Posts Tagged ‘By Sharyn L. Decker’

Sharyn’s Sirens: Daily police and fire roundup

Monday, January 21st, 2013

Updated at 2:32 p.m.

THREE-CAR WRECK INVOLVES TWO POLICE CARS

• A Winlock resident reportedly escaped any injury when his car was hit early this morning by a police car in Longview. Troopers were called just after 5 a.m. to the 300 block of Oregon Way when a Longview police officer responding to a call was following too closely behind another responding police officer, according to the Washington State Patrol. Officer Brian M. Nevels, 28, ran into Leslie C. Auman’s Volkswagen Jetta and then into the rear of the other police car, according to the state patrol. No one was hurt and the damage to Nevel’s and Auman’s vehicles was described simply as “reportable” by the state patrol. The cause was determined to be following too closely.

POSSIBLE MOTEL ROOM STABBING

• Centralia police responded  to a report of a possible stabbing at a motel the 1300 block of Lakeshore Drive at about 4:40 p.m. on Saturday and found a 22-year-old man with an approximately 2-inch gash on his forearm. The motel guest said he fell and cut himself on a broken liquor bottle in his room but officers were seeking his 56-year-old girlfriend to confirm the story, according to the Centralia Police Department. The 22-year-old was taken to Providence Centralia Hospital, according to police.

TRUCK REPORTED STOLEN TURNS UP NEAR HIT AND RUN ACCIDENT

• Centralia police took a report of a truck stolen from Orton Street in Centralia this morning at about the same time troopers were called about a hit and run south of Tumwater. The truck’s owner, found at his brother’s house on 143rd Avenue near Tenino, said he called 911 after he asked his brother to pick him up and take him to work, according to the Centralia Police Department. Since the description of the owner was similar to the description of the truck driver in the hit and run, and the truck was discovered in the brother’s back yard, the 29-year-old Centralia man is being questioned further, Sgt. Carl Buster said. The 29-year-old was booked by the state patrol for hit and run and may be charged in Centralia with making a false statement to an officer, according to police. His 31-year-old brother faces the same possible charge for statements he allegedly made, police said.

FOUND STOLEN HONDA, MINUS STEREO

• The owner of a car that vanished early Thursday from in front of a Centralia home spotted it yesterday parked at South King Street and Centralia College Boulevard, according to police. An officer called just after 5 p.m. noted the silver 1997 Honda Civic was filthy, had been rummaged through and its stereo was gone,  according to the Centralia Police Department. The vehicle started right up and was turned over the victim, according to police. Sgt. Carl Buster said he wasn’t certain, but believed it was found parked in the driveway of an uninhabited residence.

MAN ARRESTED FOR PROWLING AROUND

• Police responding to an alarm about 6 a.m. yesterday found a 28-year-old Centralia man inside a fenced compound at the 1200 block of North Tower Avenue. Ryan E. Morehouse old officers he had gone there to smoke pot out of view of the public but a laptop computer taken from inside one of the nearby parked trucks was discovered hidden under a pallet by the fence, according to Sgt. Carl Buster. Morehouse was arrested for second-degree burglary and booked into the Lewis County Jail, according to the Centralia Police Department.

STOLEN CREDIT CARD LANDS MOTEL GUEST IN JAIL

• Police following up on a report of someone using a stolen credit to check into a motel on the 1000 block of Eckerson Road on Friday arrested a 49-year-old Olympia man for credit card fraud. Jeffrey Marchell was booked into the Lewis County Jail, according to the Centralia Police Department.

MOM REPORTS HANDSY TEEN

• A mother called Centralia police about 3:30 p.m. yesterday to say a 15-year-old boy grabbed her 14-year-old daughter’s behind while at Fort Borst Park. Police are following up.

VANDALISM

• Centralia police took three reports of graffiti discovered over the weekend: yesterday morning on the side of a business on the 800 block of North Tower Avenue; on Saturday blue and yellow spray paint found on the side of a garage on the 600 block of North Tower Avenue; and earlier on Saturday on a fence and street sign near the 100 block of Roanoke Street.

PACKWOOD HOUSE LOST TO FIRE

• A fire investigator is looking into the cause of Packwood blaze that destroyed a two-story home on Friday afternoon. The wood-frame house is a total loss, according to Fire Investigator Jay Birley. When crews arrived, flames were shooting 20 to 30 feet above the roof, and the rear of the structure was in danger of collapsing, according to Lewis County Fire District 10 “pretty much, we took a defensive stance,” Chief Lonnie Goble said. The owner of the home on the 100 block of Timberline Drive was out of town when it happened, he said.

CENTRALIAN FROM DRIVE-BY SHOOTING BACK IN LEWIS COUNTY JAIL

• A Centralia teenager sentenced to nearly 93 years in prison for a downtown Centralia drive-by shooting five years ago is scheduled to appear in Lewis County Superior this week after an appeals court decision ordered him to be re-sentenced. Guadalupe Solis-Diaz Jr. was 16 in the summer of 2007 when he sprayed gunfire along the east side of South Tower Avenue missing six bar patrons. He maintained he was innocent but was convicted. He challenged his virtual life sentence in light of a 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held a sentence of life without parole is forbidden for a juvenile who did not commit homicide. Solis-Diaz was returned to the Lewis County Jail on Friday. The appearance is scheduled Thursday to set a date for re-sentencing.

JAMES REEDER SET TO BE SENTENCED IN MARCH

• A judge has set a date of March 6 for the sentencing of the Centralia man convicted earlier this month of the sexual abuse and death of his girlfriend’s 2-year-old daughter. Koralynn Fister died May 24 in Centralia. James M. Reeder, 26, made a so-called Alford plea on Jan. 9 in Lewis County Superior Court in which he did not admit guilt but acknowledged a jury hearing the evidence would likely find him guilty. Under the terms of the plea deal, the attorneys will recommend the judge give Reeder a minimum of around three decades in prison and possibly remain incarcerated for the rest of his life. Sentencing hearings generally offer an opportunity for family of victims to tell the judge what they think the sentence should be and why. Defendants are also given a chance to speak. Court hearings are open to the public. The session is set for 10:30 a.m.

News brief: Two Winlock residents seriously injured in morning wreck

Friday, January 18th, 2013

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

A 49-year-old father and his 16-year-old son were airlifted after a single-vehicle accident south of Winlock this morning.

A deputy was called about 11:20 a.m. to the 1100 block of Winlock-Vader Road found the driver of a truck somehow lost control, hit the ditch, rolled over and landed on its top, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office.

The Winlock residents were both wearing seat belts but sustained serious head injuries, according to Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown.

They were flown by helicopter to Southwest Washington Medical Center in Vancouver, Brown said. Their names were not released.

The 1996 Toyota 4by4 was totaled, she said.

Sharyn’s Sirens: Daily police and fire roundup

Friday, January 18th, 2013

Updated at 12:34 p.m.

GUNS AND TRUCK STOLEN FROM MIDDLE FORK ROAD

• A deputy responding to the 1300 block of Middle Fork Road near Onalaska yesterday evening took a report someone stole a man’s pickup truck and burglarized his home making off with several firearms, credit cards, checkbooks and documents such as a birth certificate and a passport. The 55-year-old victim said it had occurred sometime since Saturday, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office. Among the missing weapons is a shotgun, a Remington 22 semi-automatic rifle and at least one other handgun, according to the sheriff’s office. There’s no indication how the intruder got inside, according to Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown. The missing vehicle is described as a red and gray 1989 Ford F250 with a black lumber rack and toolbox in the bed of the truck, Brown said.

FIREARMS PILFERED FROM VEHICLE

• A Ruger 22 rifle and a 44 Magnum pistol vanished from the back seat of a pickup truck parked at a residence on the 900 block of E. Street in Centralia overnight, according to a report made to police yesterday morning. The owner said his vehicle had been locked but he found the driver’s door ajar, according to the Centralia Police Department.

ANOTHER AUTO THEFT IN CENTRALIA

• Centralia police took a report about 8:20 a.m. yesterday of a locked car stolen from the driveway in front of a residence on the 200 block of Tilley Avenue. The silver 1997 Honda Civic has a personalized license plate reading WWU 0905, according to the Centralia Police Department. Numerous Hondas and similar vehicles have gone missing locally in the past few days possibly because someone is using a “shaved” key to gain access, according to police. Sgt. Carl Buster said this morning that another officer discovered property stolen from one of the cars in the possession of a man he arrested in an unrelated case. “They’re digging into that now,” Buster said.

STUDENT BRUISED, WINDOW BROKEN IN SCHOOL BUS FIGHT

• Chehalis police were contacted yesterday by a mother who reported her teenage son was assaulted on his school bus the day before; struck in the stomach and the ear, as well as in the head hard enough his head broke a window on the bus. An officer investigated the alleged attack of the 14-year-old and found bruising and a swollen eye, according to Deputy Police Chief Randy Kaut. The suspect, also 14, faces a possible charge of fourth-degree assault, according to Kaut.

OOPS

• A woman presumably trying to stay out of trouble for driving with a suspended license when she was pulled over by a sheriff’s deputy last night allegedly gave her sister’s name as her own, but ended up in jail for making a false statement because the deputy recognized her, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office. Jennifer A. Haggard, of Onalaska, was stopped on the 300 block of Napavine Road East in Chehalis because of expired car tabs, according to the sheriff’s office. She was arrested and booked into the Lewis County Jail for the false statement and first-degree driving on a suspended license, according to Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown.

$100 GAS DRIVE OFF

• Police were called about 1:30 p.m. yesterday when someone in an older brown Suburban pumped about $100 worth of fuel at a service station on West Main Street and then left without paying for it. No arrest was made.

VANDALISM

• Chehalis police were called yesterday morning to a church on the 1800 block of Snively Avenue where someone had kicked in the door to a storage shed. Nothing appeared to be missing, according to the Chehalis Police Department.

• Police took a report yesterday morning of tires slashed on a vehicle during the night at the 3100 block of Galvin Road in Centralia.

• A 28-year-old homeless man was arrested about 1:30 p.m. yesterday when  Chehalis police detective spotted him spray painting on a storage container at Northwest Prindle and Front streets.  Matthew E. Eastman was arrested for third-degree malicious mischief and then released, according to the Chehalis Police Department.

• Centralia police were contacted yesterday afternoon about gang-style graffiti spray painted onto a sidewalk on the 1500 block of Oxford Avenue.

WRECK

• A 21-year-old Winlock resident t was hospitalized yesterday after a two-vehicle collision at the 800 block of Highway 603 west of Chehalis. A deputy responding about 4 p.m. learned a Toyota Forerunner made a left turn in front of the Winlock man’s Mazda, totaling the Mazda, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office. The Mazda driver had shoulder and leg pain and was taken by ambulance to Providence Centralia Hospital, according to the sheriff’s office. The Forerunner had only minor damage and it’s 20-year-old driver from Lacey was reportedly uninjured, according to Chief Civil Deputy Stacy Brown. He was cited for failing to yield and having no insurance, Brown said.

Michael Patton: Gift of reflective vest couldn’t save confused pedestrian from freight train

Thursday, January 17th, 2013

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CENTRALIA – Why was a grown man who lived 13 miles out of town, and no longer drove, standing near the outside rail of the tracks in downtown Centralia in the middle of the night?

Nobody knows for sure, because he was struck and killed by a freight train last week.

But his ex-wife has a pretty good idea.

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Michael T. Patton

Michael T. Patton, 58, lived alone in a house he built on Centralia-Alpha Road in Chehalis. Alzheimer’s ran in his family.

Some months ago, he’d developed a routine of walking to Centralia every day to visit his ex-wife, Gene Inmon.

Inmon was the one who took him to the Veteran’s Hospital in Seattle last May, where the doctor who took a brain scan told her he didn’t know how Patton was even functioning.

“I was around him every day so I didn’t notice it like other people did,” Inmon said. “But it was like every day, there was another piece of him gone.

“It’s a terrible disease.”

Thankfully his truck finally broke down, so he had to quit driving, Inmon said on a recent day as she recounted the downward spiral she witnessed in her former husband.

Sometimes he was giggly, as though he were a kid again, she said.

Adult Protective Services had begun the process to get him a guardian to mange his affairs, she said. He didn’t even know how old he was, she said, he needed to go into a some kind of home.

“I was terrified something was going to happen to him, because he was so confused,” she said.

Inmon, a sometimes substitute teacher who also works in an office in Tenino, said the disease came on fast and progressed rapidly, leaving few traces of the former “Pe Ell boy.”

Patton was single father who raised his three children in Pe Ell, she said. When he was younger, he was a a medic in the Army and served in Germany, she said.

For 35 years, Patton worked for Weyerhaeuser harvesting pine cone seeds during the season and then as a contractor in the off-season.

Inmon and Patton lived in Doty during their five-year marriage, after his daughter and two sons were mostly grown.

He was a fix-it guy, that little old ladies loved and a guitar player who composed songs he shared with friends, at home and at church, she said.

He attended Centralia Bible Chapel every Sunday before he got sick, she said.

Early last week, Patton arrived in Centralia with an orange reflective vest. Someone had stopped him on the road and given it to him, Inmon said. She doesn’t know who. He just told her it was a “gift.”

Inmon said it was his habit to stop and sort of hunker down into his shoulders when traffic would go by.

The day before he was killed, Patton wore his vest. He and Inmon did some shopping, had lunch, and she got him some movies before driving him home.

That night, she got a phone call from a process server looking for Patton’s address so he could deliver the guardianship papers.

It was 9 o’clock, she said.

“I told him, he’s asleep, he’s sick, don’t get him all riled up,” she said. “And that’s exactly what happened. I’m sure he was heading here.”

Patton died hours later.

Centralia police were called about 12:30 a.m. on January 9 to the area near Chestnut Street and South Tower Avenue.

Police were told by the engineer and conductor of the Union Pacific train they were near the Gold Street viaduct when they saw him and began sounding the horn.

According to the police report, the man was facing west with his hands in his pockets and just stood there.

He turned his head toward the train just before impact, police wrote.

Patton’s body landed only about 10 feet from the tracks. He was wearing the reflective vest over his leather coat, according to detective Rick Hughes. With him was a newly purchased pack of cigarettes and an unscratched lottery ticket, Hughes wrote.

The locomotive was stopped in the middle of the intersection at Maple Street. The engineer said he believed the train was slowed down to less than 40 mph.

Patton probably didn’t even know what the train’s headlight was, Inmon said.

His death was determined to have been accidental.

“It’s all very sad, and it should not have happened,” Inmon said. “There’s a side of me that’s angry and sad, and a part of me that thinks he’s released from that.”

Last year in Washington, there were 14 people struck and killed by trains in Washington. The year before, there were 26.

The stretch of tracks through Centralia is the busiest route in the state, with an average of 60 trains each day.

Patton is survived by his children, Jennifer Coucoules, Allen Patton and Edward Patton, their families and also by two brothers and two sisters, according to Inmon.

A Celebration of Life will be held on Saturday Jan. 26, 2013 at 1 p.m. at Centralia Bible Chapel, 209 N. Pearl St., Centralia, Wash. A potluck will follow.

Instead of flowers, his family requests donations be made to the Lewis County Veteran’s Relief Fund, 360 NW North St., Chehalis, Wash., 98532 or to the University of Washington Alzheimer’s Research Fund.

Breaking news: Tenino fourth grade teacher arrested for child porn

Thursday, January 17th, 2013

Updated at 1:51 p.m.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

A Tenino Elementary School teacher who is also a Boy Scout volunteer was arrested yesterday for possession of child pornography.

James D. Mobley, 46, came under investigation as authorities examined the records of an international company that distributed child porn through the mail, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Authorities allegedly discovered that Mobley purchased materials from the company on multiple occasions between February of 2009 and January of 2011, according to a news release today.

Mobley is described by federal authorities as a fourth grade teacher who is also a private tutor and active as a volunteer with Boy Scouts.

Any parents who are concerned about any contact he may have had with their children are being asked to call the Tenino Police Department.

In a search of Mobley’s Tenino home yesterday, law enforcement seized a computer hard drive and also DVDs containing child porn, according to U.S. Attorney’s Office spokesperson Emily Langlie.

Mobley is being held at the Federal Detention Center in SeaTac pending a detention hearing. He is charged in federal court with possession of child pornography.

The case is being handled by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service and the Tenino police.

The international company which sold the images is not named in the criminal complaint against Mobley, but it was almost two years ago when an unspecified foreign law enforcement agency searched the business and seized hundreds of child porn DVDs and business records, according to Langlie.

Missing elderly Centralia man back home, safe

Thursday, January 17th, 2013

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

An 80-year-old man with early stages of dementia who went missing early yesterday from his Centralia home ended up at a hospital in Everett, although police aren’t sure why.

“We think a little confusion on his part,” Centralia Police Department Sgt. Stacy Denham said this morning. “Everyone in his family lives south; no one knows why he went north.”

Raymond E. Wolford is okay and back home with his family, according to police.

Police were called to his home near Providence Centralia Hospital about 1:20 a.m. yesterday when his wife realized he and his car were gone. Wolford has late-stage cancer and requires medication daily, according to police.

Officer Mike Lowrey said last night around 8:30 p.m., officers were notified by the family Wolford was located in Everett, about 100 miles away.

Denham said he apparently drove himself there.

Maurin murders: Riffe’s defense includes an alibi

Wednesday, January 16th, 2013
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Ricky A. Riffe addresses his lawyer as a pre-trial hearing winds down in Lewis County Superior Court.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Ricky A. Riffe made an appearance in court today, the sixth time in six months as attorneys move toward a trial in the 1985 kidnapping and murder of an elderly Ethel couple.

Nothing momentous was on the agenda, but because the case is so voluminous, both sides want to make sure everything is staying on track as they go, according to Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer.

Meyer has said he has 150 witnesses.

Judge Richard Brosey today signed orders documenting some steps that have already been taken or are in progress, including notification of Riffe’s defense: He has an alibi and he didn’t do it.

No details on that were offered verbally during the court session.

Prosecutors contend Riffe, now 54, and his since-deceased brother abducted Ed and Wilhelmina Maurin and forced them to withdraw money from their bank in Chehalis before shooting them and dumping their bodies near Adna back in December 1985. Ed Maurin was 81 and his wife was 83.

The former Lewis County resident was arrested in July at his home in Alaska.

At today’s afternoon hearing in Lewis County Superior Court, at least three long-retired sheriff’s detectives, as well as elected Sheriff Steve Mansfield, were among those in the audience.

In the front row of benches behind prosecutors Meyer and Will Halstead as usual were Wilhelmina Maurin’s grown children and their family.

Riffe, wearing red and white striped jail garb, didn’t speak except to answer the judge’s inquiry as to whether he understood the orders being signed.

He is represented by Seattle-based attorney John Crowley.

Crowley informed the judge he expects to submit a series of motions. Judge Brosey indicated he wants to make sure any pre-trial hearings are scheduled such that they don’t delay commencement of the trial.

Deputy Prosecutor Halstead indicated it is still an unfolding case.

The trial is scheduled to start the week of May 6, a “drop dead” date to begin, according to the judge.
•••

For background, read “Maurin homicide: Riffe pleads not guilty, his attorney hints at proof” from Thursday August 23, 2012, here