Kevin Keating

Some Bonner County residents are beginning to question why the school district has done nothing about Special Education Director Bob Howman. Howman, who earns $55,000 a year, was accused by teachers of lying when he claimed at a staff meeting that he had been a professional football player, a clerk for a Supreme Court justice and an Olympic weightlifter.

Anyone building a new home in Sandpoint will now have to ante up $372 to pay for expansion of the city's parks and recreation programs. The City Council approved its first development impact fee Wednesday night with little fanfare and no objections. Only one person spoke at the public hearing - to clarify that the fee only applies to new homes and not existing residents.

Anne Fox

After a day of drinking and smoking marijuana, 15-year-old Cedar Pfenning thought he was going for a drunken walk in the woods with a friend. Instead, Pfenning's friend Wayne Thurman led him to his death, shooting the teen four times as he ran for his life, Boundary County Prosecutor Denise Woodbury told a jury Monday. Thurman, 19, is charged with first-degree murder for the August 1996 killing of Pfenning. The teenager's body was left in the woods south of Bonners Ferry. Authorities found the body nine days later and arrested Thurman, who still had his .44-caliber pistol with him. If convicted of the murder, Thurman could face the death penalty. A three-week trial began Monday for the bespectacled, lanky teen with a boyish face that makes him look much younger than his 19 years. Woodbury told the 10-woman, two-man jury they were about to hear a "sad case" about a murder that allegedly took place because of a drug deal gone awry. During a day-long party, Thurman told friends he wanted to kill Pfenning. He thought the teen was a police informer who turned in drug users, so he asked Pfenning to go for a walk in the woods, Woodbury said. "The defendant took his .44 (caliber pistol) on the walk and shot Cedar in the chest. Cedar threw up his arms and said, 'No Wayne, don't do it,' and tried to run," Woodbury recounted to the jury. "He was shot in the back. As he continued to climb up the hill, a third shot was fired into the back of Cedar Pfenning." The last shot, Woodbury said, came after Thurman walked up to Pfenning's bloodied body collapsed on the hill. "He fired another shot right through his head," she said. Thurman confessed to another inmate about the murder while in jail, Woodbury said. He even talked of how he "psyched" himself up for a half-hour before killing Pfenning. Boundary County authorities arrested Thurman after they discovered Pfenning's body and talked with some of Thurman's friends. During the arrest, Woodbury said Thurman told officers to let his friends go, saying "they are innocent. I'm guilty, I'm guilty man." Despite matching the bullets found in Pfenning's body to Thurman's gun, defense attorney Mark Jones said prosecutors don't know who really murdered Pfenning. A group of teens with Thurman and Pfenning the day he was killed were drunk, high on marijuana and all had different stories about what happened. Thurman actually passed out part of the day and left his gun in another teenager's car, Jones said. He insinuated any one of the teens could have taken the gun and killed Pfenning, who was thought to be a "narc." The person who first called police about Pfenning being murdered was the mother of one of the partying teenagers, Jones said. She told police where the body was and that the bullets in Pfenning's body would match Thurman's pistol. "Someone got possession of that gun and killed Cedar Pfenning. You aren't going to be able to tell who fired that gun," Jones said. "You are going to need a scorecard to sort (all the stories) out. This puzzle, these pieces don't form one picture that shows the defendant is guilty."

A meeting to discuss the fate of the Sandpoint Airport commission turned into a hot-tempered, name-calling session Thursday with Bonner County Commissioner Bud Mueller adding an outburst of his own. Mueller said the seven member commission has given the county bad advice about airport issues.

After months of controversy, the Bonner County teachers union said Wednesday it has no confidence in Superintendent Max Harrell or central office administrators. After polling its 330 members, the Education Association cast a nearly unanimous vote of "no confidence," said union President Joan Head.

A former city worker who had ties to the Aryan Nations says he was wrongfully fired and has filed a $75,000 tort claim against the city. Richard Masker was Sandpoint's water treatment plant supervisor for six years. He was fired Nov. 5, 1996, because he missed four days of work without notifying city officials why he was gone.

Sen. Shawn Keough is calling on the state attorney general's office to look into allegations of wrongdoing by Bonner County's special education director, Robert Howman. Howman made a call about his department's finances that was recorded on a telephone message machine. A tape of the call was turned over anonymously to The Spokesman-Review, Keough and the teachers union last week.

Robert Howman stunned staff at Sandpoint High School last year when he listed his credentials as the new special education director. He claimed he played professional football for the Buffalo Bills, was an Olympic weightlifter and a law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, according to people who attended the meeting. He also said he once killed someone.

Copyright The Spokesman-Review A message left on an answering machine by a school administrator has sparked new questions about how he and other officials are handling their budgets. The teacher's union is calling for an investigation of Superintendent Max Harrell, Special Education Director Bob Howman and other administrators to see if money was misused or budgets altered.

Frustrated by how the district is being run, the Bonner County teachers union agreed Wednesday to ask its members for a vote of "no confidence" in Superintendent Max Harrell and other central office administrators. The union is also asking teachers whether they want to sanction the district, which essentially puts it on a blacklist for colleges and employment offices nationwide.

The parking lot at Sandpoint High School was packed with cars like it was the night of a championship basketball game. But the nearly 1,300 residents who poured into the school gym Monday were not spectators. They came to send Bonner County School Superintendent Max Harrell and the school board a message: No cuts.

A half-million dollar deficit and proposed cuts in extracurricular activities have angry parents and teachers scrutinizing the Bonner County School District budget. The bottom line, they say, is that administrators with high salaries and pet projects are getting money that should be spent on kids.

FOR THE RECORD (Friday, April 18, 1997): Correction Wrong salary: The salary for Max Harrell, Bonner County schools superintendent, increased $2,500 to $75,000 annually. As part of his contract, Harrell's salary will increase again in July to $77,500. A story in Thursday's paper erroneously reported the amount of the raise. FOR THE RECORD (Saturday, April 19, 1997): Correction Wrong figures: The salary for Max Harrell, Bonner County schools superintendent, is $75,000. It will increase in July to $77,500. A story in Thursday's newspaper incorrectly reported the amount of the raise.

1. Gruber 2. Kuehl

One of Bonner County's assistant planners has quit his post, saying he can't work with new Commissioners Bud Mueller and Larry Allen, whom he called incompetent and unethical. Doug Libby worked as a county planner for three years. He resigned Friday to take another planning job in California, but sent commissioners a scathing letter of resignation. Libby accused commissioners of holding illegal meetings and questioned Mueller's education after he resorted to reading scripts to run county meetings.

Always the season to find work. Pam Auletta is part of the seasonal workforce that makes the wheels turn at Schweitzer Mountain Resort. Photo by Craig Buck/The Spokesman-Review

A $100,000 handout from Coldwater Creek has revived the Festival at Sandpoint's ailing budget and ensured a summer music series here. The donation, along with one from The Spokesman-Review, will help erase the festival's $120,000 deficit and give organizers some cash and clout to book performers for the summer. "This is a relief. When I first came on, things were looking grim," said Diane Ragsdale, the festival's new executive director. "We had some serious conversations about whether we should go forward with trying to have a season. We couldn't book artists because we didn't have the money."

Warm and wet with scattered mud. Tim Wilkins and Robert Hanson wait for a tow truck on the Fernan Lake boat docks. The two fishermen were backing up in water when their vehicle began floating. Photo by Craig Buck/The Spokesman-Review

Russell Kindred thought it was just a little snow falling off trees onto U.S. Highway 95 when he stomped on the brakes of his Mercury Cougar. "I looked up and all I saw was mud. It was all of a sudden ... there was no warning," the 37-year-old sailor in the merchant marine said Thursday from his hospital bed at Deaconess Medical Center in Spokane. A sea of mud, rocks and trees swept Kindred's car off the highway just south of Bonners Ferry Wednesday afternoon. A rain-soaked hillside gave way, dropped 1,000 feet and pushed Kindred's car off the road onto the ninth fairway of the Mirror Lake Golf Course.

Wild ride 1. A car swept off U.S. Highway 95 near Bonners Ferry ended up on the ninth fairway of Mirror Lake Golf Course. Photo by Craig Buck/The Spokesman-Review 2. Search and rescue workers probe mud to see if other cars are buried in the huge slide. None were found. Photo by Craig Buck/The Spokesman-Review 3. A logging skidder, donated by a local company, hauls away tree from mudslide covering Highway 95 on Wednesday. Photo by Craig Buck/The Spokesman-Review

A Bonner County bailiff startled people on the second floor of the courthouse Tuesday morning when he accidentally fired his 9mm handgun into a jury room wall. Mark Johnson, the chief bailiff, was apparently showing his gun and explaining how it worked to Deputy Prosecutor Mike Rosenthal when the weapon went off. The bullet hit and stuck in a wall in a small jury room. The room is next to a courtroom where a hearing was in session.

State authorities are investigating Bonner County's road department after the county reported $100,000 or more may have been embezzled by two former employees. "In the last 30 days, we noticed some things that didn't seem to add up right. On the surface, it looked fishy to say the least," Commissioner Dale Van Stone said Monday. "This appears very serious and it could have been going on for five years."

When 8-year-old Beka Brookshire flips open her home telephone book, three large numbers grace the inside cover - 911. In school and on television, she's taught those three numbers will bring help in an emergency. But if Beka dials 911 from her Priest Lake home no one will come. The number rings to a computer that says: "Hang up. Wait a moment and dial your operator."