Lewis County Sirens.com

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

A group of Centralia-area residents are in trouble after they allegedly robbed two individuals who thought they were meeting at the Capitol Mall in Olympia to purchase a car advertised on a Lewis County online for-sale site.

The victims were going to buy a Honda Accord for $1,500 but were approached in the parking lot by two males armed with handguns, according to the Olympia Police Department.

They relinquished the cash they’d brought and then followed a red VW Jetta the men got into and called 911, according to police.

It happened just before 7:30 p.m. on Saturday.

Arriving officers caught up to one of two backseat passengers who ran away on foot and other officers stopped the Jetta as it entered the onramp to Highway 101, according to police.

The female driver and a juvenile passenger were detained.

Arrested and booked into the Thurston County Jail for first-degree robbery were the driver, Kirstan A. Flat, 19, of Chehalis, and Joshua L. Meza, 18, from Winlock, according to police. Lt. Jim Costa initially described the group as from the Centralia area.

The juvenile in the front passenger seat was later released to a parent, and Costa said he’s not sure what the juvenile’s involvement was.

Police this morning were actively searching for the fourth suspect who had fled the car on foot, according to Costa.

No injuries were reported and it’s not clear if the suspects actually had an Accord to sell.

The coroner and his deputies take a look at a casket stuck in a creek off the Newaukum River just east of Onalaska.

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

ONALASKA – The caravan left the coroner’s office at 8:30 a.m., sharp, today.

Lewis County Coroner Warren McLeod and nine members of his team set out on a mission to retrieve a casket discovered partially submerged in a creek last weekend, get it opened up and deal with whatever they found inside.

If it contained somebody’s loved one, the work would begin to figure out who it was and how to get them and their coffin back into their original burial plot.

If it was empty but suspected of once containing a body, McLeod would still have to find out who the previous occupant was, where they had previously been laid to rest and then tell their family that the remains had likely slipped out and been carried downstream.

When he visited the site earlier this week, he could see the lid was damaged, and knew it was possible any remains had been swept away.

The area, a little more than three miles east on state Route 508, beyond Onalaska’s center, has seen flooding several times in recent years.

The hope was, McLeod would find clues that the steel container was the one that once belonged to a pirate.

A SeaFair pirate, who until a few years ago lived near the South Fork of the Newaukum River, with the help of his wife, transformed a never-yet-used casket into fancy outdoor storage for bottles of liquor, ice and whatever bounty such men would need when they sat around a campfire and smoked cigars.

Susan and Pat Patterson lost their casket-turned-bar after a flood several years ago.

The property where they once lived is, as it turns out, one or two addresses upstream from the caravan’s destination.

Robert and Robin Bryan relocated last summer to a home on seven acres on the south side of state Route 508.

He said today, a neighbor notified him the other day he’d found a casket in the creek behind their home. His wife said they needed to report it to authorities.

“I told him, if there was somebody still in it, they needed respect, needed dignity,” Robin Bryan said.

The caravan arrived just before 9 a.m. to the Bryan’s property, and with shovels in hand, the coroner’s team set out.

Robert Bryan and his 8-year-old granddaughter Crystina Rollins, accompanied them down a brushy, muddy path to the creek.

“You can see it just beyond that sink,” he said.

Previous flood events have left a variety of odd objects in the shallow creek.

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The bottom side of the river-colored steel casket shows an orange-ish tint. Deputy Coroner Sarah Hockett says she can’t see inside, even though it appears one half of a “split-top” may be missing.

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Lewis County Coroner Warren McLeod sees the arriving half dozen members of Lewis County Search and Rescue just before 9 a.m. and points to their target.

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Deputy Gabe Frase, red plaid, brings a cable out to attach to the coffin. Chains are wrapped around it. A couple of neighbors have joined those on the creek’s bank to watch.

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Deputy Sgt. Alan Stull pilots the Polaris four-wheeler, a piece of equipment obtained from the military, which has been outfitted with “tracks” to replace its wheels. He revs up the motor as he begins to pull, and the casket starts to rise from its resting place.

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The news media is there.

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Stull pauses, as deputy coroners decide they must dig around the casket first to loosen it further from the grip of the creek bottom. Stull then resumes pulling it toward him.

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The casket has been flipped right side up. “I’ve always wondered what’s in that,” Onalaska Elementary School third-grader Crystina Rollins says. “I’m hoping nothing.” Deputy Curt Spahn pries up the top of the casket.

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They see a mound of mud and gravel inside.

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The see what they think is an ice bucket inside. / Courtesy photo by Lewis County Coroner’s Office

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Bingo. They pull out pieces of particle board, with holes bored out, just the size a bottle of rum could sit in. Mystery solved. “This is good,” McLeod says. “We didn’t want it to be somebody.” The time is 10 a.m.

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Deputy coroners examine the interior further. I don’t know why. Maybe hoping to find some pirate loot.

They decide to leave the casket where it lay.

“It’s not occupied, so I don’t have a problem with it,” Robert Bryan said.

The members of the search and rescue team return to their day of winter training elsewhere in the county.

Long time coordinator of the group, Sheriff’s Deputy Gene Seiber said, before departing, he does not recall the Patterson’s pirate casket turning up after the big 2007 flood.

If several years from now, the container is swept away again and found again, it won’t be a closed casket that causes another mystery, since it doesn’t have a lid, Seiber suggested.

Robin Bryan brings out cinnamon rolls for the coroner’s group.

Mission accomplished.

Postscript: Robin Bryan calls a news reporter to say she informed her landlord of what transpired. The landlord handles the estate of the man who previously resided there, and has died, she said.

“She got quite a laugh out of it,” Robin Bryan said. “She said, ‘It’s still there? He knew all about it.’ ”

The former owner had discovered the casket on his property at one time in the past, and reported it, Robin Bryan said. And then it was just left there, she said.

“She got a big laugh out of it, and said I’m so glad you handled that,” she said.

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For background, read:

• “Coffin discovered in Lewis County creek” from Tuesday February 17, 2015, here

• “Search and rescue to attempt recovery of partially submerged coffin” from Friday February 20, 2015, here

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Susan Patterson’s son called her the other day, laughing so hard he could hardly talk.

“He said, ‘It’s back’,” Patterson said.

“I said, ‘What? What’s back?” she said.

“The casket,’ he said.

And she laughed too. She’s still laughing.

“That thing is just going to haunt me forever,” Patterson said.

It’s a long story.

The Patterson family at one time owned a steel, never-before-used casket. The slightly damaged container meant for the dead had been languishing in the Fife warehouse of a shipping company where her son worked.

The Onalaska woman jumped at the chance to take possession of it.

It was the perfect enhancement to a spot on their property they called Pirate Cove. A place with a fire pit where her husband Pat and his SeaFair pirate friends would hang out and smoke cigars, she said.

The now-retired couple moved from West Seattle, home of the infamous group, to Onalaska years ago. Pat Patterson, now 72, has been a pirate for 38 years.

She replaced its lining with a skull and cross bones print fabric and they transformed the casket into a bar. It sat on a couple of logs. Beneath one end of the “split top” was storage for liquor bottles and the other half held a cooler, she said.

They only had it a year, maybe two, she said.

It disappeared during one of the floods, she couldn’t remember for sure which one, she said.

But it’s reappeared twice, and she feels almost certain the one that turned up over the weekend in a creek off the Newaukum River belongs to her family.

“That thing just keeps coming back, every time I think it’s gone, it comes back,” she said.

Patterson said she spoke to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office and the coroner earlier this week.

Lewis County Coroner Warren McLeod learned of the find on Sunday. He and members of Lewis County Search and Rescue plan to attempt to recover it on Saturday morning. It’s on private property, a hike through fairly rough terrain, he said.

McLeod described the found coffin as steel gray, partially submerged, the foot end driven into the creek bottom, almost as if deposited there by raging floodwaters.

He said he couldn’t tell if it was occupied or not.

Patterson recalled theirs as maybe bluish-gray.

The first time the Patterson’s casket-turned bar disappeared might have been around 2006 during a flood. She recalled telling her husband over a cup of coffee that if anyone found it, it could be disturbing, so they placed a note on a community bulletin board in town: If anyone finds a casket, contact the Pattersons.”

“The boys searched and searched for months,” Patterson said. “Nick, my grandson found it out in the woods, standing straight up, but buried in the mud.”

They couldn’t dislodge it, so they left it where it stood.

The following year, they were flooded again and while they were cleaning up, they got a knock and their door. It was a sheriff’s deputy, she said. Asking about a casket.

“He said, ‘Yeah, I guess that last one knocked it loose, it’s now lodged downstream at the neighbor’s’,” she said.

Her recollection was it was stuck and never recovered.

Another flood hit in January 2009, and this time they lost everything. Their home was condemned. The couple moved to the other end of Onalaska.

“I never really thought about that casket after that,” she said.

She told her husband earlier this week the casket has risen again. She almost 100 percent sure it’s theirs, she said.

She told the coroner they don’t want it back.
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For background, read “Coffin discovered in Lewis County creek” from Tuesday February 17, 2015, here

Dustin Palermo’s security video captured images of three individuals heading for his front door.

Updated at 8:56 p.m.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CENTRALIA – Police are looking for three males who barged into a Centralia home last night, demanded money and shot a dog.

Centralia police say one of the subjects fired a number of times at the pet, killing it but none of the residents were injured.

The suspects then fled and are still at large, according to the Centralia Police Department.

It happened about 10:35 p.m. on the 1200 block of Marion Street, at the north end of town, according to police.

Misty, the golden colored dog on the right, in a snapshot with Bruno.

Dustin Palermo said he and his girlfriend had just settled into bed to watch a movie, when he heard a thump on the door.

“My door’s flying open, these black men rush in, shooting guns, screaming,” he said. “They shot up my room and killed my dog.”

The 35-year-old Centralia native said they were shouting about money and weed and rummaging through things. He shoved his girlfriend into a corner and told her not to move, then pushed a jar of cannabis on the floor toward the intruders, he said.

They were in and out in about 30 seconds, but it seemed much longer, he said.

The firearm was described as a handgun.

Palermo said his two pit bulls were inside with him and his 25-year-old girlfriend. Misty was just protecting her family he said.

“The male, Bruno, he’s taking it pretty hard,” he said.

Detectives are working on the case.

Detective Patty Finch said they have no idea of the motive at this point.

“The victims don’t claim to know the suspects, there’s not a clear picture as to why they were targeted,” Finch said this afternoon.

They processed the scene, interviewed witnesses and recovered some shell casings. They’re not sure yet how many shots were fired, she said.

Palermo’s mother lives in the main house on the property, with his four children and three other of her grandchildren.

Pam Vasquez said she was out with a girlfriend, but the youngsters, ages 10 to 18, were upstairs in bed when it happened. She rushed home after getting a phone call and found several police cars there, their dog dead on the front porch.

“It was just crazy,” she said. “I never would have expected this, in Centralia.”

Palermo said he thinks one of the males was probably in his mid-20s, but has no idea who they were or why they came to his house.

The large extended family has lived on the property where Marion Street turns to Little Hanaford Road for about four years. His “house” is actually a roughly 300-square-foot shack Vasquez says was the original homestead. Palermo created a bedroom on one side.

On the other side, he has a small amount of medical marijuana growing, for himself and another patient, he said. The former Navy corpsman said he uses it for anxiety and chronic back pain. He came home from Iraq in 2003, he said.

But he didn’t feel like that’s why they were there, he said.

“I don’t know if it’s because we went to the casino the night before and won some money, I don’t know if it was random,” he said.

The family showed police their security video. Palermo looked at it again this morning.

It shows the men drive off in a small two-door car, almost like a Honda Accord or a Saturn, with a spoiler on the back, he said. Finch said the car was said to have a loud muffler.
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CORRECTION: This has been updated to reflect the correct time police were called.

Five friends work at installing a new front door late this afternoon.

The car seen leaving is described as a dark-colored passenger car with a loud exhaust.