Northwest briefly: Rapist on trial for 2004 attack
Published 10:33 pm Wednesday, February 18, 2009
SEATTLE — A man who was convicted in October of attacking two women in an elevator is on trial again in Seattle on a rape charge.
Curtis Thompson is accused of raping a woman in 2004 in her apartment and pouring bleach over her body in an attempt to destroy evidence.
After this case, the 49-year-old faces another trial on a murder charge in the 2004 stabbing death of a woman in her Seattle home.
Thompson was convicted of four rapes in 1985. After he completed his sentence, a a Seattle jury decided in 2003 not to commit him as a sex predator. He said religion had reformed his life.
Monroe: Killer sent to mental hospital
A mentally ill convicted killer has been temporarily committed to Western State Hospital after serving 20 years in the Special Offender Unit of the state prison at Monroe.
The Department of Corrections says Michael McFarland, who is classified by the state as dangerously mentally ill, was referred Wednesday for civil commitment at the mental hospital for 72 hours.
Twenty years ago, McFarland pleaded guilty to stabbing his mother to death in her Kennewick home.
Corrections spokesman Chad Lewis says the Pierce County Superior Court will consider McFarland’s case Monday and decide whether to commit him for 14 more days, or release him to community supervision in Kitsap County. After the 14 days, the process could be repeated for a 90-day commitment. After that, McFarland could be recommitted every 180 days.
Seattle: Professor joins Obama team
A University of Washington law professor who has been on leave to help the presidential transition has taken a full-time job as special assistant to Barack Obama.
Paul Miller is an expert in disability and employment discrimination law.
The Seattle Times reported he will help the administration make certain political appointments in federal departments and agencies.
@Headline briefly item 16 light:Metro may raise fares, cut service
King County Metro may have to cut service, raise fares and postpone construction projects, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported.
Metro General Manager Kevin Desmond told the county council Tuesday that tax revenues for 2008-09 are likely to fall $30 million short of what was expected as recently as September.
@Headline briefly item 16 light:Union to talk with staff on P-I buyout
The Pacific Northwest Newspaper Guild has scheduled a meeting next Tuesday to discuss whether Seattle Post-Intelligencer workers are interested in investigating a possible employee buyout of the newspaper.
The union represents most P-I workers.
Guild Administrative Officer Liz Brown says the union is trying to figure out whether there is sufficient interest to bring in a consultant and seek state money for a feasibility study.
The Hearst Corp. put the newspaper up for sale Jan. 9 and said it would quit printing the paper in 60 days, perhaps maintaining an online-only P-I.
In Brown’s words, “If people are resigned to let the old girl die, then it isn’t worth it.”
Associated Press
For Lewis: Brigade off to Afghanistan
The Fort Lewis-based 5th Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division is headed to Afghanistan in midsummer. The 3,900 soldiers had been scheduled to go to Iraq this summer.
President Barack Obama on Tuesday approved adding some 17,000 U.S. troops for the flagging war in Afghanistan, his first significant move to change the course of that conflict. In addition to the Stryker Brigade, those forces will include a Marine unit and support troops.
Fort Lewis spokesman Joe Piek says the 5th Stryker Brigade is the Army’s newest Stryker Brigade — activated in May 2007 — and the fourth to be formed, equipped and trained at Fort Lewis. The brigade’s soldiers are currently at the Army National Training Center in Fort Irwin, Calif., for exercises through the end of February.
Stryker brigades are based around highly mobile eight-wheeled infantry troop carriers.
Spokane: Paper to freeze wages
The Spokesman-Review newspaper will freeze wages in 2009, and seek a 5 percent salary cut for all managers, nonunion employees who earn more than $11 an hour, and, with their voluntary consent, all union employees.
Publisher W. Stacey Cowles made the announcement during staff meetings on Monday afternoon.
Cowles said advertising revenue was down about 14 percent in 2008 from the year before. The newspaper had budgeted to be down an additional 5 percent for 2009, but now expects a steeper decline.
In recent years, the newspaper has laid off employees in its newsroom and other departments.
Mabton: Company to study wind farm
Horizon Wind Energy wants to build towers 200 feet tall to test four sites near Mabton in the Horse Heaven Hills as potential wind farms.
The Yakima Herald-Republic newspaper reports the sites will be studied for up to three years.
A public hearing on the county application is set for March 19 in Yakima City Hall.
Horizon of Houston, Texas, is the firm pursuing the Kittitas Valley Wind Project near Ellensburg.
Kennewick: Arrest 26 years after theft
A 70-year-old woman sought by police for 26 years after allegedly embezzling $106,000 from a Tri-Cities credit union has been arrested in Arizona.
Detectives arrested Barbara Kurz at her home in Mesa, Ariz., on a warrant for first-degree theft. She was living under a false name.
Kurz was 44 and a married mother of four when she was last seen. Her abandoned car, partially burned, was found in Oregon. Kurz is accused of taking $106,000 from the Tri-City Medical Credit Union.
Several days after she disappeared, she called her husband and one of her daughters and claimed she had been kidnapped. That apparently was the last contact she had with her family.
Port Angeles: Fire burns waterfront building
It took firefighters more than three hours to control a fire in a waterfront building in Port Angeles.
Fire Chief Dan McKeen says the fire may have been undetected for some time before it was reported at 9 p.m. Tuesday.
He says there was no alarm or sprinkler system in the building.
KONP reports the building housed Kamen Industrial Technologies, Jesse Bay Cabinetry and three other businesses.
Investigators are looking for the cause of the fire.
Oregon: Portland mayor’s former lover to pose nude
A gay magazine says the young man at the center of a sex scandal that nearly derailed Portland Mayor Sam Adams has agreed to appear nude for the publication.
Unzipped magazine said on its Web site it has just completed “an erotic photo session” with Beau Breedlove with nude photos and an interview to appear in the May issue.
After Adams took office in January, Portland was in turmoil over the mayor’s admission he had lied during the election campaign when he denied having sex with Breedlove.
Both Breedlove and Adams have said they met when Breedlove was 17 but did not have sex until Breedlove was 18.
Despite calls for his resignation and an investigation, Adams has decided to remain in office. Efforts to reach Breedlove were unsuccessful.
Associated Press
