Pair take cameras — cameras take their pictures

Actors live for a close-up, that fleeting moment when their face fills the screen.

Burglars, not so much.

Two men who stole two security cameras from a Seattle parking garage earlier this week left behind some incriminating clues for police: clear, close-up video images of their faces.

"It's not that often that we get such good video of thieves doing their handiwork," said Seattle Police Department spokeswoman Debra Brown. "It's a great opportunity for us to ask the public to assist us."

In the videos taken by cameras in the parking garage of an apartment building in the 4400 block of Fremont Avenue North on Monday, one man is seen peering at one of the surveillance cameras from around a concrete wall.

Then he and another man are recorded walking across the garage, where one boosts the other up onto the wall and the man being boosted pries one camera from its base.

They then disappear around a corner and one of them reappears, climbs in front of the camera and fiddles with it, grimacing, until the recording ends.

Brown said the duo stole the cameras, but not the recorder connected to both. So while the men walked off with the cameras, they left behind recorded images of the thefts.

"We don't know what they're doing with them," Brown said. "We don't know if they're selling or they just took them, but they just came in and pried both from the ceiling."

Police released the videos and some still photos of the pair in hopes that someone will recognize them. Anyone with information can call Detective Bruce Larsen of the North Precinct Burglary Unit at 206-684-5723.

Christine Clarridge: 206-464-8983 or cclarridge@seattletimes.com