Masked teen thieves target Washington State high school students for robbery, crime

Students across Washington have become the targets of armed muggings and worse as crime continues to spike across the state.

In Seattle, armed robberies have been committed around both Ballard High School and Whitman Middle School. According to students, it began approximately six weeks ago and some students have been physically assaulted while criminals have taken cell phones, wallets, and other valuables.

Cove Brammer, a student at Ballard High told KOMO News, “It's a little scary because I walk home alone and I have my phone and my wallet."

Victims have reported that four to six thieves, who appear to be teens, jump the students and are typically wearing ski masks or hoodies and drive various cars, including a red Kia, a gray Hyundai, and a red/silver sedan.

On Tuesday, a student at Bishop Blanchet High School was assaulted and their phone was stolen. According to KOMO News, the suspects were three teenage girls in a dark gray minivan.

The Seattle Police has claimed that it will offer extra patrols but only when staffing allows as the department has seen an exodus of over 600 officers since the city council began defunding the police in 2020.

According to Mike Solan, President of the Seattle Police Officers Guild, there have been more homicides in the city than officers recruited in 2023. The crime has become so rampant that the police department will be holding a press conference on Wednesday to address the recent string of robberies.

However, the attacks on students are not limited to the Emerald City as crime spreads across the Evergreen State.

Last week, five students were assaulted by a group of individuals who got inside Auburn Riverside High School. According to the superintendent, the assaults on campus are linked to back-to-back fights at the school the week before and are from gang activity spilling into the school.

On October 19, a 16-year-old boy was arrested after shots were fired in the parking lot of the stadium behind Evergreen High School.  The high school and Cascade Middle School were placed on lockdown as police searched for a suspect. Police recovered a 9 mm semiautomatic handgun and several shell casings.

Many school districts do not have police on campus following school boards voting to ban officers from campus in response to the BLM and Antifa riots in 2020.

Washington Democrats continue to advocate for “restorative justice” programs that are operated by anti-police organizations and have almost no oversight. As a result, juveniles are regularly released from custody no matter what priors they have.

The catch-and-release justice system has become so prevalent that recently a teen who is a suspect in a violent robbery was shocked when the judge refused to allow him to go home rather than juvenile detention.

King County Councilmember Regan Dunn recently wrote in a letter seeking an audit of the programs “To date, King County has allocated $17.5 [million] in public funds to 18 private organizations that are responsible for preventing youth gun violence and incarceration by treating juvenile offenders outside of the judicial court system.”

“Alarmingly, these organizations do not track or collect metrics that would demonstrate meaningful success, such as whether the juvenile offenders complete all requirements of the rehabilitation program or not, or whether the juvenile offenders commit future criminal charges.”

Dunn specifically called out the Restorative Community Pathways program which employs criminals and has a poor track record of rehabilitating juveniles.