Lewis County Sirens.com

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

Round one: code violations.

Round two: zoning violations.

Lewis County officials continue in their attempts to shut down what they now call boarding houses, two residences in rural communities in which a handful of individuals recently released from prison live together.

110 Nix Road

At issue is a three-bedroom home on Nix Road west of Chehalis where neighbors have said they’re afraid to let their grandchildren outside alone to play as well as a similar operation on the 200 block of Clark Road near Onalaska.

The county has filed a civil suit in Lewis County Superior Court asking a judge to declare the property owners are in violation of zoning rules by using the houses for anything other than single family residences.

Named in the complaint are Judy Chafin-Williams who leases the houses and acts as property manager for the tenants, Janice I. Thompson who owns the properties and Larry G. Gladsjo who is co-owner of the Clark Road property.

Sheriff Steve Mansfield has told a block watch group on Nix Road his goal is to remove the felons from their neighborhood, implementing a zero-tolerance policy for any incidents there and working with other arms of county government to discover if any code or zoning rules have been violated or even craft new ordinances.

Lewis County Commissioner Ron Averill said today the county has  already looked to see if got they’ve got more members of the households than allowed for the particular septic systems.

“At one point they had about nine people and they were informed they were exceeding the septic limit and they had to get that down,” Averill said. “And I understand they did.”

In March, elected officials and other county employees spoke at a block watch meeting for Nix Road, sharing what they believed they could and could not do.

At the time, Chief Civil Deputy Prosecutor Glenn Carter said among the questions they were pondering is what exactly is meant by “single-family” dwellings. It’s not black and white, he said.

However, the complaint filed Wednesday focuses on where in unincorporated Lewis County single family residences are allowed and where they are not.

Both the Nix and Clark road homes are situated in zones called rural development districts. Multi-family residences are not allowed in those zones.

By contrast, there are areas of the county which were more densely populated before the state Growth Management Act was put into place – such as Onalaska, Packwood, Glenoma and similar communities – where multi-family uses are permitted.

The complaint is for an injunction, declaratory judgement and abatement of nuisance.

Part of the request is for a judge to set monetary penalties if the respondents fail to comply within 30 days of an order.

Chafin-Williams, who oversees the homes as well as similar houses in the cities of Centralia and Chehalis, describes her work as Christian-based, and the owners as people who got tired of renting to drug addicts.

The number one house rule is no drugs or alcohol, according to Chafin-Williams. These are simply people who need assistance getting back on their feet after they’ve done their time in prison, according to Chafin-Williams.

She said she was served notice today of the lawsuit.

“I do have an attorney, and we are going to fight it,” she said.

The property owners Thompson and Gladsjo couldn’t be immediately reached for comment.

They have 20 days to file a response to the complaint.
•••

For background, read:

• “Discord on Nix Road: Newest arrivals unwelcome” from Saturday March 3, 2012, here

• “The backstory: Intelligence gathering, possible fines and code enforcement tools ‘not normally used’ ” from Sunday March 4, 2012, here

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

An appeals court has upheld the insurance fraud conviction of Jennifer M. Mau, a Morton woman best known for her private endeavors to search for missing children in high profile cases.

Mau, then 30, and her boyfriend David Eden, then 47, were found guilty in September 2010 of making a false insurance claim involving a U-Haul trailer they said leaked and damaged their belongings during a move from Centralia to Morton three years earlier.

According to the findings issued by the Washington State Court of Appeals, Mau was told the loss from rain and water damage was not covered under the protections she had purchased but told to make a report to U-Haul’s insurance company anyhow.

Mau provided a seven-page list of items totaling approximately $16,000, but said they had taken the damaged items to the dump, according to the decision.

The claims administrator found it suspicious and the claim was denied, according to the decision.

Mau testified it was her understanding it was a preliminary list of items that potentially could have been damaged.

Her appeals attorney argued the list was not made under a contract of insurance. Eden’s appeal involved a denial he was an accomplice. The panel of three judges disagreed in their opinion issued on Tuesday.

The crime is a class C felony, which prosecutors said at the time of conviction could mean up to 12 months in jail.

Mau, a criminal justice student, was founder of the Mount St. Helens Chapter of a Texas-based group called Guardians of the Children, an organization she said helped with abused and missing kids.

In the summer of 2010, she organized volunteer searchers who eventually found the body of a missing 16-year-old Morton boy with the help of a Portland psychic.

A 21-year-old friend of Austin King was subsequently convicted of manslaughter in his death.

Mau, who has since started a different group called Search and Seek, indicates she will appeal the decision.

Firefighters finish putting out travel trailer fire south of Chehalis. / Courtesy photo by Lewis County Fire District 5

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – After the flames that virtually consumed Ken Schumann’s travel trailer on Interstate 5 were extinguished, a local man stuck around to help the Alaska resident salvage what he could of his possessions while they waited for a tow truck.

Schumann was relocating to Arizona, pulling the 31-foot trailer that has been his home for the past two years. Most everything he owned was inside, except his dog which was riding in the far back of his GMC Yukon sport utility vehicle.

“We found a coin collection, some old album photos and, I think that’s about it,” Antonio Martinez said.

Schumann, who turns 80 next month, was southbound near milepost 68 outside Chehalis just before 11 a.m. on Sunday when he thought he might have a tire fire. He pulled over and grabbed his little fire extinguisher, but quickly realized it was a losing battle, he said.

About that time, Martinez and his family were crossing the Avery Road overpass, on their way to breakfast at Spiffy’s and the father of three could see the motorist attempting to unhook his truck from the burning trailer.

“I saw the old man was struggling,” Martinez said. “I can’t believe how many people were on the bridge, taking pictures and video. I told my wife, I’m going to go help him.”

Martinez said the fire was growing so big, he told the elderly gentleman they needed to get the dog out of the truck. They struggled until they realized the end of his leash was stuck.

Schumann said he had to unhook the leash from “Spook’s” collar, and sure was glad he wasn’t alone on the side of the freeway with his unleashed pet.

Two passing motorists also stopped to help, one from Oregon and another on his way to California, Martinez said.

“In less than 10 minutes, it was gone, the trailer,” he said. “It was amazing how fast.”

Lewis County Fire District 5 found the trailer fully engulfed in flames, and put it out.

Schumann said he’d tucked away cash, not much but it was his savings, inside the trailer. He literally jumped up and hugged two firefighters at the same time, when they managed to find the money – soaking wet – among the ashes, he said.

And while the backside of his truck was “baked” as if badly sunburned, it was still drivable, according to Schumann.

“I don’t feel 80,” Schumann said Monday night after he rested. “At least I didn’t until the trailer situation.”

Schumann’s Alaska-based business, before he retired, involved traveling to do service calls to repair electronics. He liked to tinker, he said. Which is why he had three flat screened televisions and various other projects in his trailer, he said.

For about 10 years, he lived in Central America, still taking on some repair jobs after he turned his business over to his son.

“I sold my little house in Belize, took the money and bought a trailer,” he said. “All my life I’ve admired people who traveled in travel trailers. That was my chance.”

At one job on a military base in Honduras four years ago, he picked up a retired Air Force guard dog that looks like a miniature German Shepherd, but is actually a Belgian Malinois, with eyes so light blue he named her Spook, he said.

Spook has traveled with him ever since, and is a good companion except she barks too much, he said. The ordeal on Sunday apparently cured her of that.

“She has not opened her mouth a squeak since she sat and watched that trailer burn,” he said.

While Schumann and Martinez waited for the right kind of tow truck to come on Sunday, they scavenged through the debris looking for a coin collection and other items the retired businessman hoped to save.

The 32-year-old Napavine man sent his family on to the restaurant without him.

“My wife said, hey, you gonna come to breakfast? I said, I don’t think so, because everybody had left,” Martinez said. “He was shaking so bad, I felt bad to leave him alone.”

Martinez’s wife brought them back burgers, plain for the dog.

As they picked through the remains, Schumann lost his balance and fell from the wreckage onto a pile of debris on the pavement.

Schumann said he swung his arm back, gouging his wrist on a sharp beam. He didn’t see the wound, but Martinez grabbed his forearm like a baseball bat and held pressure on it until medics arrived, he said.

Schumann was taken by ambulance to Providence Centralia Hospital.

Lewis County Fire District 5’s Lt. Laura Hanson said they often find that folks stop briefly to assist in bad situations, but she called Martinez a good samaritan who stayed and helped above and beyond.

Martinez took the dog to his Napavine home, and then went to the hospital to wait until Schumann was released at about 8 p.m. The family invited him to stay over, but he wanted to overnight in Longview, so he could get to the tow yard first thing in the morning, he said.

He wanted to check for some keepsakes, he said, like a belt buckle personally given to him by Elvis Presley in Biloxi, Mississippi, and perhaps his medications from the V.A., he said. But the floor was six to 12 inches deep with charred wood and soot.

The medicine cabinet was nonexistent, and, Schumann said, come to think of it, he never even saw what had been the bathroom.

Schumann stopped Monday evening back at the Martinez’s Napavine home; he’d forgotten to write down his address. He was on his way to Wal-Mart to buy a charger for his cell phone, and then on to Seattle to talk with his insurance company.

He couldn’t have asked for a better man to help him than Martinez, he said. “All the way through this, he was so much help,” he said.

“If you use the word hero anywhere, the right place might be Antonio,” Schumann said.

The idea of moving to Arizona was his son’s he said. He was actually partial to wintering in southern Texas, in a place that is half giant flea market, half mobile home park.

“You know how crazy this is turning out, I don’t have any reason to go to Phoenix anymore,” he said.

“The insurance will cover the trailer, but at my age I wonder if I want to buy another one.”

Southbound Interstate 5 near milepost 68 on Sunday. / Courtesy photo by Kristal Tardiff

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

The Centralia man suspected of breaking his impounded dogs out of the Lewis County Animal Shelter has been found and booked into jail.

Terry Petrich was wanted for questioning after his Pit Bull and Rottweiler which were scheduled to be euthanized vanished last week from the facility on Centralia-Alpha Road.

Someone cut a fence on the exterior portion of their kennel.

Lewis County Sheriff’s Office Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown said Petrich was brought in by a bail bond company around 1 o’clock this morning.

The canines got in trouble after a December 2010 attack on a neighbor’s pack of alpacas that left six animals dead and others maimed.

Petrich was issued an infraction for “prohibited activities by dogs,” according to Brown. The county then deemed the canines “dangerous dogs” putting into place numerous requirements and fees if their owner wanted to keep them.

Shelter Manager Amy Hanson said the issue was appealable, but Petrich failed to show up at two hearings. The pets, Whitney and Max, were impounded in April, she said.

The sheriff’s office on Wednesday got a tip the animals were back at Petrich’s South Schueber Road property, seized them again and questioned Petrich’s girlfriend who lives there. He wasn’t around and she said the dogs just “showed up” at their door in the night.

She was arrested and jailed for possession of stolen property and rendering criminal assistance,

Hanson said yesterday they didn’t actually bring the dogs back to the shelter but moved them to another holding facility to keep them from possibly being stolen again.

Once an animal is designated a dangerous dog by county officials, the only way they can avoid being put down is for the owner to secure $250,000 in liability insurance, keep the dogs in a six-sided pen, microchip them for identification and pay a $50 registration fee to the county, according to Hanson. Plus, Petrich would have had to pay impound fees, she said.

“We don’t want to euthanize, but there’s no other alternative,” Hanson said. “We can’t adopt them out, they’re not adoptable.”

The dogs were given something like a last special meal, according to Hanson. The woman who was holding them fed them cheeseburgers and ice cream, she said.

Hanson said they planned to put the dogs down after closing yesterday.

•••

For background, read:

• “Stolen dangerous dogs located, returned to animal shelter” from Thursday June 14, 2012, here

• “Survivors of alpaca attack “scared, ugly and sad”” from Sunday Dec. 19, 2010, here

Updated at 8:58 p.m.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – A judge ordered a mental evaluation for the 25-year-old Centralia man accused of torture and rape in the death of his girlfriend’s 2-year-old daughter.

James M. Reeder

James M. Reeder will have to be evaluated by psychiatrists from Western State Hospital before further court proceedings can take place.

Reeder is charged with homicide by abuse and related charges, including possession of methamphetamine, following the May 24 death in Centralia of Koralynn Fister.

Reeder’s attorney last week requested the arraignment be postponed based on his interactions with his client in the courtroom when Reeder appeared before a judge.

This morning David Arcuri told Lewis County Superior Court Judge James Lawler he needed to have Reeder evaluated to review his competency.

The process is undertaken to find out if defendants are competent to stand trial and able to assist their lawyer in their defense.

Arcuri said his client will be transported to the state mental hospital for the review, instead of state psychiatrists traveling to Lewis County to conduct it in the jail as is sometimes done.

Reeder had moved in with the toddler’s mother about 10 weeks before the toddler died. Police and aid were called to their north Centralia neighborhood when he carried her to a house across the street, saying he stepped out from her bath briefly and returned to find her face down in the tub. Authorities said they found numerous injuries, including signs of rape.

Homicide by abuse is a class A felony, with a maximum penalty of life in prison.

A brief court hearing is scheduled for July 5 to review the status of the evaluation.

•••

For background, read “Father of Centralia toddler who died speaks out” from Saturday June 2, 2012, here

Updated at 8:24 p.m.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

Guards were missing from a conveyor and lockout procedures were lacking at Hampton Mill in Morton when a 20-year-old worker died after his clothing got caught in a machine and around his neck last December, a state agency has found.

Dillan Davis, 20, of Randle, was killed on Dec. 13 at the east end sawmill.

The state Department of Labor and Industries last week fined Hampton $11,200 for three serious violations.

The mill is owned by Portland, Ore.-based Hampton Affiliates.

Davis had been working since the year before at the Hampton mill in Randle, and transferred to the Morton facility several weeks before he was found on a conveyor fatally injured.

The citation issued last Wednesday stated the employer did not ensure guards were provided at all points along the conveyor where workers might be injured by “nip” points.

In particular, there was no guard where a tensioner roll had been installed on the block chipper conveyor belt where Davis was killed, according to a spokesperson for Labor and Industries.

A second serious violation in a different location was a 24-inch drive sprocket which was only partially safeguarded leaving a roughly 10-inch gap where a person could get caught, according to the citation.

Further, the plant manager and other employees including the human resource manager all stated they didn’t use supplemental information tags when locking out equipment, according to spokesperson Elaine Fischer.

Fischer said that when a piece of equipment is shut down for example while someone is making repairs or cleaning it, both a lock preventing it from inadvertently getting turned on and a tag are required.

The tag issue was a general violation, of lesser significance than a serious violation, according to Fischer.

However, the third serious violation was Hampton did not have written, equipment-specific lockout procedures for all machines in the mill.

The safety inspection prompted by the death also found the employee-elected members of the plant safety committee were serving two years instead of only one year as required, which could cause them to become complacent to safety issues. There was no penalty associated with that general violation.

The mill has until July 24 to correct the tagging issue. The other items were all corrected during the inspection process.

Hampton has 15 business days to either pay the fines or appeal, according to Fischer.

•••

For background read “News brief: Clothing caught in a machine killed saw mill worker” from Friday December 16, 2011, here

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

A pair of dogs apparently sprung from the animal shelter where they were awaiting probable euthanization were found by deputies yesterday on the property of the Centralia man who owned them.

One woman there was arrested and deputies are looking for the owner to question him about last week’s burglary at the shelter, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office.

The female Pit Bull and male Rottweiler were scheduled to be put down; they had been impounded in mid-April in connection an attack on neighboring Alpacas.

Estara J.E. Bojorquez, 41, told deputies yesterday only that the animals showed up at midnight at their back door, according to the sheriff’s office.

She was arrested for possession of stolen property and rendering criminal assistance, the sheriff’s office said.

The sheriff’s office got a tip yesterday that neighbors heard the dogs barking at the 1400 block of South Schueber Road, the home of Bojorquez and Terry Petrich, the dog’s owner, according to Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown.

Brown said the animals were hidden in a wooded area behind the house, in a sheet metal-sided structure.

The dogs, Whitney and Max, were seized and taken back to the shelter, according to Brown.

Early last Friday morning, employees at the shelter on the 500 block of Centralia-Alpha Road discovered someone had cut a fence and taken the dogs.

Petrich had until tomorrow to pay fees and comply with county requirements regarding the pets which had been deemed dangerous dogs. They were scheduled to be euthanized  this coming Monday.