First week of July’s police reports are in at East Precinct. Here’s a look at what we found. Before jumping into the incident reports of interest, a quick note on some stats we wrote about earlier on the site. A growing crime problem on the Hill is theft — about 52% more incidents in the first months of 2009 vs. 2008. To get a flavor of what ‘theft’ means, in the Capitol Hill area reports we just reviewed, there are 13 theft reports. Of those, 6 of them were car prowls, 4 involved theft from an ATM using somebody’s left-behind debit card and 4 were miscellaneous thefts from businesses including this first incident report:

• There’s an ongoing problem at the local Gold’s Gym. For the past several weeks, we’ve seen reports of theft from locked lockers at the facility. Two more in this week’s batch, reported on June 28th and June 30th, according to SPD. Bad guy or guys got $200 from the two thefts.
• A 37-year-old man awoke to find two burlgars ransacking his E. Lynn apartment on July 1. They left with his wallet and cell phone and racked up a $400 charge at the QFC at 5th and Mercer. The man said he tried to grab one of the burglars. A burlgar told the man his girlfriend had sent them but the man told police the woman was not his girlfriend.
• A man contacted the police on July 2 complaining that a tan American Eagle bag which contained “a Mac laptop and several novels” had been stolen from inside the Crescent Lounge. The man was extremely inebriated and had been thrown out of the bar after cursing at patrons performing karaoke. Police and staff could not find the bag.
• Early in the morning of July 4, officers came to the assistance of a 46-year-old white male who was being beaten by a group of black males in the parking lot of the E. Pike BMW dealership. The victim said he was being attacked because the attackers “were black.” The officer’s report lists the victim’s condition as ‘mental,’ SPD shorthand for somebody suffering from mental conditions though it’s not clear if the man’s condition was due to the situation.
• A Boylston Ave man reported receiving a phone call asking for a $10,000 ransom for a woman that had been kidnapped. It isn’t clear from the report how the woman was related to the man.
• The Windermere office on 19th Ave E reported that somebody threw rocks through three of its windows doing about $900 in damage. 
• A 92-year-old E. Pine St. resident reported to police that her neighbor repeatedly breaks into her house and eats her food without permission.