Archive for June, 2013

Sharyn’s Sirens: Daily police and fire roundup

Saturday, June 29th, 2013

WRECK

• A pair of 22-year-olds from Olympia were injured when a motorcycle ended up in a creek at the “S” curves on North Gold Street in Centralia yesterday. Police responding about 6 p.m. concluded excessive speed was a factor in the wreck. The male and female patients were transported to Providence Centralia Hospital, responders said. Both were wearing helmets.

DRUGS

• A 37-year-old man stopped for riding a bicycle without a headlight in Centralia overnight was found to have warrants for his arrest and when he was detained, baggies of suspected meth fell from his hand, according to the Centralia Police Department. It happened about 4:30 a.m. near Jefferson and South Pearl streets, according to police. Makia D. Adams was arrested and booked into the Lewis County Jail.

THEFT

• Centralia police took a report about 2 o’clock this morning regarding an individual stealing beer from a convenience store on the 600 block of South Tower Avenue.

• Centralia police were called to the 200 block of East Van Buren Street about 4:30 p.m. yesterday about wiring being ripped from the walls of building. The case is under investigation, according to the Centralia Police Department.

News brief: Outdoor burning to be restricted

Saturday, June 29th, 2013

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

A statewide burn ban starts on Monday and runs through September on  all forestland and other property that is protected by the state Department of Natural Resources.

Exceptions include recreational use in approved fire pits in designated campgrounds, according to a news release from DNR.

“The threat of wildfires from escaped outdoor burning is highest during the hot and dry days of summer,” Commissioner of Public Lands Peter Goldmark stated. “Wildfires are serious threats to public safety, private property and wildlife habitat. We must take prudent steps to prevent wildfires and minimize the large expenditures of public resources spent to fight them.”

Already this year, 57 wildfires have started from escaped outdoor burn piles, according to the state agency.

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Get more information from Department of Natural Resources

Read about Packwood resident dies in Montana National Park …

Friday, June 28th, 2013

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

The Missoulian in Montana reports a hiker who slipped on a snowfield falling about 100 feet to his death has been identified as Charles Fred Huseman, 64, of Packwood.

News reporter Vince Devlin writes a park ranger and others administered aid following the Wednesday afternoon incident in Glacier National Park but Huseman died at the scene.

Read about it here

Sharyn’s Sirens: Daily police and fire roundup

Friday, June 28th, 2013

Updated at 10:12 p.m.

ONE HURT IN HIGH-SPEED COLLISION WITH DEER ON STATE ROUTE 505

• A 55-year-old motorcyclist was hospitalized last night after he struck a deer southeast of Toledo, was tossed onto the ground and slid some 50 feet along the pavement. Troopers and aid responded about 9:20 p.m. to the scene, along state Route 505 near Merchant Road. The bike was big, the deer was small and the speed limit there is 55 mph, according to Lewis County Fire District 2 Chief Grant Wiltbank. The chief said the touring-type motorcycle continued nearly another 100 feet past the rider. “He was wearing modern and fairly heavy duty riding clothes,” Wiltbank said. “If he’d have been wearing just Levi jeans or something, he’d have been pretty torn up with all that.” Thomas I. Newland, 55, from San Francisco, was headed north, and a passing physician had stopped to wait with him for the fire department, according to responders. He was transported to Providence Centralia Hospital with injuries that did not appear to be life-threatening, the chief said. The 2012 BMW sustained significant damage. The deer was killed upon impact. No citation is expected, but the Washington State Patrol blamed inattention.

ONE HURT IN WRECK WITH FREEWAY SIGN

• One person was injured in a rollover accident on Interstate 5 north of Centralia yesterday morning. Troopers called about 5:15 a.m. reported a 21-year-old woman from Kent was traveling northbound near the county line when her Saturn station wagon left the roadway to the right, struck a sign and rolled. The driver Lisa M. Wilkins was reportedly uninjured but her passenger, Brianna P. Chandler, 23, from Snoqualmie, was transported to Providence Centralia Hospital, according to the Washington State Patrol. The state patrol blamed driver inattention for the wreck.

GUN STOLEN IN BURGLARY

• Centralia police were called just after noon yesterday to an office which had been broken in to at the 400 block of West Main Street. Taken was a camera and 25 caliber pistol, according to the Centralia Police Department.

SCARY GUY WITH BIKE

• Police were called to a north Centralia neighborhood about 3:30 p.m. yesterday where a 13-year-old boy said as he rode his bike down Oxford Avenue past an abandoned house, a guy with a bike reached out and grabbed towards him. The youngster told police as he pedaled away, he noticed the guy behind him, although not chasing after him, according to the Centralia Police Department. The subject wasn’t located and at this point, it appears less like an attempted abduction and more like someone trying to scare a kid, Sgt. Kurt Reichert said.

VISITOR ARRESTED FOR ALLEGEDLY PULLING WOMAN INTO BEDROOM

• A 22-year-old Toledo man was arrested yesterday for unlawful imprisonment for an incident that occurred early last week when he was a guest in a home on the 200 block of Howe Road East near Toledo. A detective was told when it was reported the following day that Rupp W. Freece was intoxicated and dragged the 61-year-old female resident down a hallway into a bedroom, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office. She screamed, he let go of her and other members of the household made him leave, Cmdr. Steve Aust said.

AND MORE

• And as usual, other incidents such as arrests for warrants, misdemeanor domestic assault; responses for alarms, fender benders, graffiti on a fence, bicycle theft, misbehaving dogs … and more.

Mossyrock police chief contesting protection order

Friday, June 28th, 2013

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

Mossyrock Police Chief Jeremy Stamper is under court order to check his service firearm to his supervisor after each shift where it will be held until his following shift as part of a protection order sought by his wife.

He was also ordered to undergo domestic violence treatment and drug and alcohol treatment, according to court documents.

Stamper, the east Lewis County town’s only police officer, didn’t return calls for comment, but his supervisor says Stamper remains on the job.

“I have full confidence in him, or he wouldn’t be on patrol right now,” Mossyrock Mayor Tom Meade said yesterday.

Meade however said he isn’t aware of the requirement he hold Stamper’s gun.

The court case began when the police chief’s wife, Shannon Stamper, petitioned the court on May 20 for a year-long protection order and requested her husband be required to undergo treatment.

Court documents show that at a June 10 hearing, Lewis County Superior Court Commissioner Tracy Mitchell found “Ms. Stamper credible” and signed a protection order.

Shannon Stamper’s initial request said her husband never hit her, but he had access to weapons. An example of her concern she wrote about was an incident at the end of February in which she said Jeremy Stamper crushed his phone because he could not figure it out.

The order put in place has numerous restrictions, such as prohibiting him from coming within 200 feet of her residence. Five children are listed as protected as well.

A handwritten aside on the document states that work related contacts in the neighborhood are okay.

Meade said the court order comes during a contested divorce and makes no sense to him. He said the court didn’t analyze the situation thoroughly.

“This whole thing has me scratching my head,” Meade said. “I’ve supervised people for 40 years and I can spot an alcoholic and I can spot an abuser, and I just don’t see this.”

Meade said when the issue first arose, everyone thought the best course of action would be for the police chief to go on vacation. “Not administrative leave, just plain vacation,” he said.

Stamper has been back about a week and half, he said.

Meade pointed out his police chief works 40 hours, but is subject to call out at any time. He’s on duty 24 hours a day, Meade said.

The language on the standard protection order form states that if it is a domestic situation, then effective immediately the respondent may not possess a firearm or ammunition. A handwritten notation on the page indicates Stamper can possess his duty firearm while on shift, per “18 USC 8925.”

Stamper’s attorney Don Blair has filed a motion the order be revised contending the evidence did not show the petitioner was a victim of domestic violence.

Shannon Stamper four days after the order was filed made a written request it be terminated, writing the couple has agreed to reconcile and undergo family counseling. She wrote she may have been mistaken in interpreting her husband’s behavior.

Shannon Stamper wrote she has feared her husband in the recent past but never had issues of safety regarding herself or their children.

Her only comment today: “It’s all blown out of proportion.”

A hearing is set for Monday on the matter.

Arguments for re-sentencing teen drive-by shooter to be heard this autumn

Thursday, June 27th, 2013
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Guadalupe Solis-Diaz Jr. waits in a Lewis County courtroom after attorneys pick a date for his new sentencing hearing.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – Former Centralia resident Guadalupe Solis-Diaz Jr. made a brief appearance in Lewis County Superior Court today as his “do-over” of a nearly 93-year prison sentence winds its way through the system.

Solis-Diaz was 16 years old when he was arrested following a drive-by shooting in downtown Centralia in the summer of 2007.

He was tried as an adult and convicted of multiple offenses, including one count of first-degree assault committed with a firearm for each bullet that was fired. Nobody was hit.

The state Court of Appeals tossed out his virtual life sentence last September and ordered the local court to conduct a new sentencing hearing, referencing various matters that should have been handled more thoroughly, given that he was a juvenile.

The former Centralia High School student’s personal restraint petition focused on 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.

He is represented by attorney Robert Quillian.

In January when Solis-Diaz was returned to Lewis County to begin to address the issue, Quillian asked he remain housed in the Lewis County Jail for closer access as the attorney prepared for the new sentencing hearing.

Quillian and Lewis County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Sara Beigh told a judge this afternoon they expect the hearing will take half a day. It was put on the court calendar for Sept. 27.

The deputy prosecutor who handled the case in 2007 has predicted the new sentence isn’t likely to be all that much shorter, given the statutory framework in place.

Beigh this afternoon said the prosecutors office still hasn’t finalized exactly how much time they will ask for. She’s waiting to see what arguments the defense attorney raises.

“I know what I think I’m going to recommend,” Beigh said. “But I’m trying to keep an open mind and see what they present.”
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For background, read: “Appeals court gives Centralia teen a “do-over” on 90-plus-year drive-by shooting sentence” from Wednesday September 19, 2012, here

Centralia jewelry shop burglary case ends with prison for two men

Thursday, June 27th, 2013
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Justin D. McPherson of Federal Way asks a judge for mercy in deciding his sentence in Lewis County Superior Court.

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – A judge yesterday disregarded a defendant’s plea for a special drug offender sentencing alternative and gave him seven years plus two months in prison for the failed Centralia jewelry store burglary in which he was shot.

Justin D. McPherson, 29, stood before Judge Nelson Hunt in Lewis County Superior Court yesterday and admitted he acted selfishly and irresponsibly, saying he didn’t want to “live this life anymore.”

“I do have a drug problem,” McPherson said, his voice breaking. “I need help. I just ask for your mercy.”

McPherson was found guilty by a jury last month for breaking into Salewsky’s Jewelry shop in the early morning hours of March 20. He was confronted by the owner’s son who awoke in an upstairs apartment and shot him before he escaped through a hole he’d cut in a wall to an adjoining office space, dropping a trail of jewelry behind him.

Hunt told the Federal Way resident he deserved hard time.

“It may be that you have a drug problem, but frankly it doesn’t matter to me,” Judge Hunt said.

“You’re also a criminal.”

Hunt outlined his reasons. Part of it had to do with the obvious planning that went into the crime, he said.

Mainly, the judge said, McPherson went into a building where he didn’t belong when someone was present. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t aware anyone would be there, he said.

Gunshots threaten everybody, Hunt said.

“This was a legitimate use of self defense, but it was caused by you,” he said.

McPherson was sentenced for one count of second-degree burglary and one count of residential burglary, as well as second-degree malicious mischief for cutting a hole in the wall inside the building.

He was represented by Chehalis attorney Ken Johnson.

Lewis County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Will Halstead told the judge the case against McPherson’s childhood friend Ryan W. Cox wasn’t quite as strong. Cox pleaded guilty in a plea deal.

Later yesterday, Cox was sentenced to seven years for his role.

Halstead said it never was learned how the two non-local men knew about the place; they broke through the back door of the vacant neighboring space and used a crowbar to break through a wall to get into the shop.

The two women who testified they waited in their cars nearby but didn’t know of the plan to steal any jewelry have pleaded guilty to rendering criminal assistance.
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For background, read “Jewelry store break-in defendant’s companions testify against him” from Thursday May 30, 2013, here