EVERETT — Police trying to track $100,000 in missing gems are finding there’s no honor among thieves.
The jewelry disappeared on Jan. 17 when a rental car belonging to an Oregon gem dealer was stolen from an Everett hotel. Everett police on Thursday arrested Michael Fuller, 26, for investigation of stealing the car with the ge–ms inside.
Detectives believe one of Fuller’s friends tried to sell the gems and became a robbery victim in the process.
The woman allegedly went to an Edmonds hotel on Highway 99 the day after the jewels were stolen, but the prospective buyers didn’t show.
She told police that two days after the theft, she was threatened with a knife and hatchet by two men in a Mountlake Terrace motel. She said one of the men identified himself as being part of a “Peckerwood” white-power, skinhead gang. The bald middle-aged man was described as missing two top front teeth and wearing a trench coat.
His alleged accomplice — an Everett man, 43 — was arrested Friday by Mountlake Terrace police for investigation of robbery. The two are accused of stealing the woman’s computer, iPod and driver’s license and threatening her and her son if they said anything.
Police also were told that the Everett man’s wife pawned a ring that had been stolen from the gem dealer.
One witness told police he saw some of the boxes that contained the gems in the Everett man’s living room.
“Clearly, it’s an ongoing investigation at this time,” Everett police officer Aaron Snell said Friday.
The gems — diamonds, rubies and sapphires — belonged to a 79-year-old Oregon gem dealer. Fuller is accused of stealing his rental car keys from a south Everett hotel room and then the car with the gems inside. The jewels were not insured and represented the gem dealer’s life fortune, according to court papers.
So far, just one ruby has been recovered.
Eric Stevick: 425-339-3446; stevick@heraldnet.com.
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