Seattle Pair Pleads Guilty to Breaking Into Eastside Businesses

Two Seattle men who broke into emergency key boxes and then stole electronics from several Eastside businesses pleaded guilty Tuesday to six counts each of second-degree burglary.

Brad E. Lowe, 36, and Joshuah A. Witt, 35, each face a sentence range of 51 to 68 months in prison after pleading guilty in King County Superior Court in Seattle to the 2010 burglaries. They will be sentenced Feb. 3 before Judge Mary Yu. 

Federal charges of hacking into computer systems of local companies, allegedly to steal personal and business information, are pending.

Prosecutors say Lowe and Witt stole servers, computers and electronics equipment from nine businesses in Woodinville, Redmond, Kirkland and Bellevue. Businesses lost more than $750,000 in the break-ins, which date back at least to early 2010, charging documents say.

Concur Technologies in Redmond was among the hardest hit. The publicly traded company, at 18400 Union Hill Road, provides travel and expense management services for businesses. According to a court document with a statement from a Redmond police detective, the company lost $289,000 in servers and other equipment in a break-in Nov. 27-28.

Concur Executive Vice President Scott Torrey told police at the time that he was concerned that the thieves seemed interested mainly in stealing data files rather than the equipment itself. Eight servers were stolen, some containing six years of employee and customer email exchanges, Torrey told police. “The suspects could have the ability to access personal information of the company’s employees and customers as well as proprietary information concerning the operation of the business,” according to the document.

In a statement emailed to Patch, the company said that some of the stolen equipment included personal employee information, but there was no evidence that any of the data had been accessed or misused.

“None of the missing equipment is associated with Concur's financial systems or its production and transaction services infrastructure used by its customers, which is located in a secure hosting facility off-site,” the statement said.

“The company has taken a number of actions to protect the employees impacted by the theft including contracting with a company to provide employees with fraud resolution assistance, credit monitoring, educational information, and other related services.”

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Information from the King County Prosecutor's Office and Patch files.