Lewis County Sirens.com

Rolando Carrillo-Cruz, Javier E. Martinez, Ulises Carrillo-Cruz and Francisco J. Robles, left to right, sit in Lewis County Superior Court after seeing a judge Wednesday afternoon.

This was updated at 6:06 p.m.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Twenty-year-old Ulises Carrillo-Cruz was ordered held on $250,000 bail when he was charged yesterday with first-degree assault following Tuesday’s shooting at the Centralia apartment complex where he lives with his older brother.

Also charged yesterday with rendering criminal assistance were his brother Rolando Carrillo-Cruz, 25; Francisco J. Robles, 18; and Javier E. Martinez, 18, all Centralia residents.

All four wore red jail garb when they appeared before Lewis County Superior Court Judge Richard Brosey.

Defense attorney Bob Schroeter argued unsuccessfully for lower bail on Ulises Carrillo-Cruz, noting he has been a local resident his entire life.

The other three men were ordered held on $50,000 bail.

Seven pages of charging documents describing interviews with the four as well as others involved and residents of the Edison Terrace Apartments contain conflicting accounts of exactly what transpired.

Three individuals said alleged gang member Joshua Rhoades showed up to the apartment complex with other people, Rhoades being someone who “tries to jump him,” Ulises Carrillo-Cruz told police.

Rolando Carrillo-Cruz told police he saw two fast-moving vehicles pull over on Ash Street and several individuals began walking then running towards them yelling “LVL and other gang slang” as well as making threatening gestures.

Ulises Carrillo-Cruz said he fired two rounds into the ground and claimed self defense, according to charging documents.

Charging documents contain the following information:

A green Ford Taurus that reportedly fled the scene was found at the emergency entrance at Providence Centralia Hospital, where Rhoades told an arriving officer Genevieve Purser had been shot. She was inside with a gunshot wound to her right shoulder.

With Rhoades were Richard Molina and Augustina Flores-Purser.

Flores-Purser told police she and Rhoades had driven to North Ash Street to pick up Molina and Purser who had been walking.

Purser was shot before she got into the vehicle, two of them told police.

The victim, 28-year-old Purser of Centralia, remained hospitalized this morning but has been upgraded to satisfactory condition.

What is clear is police responded about 1:15 p.m. to a report of shots fired at the 400 block of North Ash Street.

A divot found in the ground appeared to be from a bullet, and indications were the trajectory came from apartment 20, according to police. Police report a spent handgun cartridge was found there as well.

A 9 mm pistol was found in some brush west of the apartments near the railroad tracks. The slide was partially opened and a round jammed in the “action,” according to charging documents.

Witness accounts indicate the four who were eventually arrested fled to another apartment in the complex.

Three of them brought two baseball bats there, one of them had allegedly hidden the gun, one or two of them flushed shell casings down the toilet and one of them hid a pair of black gloves and some marijuana behind the toilet, according to charging documents.

Rolando Carrillo-Cruz told police he had purchased the loaded gun for $50 for protection at his apartment.

Rolando Carrillo-Cruz was the alleged intended target of an August 2010 drive-by shooting in Chehalis that authorities described as perpetrated by the LVL gang.

The apartment where the two live with a female roommate was the target of window and car smashing earlier this month.

Both Carrillo-Cruz’s are additionally charged with unlawful possession of a firearm.

Arraignments are all set for Jan. 5.

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Read yesterday’s story here

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

The Centralia woman shot yesterday in what police are calling a gang-related dispute at an apartment complex is listed in serious condition this morning and the man accused of firing the gun is expected to go before a judge this afternoon.

Edison Terrace Apartments

Ulises Carrillo-Cruz, 20, confessed to shooting the woman, but police were told he wasn’t targeting her, according to the Centralia Police Department.

“There’s a claim he fired to scare them off, and rounds were fired into the ground,” police Sgt. Kurt Reichert said this morning.

Carrillo-Cruz, also of Centralia, was arrested yesterday at the apartments for first-degree assault and felon in possession of a firearm, according to police.

According to police, a group of at least four people – including 28-year-old Genevieve Purser who was shot – showed up at the complex on the 400 block of North Ash Street in Centralia.

“The short version is one group went to the other group’s apartment to raise hell,” Reichert said.

Officers were called just after 1:15 p.m. by the manager who heard two gun shots and then saw two males standing nearby at the corner of Ash Street and Park Way screaming and cussing toward one of the apartments.

Carrillo-Cruz and his brother Rolondo Carrillo-Cruz, 25, reside at the apartment with a young woman, according to the apartment managers.

Purser was taken to the Providence Centralia Hospital by friends, according to police. She had a gunshot wound to her shoulder, according to police which they described as non-life threatening.

Purser was then transferred to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

Centralia police reported they found a firearm yesterday hidden in some bushes near the scene. Police have not said how many shots were fired, only that it occurred in a “common area”.

Three other males were also arrested yesterday at the complex, called the Edison Terrace Apartments.

Rolondo Carrillo-Cruz was arrested and booked also for  first-degree assault and felon in possession of a firearm, according to police. It’s not clear what his role was.

Francisco J. Robles, 18, and Javier E. Martinez, 18, were arrested and booked for rendering criminal assistance; they are suspected of hiding evidence, according to Reichert.

Reichert said it was the same general group of people who showed up at the apartments earlier this month and took baseball bats to the windows of that apartment unit and a Kia car.

All four men are scheduled to go before a judge in Lewis County Superior Court at 4 p.m. today.

Sheriff's deputies look around the patio of an apartment on Ash Street in Centralia.

This news story was updated at 3:13 a.m. Wednesday December 28, 2011

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CENTRALIA – A 28-year-old woman was shot in Centralia this afternoon and police are investigating.

Officers were called at 1:16 p.m. about shots fired at the 400 block of North Ash Street.

A Centralia woman was taken to Providence Centralia Hospital with a gunshot wound to her shoulder, described as non-life threatening, according to police.

However she was being airlifted this afternoon to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, Officer Patricia Finch said.

Nobody has been arrested, Finch said about 3:30 p.m. today.

Yellow police tape was stretched around a grassy area behind a lower unit at the Edison Terrace Apartments.

Officers from Centralia and the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office congregated there this afternoon.

Two young men were brought out of a nearby apartment and handcuffed by police and taken away.

Finch said she did not know if the injured woman lived at the apartments.

Finch said she did not know if the shooter was at large.

The couple who manage the complex didn’t know much either this afternoon.

“All I know is I heard gunshots, it was two gunshots,” said Gregg Zetz who manages the apartments with his wife.

Zetz said he saw two guys outside on the corner of Ash Street and Park Way screaming and cussing toward one of the apartments.

“My husband tells me to get the kids on the floor and call the cops,” Melissa Zetz said.

Melissa Zetz said the complex is usually fairly quiet, except about two weeks ago someone came to the same apartment with baseball bats and broke out windows and smashed up a car belonging to the resident.

On Dec. 4, four men were arrested in connection with baseball bats there, and police were told it was “gangsters.”

Gregg Zetz said he informed the tenant of the involved apartment today she must move out.

Update 10:06 p.m.: Centralia police report they have arrested four men – all Centralia residents – in connection with the shooting they are calling gang-related.

Twenty-year-old Ulises Carrillo-Cruz was booked into the Lewis County Jail for first-degree assault and felon in possession of a firearm, according to the Centralia Police Department.

Carrillo-Cruz confessed to shooting the woman, police say, who was not the intended target.

Rolondo Carrillo-Cruz, 25, was booked for  first-degree assault and felon in possession of a firearm, according to police.

Two others were booked for rendering criminal assistance. They are Francisco J. Robles, 18, and Javier E. Martinez, 18, according to police. Robles was also booked for possession of a firearm.

A firearm was found hidden in some bushes near the scene by police dog Kayo, according to police.

Police officers look through the grass at the corner of Ash Street and Park Way in Centralia.

Brandon Piatt, of Glenoma, sits with defense attorney Bob Schroeter in Lewis County Superior Court. Behind him are James and Sherri Hamrick, both of Packwood.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Four of the individuals scooped up in a crack down on drug dealing in the east end of Lewis County were charged yesterday with delivery of methamphetamine; one young woman was released with no charges after spending a night in jail.

Law enforcement officers from multiple agencies, including the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office SWAT team traveling in an armored personnel carrier, arrested eight people on Thursday in a sweep through Packwood and Morton.

The action followed a three-month investigation by the Lewis County Regional Drug Task Force, which had been conducting undercover drug buys, according Sheriff Steve Mansfield.

Officers served a search warrant that morning  at the 100 block of Edmonds Road in Packwood where they detained three people, James D. Hamrick, 29; Sherri J. Hamrick, 46; and Amaris R. Smith, 21, according to the sheriff’s office.

While Smith was arrested for alleged possession of methamphetamine, she was not charged because there were no drugs found on her, Lewis County Deputy Prosecutor Shane O’Rourke said.

The rest of those arrested appeared before a judge in Lewis County Superior Court in Chehalis yesterday afternoon.

James Hamrick was charged with two counts of delivery of methamphetamine and one count of possession with intent to deliver. He has several felony convictions from the past, according to O’Rourke; Judge James Lawler set his bail at $50,000.

Sherri Hamrick was charged with four counts of delivery of methamphetamine and one count  possession with intent to deliver. Her bail was set at $15,000. Prosecutors said she has no criminal history.

Venus D. Hamilton, 48, of Morton, was charged yesterday with delivery of methamphetamine.

In June, the sheriff’s office called Hamilton one of two main narcotics distributors in the east end when she was arrested and charged with selling methamphetamine, but those charges were dismissed after prosecutors has problems with the informant, according to O’Rourke.

“She lost her car and she was warned if she continued and persisted, she would be caught again,” O’Rourke told the judge.

Lawler set her bail on the new charge at $10,000.

Two of the eight were arrested only for unrelated warrants for failing to appear in court. The judge set bail at $10,000 for Effren E. Barron, 40, and at $3,000 for Bradley J. Miller, 35, of Packwood.

Two individuals were arrested around noon on Thursday on the 6300 block of U.S. Highway 12 in Morton.

Brandon Piatt, 31, of Glenoma was charged yesterday with four counts of delivery of methamphetamine and ordered held on $30,000 bail. Sheila Schmitt, 44, of Morton, was not charged in connection with his alleged drug dealing, according to O’Rourke.

However, charges were filed yesterday against both for drug possession related to a June arrest. Schmitt’s bail was set at $10,000, unsecured, for possession of methamphetamine. Piatt’s additional charges were for possession of methamphetamine, hyrocodone and another prescription drug, according to O’Rourke.

Piatt and James Hamrick remain in the Lewis County Jail.
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See Thursday’s news story, “Drug task force arrests eight in East End” here