On Monday, about 40 officers from the Seattle Police Department and the Department of Corrections searched the “Jungle,” the greenbelt on northwest Beacon Hill, looking for possible weapons and shooting victims after nearby neighbors reported the sounds of gunfire within the greenbelt. Jonah Spangenthal-Lee (formerly with The Stranger, Seattle Crime, and Publicola, now with the SPD) wrote an interesting post (with photos) on the search at the SPD Blotter blog:

After a day of crisscrossing overgrown, muddy pathways along the west side of Beacon Hill Monday, three South Precinct officers stand on a leaf-covered hillside just below Holgate Street, digging up a patch of dirt.

They’re looking for a body.

The officers, along with dogs trained to find weapons or human remains, spent seven hours trekking through the woods and interviewing more than 150 people living in and around the greenbelt. No weapons were found, and the only remains found turned out to belong to an animal.

The Community Police Team will revisit the greenbelt with social workers and representatives of the Department of Neighborhoods over the next week to assist those living in the “Jungle” in connecting with needed social services.