Redmond

Police are investigating three armed robberies in Redmond, two at pharmacies that led to the arrest of a 21-year-old Redmond man.

On Friday, police said, a man entered a pharmacy in the 17200 block of Redmond Way, implied he had a gun and demanded Adderrall, a drug for hyperactivity. He fled on foot.

A few minutes later police received a report about another armed robbery at a pharmacy in the 17600 block of Northeast 76th Street. Witnesses gave the same description as in the first robbery; police spotted a man who matched the description and arrested him.

The third armed robbery occurred Friday night in the 6500 block of East Lake Sammamish Parkway. A man entered a business, displayed a handgun and demanded the cash in the register. The suspect left the store in a white, older-model car. He was wearing a green sweatshirt, jeans and white tennis shoes, and had round glasses with silver trim. He had a mustache and was estimated to be about 50 years old.

Anyone with information is asked to call Redmond police at 425-556-2581.

Monroe

Suspect in fraud case says he's not guilty

A Monroe man charged with defrauding the government, banks, businesses and Internet auction customers of hundreds of thousands of dollars pleaded not guilty in U.S. District Court on Friday, four years after he fled to Greece to avoid prosecution.

Evangelos Dimitrios Soukas, 26, was arrested when he arrived at an airport on Cyprus on Jan. 14. The FBI had asked Interpol to keep an eye out for Soukas, who had been living in Greece, prosecutors said.

A 50-count indictment returned by a federal grand jury in Seattle last month charged him with conspiracy, mail and wire fraud and identity fraud.

Starting in 1999, he placed false advertisements for items such as laptop computers on Internet auction sites, the indictment said. The winning bidder typically received nothing after paying, though one got a box filled with Styrofoam and rocks.

He also opened bank accounts in other people's names and filed fraudulent tax returns, prosecutors said. The IRS sent him checks totaling nearly $11,000.

His lawyer, Scott Engelhard, had no comment Friday. Trial is scheduled for May 31.

Spokane

Teen planned to kill teacher, self, police say

A high-school student arrested for bringing a loaded gun to his former school allegedly planned to kill a teacher and himself, and told investigators he was partly motivated by the recent deadly shootings at a school on a Minnesota Indian reservation.

The 14-year-old boy was arrested Friday and booked into juvenile detention for investigation of first-degree attempted murder, a day after bringing his stepfather's handgun to Ferris High School.

He was expelled from the school in January after e-mailing a threat to the teacher. He faces a felony charge of harassment in that case, police said.

The boy has not been identified.

On Thursday afternoon, he wrote a suicide note, then took the gun to Ferris High, where he saw the teacher inside a doorway. At one point, he came within 6 feet of the teacher, police said.

A family member called police after finding the boy's note.

Portland

Driver on cellphone plummets into river

A woman talking on her cellphone lost control of her car and crashed into the guardrail of a downtown Portland bridge, then plunged into the Willamette River, police said yesterday.

Melisa Borgaard, 31, managed to get out of her car, which sank, and she was rescued by a diver, said Lt. Mike Shults of the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office.

Borgaard was taken to Oregon Health & Sciences University for treatment of hypothermia and other injuries, including cuts on her face and hands.

Times staff and news services