A fight over an old car near a remote Pend Oreille County lake led to a rare double homicide in which investigators believe the victims killed each other.

No arrests are expected in the homicides of Richard “Richie” R. Hill, 18, and Steven Quinn Divine, 22, early Sunday because investigators believe each is responsible for the others death, officials said Monday.

“One of the victims had a knife, the other had a gun. And the results are they are both deceased,” said Thomas Metzger, Pend Oreille County coroner and prosecutor.

Read the rest of my story here.

Empty liquor bottles in the yard of a home that's typically immaculate led to the arrest of two Spokane residents on burglary charges last week, officials said today.

Ashley C. Spencer, 24, and her boyfriend, Zachary T. Harris, 23, had been staying in one of the burglarized homes, which belonged to a relative of Spencer, without permission when Pend Oreille County sheriff's deputies contacted them Friday.

Deputies were investigating burglaries at two vacation homes in the area of South Shore Road near Diamond Lake when they heard a burglary alarm at a nearby residence and found another home that bad been burglarized, according to the Pend Oreille County Sheriff's Office.

Deputies began canvassing the neighborhood and noticed the liquor bottles and clothes in the yard of the normally well-kept home. Spencer and Harris were arrested, and deputies seized items from the burglaries at a family member's home.

They face residential burglary and malicious mischief charges. Harris also faces a marijuana possession charge.
  

Federal agents found a dead body while training with snowmobiles last week in Pend Oreille County.

U.S. Border Patrol agents were in the mountains northeast of Sullivan Lake when they found the body of a adult male, the Pend Oreille Sheriff's Office announced Monday.

Deputies say the man is a 61-year-old from Los Angeles. His identity is being withheld until his family is notified of his death.

Investigators believe the man left his vehicle on foot and died and hypothermia, the sheriff's office said.

Detectives are asking for help finding a man suspected of robbing a Newport pizza place last week.

Benjamin Thomas Watson, 24, is considered armed and dangerous after the Pend Oreille County Sheriff's Office linked him to a robbery at Westside Pizza, 325 S. Washington Ave., on Friday.

Thomas is described as 5-foot-7 and 170 pounds with blue eyes and very short hair or a shaved head.

He's believed to be driving a grey 1987 Nissan Pathfinder, with Washington license plate 837UBL.

Anyone with information on Watson's location is asked to call the sheriff's office at 1-800-669-3407. If you see him or his vehicle, call 911.

Three men are wanted after deputies found clandestine meth labs and stolen vehicles at a home in Pend Oreille County. 

Suspect Shad A. Johnson, 38, (left) already was being sought by police in Spokane County in connection with a separate drug case stemming from an arrest outside a Spokane developer’s home.

Now Johnson is accused of being a key player in a case Pend Oreille officials say began when he escaped from the woods near the Spokane County line during a burglary investigation March 30.

When a caller reported a man and woman pointing a rifle out a car window near Metaline, Wash., the next day, investigators determined the suspect vehicle belonged to Michael P. James, 37, of Athol, (right) who they believe has been staying with Johnson at a home at 172 Bobier Road, northwest of Newport.

Deputies arrested six people from North Idaho and Eastern Washington over the next few days, but Johnson and Jason P. Conboy, 30, of Spokane, remain at large. James was arrested Monday after breaking a Pend Oreille County sheriff’s deputy’s wrist in a scuffle, the Sheriff’s Office said.

Read more in tomorrow’s Spokesman-Review.

Three pit bulls mauled a miniature horse before being shot to death in Elk, Wash., last week, the Pend Oreille County Sheriff’s Office announced today.

The melee led sheriff’s deputies to a marijuana growing operation on the dog owner’s property, according to a news release.

The man, Justin R. Howell, lives next door to the horse owner, who told a sheriff’s deputy he’d fired several warning shots before shooting Howell’s dogs.

Two died at the scene; a sheriff’s deputy took the third to a veterinarian, where it died of the gunshot wound, according to the Sheriff’s Office

The horse is being treated for severe injuries.

Howell told deputies he has a medical marijuana permit, but detectives found more than 50 plants and several pounds of dry marijuana, which exceeds the amount allowed for medicinal use.

Deputies also seized a police-issued bullet proof vest. Howell was arrested on a charge of manufacturing a controlled substance and cited for having a dog at large.