In brief: Seven wolves in pack killed

Wildlife officials have killed seven wolves that were part of the Morris Flat Pack located west of Fairfield in central Idaho because they had been preying on livestock, officials said.

Officials say they are still trying to capture and kill another member of the pack that killed a calf on or before Aug. 15.

State and federal wolf managers in July began killing the wolves incrementally, hoping that the rest of the pack would move or that the attacks on livestock would end.

The first wolf was killed July 25, and two more pack members were removed Aug. 3 after livestock attacks continued, officials said.

Between Aug. 4 and 10 officials killed four more wolves from the pack on the Boise National Forest.

But officials with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game said that a wolf killed another calf in the area sometime around Aug. 15, and that the wolf will also be killed if it is trapped.

– Associated Press

Spokane

Jury instructions agreed on for Coe

Attorneys agreed Wednesday on what a jury will hear about Kevin Coe’s refusal to be tested for his arousal levels to images of forced sex.

Superior Court Judge Kathleen O’Connor will tell the jury that she ordered Coe to submit to a penile plethysmograph test but that he refused with “no lawful justification.”

“The jury may infer from Mr. Coe’s refusal that he is deviantly aroused by forcible, non-consensual sexual contact with adult women,” O’Conner’s statement will conclude.

Spokane police linked Coe to 43 sexual assaults between 1978 and 1981. He was convicted of four rapes, but appellate judges threw out three convictions, leaving him with a 25-year prison sentence which expired last September. He is being held pending a civil trial in March, in which the state will try to convince a jury that he is a sexually violent predator, likely to re-offend.

– Thomas Clouse

Not guilty plea in solicitation case

A retired teacher pleaded not guilty Wednesday to allegations that he solicited sex with a 4-year-old and an infant.

Gordon L. Erickson, 78, was given a trial date of Nov. 19. He is charged with two counts of attempted rape.

According to court records, an anonymous informant told police that Erickson wanted to find young girls for sex.

Police said an undercover officer agreed over the phone to meet Erickson so he could perform oral sex on the fictional girl and infant.

Erickson retired from Spokane Public Schools in 1982.

– Thomas Clouse