Arrested man may be hotel bandit, Bellevue police say

Bellevue police think a 36-year-old Renton man arrested early today may be responsible for 15 robberies or attempted robberies at various businesses, most of them hotels, since early March.

According to the Bellevue police spokesman Greg Gannis, an employee at the Hyatt Regency Bellevue, located at 900 Bellevue Way, called 911 at 3:07 a.m. and said the hotel was being robbed. Officers converged on the hotel and spotted a gold sedan leaving the area, he said. The car matched the description of the getaway car used in a hotel robbery in Seattle on Friday.

Officers stopped the vehicle at Northeast 8th Street and 112th Avenue Northeast and arrested the driver, Gannis said. Officers found a power drill wrapped in plastic inside the vehicle and think the robber disguised the drill to look like a handgun, he said. All of the victims in the previous robberies had reported that the robber had threatened them with what looked like a gun concealed in a towel or plastic bag.

According to Gannis, the suspect is to be booked into the King County Jail, he said.