Tag: everson

By Caleb Hutton

An alleged kidnapper, carjacker and burglar who racked up 11 felony charges in a crime spree was formally charged last week.

The probable cause statements clarify a few things the police weren’t able to answer in the hours after the arrest of James Michael Craver, 28, of Bellingham. (You can read the original story here.)

Here’s the first set of charges. I blacked out sensitive info. A few new details that emerged:

• The couple was not asleep when Craver allegedly crept to their bedroom with a knife on Dec. 11.
• According to the charges, Craver eventually let his ex-girlfriend use the bathroom, but told her if she tried any funny business, he would “kill them all, including the children.”
• An alarm clock may have saved the woman’s life.

And here are the charges from the second leg of the crime spree, when Craver was accused of jacking a college student’s car, forcing her to drive or get shot.

• A Whatcom Community College student leaving class was the first to notice anything suspicious. He saw a man going through the cab of his truck at 4:45 p.m. Dec. 12. He chased the suspect through an apartment complex. That victim tried to get drivers to lock their doors.
• But one victim couldn’t lock her passenger door in time. To convince her to drive, Craver allegedly told her “he was being chased by people with a gun and that he was armed with a gun as well.”
• She tried to drop him off at Walmart, but he wouldn’t leave.
• They drove along Interstate 5 into north Whatcom County. They drove around for hours, and must have turned around at some point, because the Regency Park Apartments are in Bellingham.
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• The woman identified Craver in a photo lineup immediately, saying she was “100 percent certain” he was the man who abducted her.
• But even before seeing the lineup, the woman recalled a U-shaped tattoo on the man’s neck that said “Teresa.”
• Here’s a mugshot of Craver:

In all, Craver is charged — in two separate cases — with first-degree domestic violence burglary, first-degree kidnapping, attempted second-degree robbery, second-degree assault, attempted second-degree robbery, theft of a motor vehicle, attempted theft of a motor vehicle, domestic violence felony harassment, felony harassment and two counts of unlawful imprisonment.

The original story in the paper gave an overview of his past crimes:

Craver has a criminal history dating back to a 1993 shoplifting case. By the time he was an adult, he’d been convicted of more than a dozen crimes, rarely going more than a few weeks without getting into trouble with police, according to juvenile court records.

At age 17, he was convicted as an adult of felony assault for holding a steak knife to the throat of a 13-year-old boy he’d never met. He was sentenced to a year and a day in prison for that crime.

He also has a history of theft, assault with a sexual motivation, harassment, and drug crimes. In May 2010, Craver was sentenced to two years and six months in prison for trying to break into a home on West Pole Road to steal heroin.