Briefly

Autopsy finds girl died of asphyxiation

An autopsy Tuesday showed that a 16-year-old girl died of asphyxiation after she became pinned under her car outside a Mead home Monday night.

Renae A. Bohman, of the Camelot neighborhood in north Spokane County, was visiting a home at 3909 E. Sorrel Lane on Monday night for a family get-together when the accident took place, sheriff’s spokesman Cpl. Dave Reagan said.

She was discovered under her car about 7:35 p.m. at the lower end of a steep driveway. The crutches Bohman was using for a sprained ankle were found at the top of the driveway.

The girl may have been trapped under the vehicle at the top of the hill and dragged down the driveway, Reagan said.

Family members attempted to lift the four-door Honda Accord off her, but they couldn’t. Her father drove the car off and family members performed CPR until paramedics arrived.

The autopsy showed that Renae died of “mechanical asphyxia,” Reagan said in a press release.

Detective Tom Henderson said Bohman was a novice driver and may not have placed the car in park. She may have tried to hold the car as it began to roll downhill and been pulled underneath, Reagan said.

Bohman’s father said late Tuesday that he wasn’t ready to comment about his daughter’s death.

Sierra Club awards Dead Swan to Rey

The local Sierra Club chapter gave its Dead Swan Award to Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey on Tuesday, alleging his forest policies are responsible for floods that spread heavy metals across the Inland Northwest.

As undersecretary for natural resources and environment, Rey oversees the U.S. Forest Service. For nearly two decades before his appointment, Rey was a lobbyist for the timber industry.

Forest Service policies on timber cutting have caused floods that wash toxic mining wastes across the region, the Upper Columbia River Sierra Club chapter contends.

“Mark Rey – first as timber lobbyist and now as undersecretary – shares responsibility for the toxic floods of the Coeur d’Alene,” Dr. John Osborn, a Spokane physician and the group’s conservation chairman, said in a release bestowing the dubious honor.

In a telephone interview from his Washington, D.C., office, Rey called the award a baseless attack. “Generally speaking, I’ll take responsibility for anything that happened on my watch,” he said, noting that forest policies the Sierra Club objects to had been approved by his predecessor.

The group’s award is named for tundra swans that migrate through the Coeur d’Alene River Basin each spring, and feed in wetlands contaminated with lead from past mining activity. Lead paralyzes the swans’ ability to swallow and they slowly starve to death.

Wastes from more than 100 years of silver mining in North Idaho’s Silver Valley have flowed into Lake Coeur d’Alene, the headwaters of the Spokane River. The waste flows down the river into Washington and eventually to the Columbia River.

During the 1980s and early 1990s Rey was a lobbyist for the timber industry. He then served as a staff member with the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, which helped set national forest policy.

Rey was sworn in as undersecretary of agriculture on Oct. 2, 2001, and has worked to increase levels of logging in the national forests.

Two men arrested in robbery on North Side

Spokane police arrested two men early Tuesday in connection with a reported armed, home-invasion burglary on the city’s northeast side, police said.

A woman told police that two men entered her home on East Decatur about 12:45 a.m. Tuesday. The woman told responding officers that she knew one of the two suspects.

Officers then responded to 2417 E. Longfellow and found both suspects as they were leaving, police spokesman Dick Cottam said in a press release.

Arrested were 34-year-old Shannon D. Summa, who gave his address as the Longfellow home, and a 16-year-old male.

Based on interviews with the suspects, the victim from East Decatur and several other people, officers determined that one suspect held what appeared to be a handgun on the victim while the other suspect ransacked a closet and a dresser, Cottam said.

Officers found all the items the women on East Decatur had reported missing inside a Jeep that the suspects had used to flee the scene, Cottam said. They also found a pellet gun designed to look like a .45-caliber semi-automatic pistol.

When the officers searched Summa, they found a bag of methamphetamine and a large folding knife, police said. He was booked into jail on suspicion of armed burglary and possession of drugs.

The 16-year-old male was booked into Juvenile Detention on suspicion of first-degree burglary, Cottam said.

Standardized tests to change in 2005

High school students will soon enter a new era in college admissions with new versions of the SAT and ACT in 2005.

Colleges make admission decisions based in part on a student’s scores on the standardized tests.

The new SAT includes a writing section and debuts March 12.

On Feb. 12, the ACT will debut the optional writing section for students. The deadline to sign up before late fees apply is Jan. 7.

According to the ACT Web site, three schools in Washington require the new writing section of the ACT. These schools are Washington State University, Seattle University and the University of Washington. Some schools ask students to check with their admissions office for details. For more information on the ACT, go to www.actstudent.org.