Lewis County Sirens.com

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – The sitting Lewis County clerk edged out his opponent by just 38 votes, but because the race is so close, a recount will be conducted, according to officials.

Scott Tinney was appointed to the position a year ago after Lewis County Clerk Kathy Brack vacated the elected office two years into a four-year term.

Scott Tinney

Carla Shannon, a deputy clerk in the Lewis County Clerk’s Office, ran against him. Both are Republicans.

The results of the November election were certified today.

The final tally shows Tinney with 7,318 votes and Shannon with 7,280.

Lewis County Auditor Larry Grove said today that because the number of votes separating the two candidates is so small, a machine recount has been scheduled for next Tuesday, at 10 a.m.

Because Brack served as a Republican, her party got a role in the process of replacing her after her retirement in September of 2016. The local party’s first choice was Shannon, but the Lewis County Board of Commissioners selected the party’s third choice, Tinney, when they made the appointment last year.

Carla Shannon

The Lewis County clerk serves as the official record keeper for the Lewis County Superior Court. The office is on the second floor of the Lewis County Law and Justice Center in Chehalis.

Shannon has worked in Lewis County as a deputy clerk in Lewis County about six years. Tinney previously worked as a deputy clerk in Thurston County.

The position will again be on the ballot in November 2018 for a normal four-year term.
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For background, read “Primary voters favor Tinney, Shannon for county clerk” from Wednesday August 2, 2017, here

Angel Davison snapped a picture from her vehicle before the two eagles moved off the roadway

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – A pair of bald eagles fighting on the ground in the middle of Interstate 5 in Chehalis today drew the attention of motorists and then law enforcement.

Troopers called to the area near the Wal-Mart exit just before 2 p.m. arrived about six minutes later to find one of the birds had moved to the northbound shoulder and the other to a ditch adjacent to the southbound lanes.

“A trooper was (on the southbound side) looking for him and he got up and flew away,” Trooper Jacob Payne said.

The eagle on the northbound shoulder succumbed to his injuries shortly after they arrived, Payne said.

They don’t know if either of the eagles were struck by any vehicles, but the deceased bird didn’t appear to have any exterior trauma, Payne said.

The dead bald eagle was taken by an officer with the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, he said.

Payne said he was told by the wildlife officer this type of incident is not uncommon, and since it’s not mating season, they were probably fighting.

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CORRECTION: The caption below the photo with this news story has been updated to reflect the correct name of the motorist and photographer.

Lewis County Fire District 1 Commissioners, left to right, Jeff Lee, Chair Rich Bainbridge and Bill Kassel

Updated

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – A contentious emergency meeting of Onalaska fire department leaders after the firing of their chief saw roughly one-third of the volunteers quit days earlier ended with a two-to-one vote to appoint a new person interim chief.

Lewis County Fire District 1 Board of Commissioners Chair Rich Bainbridge opened the Tuesday evening gathering inside the garage of the station by telling those in attendance of the need to fill a personnel gap and reassure the public the level of service isn’t diminished.

“Is this going to affect our staff here?” Bainbridge said. “Yes, it is going to be more work. We have qualified staff here to carry on.”

The chair of the three-member board said that just the night before at a meeting of fire commissioners from around the county, other fire districts expressed their support and willingness to help out. He reminded the crowd of existing mutual aid agreements.

Not everyone was as optimistic as Bainbridge.

Now-former Capt. Randy Tobler called out: “You have zero firefighters right now, you know that?”

The all-volunteer district that protects the area around Onalaska did have 24 members, according to district secretary Linda Patraca.

Last Thursday night when the commissioners voted after an executive session to dismiss volunteer Chief Andrew Martin, six other volunteers either turned in their gear or submitted letters of resignation, Patraca said.

Midway through Tuesday evening’s meeting, Assistant Chief Rhonda Volk quit as well. Volk stood and took the side of her former chief, opposing two of the commissioners.

“I will not compromise my values, until these two are removed or resign, I will not respond to any more calls,” Volk said.

There were other calls for Bainbridge and Commissioner Bill Kassel to step down, calls for them to reconsider and work to get along and demands for them to explain the chief’s termination.

As Martin described in a lengthy letter to local news media and spoke of to the gathering, he refused to further punish a member who had brought to his attention a misdeed by another member, who is a relative of Commissioner Kassel. Volk called it an attempt at retaliation.

Kassel saw it differently, and Bainbridge stood with him.

“One, he’s supposed to take direction from us,” Kassel said. “He refused to talk to us about projects, harassment charges.”

Commissioner Jeff Lee who voted no to appoint Adam Myer as interim chief, and who voted no about dismissing Martin said it’s hard to be a commissioner in Onalaska.

“I think we failed,” Lee said. “We never as a group asked him, we did it as individual commissioners.”

Myer is a former firefighter and fire investigator from the Chehalis Fire Department.

The conversation veered at times to disagreement about a new building, about deteriorating equipment, about a plan for keeping a fast-response vehicle parked at a volunteer’s house and even a past board of commissioners giving away “a chunk of the district to Salkum.”

Accusations that two of the commissioners violated the state open meetings rules by making decisions without Commissioner Lee led to a proposal for a five-member commission.

“We have no way to trust the two of you lifelong friends not talking business when you go hunting together,” community member Kathy Jackson said.

Martin has warned the loss of so many volunteers means citizens can expect a delay of twenty or more minutes if an out of district unit has to be called to handle an emergency.

Tobler spoke passionately about his concerns of a department down to 16 members.

He noted a one-person response on Monday to a rollover crash then a half an hour for a response to a 911 call about chest pain.

“When’s the last time any of the old members heard of a 30-minute response time?” Tobler asked.

Onalaska resident Pat Patterson, 74, stood and told of his worries about his and his wife’s well-being.

“I don’t want to wait for somebody from Salkum to come get me,” he said. “I don’t want my house to burn down.”

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Community members demand answers, suggest solutions at Lewis County Fire District 1 special meeting

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Rhonda Volk, far left, and Andrew Martin, second in from right, listen from back of room

Anthony and Mary Foxworth, in green and white striped jail garb, wait to be returned to the jail after hearing. Her attorney Jacob Clark sits in the foreground.

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Mary G. and Anthony S. Foxworth Sr. were returned to Lewis County last week and brought before a judge this morning where they pleaded not guilty to bail jumping.

The Centralia parents failed to appear for their sentencing earlier this month for first-degree criminal mistreatment involving severe neglect of their teenage son. They were tracked down and located in South Carolina.

The couple face prison terms of between 51 months to 68 months for the original case and now also a maximum of five years for the new charge.

Lewis County Superior Court Judge Joely O’Rourke advised them since they’ve already been convicted and because they violated conditions of their release, they no longer have a right to bail.

They are being held in the Lewis County Jail, where they were booked last Thursday night.

Centralia police began investigating in January of last year, after couple took their 16-year-old son to the doctor, and he was hospitalized with severe malnutrition, weighing just 54 pounds. Police found he had not seen a doctor since 2007, was not enrolled in school and could not read or write.

Anthony Foxworth Sr., 45, and Mary Foxworth, 43, pleaded guilty in October to avoid the possibility of being convicted in a trial of potentially more serious charges.

Lewis County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Will Halstead said the couple will come back to court on Dec. 21 to schedule a date for sentencing in the original case. He said he doesn’t want that hearing to be held until after their bail jumping cases conclude.
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For background, read “Foxworths: Local law enforcement to go pick up parents of boy in neglect case” from Thursday November 16, 2017, here

Bryce Friedley, 17, faces a judge in Lewis County Superior Court as co-defendant Brandon Caley, in red, awaits his turn.

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS –  The armed encounter involving a a group of high school students on foot and four males in a car near Penny Playground earlier this week related to a dispute between a 17-year-old and a 14-year-old over a girl, according to authorities.

Chehalis police didn’t know it happened until the following day and began investigating. It happened just before 3 p.m. on Wednesday near Southwest 13th Street and William Avenue.

On Thursday, police began looking for four male suspects and one of them, a 17-year-old suspect was located by the Centralia Police Department in Safeway in Centralia. Members of the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office tracked down a 20-year-old suspect in Winlock.

Two men in their 20s are still outstanding.

Charging documents in the case, based on police interviews with the unspecified number of students from W.F. West High School indicate the 17-year-old and the 14-year-old had a disagreement regarding the female and had been texting each other, and the older boy allegedly said he was going to kill the younger boy.

The younger boy and a group of friends were walking near the playground on Wednesday when a vehicle ran up onto the curb and four people exited, looking for the 14-year-old, Lewis County Deputy Prosecutor Paul Masiello wrote in charging documents.

The 14-year-old however had run off and hid in the bed of a passing truck, Masiello wrote.

The students told police 20-year-old Brandon L. Caley of Winlock and one of the unknown male suspects were armed and that Caley brandished his firearm, at first.

The 17-year-old suspect didn’t have a gun, but allegedly approached one of the boys – an 18-year-old – asked him what was in his pockets and hit him in the face and took headphones from his pocket.

Yesterday, both Caley and Bryce A. Friedley, 17, of Chehalis, were charged in Lewis County Superior Court with first-degree robbery.

Lewis County Chief Criminal Deputy Prosecutor Brad Meagher told the judge that Friedley, because of his age and the nature of the charge was automatically charged as an adult.

The maximum penalty, if convicted, is life in prison.

Meagher asked for and the judge granted bail to be set at $100,000 for Caley and $50,000 for Friedley, noting the affidavit of probable cause for the 17-year-old included some gang overtones. The higher amount for the older suspect was requested because of previous criminal convictions.

The two suspects are brothers and Friedley was the victim of a stabbing last month in the parking lot at Wal-Mart, according to court documents in two other recent Lewis County cases.

The charging documents in the current case say that in an interview with Chehalis detective Jason Roberts, Friedley denied knowing what the detective was talking about when asked about the park incident and the headphones.

Friedley allegedly stated “they” would pay and “they” should know better and stated:

“They better all stay in their houses and keep their doors locked, that’s all I’m saying about that.”

The documents in the current case give no indication if the disagreement was related to the stabbing, and make no mention of the stabbing.

The two suspect’s arraignments are scheduled for Wednesday in Lewis County Superior Court.
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For background, read “News brief: Chehalis police seek info on incident with gun near park” from Friday November 17, 2017, here

Jeremy L. Francis, in red, walks to the defense table in Lewis County Superior Court

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – A 34-year-old Centralia man was charged with second-degree rape yesterday for what allegedly began as a consensual sexual encounter but turned violent.

Jeremy L. Francis was brought before a judge yesterday afternoon in Lewis County Superior Court where his bail was set at $100,000.

Francis was arrested early Saturday morning after the mother of a 23-year-old woman called 911 to report to Centralia police her daughter had been raped.

Temporary defense attorney Rachael Tiller told the judge she had discussed the charge with her client and the potential maximum penalty of life in prison.

She suggested his income might mean he qualified for a court-appointed lawyer.

“He is working and hoping to keep his job,” Tiller said.

Lewis County Deputy Prosecutor Joel DeFazio asked for the high bail, noting the defendant had no prior felony cases he was aware of, but then corrected himself and cited a 2016 case of vehicular assault.

Francis used reading glasses off and on during the brief hearing, and sported a deep purple bruise around his left eye. Both Tiller and DeFazio said after the hearing they didn’t know how that happened.

Charging documents in the case state the young woman’s mother was sleeping on her couch when her daughter arrived, locked the door behind her and then laid her head on her mother’s lap, shaking and crying.

The 23-year-old said she’d been raped by a male named Jeremy whose last name she didn’t know – in the area of South Pearl and Cherry streets – and he might be on his way over, the documents relate.

The alleged victim told the police officer who arrived that earlier, the two of them had begun to engage in sex, but then he began to abuse her, according to charging documents.

She said when he jammed his fingers inside her, scraping her with his fingernails, she told him to quit, but he wouldn’t, Lewis County Chief Criminal Deputy Prosecutor Brad Meagher wrote.

Meagher wrote she told the officer he tried to choke her, he pulled her hair until she felt like it was going to come out of her skull and that he repeatedly banged the top of her head into his headboard.

She stated she told him multiple times to stop and he didn’t; he told her to shut up, the charging documents allege.

The suspect did show up at the mother’s home a little later and a male in the household detained him until police arrived, according to Meagher. Francis was arrested and then booked into the Lewis County Jail.

His arraignment is scheduled for Thursday in Lewis County Superior Court.