Lewis County Sirens.com

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – One after another, a doctor, a judge, other elected officials and social service professionals stood up and told how an investment they support would reap multi-fold savings for taxpayers as well as reduce suffering for children, families and other individuals in Lewis County.

Their goal? To persuade the three county commissioners to implement an increase in the sales tax in the county, to help fund what’s known as drug court, a family treatment court and other measures to reduce drug and alcohol abuse and help keep mentally ill individuals stable.

The overwhelming message at a gathering last week in Chehalis was this: Untreated mental health and addiction issues are pervasive, and extraordinarily expensive as they are currently handled. And a tax increase of one-tenth of one cent could be used to deal with the problems in a more cost-efficient way.

The money arguments seemed compelling. The social costs described were heartbreaking.

Lewis County Superior Court Judge Nelson Hunt told of the savings to the criminal justice system that comes with each drug court participant, by putting a stop to repeated offenses related to ongoing drug use.

Some of their drug court members have 13, 14, even 20 prior convictions for theft-related crimes, Hunt said.

One person, one felony, one time, costs several thousand dollars, not counting the costs to the victim, he said.

Former Lewis County Superior Court Judge H. John Hall founded the local drug court in 2004. Hunt took over after Hall retired in the summer of 2007.

Of the 70 people who have graduated from drug court since its inception, only four have returned with a new felony charge, Hunt said, calling that number astounding.

While recidivism in general is between 60 percent and 65 percent, it’s much lower among drug court participants, according to an exchange between Hunt and drug court attorney Paul Dugaw.

Among those who attend drug court, recidivism is expected to be between 5 percent and 20 percent, Hunt and Dugaw said.

“Also the lives that are changed, you cannot put a value on that,” Hunt said.

Judge Hunt has been visiting city councils one by one to win their endorsements for the tax.

Hunt and drug court manager Jennifer Soper-Baker began their campaign after they were told last fall the county budget could only support drug court one more year.

But a little-known group known as the Lewis County Community Health Partnership / Network has been working for two years to get the county to take advantage of an option to increase its sales tax to fund enhanced substance abuse and mental health services and what are called therapeutic courts. Drug courts are just one kind of those.

Fifteen counties in the state have enacted it so far, according to the moderator of the March 31 gathering, Donna Karvia, a member of the Network and former Lewis County Clerk.

“This is not just a drug court tax,” Hunt told the audience of some 50 people at W.F. West High School. But it could preserve the program he has come to believe is beneficial, he said.

Hunt noted that nine drug-free babies have been born to participants, at a savings of some $1 million in costs over the lifetime of each.

“You’re paying for it now, you just don’t know it,” Hunt said. “Really, its an opportunity that can’t be missed.”

The head of Providence Centralia Hospital stood up to describe the huge cost of treating addicts and the mentally ill in the emergency room instead of less expensive and more appropriate settings.

The cost to the hospital last year was $2.2 million to treat the 13 percent of patients seen in the emergency room, people whose primary diagnosis was substance abuse or mental health problems, according to Cindy Mayo.

The public is paying for most of it already, Mayo said.

“Eighty-six percent of those patients had a government payer, so the community, as taxpayers, we are paying for it,” she said.

Dr. Isaac Pope urged those present to support the tax, saying: “If we don’t use it, we’re going to lose it.”

“Our kids are our most important natural resource,” said Pope, founder of a Centralia center for special needs children.

The pediatrician told of three generations of ailments and hardships that grew out of just one individual.

He spoke of a woman he saw early in his practice in the 1980s.

She had three daughters who each, by the age of 14 had problems with drugs and alcohol and each had one child, Pope said. Those children, by the time they were 15 had two children, he said.

Pope went on to say one was a male who was incarcerated and died. He left behind two fatherless children, Pope said.

Of that family, one went on dialysis, another had another serious illness, and all lost their teeth, he said.

“All of this group of people (their medical bills) were paid for by the state,” Pope said.

“To use this tax for what we are proposing to use it for is the right thing to do,” he said.

Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer said he was sold on drug court as a defense attorney and continues to support the program.

When he was in private practice, some 80 percent to 90 percent of his cases involved drugs in some way, he said.

As the elected prosecutor, he continues to see the pervasiveness of the problem.

“I would say a good 80 percent of my budget, which is $2 million, goes to fighting crime,” Meyer said. “And a good portion of those are drug related.”

“We have eight to nine homicides, I’ve lost track, and of those one is not drug or mental health related,” Meyer said.

Holli Spanski, administrator for Lewis County Juvenile Court, spoke about youth.

In the local juvenile justice system, two-thirds of the youngsters who come through have been, or are being, treated for mental health issues, Spanski said.

Lewis County Superior Court Commissioner Tracy Mitchell addressed the costs in both money and children’s lives.

Ninety-seven percent of the children who come into the dependency system – are taken away from their parents either temporarily or permanently – are there because of mental health or drug and alcohol problems, Mitchell said.

Children in that system are in limbo for an average of two years and eight months while their parents are working to meet conditions necessary to reunite their family, according to Mitchell.

During that time, children, on average, are moved three times, often away from their siblings and their schools, and they suffer from lost relationships and interruptions of their education, she said.

“Three years is way too long for these kids,” Mitchell said. “We’re working to reduce the time, but it’s a challenge in the system we currently have. Also, I have very little leverage.”

If she could operate a family treatment court, she could shorten up that time, using local dollars to get immediate help for parents, without all the red tape they currently have to wade through, according to Mitchell.

“It’s over $500,000 a year we’re spending to keep these kids out of their homes,” she said. “For every dollar we spend up front, we can save $3,” Mitchell said.

Clark County Commissioner Marc Boldt was the keynote speaker, and told the gathering how his county implemented it in 2007, calling it the meth tax.

“It seemed like very time you turned around, whether in child dependency, DSHS, court, meth was always involved,” Boldt said.

His message: Basically people are paying for these issues anyways, just after the fact, and lots more.

“You’ll hear a lot of data, but the truth is, because of this tax, it has brought our community together in ways you can’t imagine,” he said.

Sales tax in most of Lewis County, as in many places around the state is 7.7 percent. It varies in cities and counties as each tacks on portions of pennies to fund local initiatives.

Sales tax in Chehalis and Centralia is 7.9 percent.

It is as low as 7 percent in Skamania County and as high as 9.5 percent in much of King County.

Lewis County increased the sales tax for a local purpose when in the autumn of 2001, voters agreed to add one-tenth of a cent to the sales tax in order to help build former Sheriff John McCrosky’s new jail.

Repeatedly, the Thursday night audience heard how tiny the increase would be; just one penny on a $10 purchase or a quarter on a $250 sale.

Karvia says the increase would amount to about $20 per household per year.

The police chiefs and sheriff in Lewis County have delivered a letter to the commissioners giving their unanimous support.

Soper-Baker said already the city councils of Chehalis, Toledo, Winlock and Morton have expressed their support. As of the end of this past week, Centralia and Pe Ell had heard Judge Hunt’s presentation and planned a vote on whether or not to endorse to tax increase, according to Soper-Baker. Hunt next visits Napavine, Mossyrock and Vader, she said.

“Our goal is to get every city to endorse it,” Soper-Baker said.

Also among the panelists was Lewis County Commissioner Ron Averill.

Commissioner Averill said he supports drug court, but the county has seen three bad years budget-wise. The commissioners have been trying to shave away any projects or programs that are not mandated.

“We told the drug court it was very difficult to see where the money was going to come from,” Averill said.

The commissioner, speaking after the Thursday night gathering, described how even if it is an investment with a good return, why he’s not in favor of spending money out of the county budget.

“From my perspective, when I’m spending almost 80 percent of my budget on law and justice, it’s very difficult to take up what I see as the state’s responsibility,” he said. “And I’ve got limited dollars.”

The commissioners could simply implement the tax increase, or, they could put an advisory vote on the ballot to learn how much public support exists and then decide. However, if they put off the decision until after November’s election, it could be well into next year before money starts flowing in, Averill said.

The sales tax increase, if put into place, would bring in an estimated $900,000 each year, according to Averill.

Averill said he sees a great need for people with mental health problems, as state money to assist in that area has all but dried up.

The gap is huge, and there is a real need in the community, he said.

“And I know you don’t like a tax, but as taxes go,” Averill said. “This one is pretty benign, and we need it.”

The  Community Health Partnership / Network at the end of the night offered to be the advisory committee to the commissioners on how to allocate money from the tax increase.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

OLYMPIA – As expected, Bernard K. Howell III was sentenced yesterday to 26 years and eight months in prison for the murder of 60-year-old Vanda Skau Boone on a bicycle trail in Tenino last August.

The 27-year-old Tenino man sat quietly between his two attorneys in Thurston County Superior Court as lawyers, the judge and a friend of the victim spoke of the case that was discovered when Howell was pulled over by a deputy and Boone was found dead in his truck, wrapped in a sleeping bag with weights strapped to her body.

Deputy Prosecutor Jim Powers asked for the maximum sentence.

“The state is asking, believes and urges upon the court, that is the only appropriate sentence,” Powers said.

He called it a particularly gruesome murder, with the victim, timing and place methodically chosen.

There were multiple blunt force and sharp force injuries, and suffering, Powers said.

“So the victim not only died at the hands of this defendant, but she also suffered before she died,” he said.

Howell had been living off and on in Tenino with his father when he was arrested Aug. 8. He pleaded guilty three weeks ago to first-degree murder.

Defense attorney Robert Jimerson told the judge yesterday his client chose to plead guilty, when no plea agreement was offered and was remorseful.

“He decided he wanted to plead guilty and he wanted to accept responsibility for what he did,” Jimerson said.

And while it didn’t excuse what happened Jimerson said, Howell was found to show symptoms of a severe psychotic disorder, the symptoms of which the evaluator said Howell didn’t appear to be fabricating or exaggerating.

Howell admitted to heavy methamphetamine use in the days before the murder, and the evaluator could not tell the cause of the symptoms, according to Powers.

Jimerson asked for middle of the standard sentencing range, 280 months.

Boone, a massage therapist who worked in Olympia and lived in Yelm, was attacked on the bicycle path known as the Yelm to Tenino Trail near Churchill Road Southeast.

Lori Drayson, who said she and Boone moved from New York to open a healing center, asked Judge Gary Tabor yesterday to lock Howell up for as long as possible.

“How can I ever forget that phone call … how do I ever erase the image of the horrified look on my friend’s face when the coroner showed me the photo to identify her,” Drayson said.

She called Howell viscous, and not entitled to walk among the living.

“How do one feel safe when you have such a creature as Mr. Howell lurking out there,” she said. “It wasn’t even in the dark of night.”

Howell chose to address the judge. He was polite and brief.

“God knows how sorry I am,” Howell said. “Christ willing, I’ll have a family someday.”

He asked the judge to put him in protective custody as he feared what could happen to him in prison.

Judge Tabor said he recognized Howell has mental health issues and substance abuse issues but they don’t mitigate what he did, he said.

He had a plan, and it was deliberate, cruel and bizarre, the judge said.

“The evidence tells us several things, it tells us there was indeed suffering in this case,” Tabor said.

That it occurred over a substantial period of time makes it particularly egregious, he said.

Tabor sentenced Howell to 320 months and then three years in community custody after his release. He also ordered substance abuse and mental health treatment.

Howell’s mother, father and older sister were in the courtroom, although they did not address the judge.

His mother, Cathy Howell, said she didn’t want people to know what happened. She had little to say afterward.

“My son is mentally ill and I’m going to be dead when he gets out,” she said.

His father, Bernard Howell Jr., spoke briefly.

“We’d like to have something said, we regret what happened,” he said. “It’s very unfortunate things like this are happening.

“I speak to him almost every day, or every other day, he knows he’s sick. He’s very remorseful.”
•••

Read most recent story, here

Read background, here

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – The three shots that fatally wounded 23-year-old Efren J. Triana outside a Centralia tavern were fired into his back, prosecutors alleged when they charged Carlos Vidal Guiterrez almost a quarter of a century ago.

Today, Guiterrez faced a judge in Lewis County Superior Court in Chehalis and a charge of second-degree murder.

Guiterrez, 54, was brought to Lewis County yesterday following his arrest by U.S. marshals two weeks ago in San Benito County in central California.

Centralia police had been tracking him off and on since 1986 and a “cold case” detective recently located him, according to the Centralia Police Department.

Defense attorney Bob Schroeter, using a Spanish interpreter, told the judge Guiterrez has no assets and no income to hire a lawyer.

Judge Nelson Hunt appointed Centralia defense attorney David Arcuri to represent Guiterrez.

Hunt scheduled Guiterrez to return to court tomorrow afternoon, so bail can be set by another judge.

“I am recused from the case, as I was chief criminal deputy prosecutor when the case was charged,” Hunt said.

Then-elected Lewis County Prosecutor James Miller filed the charge in 1986.

Lewis County Deputy Prosecutor Will Halstead – one of three lawyers newly-elected Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer hired after he started in January – is handling the case today.

“The real part now is just finding some of the folks,” Halstead said after the brief hearing.

It was almost 25 years ago, at about 1 o’clock in the morning when Centralia police were called to a tavern called La Adalitas, at the 100 block of West Main Street, according to Centralia Officer John Panco. Triana, a Rochester resident, had been shot. It was Oct. 25, 1986.

Charging documents filed four days later describe how the suspect had attempted to pick a fight with other bar patrons. Nobody took him up on it until Triana said, ” … if he wished to fight, he, the victim, would fight with him outside the tavern,” charging documents state.

The documents go on to give the following account:

Once outside, the victim put his hands up as though to fight and a gunshot was heard. The victim grabbed his head, then turned away from the defendant.

The defendant fired three more rounds, after which the victim ran several feet and collapsed. The defendant ran from the area.

Police and Centralia Fire Department aid persons found Triana seriously wounded. Triana was taken to Centralia General Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

An autopsy the following day determined Triana suffered a grazing wound to his head from a bullet and three fatal shots to his body.

The 23-year-old was believed to have been unarmed.

Police discovered their suspect got a ride to the Yakima area, but didn’t find him there. He had worked often in Eastern Washington as a laborer.

On of the primary investigators was Sgt. Robert Berg, now the chief of police.

Police developed information their suspect would be leaving the state and trying to return to Mexico. He was a Mexican citizen, and as far as investigators could determine, not legally in the United States.

Charging documents say the suspect used several aliases. Those listed are: Roberto Vidal Guiterrez, Roberto Sepi Guiterrez, Carlos Kiros, Sepi Guiterrez and Carlos Guiterrez Moreno.

There is currently a hold on Guiterrez by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
•••

Read “Breaking news: Suspect arrested in 1986 Centralia cold case murder” from Wednesday March 23, 2011, here

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

While attorneys for the Tenino man found with a dead woman bundled in a sleeping bag in the passenger compartment of his truck in August told him they believed he had a viable insanity defense, Bernard K. Howell III chose a straight up plea of guilty to first-degree murder.

Howell, now 27, initially denied any involvement in the death of the 60-year-old woman whose throat was cut and was found partially unclothed inside his pickup truck. But on March 17, he pleaded guilty in Thurston County Superior Court.

There was no plea agreement, there was no so-called Alford plea in which defendants deny guilt but accept a conviction admitting they would likely be found responsible, according to lawyers handling the case.

“Why? Because he knew he did it, he knew he was going to get punished no matter what happened,” his defense attorney Robert Jimerson said yesterday. “He simply wanted to get that punishment started.”

Investigators believe Vanda Skau Boone, a massage therapist who worked in Olympia and lived in Yelm, was attacked on the bicycle path known as the Yelm to Tenino Trail near Churchill Road Southeast.

Howell was arrested Aug. 8 when he was pulled over near Tenino’s elementary school with Boone’s still warm body.

According to charging documents, the self-employed door-to-door meat salesman told detectives he had a 10-pound weight in his truck and was going to bury her in a swamp to save the family the cost of a funeral. He told detectives he had in sex with her after he found her dead.

Howell, who goes by his middle name of Keith, is scheduled to be sentenced Thursday morning in an Olympia courtroom.

Deputy Prosecutor Jim Powers says he will recommend a prison term of 26 years and eight months, the high end of the standard sentencing range. The low end is 20 years, according to Powers.

Jimerson said his client didn’t want to sit through a two to three week trial with horrific details and horrific pictures.

“He had asked to try and get some sort of a deal, and we weren’t able to do that,” Jimerson said.

Howell has no criminal history, but he has a history of mental health issues, according to his father, his lawyer and even an attorney for the prosecution.

He was sent to Western State Hospital to be evaluated, treated and subsequently was found competent to stand trial.

Jimerson didn’t go into specifics or describe his client’s diagnosis.

“Mental health was an issue before this event and it’s going to be for the rest of his life,” Jimerson said. “That, without question, is the case.”

Jimerson said he and co-counsel Patrick O’Connor spoke at length with Howell about an insanity plea. However, if an individual is found not guilty by reason of insanity, they can be held for the maximum term of the charge, which in this case would be life, Jimerson said.

“I think this presents a little more certainty for him” knowing his incarceration will end at some point, he said.

Jimerson said he hasn’t decided yet exactly what he will present at the sentencing. As awful as it is what happened to Boone and what Howell did, he and O’Connor wish that Howell’s life could have been a little different, he said.

“(The judge) will hopefully see that Mr. Howell is a human being who I know regrets what he did, knows, I think, understands, the nature of what he did, and is ready to accept punishment,” he said.

Howell lived off and on in Tenino with his father. Before that, he lived in Lakewood. At one time, he was employed as a security guard working in places from Lakewood to Auburn, according to his father, fifty-seven-year-old Bernard K. Howell Jr.

Soon after his arrest, the Thurston County Sheriff’s Office was contacted by other law enforcement agencies in the state – including Pierce, Snohomish and Grays Harbor counties – who wanted to know if Howell offered any information about anything else he’d been involved in.

The sheriff’s office still considers him to be a person of interest in the March 2009 disappearance of Nancy Moyer, a 36-year-old mother of two when she vanished from her Tenino home.

Moyer’s house is less than a mile from where Howell lived with his father.

She was last seen by co-workers on March 6, 2009, and two days later her ex-husband went to her home, discovered she wasn’t there and reported her missing.

Deputy Prosecutor Powers said Howell hasn’t yet been interviewed about any other cases, because it’s inappropriate while this case is unfinished.

Thurston County sheriff’s Lt. Greg Elwin said they expect to talk with Howell after he is sentenced.
•••

Read background on the case here

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

The city of Chehalis’s building official was fired on Friday following an investigation into money taken from a city safe last November.

Jeff Shine, a 16-year city employee, admitted to the theft, City Manager Merlin MacReynold said this morning.

Chehalis police were called the morning of Nov. 19 to the community development building on the 1300 block of South Market Boulevard where money was discovered missing. Chehalis detective Sgt. Rick McNamara said yesterday the burglary involved an amount of less than $1,000, but he didn’t have the details readily available.

Some of the money being stored in the safe was raised for the medical needs of the daughter of a pair of police department employees.

MacReynold said the building official is responsible for looking over construction sites and making sure code is followed.

“Not a happy situation,” MacReynold said.

McNamara said yesterday officers did not make an arrest, but referred their case to the Lewis County Prosecutor’s Office for a charging decision.

Shine, reached this morning by telephone, said he hadn’t heard he’d been terminated and didn’t want to comment.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

The partial human skull found near Mineral on Saturday appears to be from an adult, but detectives don’t know if it belongs to a male or a female, the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office said this afternoon.

They’re hopeful there is enough DNA to help identity the individual, Chief Deputy Stacy Brown said this afternoon.

It was found by a hiker in a wooded area and will be sent to a forensic pathologist for further examination.

“We really don’t know how long its been out there,” Brown said. “Weather conditions affect that, and we’re not experts.”

The find was reported Saturday and detectives, along with two dogs, have searched the area for potential evidence, according to Brown. It was in a brushy area on the ground, she said.

Brown said she expects members of Lewis County Search and Rescue to go out there and help look sometime in the next couple of weeks.

“We did find other evidence, or potential evidence at the scene,” she said, without specifying what it was.

The sheriff’s office isn’t saying how much of the skull was recovered or even a location more specific than near Mineral.

“Until we know what we have and what kind of an investigation we’re looking at, we’re not releasing a lot,” Brown said.

Its too early to consider what missing persons it could match up to, according to Brown. She did say they don’t have any indication its Kayla Croft-Payne, who vanished almost a year ago at age 18.

Mineral is along state Route 7, near where the Lewis, Pierce and Thurston county lines meet.

Besides Croft-Payne, who was living in the Chehalis area when she disappeared, the sheriff’s office lists two other missing persons on its web site.

Henri W. Maillard, 20, disappeared in July 1994 after a drive up the Skate Creek Road near Packwood with a friend, according to the sheriff’s office.

Delmar W. Sample, a 53-year-old pharmacist from Onalaska, failed to report to work in Chehalis in March 2005. Sample’s truck was found near Lake Quinault on the Olympic Peninsula.