Burglarized Bellevue family strikes back | Two arrested after the Gertzes track down belongings with cellphone

Published 12:46 pm Friday, January 9, 2015

Darren and Nancy Gertz went from crime-victims to crime-stoppers last month when they tracked down the two men charged with burglarizing their Bellevue home while they and their children slept.

Nancy Gertz woke up early on Dec. 17, with the realization she had forgotten to bring her cellphone to bed with her. She walked into the living room and noticed the screen door half-open. Her first thought was it had been left open for Bolt, the family bulldog. Then Nancy saw a Christmas stocking lying on the floor.

“I threw it under the tree, and then I said, ‘Where are the presents?'”

The Bellevue couple quickly determined they were once again the victims of a home burglary. Nancy’s Louis Vuitton purse, wallet, cellphone and other valuables also were discovered stolen. Their kitchen cabinets and vehicles had been rifled through. Nancy Gertz found her car keys in her husband’s locked car. The keys to a Porsche that Darren Gertz had driven home from the dealership he works at also were stolen, but the high-end vehicle was left parked on their street. He had planned to sell it later that day.

The couple was quick to check the status of Nancy’s credit cards. One had been used to purchase gas at a station in Auburn. They waited until their boys — 10 and 12 — were out of the house before calling the police.

“We didn’t want to scare them or disrupt their day,” said Darren Gertz. “We got them off to school. Of course they noticed the (missing) presents.”

“If it wasn’t Christmas, they wouldn’t have gotten anything,” his wife said of the burglars.

A Bellevue Police officer responded and dusted the Gertzes’ screen door for fingerprints, telling them it could take some time for them to be processed, the couple said.Luckily, the burglars stole Nancy Gertz’s phone, because “we would have never found them,” she said.

The mother-of-two remembered the smartphone app she uses to track her children’s whereabouts, and decided to borrow her son’s phone to find hers. The Find Friends app showed her stolen phone somewhere in Auburn.

“It’s almost like we drove right to them,” Nancy Gertz said.

The Gertzes followed the app’s mapping technology to a Safeway parking lot in Auburn. Shortly after arriving at the parking lot, the Gertzes spotted one suspect — allegedly carrying Nancy’s designer purse — enter a black Honda Civic.

Then they called the police.

“I didn’t realize it at first, but he was actually wearing one of Nancy’s presents,” Darren Gertz said.

Several Auburn Police officers responded to the parking lot, where they took 32-year-old Nathaniel Hicks into custody. He was charged the next day with residential burglary and theft of a motor vehicle, the Honda having been stolen from a restaurant parking lot in Auburn the day before the burglary, according to an Auburn Police report, which adds Hicks and an accomplice left behind another Honda they allegedly stole.

Police arrested Jason Lucresio-Lopez, 18, a short distance away from the Safeway store, where he is alleged to have fled after seeing Hicks being arrested. Store security footage was used to determine the two men had been together shortly before police arrived, and security footage at the Auburn restaurant to connected Hicks and Lucresio-Lopez to the vehicle theft, the police report states. Lucresio-Lopez is charged with motor vehicle theft and possessing methamphetamine, a baggie of the drug allegedly found on him during booking.

Hicks reportedly told police he had been at a casino in Auburn with several people who owed him money, a few deciding to prowl cars for loose change to win their money back. He told police he went with Lucresio-Lopez and another man to the Gertzes’ home, but later decided to wait outside when he thought he saw a security camera. The police report states he admitted to using Nancy Gertz’s credit card to buy gas.

Most of the Gertzes’ belongings and presents were found during the arrests, but many family members had already cancelled the recovered gift cards. However, the cash from some holiday cards already was spent, said Darren Gertz. His wife’s cellphone, which had been the beacon for finding their alleged burglars, was found on the floorboard of the stolen Honda, according to the police report.

When they lived on Lake Washington Boulevard in December 2012, someone broke into the Gertzes’ home in broad daylight, and just a day later than when they were hit in 2014. Darren Gertz said that experience was much worse, and didn’t result in any arrests. By taking action this time around, he said the family found most of their stolen belongings and, just as importantly, closure.

The Gertzes say they are beefing up their security and have joined the neighborhood watch. They told the Reporter they want their story to be a reminder to others to take steps to protect their property.