By Pepper Fisher
SEQUIM – We learned this week that four people were arrested last Friday morning, suspected of trying to steal a portable sawmill from a property on Atterberry Road in Sequim. The suspects ended up abandoning the sawmill in the road, crashing the truck in a field, and trying to escape on foot.
It was about 7:00am on September 2 when deputies got a report of a theft in progress in the 500 block of Atterberry Road. The reporting party said someone in a truck was dragging a neighbor’s sawmill, worth as much as $50,000, along the roadway.
Deputies arrived to find the sawmill had been dropped in the middle of Sherburne Road and saw two men running toward the suspect truck. The men sped away eastbound on Atterberry Road and deputies were unable to catch up.
Soon after, a resident called 911 to report a Ford truck had just sped through their property, crashed into a boulder, and four people fled on foot into the woods.
By 8:00am, deputies came across 31-year-old Jennifer Spencer, and 35-year-old Lance Smith, walking nearby, and it was evident the two had been walking through wet grass. A local resident identified Spencer and Smith as having been seen with another suspect, 31-year-old Dillan Klepps, that morning, giving deputies enough probable cause to arrest them both on suspicion of theft.
Later that same morning, another caller reported that two men had run through their property on Parrish Road. Deputies responded and after a brief foot chase contacted Dillan Klepps and the fourth suspect, 29-year-old Codey Cramer.
All four suspects were booked on charges ranging from theft to eluding police, resisting arrest, hit-and-run and more.
(Pictured, clockwise from top left; Lance Smith, Cody Cramer, Dillan Klepps, Jennifer Spencer)