Tree Farm area the evening of Sept. 22. Police said they believe the prank was provoked by an influx of parents parking at Inglewood Junior High and its surrounding streets for a student curriculum night from 7-9 p.m. The suspect would be guilty of impersonating a police officer, which could result in a year in jail or a substantial fine, according to police.
Sgt. Robert Baxter, of the Sammamish Police Department, said about 200 cars parked in the Tree Farm area received the fake parking tickets, calling for fines as high as $225.
The tickets said that any fines not paid within 30 days would be subject to a doubled fine.
Detective Steve Perry, also of Sammamish police, is investigating the case.
Perry contacted the Tree Farm Homeowners Association to verify that it was not behind the tickets. (The tickets were titled as “Tree Farm Obscurities Fines.”)
“We didn’t authorize this. The street is open to the public,” said Dana Heiser, president of the Tree Farm Homeowners Association.
Heiser added that the parking situation occurs every year when Inglewood holds its curriculum night.
“We don’t have a problem with it,” she said.
Perry pointed out that there were a few fishy items on the parking tickets. They were supposedly written up by an “Officer Steve Capline,” which is not the name of anyone working at the Sammamish Police Department.
The tickets used the adjective “submersible,” as in, “No Display of Parking Pass submersible to a $75.00 Fine.”
The adjective means that something is capable of being put under water or another fluid, but Perry said it had no place in legal language.
“I have no idea what that means,” Perry said.
The tickets also cited a fake state law (“RCW 184793″), which Perry said is just a meaningless string of numbers.
The tickets also listed a contact number that did not belong to Sammamish police. When the Sammamish Review called it, a man answered, but he said he didn’t who the number belonged to and hung up before the conversation could continue.
The Web site whitepages.com lists the number as belonging to an unpublished landline in Kirkland.
Police ask that anyone who received a ticket and still has a copy intact bring it to the Sammamish Police Station at City Hall for fingerprinting. To contact Sammamish police with more information, call 295-0770.
Reporter J.B. Wogan can be reached at 392-6434, ext. 247, or jbwogan@isspress.com. To comment on this story, visit www.SammamishReview.com.
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WOW I GO TO IJH AND HAVE NEVER HERD OF IT BEFORE. I BET THEY WERE SOME 9TH GRADERS JUST HAVING FUN!