Lewis County Sirens.com

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

The (Longview) Daily News reports some phone lines in Ryderwood and Castle Rock are not working and some 911 lines have been re-routed.

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By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – The suspect in the sword robberies at the Market Street Market in Chehalis was living just four or five blocks from the convenience store, police said today.

Officers were called about 9:15 a.m. yesterday to the convenience store between 12th and 13th avenues on South Market Street, and told an armed robbery had occurred about an hour earlier, according to the Chehalis Police Department.

Security video image from June 18

Officers were told a male wielding a sword came in and demanded money, the second such hold up at the business in a little more than a week.

The owner of the market said yesterday the encounter was brief, with the subject making him put cash into a plastic bag.

The masked man was last seen running in the area of Southwest Cascade Avenue and 13th Street, according to the Chehalis police.

Deputy Chief Randy Kaut said officers yesterday learned of a gentleman who owns some swords, spoke with him and came to the conclusion the man’s young relative had borrowed the weapons and robbed the store twice.

Twenty-three-year-old Jonathan A. Jamerson went into the police department yesterday, was interviewed and then arrested for two counts of first-degree robbery

Jamerson was temporarily staying with the relative who resides a few blocks from the store, Kaut said. He is previously from Thurston County, according to Kaut.

Police took possession of at least three swords from the home, and some cash – possibly from the holdup, Kaut said.

Police believe Jamerson is likely the same individual who pointed a sword at two clerks and robbed the market the night of June 18.

The victim said yesterday it looked to be the same person, wearing the same clothes.

Kaut said he didn’t know the reason for the delay in reporting yesterday’s incident, except the victim told police he really didn’t know what he should do.

Jamerson is tentatively scheduled to go before a judge today in Lewis County Superior Court.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

The U.S. Attorney’s Office announced today the leader of a drug trafficking ring they said operated like a pizza delivery business, using runners and dispatchers and catering to customers from Pierce, Thurston, Lewis, Kitsap, and Grays Harbor counties, was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Last summer, the Spanaway man was among 23 people arrested in a coordinated law enforcement effort targeting Mexican cartels distributing large amounts of heroin and methamphetamine in the region, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

In asking for the lengthy prison term, prosecutors noted Jose Manuel Campos Pinedo, 34, dealt in black tar heroin, one of the drugs which has fueled cartel violence, according to a news release.

According to the U.S. State Department, there have been 22,700 narcotics related murders in Mexico since 2006, as Mexican cartels battle to decide who will control the supply of drugs, such as black tar heroin, into the United States, the news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office stated.

Read more about it in The (Tacoma) News Tribune, here

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Ronald A. Brady took the witness stand yesterday in his first-degree murder trial for the fatal shooting of a suspected burglar.

The 60-year-old’s testimony was mostly, but not entirely, similar to what jurors have already heard he told a detective in a taped statement from hours after the incident.

Prosecutors made their closing arguments this morning in Lewis County Superior Court.

After lunch, jurors will hear from defense attorney Don Blair.

Then the case will be given to the jury of six men and six women to decide.

More to come

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Scroll down to read previous news of the trial

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Denise R. Salts is expected in Lewis County Superior Court tomorrow to make her plea on a charge of delivery of methamphetamine.

Salts, 52, and a Morton woman were labeled two of the main narcotics distributors in East Lewis County after they were arrested when sheriff’s deputies and their SWAT team served a search warrant last Thursday.

When she went before a judge the next day, her attorney said she only one previous interaction with “the system”; Salts was a successful graduate of drug a number of years ago, defense attorney Bob Schroeter said.

Salts is the same woman who was shot in the face when her boyfriend and two others were slain last August inside a Salkum-Onalaska area home.

She and  Venus D. Hamilton, 47, of Morton, were both charged with the same offense and both released on $5,000 bail on Friday.

The arrests followed undercover drug buys earlier this month, according to charging documents.

An informant was given $40 to purchase two “quarters” and allegedly bought them from Hamilton near Riffe Lake, according to charging documents.

The same day, an informant was given a $20 bill to buy methamphetamine from Salts.

The informant went to the Glenoma home where Salts lives and was “surveilled” as they went inside, according to charging documents.

Afterward, the informant said told the detective they asked the man who also lives there if they could purchase “a twenty” and he replied, “You know how it works”, according to the documents.

The man turned to Salts, inquired if they had “a twenty”, and left the room while Salts handed over a small baggie of a substance that field-tested positive for meth, the documents allege.

Salts survived the August 21 shootings that left her live-in boyfriend David J. West Sr, his 16-year-old son and a friend from Mineral dead in a house off Gore Road.

John Allen Booth Jr. is charged with her attempted murder, murder, attempted extortion and unlawful possession of a firearm. His trial is scheduled for the end of August. His former cell mate Ryan J. McCarthy, 29, is also charged in the case.

Salts’s arraignment is scheduled for tomorrow morning. Hamilton’s is set in the afternoon.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – The Lewis County Sheriff’s Office said this morning the deputy involved in yesterday’s early morning fatal shooting of a Napavine man is Deputy Matt McKnight, a four-plus year employee of the sheriff’s office.

McKnight, 27, remains on administrative leave as is standard protocol for deputies involved in shootings, Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown said in a news release.

The sheriff’s office says the 33-year-old Napavine man refused to take his hands out of his pockets and then charged McKnight around 2 a.m. when deputies responded to assist with a call about an individual who left stab holes in the door of a Napavine home trying to get inside.

An autopsy was set for today on the deceased, whose name is expected to be released later by the Lewis County Coroner’s Office.

Participants stand as potential jurors arrive in Lewis County Superior Court. Left to right: Sheriff's detective Bruce Kimsey, deputy prosecutors Shane O'Rourke and Colin Hayes, defense attorney Don Blair and defendant Ronald Brady.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Lawyers spent half a day yesterday questioning potential jurors to hear the first-degree murder trial of Onalaska resident Ronald A. Brady.

Brady, 60, is charged in the April 2010 shooting death of 56-year-old Thomas McKenzie of Morton and first-degree assault for allegedly firing at McKenzie’s estranged wife Joanna McKenzie as she fled his property on the 2100 block of state Route 508.

He told sheriff’s detectives he was staying overnight at his unoccupied house in case burglars from earlier in the day returned.

Some 70 prospective jurors were whittled down to six women, six men and two alternates by 5 p.m. yesterday.

Lewis County Superior Court Judge Nelson Hunt is hearing the case.

The attorneys are scheduled to begin with their opening statements at 9:30 a.m. today.
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