Lewis County Sirens.com

Jonathan Meyer, Will Halstead and Bruce Kimsey of the prosecution team face the judge’s bench in Lewis County Superior Court.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Lawyers on both sides in the Ricky Riffe murder trial accused each other of misconduct as the fifth week of proceedings began to wind down.

The conversation in Lewis County Superior Court before the jury was called into the courtroom on the surface was about whether a local attorney should be called to the witness stand but at its root revolved around whether a jailhouse snitch got a deal in exchange for saying Riffe confessed to him.

Defense attorney John Crowley told the judge he would file a motion for prosecutorial misconduct and would be asking  that Lewis County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Will Halstead be disqualified from the case.

Halstead, who is handling the prosecution along with elected Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer, shot back.

Erwin Bartlett

“I hope Mr. Crowley attaches the threatening email he sent that he would not file it if the state would stipulate to certain facts,” Halstead said. “That in itself is misconduct.”

Judge Richard Brosey ruled the informant’s lawyer should be called, saying the jury is entitled to know if the inmate did or did not get “consideration” in exchange for his testimony.

Under questioning by Halstead late last week, Erwin Bartlett denied he was getting anything in return for taking the stand, but when presented with the plea agreement document, said he didn’t remember much about the hearing as his liver ailment was causing him pain.

Brosey indicated he’s listened to many informants over the years and said his impression was Bartlett may have expressed confusion by design and it might be that he’s “smart like a fox”.

Crowley told the judge his client’s case was irreparably damaged by the matter.

Jurors sent home for the weekend were told to return Tuesday morning because Monday is a holiday. However, court is scheduled to begin for the attorneys early that day as they argue the defense motion.

Crowley represents Riffe, the 55-year-old former Mossyrock resident who was arrested last year at his home in Alaska and charged in the December 1985 shotgun deaths of an elderly couple who lived in Ethel.

Prosecutors contend Riffe and his now-deceased younger brother were responsible, that someone forced Ed and Minnie Maurin to drive to their bank to withdraw thousands of dollars and then to the woods near Adna where they were shot in their backs inside their car and dumped along a logging road.

Jurors since early October have heard dozens of state’s witnesses describe the day the couple vanished from their home, seeing them with someone else in their green sedan and observing  an unshaven man in an Army jacket with a gun at or near Yardbirds Shopping Center in Chehalis where the car was abandoned. Both Riffe and his brother John Gregory Riffe have been pegged as the person in a composite drawing and in photo montages.

A former drug dealer has testified Riffe told him he thought they got away with it, a woman who conducted an online relationship with him has said he made references to it and a Mossyrock man said he remembers overhearing the brothers planning it. But prosecutors have no fingerprints or DNA evidence that ties either brother to what has been described as one of the most horrendous murder cases in Lewis County.

When Bartlett took the witness stand on Oct. 31, he was forthright about his own crimes and how he came to be locked up in the Lewis County Jail, in an adjacent cell to Riffe early this year.

The now-50-year-old told of escaping New Mexico State Penitentiary where he was serving time for two counts of attempted first-degree murder – he said he took an axe handle to two men he caught on his living room floor with his wife.

When asked, he said in prison he built couches for a dental office and one day took the guts out of one of them, climbed inside and got loaded onto a flatbed truck. Bartlett said he was free for six months and 11 days before he was apprehended and ended up serving about 13 and half years.

He returned to Washington in 2007 and this past winter was serving six months in the Lewis County Jail for assault, he testified.

Bartlett lives in Hoquiam, but considers Chehalis his hometown. He told of getting to know Riffe earlier this year.

“I met Rick probably several days after I was in the medical unit,” he said. “I told him what I was in for, he told me what he was there for.”

Later, after Bartlett returned from a medical furlough and was caught trying to smuggle a prescription medication back into the jail, he tried to negotiate for leniency in exchange for information on fellow inmates, he testified.

His charge was a felony, possession of a controlled substance by a prisoner.

“What consideration did you receive?” Halstead asked him.

“None, I was told by you I wouldn’t get any,” Bartlett said.

Under questioning by Halstead, he began to describe the conversations he and Riffe had.

“First, I want to say, when you get locked up like we are, you really tend to say things,” Bartlett said. “I laid my heart out.”

He shared what he knew about his fellow inmate, that he said he lived in Alaska, loved the outdoors and fishing and hunting, and did odd jobs.

“I know he had sleep apnea and COPD, a respiratory problem,” he said.

Bartlett said Riffe showed him pictures of his wife and children and that they both liked to read Westerns.

“I believe this conversation happened through the vent,” he said. “We call it the “cell” phone.”

“He told me that he committed a crime, that he had killed two old people and that’s what happened,” Bartlett testified.

The witness went on to say Riffe told him that he had help, he thought an accomplice who was “no longer here.”

He said they took one of the individuals to the bank, and maybe said the cops might have a picture of the ATM driving through, according to Bartlett.

Riffe also complained about his well-paid attorney from Seattle not coming to see him, not talking to witnesses, he said.

“He told me it was a bad, bad mistake,” he said. “I think the first time he told me he did it, the second time he said allegedly.”

Under questioning by Crowley, Bartlett said he has already pleaded guilty to the smuggling charge and wasn’t sure why he hasn’t yet been sentenced.

Asked if he was receiving anything in exchange for his testimony against Riffe, he said it’s never a sure thing, but he sure hopes so.

The defense attorney put a document in front of the witness and asked if prosecutors were going to recommend he get a 30-day sentence.

“As I said, I don’t remember anyone discussing this with me,” Bartlett said.

The witness recalled he was looking at 12 months maximum, given his background.

The document was signed by Halstead, the one who prosecuted his case.

The jury was sent out of the room, when Halstead objected.

Crowley told the judge he’d gone to the clerk’s office the day before and gotten a copy of Bartlett’s case documents.

Halstead told the judge it was Bartlett’s attorney’s bad habit to attach a copy of the plea offer sheet to the filing.

“This document was not in discovery,” Crowley told the judge.  “Obviously there is consideration, it sticks out like a sore thumb.

“I’m not going to let this go.”

Centralia lawyer David Arcuri was called as a witness subsequently and testified he had no idea what his client Bartlett told law enforcement about Riffe.

The plea agreement however, was if Bartlett testified truthfully in the Riffe case, Halstead would tell the judge he should get 30 days for bringing drugs into the jail but if he didn’t, Halstead would seek the maximum sentence, according to Arcuri.

The state said they expect to rest on Tuesday. The defense will then begin to call its witnesses and closing arguments could take place, or at least begin, by the end of the week.

John Crowley looks through case exhibits at the end of the day.

Deb George responds to attorney’s questions about herself and her online relationship with murder suspect Ricky Riffe.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Debra George testified yesterday about online conversations she had with murder defendant Ricky Riffe that over a period of time sometimes included exchanges related to the 1985 Maurin murders.

George, 57, said she had a Facebook account in her and her husband’s name and at some point, Riffe made a friend request meant for his old high school buddy, but he ignored it. A month or so later, she responded and they developed a private long distance email relationship that took place over about a year and a half, according to George.

“What did Rick tell you about sex and dead people? That he used to do that over dead people?” George was asked.

“We talked about different things like that, yeah, but we knew we would never do that,” she replied.

George told the prosecutor Riffe spoke of doing it in graveyards and and such places because nobody could catch him.

Did you tell detective Kimsey that Riffe talked about having sex where the Maurins were killed, she was asked? And what did she say to Kimsey about that?

“I couldn’t tell him much because I didn’t want to be killed,” she said.

George is among the final witnesses for the prosecution in Riffe’s kidnapping, robbery and murder trial that began early last month in Lewis County Superior Court.

Riffe, 55, was arrested and charged last year in the deaths of Ed and Minnie Maurin, the elderly Ethel couple whose bodies were found dumped on a logging road near Adna on Dec. 24, 1985.

The former Mossyrock man who moved to Alaska in the late 1980s chatted with George sometimes daily, according to the woman.

They communicated over Facebook, Gmail and video chat, she said. She testified she deleted all of it.

According to George, she once broached the subject of the homicides with the man she suspected was involved.

“I was telling him a story about some guy talking about a murder back in the 80s,” she said.

Through her testimony and the lawyer’s questions, it appeared she mentioned a name of a local man she’d talked with about it, and Riffe chuckled and said the man was a “snake in the grass.”

She was just very curious, George testified.

“He asked me who they thought did it,” George said.

George spoke of one time simply asking Riffe what happened to the bloody clothes.

He turned off the web cam, but she could still hear him and she thought Riffe was talking to himself, according to George.

Riffe said he said he gave them to someone else to bury by the lake, according to George.

“Do you remember detective Kimsey asking if the clothes were burned?” Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer asked her.

“Yeah, they weren’t. And I was shocked,” George replied.

Do you remember talking to detective Kimsey about Mr. Maurin being struck in the back of the head? she was asked.

“He got hit in the head when he wouldn’t get out of the car,” George said.

George came to the attention of law enforcement because her husband Les George said she’d been communicating with Riffe.

After she attended Riffe’s first court appearance in July of last year, detective Bruce Kimsey asked to interview her.

At times her testimony was confusing, as she repeatedly responded she didn’t recall “at this time.”

She admitted she was afraid of testifying.

Under questioning by defense attorney John Crowley, she acknowledged a head injury that made her forgetful and that she was taking medication for a variety of anxieties.

Crowley queried her about why she only just this week made mention of the injury to Ed Maurin’s head, insinuating it didn’t come from his client.

“Well, how else would I have known that?” George asked.

She denied she followed news of the case or spoke with her sister who had been attending the trial.

Two of Minnie Maurin’s children, Denny Hadaller and his sister Hazel Oberg, observe proceedings during the Riffe murder trial.

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Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer, left, and detective Bruce Kimsey confer during a court recess.

Updated

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

A 30-year-old Packwood area woman is dead after she was pulled from the Black River near Rochester last night, apparently in an attempt to flee the law.

The Thurston County Sheriff’s Office said she and a 34-year-old man were contacted in a vehicle parked with its lights off near the boat launch near School Land Road about 8 p.m.

As the deputy was checking information on her, the driver’s door swung open and she ran toward the river, Sgt. Ray Brady said.

“She jumps into the water and starts swimming away from him,” Brady said.

Firefighters responded about 8:22 p.m. and with the use of thermal imaging equipment spotted the woman floating about a quarter mile downstream, according to West Thurston Regional Fire Authority. It was approximately 9:05 p.m., according to Chief Robert Scott.

Her head was above water, but she was hypothermic and incoherent, Scott said. Responders said she was treated for exposure but then medics had to perform CPR enroute to the hospital.

Brady said she passed away about 2:30 a.m.

The woman had arrest warrants from the state Department of Corrections and related to possession of methamphetamine, according to Brady.

As far as they can tell, that may be the reason she ran, he said.

“It’s really kind of tragic, trying to flee some warrants, and have it end in the death of someone,” Brady said.

The Thurston County Coroner’s Office identifies her as Kristina L. Jorden.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – The wife of Ricky Riffe’s high school friend Les George took the witness stand yesterday where she was asked about a long distance email relationship that took place over about a year and a half between herself and the murder defendant.

Debra George tearfully and seemingly reluctantly spoke of sometimes daily conversations over Facebook, Skype and through Gmail.

Ricky Allen Riffe

“Did Rick ask you if people were talking about the homicides?” Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer asked.

Yes, she said, but they never mentioned the Maurins by name.

Prosecutors have indicated they believe Riffe was keeping tabs on  the Lewis County investigation even as he was thousands of miles away in Alaska.

“Did you save those emails?” she was asked.

“No, he told me not to,” Deb George testified.

She said she thought Riffe didn’t want her husband or anyone else to see them.

Jurors in Lewis County Superior Court yesterday heard that her computer, as well as two computers from the Riffe household in King Salmon were seized and forensically examined a few weeks after a detective last year learned of the exchanges.

As the trial comes to the end of its fifth week, prosecutors continue in their attempts to prove Riffe is responsible for the December 1985 shotgun deaths of Ed and Minnie Maurin, the elderly Ethel couple whose bodies were found dumped off a logging road near Adna.

The now-55-year-old former Mossyrock man was arrested at his home in King Salmon, Alaska last year not long after the other prime suspect – his younger brother – passed away.

Lewis County Sheriff’s Office detective Bruce Kimsey spent his second day on the witness stand yesterday, sharing more of what he learned about the defendant when he flew to Alaska to confront him and subsequently to bring him back to Lewis County.

Riffe told him’d quit drugs cold turkey when he took a job in Alaska and put that part of his life behind him, according to Kimsey.

Kimsey has suggested the suspect’s attitude changed once he knew “the gig was up”, in contrast to the aloof manner he presented during the interrogation.

“It’s totally different,” Kimsey testified. “He’s more open, willing to talk to me. Willing to joke around and show he had a personality.”

After the July 8, 2012 arrest, he found the suspect not only more relaxed but quite witty, he said.

Kimsey spoke of observing Riffe during his court hearing in Anchorage laughing with other inmates, of conversing over lunch at Chili’s and then a fast food stop on their way to the Lewis County Jail.

When they hit Federal Way, they drove through and ordered burgers, according to Kimsey.

Kimsey walked over to a mini mart and brought back Pall Mall filtered cigarettes, apologizing he couldn’t get exactly what Riffe smoked, he said.

“So, he takes the cigarette out, bites off the filter, spits it on the ground and makes a joke to me,” Kimsey said. “Yes, he laughed.”

Kimsey said during the four-plus hour plane ride, he had continued to go through what all the witnesses have said.

“I’m sitting on his left side, detective Riordan on his right,” Kimsey says.

Riffe still had little to say about the case itself.

“He said, I don’t know. I hope justice prevails.”

“I told him, you can save that for your family and friends,” Kimsey recounted.

“He said, ‘well, it doesn’t look good’,” Kimsey said. “I said, ‘it’s bad.’ And he said, ‘yeah, it’s bad’.”

“Did you ask him if he’d worried?” Lewis County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Will Halstead asked.

“I’m talking in his left ear,” Kimsey said. “Did you ever think the day would come when police would come knock on your door and arrest you?”

His answer, “Well yeah.”