Watch your U-haul in Spokane

By Crime Stoppers on December 21, 2009

12/22, 12:24 P.M.  STORY UPDATE HERE.

A family traveling from North Dakota to Western Washington awoke this morning to find their pickup and rented moving trailer stolen from a Spokane Valley motel parking lot.

Dewey and Sharon Brown and their 7-year-old daughter were headed to McChord Air Force Base, where he's scheduled to fly to Korea for a year-long military assignment after the family gets settled.

The Browns were due in Tacoma today but are staying in town in hopes of finding the pickup and rented U-Haul trailer missing this morning from La Quinta Suites, 3800 N. Sullivan Road.

In the trailer were clothes, toys, photo albums, checks, family quilts, medical records, Christmas gifts and $50,000 in jewelry. Also gone are Dewey Brown's military uniforms and paperwork, including his transfer papers, and his daughter's beloved doll.

"That's a big Scrooge move," said Sharon Brown. "We're going to sit here for a day or two and hope for a Christmas miracle."

Crime Stoppers is offering a $500 reward for information that leads to an arrest.

The pickup is a blue 1995 Dodge with Alaska license plates, oversize tires and a chrome strip along the lower sides. The single axle, 5 x 8 trailer has Florida license plates with a Tucson, Arizona graphic on the sides.

Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (800) 222-TIPS, or submit tips online.

It's the second time this year a visiting family's U-Haul has been stolen from a Spokane Valley motel parking lot.

On July 12, a family moving to Florida from Canada discovered their 17-foot U-Haul truck stolen from the Holiday Inn Express on Mission Avenue.

It was found in an abandoned barn July 15 with most of the family's possessions intact. No arrests have been made.