Investigation timeline
The stories in today’s Spokesman-Review result from work that began in the summer of 2002.
In that year, the newspaper began investigating allegations of sexual abuse against the Rev. Patrick O’Donnell, a Catholic priest. O’Donnell was the Spokane church’s liaison with the local Boy Scouts and was a chaplain for the Spokane Police Department. Ultimately, O’Donnell would be accused of abusing more than two dozen boys starting in the mid-1960s.
The newspaper had received tips that some of O’Donnell’s victims were also abused by George E. Robey, a Scout leader who killed himself amid allegations of pedophilia in April 1982. After reviewing the circumstances of Robey’s death, reporter Bill Morlin re-examined the death of David Hahn, a Spokane County sheriff’s deputy who killed himself in August 1981, also amid allegations of pedophilia.
On June 8, 2003, the paper published two stories that detailed accusations of abuse against Hahn by three alleged victims – Doug Chicklinsky and brothers Brett and Robert J. Galliher. “Hahn was assistant scoutmaster at Hamblen Elementary on Spokane’s South Hill, where his friend and fellow deputy, Jim West, was the scoutmaster,” the story reported.
Following those stories, Morlin and other reporters received numerous tips – some anonymous – suggesting the paper look closer at West’s behavior while he was a sheriff’s deputy and Scout leader. In October 2004, editors assigned Morlin to the story full time – though no decision had been made about whether anything would be published.
Also that month, Morlin identified and interviewed an 18-year-old Spokane man who said he met West in a Gay.com chat room and eventually had consensual sex with him. Morlin eventually interviewed the young man five times. Editors agreed not to reveal his identity.
The newspaper hired a forensic computer expert with a background in federal child pornography stings. The consultant created a fictitious identity as an 18-year-old high school student and went online to chat on Gay.com. He then changed his age to 17. Within two months, West and the consultant began a conversation in the chat room.
After the consultant told West he’d turned 18, West offered him gifts and an internship at City Hall. In April, West revealed his identity, and the two arranged a meeting. On April 10 at a Spokane golf course, West arrived at the appointed time.
Meanwhile, reporter Morlin had interviewed and re-interviewed former Scouts in Hahn and West’s troops. On April 12, Robert Galliher was deposed in a lawsuit against Spokane County over Hahn’s alleged abuse.
In the deposition, Galliher said he was abused as a minor by West. In an interview with The Spokesman-Review, another man, Michael Grant, alleged that West had done the same thing to him.
Based on the on-the-record interviews with Galliher and Grant and evidence from the computer consultant, editors decided to publish the stories about West.