Right to left, Guy LaFontaine's daughter Kandace Barton, son Eric LaFontaine and family friend William Young listen as Gail LaFontaine speaks to the court about her husband's death
By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
CHEHALIS – Gail LaFontaine’s husband had been badly beaten.
The 58-year-old welder from Federal Way had broken ribs, broken eye sockets, a broken forearm and what a sheriff’s detective described as a shoe or boot print on his head.
After spending some five hours in the emergency room at Morton General Hospital, where they sewed up a gash in his head, Guy LaFontaine’s wife was given a CD, an appointment for the following Monday with a facial re-constructionist and hope, lots of hope.
Guy LaFontaine
The 60-year-old woman took her husband and headed home in the middle of the night to Federal Way, on the back roads, she said.
Her daughter Kandace Barton followed them. The three had been together at the Randle home of taxidermist Erik Massa.
“He said, ‘Gail, I’m hot’, and I rolled the window down,” Gail LaFontaine said of her ailing husband. “And he grabbed my thumb.”
“Then he said, ‘Gail, I’m cold’,” she said. She turned on the heat.
“He laid back and I thought, good, he’s resting,” she said. “And he squeezed my thumb.”
When they pulled off the freeway, her daughter rolled her car window down and said ‘Mom, I don’t think he’s moving right, we’re going to St. Francis (Hospital)”, according to Gail LaFontaine.
When they arrived at the hospital, her husband of some 30 years was dead.
Massa, 44, was charged with second-degree murder in the March 14, 2010 death.
Erik R. Massa
Under an arrangement formalized today, his case was pleaded down to second-degree assault and he was sentenced to as much as the judge could give someone with no criminal history – nine months in jail.
LaFontaine, who worked at Todd Shipyard in Seattle, was described in court today as a union representative so beloved, some of the Korean workers he assisted would literally bow to him and his wife.
Lewis County Chief Deputy Prosecutor Brad Meagher told a judge this afternoon there were no marks on the defendant; it was not a neutral fight.
“This is a particularly brutal beating, and there seems to be no reason for it,” Meagher said.
However, Meagher said, the pathologist who conducted the autopsy suggested LaFontaine’s death involved the altercation as well as heart disease and diabetes.
“And for whatever reason, Mr. LaFontaine was either forced to go or checked out of the hospital,” Meagher said.
Meagher said he would have had a hard time proving the cause of death at trial. Also, one witness has died and a significant piece of evidence had been suppressed – a broken shotgun found in a silo on Massa’s property, according to Meagher.
The standard sentencing range for second-degree assault is three to nine months in jail. Meagher recommended nine months. Defense attorney Chris Baum recommended three months.
Lewis County Superior Court Judge James Lawler chose nine months and ordered the defendant to be evaluated – and treated if necessary- for drug and alcohol abuse.
Massa spoke in court to the judge and his father-in-law’s family saying it is a family tragedy he will live with for the rest of his life.
“I did love him and I’m very sorry for what happened,” Massa said.
He admitted only to punching his father-in-law in the ribs.
Almost an hour was spent listening to family tell the judge what the sentence should be and addressing Massa, who wouldn’t look at the speakers.
Gail LaFontaine accused him of beating to death a crippled old man.
“My life is over, it’s done,” she said.
She held a photo of her smiling husband up and spoke of how much her husband adored his son-in-law.
All a person would have to do to get Guy LaFontaine to back off is remove his glasses, Massa was told.
“Erik, you’re getting out in nine months and I have terminal cancer,” she said. “You’re coming with me.”
Massa was told when one of Guy LaFontaine’s daughters heard the “worst news ever, she thought it would be her sister” – Massa’s wife who was dead.
The details of what occurred at the 11,000 block of U.S. Highway 12 in Randle won’t be heard in a trial, but bit and pieces emerged during the hearing today.
Defense attorney Baum told the judge his client didn’t hit Guy LaFontaine over the head with a shotgun.
“LaFontaine grabbed that shotgun, pointed it at my client and threatened to kill him,” Baum said. “My client wrestled the shotgun away and took it and broke it.”
There were allegations both men had been drinking.
Massa’s wife spoke of her husband’s drinking problem, and said she, her husband and both her parents were at the property that night.
It was all over the farm, it wasn’t just one spot, there was blood everywhere,” Barton said.
She described the trauma of seeing her father laying on the taxidermy shop floor, his face is smashed, and her “holding the blood in the back of his head.”
She persuaded her husband to leave, so she could get away with her toddler, she said. She wondered if they would get out alive, she told the judge.
“To know my husband is going to out in nine months and mad at me for doing this, that’s even scarier,” she said.
Massa will be subject to 18 months community custody after his release, $1,800 in financial obligations, and 10-year no contact orders with his wife and mother-in-law.
Barton filed for divorce shortly after her father died.
Massa took only one brief look toward his father-in-law’s family as he was handcuffed and led out of the courtroom.
Exactly the circumstances under which Guy LaFontaine was discharged from Morton General Hospital aren’t clear.
“It’s very sad the hospital in Morton let him leave,” defense attorney Baum said.
A sheriff’s deputy who had gone to the emergency room that night noted Guy LaFontaine’s substantial injuries, and later was notified by the hospital they couldn’t keep LaFontaine in his bed so they were releasing him.
Gail LaFontaine, who said the emergency room had lined up a LifeFlight at one point that night, characterized it this way: The doctor told her husband, “Guy, I’m tired of f-ing with you, get out.”
The King County Medical Examiner’s Office listed Guy Lafontaine’s death as a homicide caused by blunt force injuries to his head, torso and extremities.
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Notes from behind the news: What readers wanted to know in 2011
Saturday, January 7th, 2012Members of the news media swarm around Barb Thompson as she exits the courthouse after the inquest jury concluded her daughter's death was homicide. / Courtesy photo by Bradd Reynolds
By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
I think it’s a little bit lame to write about the top news stories of the year after the year has ended and a new one has already begun.
But I’m going to do it anyhow.
I got busy the past several days and, I can’t bring myself to forego a look-back.
Ronda Reynolds, case
Once again, I can’t say for sure exactly what the most read news stories were on Lewis County Sirens, because if they are ranked somewhere in my web sites statistics, I still haven’t found that part.
But I can see the numbers for what people are searching for on the Internet when they end up on the news site.
Overwhelming, the October coroner’s inquest into former trooper Ronda Reynolds’ death in Toledo in 1998 comes out on top, with the startling outcome of her husband Ron Reynolds and his son, Jonathan Reynolds, being named responsible.
Search terms like “Ronda Reynolds”, “Ron Reynolds”, Barb Thompson” and “coroner’s inquest” number in the hundreds, and hundreds and hundreds.
Not too far behind is news about John Allen Booth Jr. and his triple murder trial last month, where prosecutors said he executed David West Sr. 52, 16-year-old David West Jr., 16, Tony E. Williams, 50, of Randle, and tried to do away with Denise Salts, then 51, at the West’s Salkum-area home.
Kayla Croft-Payne, still missing
Based on reader searches, the next most popular story was the missing Kayla Croft-Payne from Vader, who more than a year after she vanished at age 18 remained much on many people’s minds.
The fourth most sought out story was about Robert Maddaus who last February was found guilty of murder as he tried to recover cash and methamphetamine stolen from his Rochester trailer home. He was sentenced to life for the death of Shaun Peterson, who was found handcuffed and fatally shot on Capitol Way in Olympia in November 2009.
Next it’s kind of a tossup (based on reader searches) between three stories:
Kenneth Varner, arrested in April for allegedly helping his father – James E. Varner, 49, a former Washington state trooper – carry out a suicide plan in Packwood five years earlier and making it look like homicide so the family could collect insurance money. Charges were dismissed in October following a deal in which the now 35-year-old son pleaded guilty to first-degree theft in an unrelated case. He was sentenced to time served – about six months;
Ronald A. Brady, convicted
Laura L. Hickey, the the 25-year-old Centralia woman accused of decapitating her premature newborn in a trailer park in March. Her trial is currently scheduled for next month;
Ronald A. Brady who was convicted in July of manslaughter for fatally shooting suspected burglar Thomas McKenzie of Morton outside his Onalaska house.
So those are the top several stories readers were looking for when they came to Lewis County Sirens.
However, all that still doesn’t really tell me what people have read the most or enjoyed reading the best, because the majority of visitors have bookmarked Lewis County Sirens and presumably just look over whatever news appears on the homepage.
What I do know for sure, is the news site has grown so much richer with the increase of readers commenting and adding their opinions. A whole other set of dialogue – sometimes even more spirited – has swelled on Lewis County Sirens Facebook group page.
And traffic to Lewis County Sirens has grown tremendously.
A year ago at this time, Lewis County Sirens’ number of readers was approaching the circulation of the local daily newspaper here. The number of readers has more than doubled since then. I like that.
I’d sure appreciate hearing what readers liked, didn’t like or would hope to see written about in 2012. Myself, I’d like to see more guest columns in the coming year, because more voices are more interesting.
Feel free to send me a note or comment.
Your news reporter,
Sharyn L. Decker
Tags:By Sharyn L. Decker, news reporter
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