Lewis County Sirens.com

Law enforcement officers proceed to dismantle an apparent drug lab on Oxford Avenue in Centralia.

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CENTRALIA – Authorities aren’t sure who he is but he was jailed last night when police allegedly found a loaded AR15 assault rifle just inside his front door and numerous items including jars of unidentified liquids and a large pile of white powder in his Centralia home.

The man being called Joshua Paul Green was charged today with multiple crimes as law enforcement on Oxford Avenue continued to sift through an amount of chemicals so large, a contractor for the federal Drug Enforcement Administration was called upon to deal with the cleanup.

He says he’s self-employed; he grows coral.

“There’s a lot of chemicals here, a lot that don’t fit, I’m not 100 percent sure what he’s doing,” state Department of Ecologist hazard specialist Doug Stolz said.

Stolz described seeing the usual materials one would find in a methamphetamine lab, such as solvents and glass flasks, but there was also a tank of water with air blowing into it, but without fish, he said.

Green, who is listed by police as 31 years old, was in Lewis County Superior Court this afternoon.

“The state is still not sure Joshua Green is the respondent,” Lewis County Deputy Prosecutor Eric Eisenberg told the judge. “We’re still not sure who we’re dealing with.”

According to charging documents, he was arrested and booked earlier this month following a traffic stop in Centralia and gave his information as Jonah Andrew Farrer, 34 years old. His driving status was suspended in Alabama.

He had a loaded .45 caliber Colt pistol in his waistband, but no license to carry the firearm, according to charging documents.

This week, a Centralia officer contacted his girlfriend – who said she has two children with him – and was told his real name is Joshua Green.

An officer who checked with authorities in Alabama learned the Farrer name, birth date and social security number belonged to an individual who died in 2008.

Last night, when Centralia police went to his home to serve a protection order regarding the girlfriend, they got information from 911 dispatch the Colt 45 was stolen, and the victim in that case had five other firearms stolen.

That led to a search warrant.

Today, a pair of firefighters stood by as protection-suited officers collected materials from inside the two-story house on Oxford Avenue.

Part of the electricity had been shut off for safety and fire hoses lay ready, just in case.

On a tarp in the front yard sat gallon cans of Xylene, mason jars, five-gallon buckets and a large glass container half-filled with something brown.

Charging documents list some of the items found inside as numerous pistols, Pyrex dishes with “sludge”, a scale and a used methamphetamine pipe.

The Centralia Police Department hasn’t seen a meth lab in quite some time, according to Public Information Officer John Panco.

They asked teams from the Washington State Patrol and the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department to conduct the examination, Panco said.

Personnel from the Department of Ecology had gone in first to check the air for safety.

Stolz, who had completed that task earlier in the day, said the interior was a mess, with a lot of garbage, many buckets of unidentified substances and even three triple-necked flasks – something illegal for just anyone to own.

The hazard specialist who said he’s been to more than 900 labs or partial labs in his 14 years on the job wondered if the resident was trying to make something he hadn’t seen before, or perhaps testing new “recipes”.

At least two dogs were removed from the home, according to Panco.

Next door neighbor Sharon Mitchell said the clean-shaven young man who moved in about three months earlier isn’t someone who had much company.

She didn’t know if he worked.

“Gosh, he’s a nice guy,” she said. “When I learned what happened, I was amazed.”

His girlfriend told police he travels to Seattle weekly and returns with an abundance of cash; and he gives her money to buy him guns, according to charging documents.

The last official word from police shortly before 3:30 p.m. called the find a possible drug lab.

Green was charged shortly after 4 p.m. today with manufacture of methamphetamine, possession with intent to manufacture or deliver, possession of a stolen firearm and identity theft.

Charging documents described the found materials as “consistent with a methamphetamine lab.”

Deputy Prosecutor Eisenberg asked for bail to be set at $75,000.

Defense attorney Bob Schroeter asked for $10,000.

He’s self-employed, growing coral, but hasn’t made any money from that yet, Schroeter told the judge.

“His assets for the business are not more than $1,000,” Schroeter said.

Judge Nelson Hunt set bail at $250,000.

Green – or Farrer – is scheduled for his arraignment next Thursday.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – The real life drama that has played out in Lewis County for more than a decade and peaked last autumn with a coroner’s inquest into the controversial 1998 death in Toledo of former trooper Ronda Reynolds will be told on national television next month.

48 Hours Mystery, CBS’s true crime series will feature a one-hour documentary on the case on April 21 at 10 p.m., according to Reynolds’ mother Barb Thompson.

Inquest witness, 2011

Thompson, who lives in Spokane, got word today from producers of the airing date, and she promptly sent out a message sharing the news for those interested in the story.

“My daughter Ronda Reynolds died Dec. 16, 1998 and finally in October 2011 her death certificate was changed for the last time to homicide,” Thompson wrote.

Reynolds, 33, died with a bullet in her head in the home she shared with husband of less than a year, Toledo Elementary School Principal Ron Reynolds. She was found dead on the floor of a small walk-in closet, covered up by a turned-on electric blanket.

Her death was labeled a suicide and an unconvinced Thompson battled the offices of the sheriff and the coroner and then took the matter to court.

Producers from 48 Hours joined local and regional news media in October at the Lewis County courthouse when new Coroner Warren McLeod held his inquest.

The sheriff’s office admitted to some mistakes, including either the handgun being moved at the scene before photos were taken, or those photos getting lost. Jurors heard about evidence being destroyed or returned too soon.

The inquest jury ruled unanimously the manner of death was homicide and named Ron Reynolds and his son Jonathan as responsible. Lewis County Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer however declined to bring criminal charges. The father and son deny any involvement.

Thompson said television crews spent four days with her in November and three more days in Spokane earlier this month.

“I know they interviewed Ron and his family once, and went back and did it again a couple weeks ago,” Thompson said this evening.

The widespread attention to the case is not something Thompson expected to ever see.

There was a time when she pestered local newspaper editors to investigate her daughter’s death, and was told no, they don’t report on suicides.

In 2001, she and a good friend of her daughter’s, David Bell, took a trip down to The (Centralia) Chronicle to try once again with its new editor at the time, and succeeded.

“Way back then, we were just hoping to wake up Lewis County,” she said. “That was kind of all we were thinking about; helping people realize there was a problem.”

Thompson said she didn’t think the examination of the case would go on for almost 14 years, or turn into a book by true crime author Ann Rule, let alone a television documentary.

“I’ve got the death certificate that say homicide,” she said. “And that’s what I set out to prove.”

Thompson said she only knows about the parts that were filmed with her, and doesn’t know how the 48 Hours episode will end.

She and her 36-year-old son Freeman will likely watch the show together, just the two of them, she said.