In Brief
Parking garage fall deemed suicide
A 15-year-old girl died after falling from the River Park Square garage in downtown Spokane Wednesday.
An autopsy Thursday by the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Office concluded the girl died of injuries suffered in the fall. Police are investigating her death as an apparent suicide, said Officer Jennifer DeRuwe, spokeswoman for the Spokane Police Department.
The girl fell several stories, landing on the paved garage entrance ramp below.
She was transported to a local hospital with life-threatening injuries after police were called about 2:52 p.m.
The garage is owned by the Cowles Co., which also owns The Spokesman-Review.
SCRAPS offers holiday deals
The Spokane County Animal Protection Service is having a holiday sale of its own.
Adoption fees for all cats 6 months and older will be waived this month. Cats can be adopted for a $15 license fee and will be spayed or neutered, vaccinated, affixed with a microchip and given a free exam.
“We really want all of our animals to have a home by the holidays and cats are harder for us to adopt than dogs,” SCRAPS Director Nancy Hill said in a news release.
SCRAPS will also hold an open house Saturday from noon until 5:30 p.m. at the shelter, 2521 N. Flora Road.
The shelter’s regular hours are Monday through Saturday, noon to 5:30 p.m. Adoptable pets are listed at www.spokane county.org/SCRAPS.
Stevens County assessments are in
Stevens County Assessor Al Taylor said real estate values decreased on about 10,500 parcels and increased on about 18,500 in notices mailed this week.
He said about three-fourths of the increases were less than $10,000, and most of the increases were for utilities, not land or structures.
Values of utilities such as electric, water and septic facilities previously were added to land values, but starting this year will be added to improvement values, Taylor said.
Woman honored for aiding police
A Spokane woman who helped police catch a bank robber last summer was honored with a Citizen Award Thursday by police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick.
Carey Smith was driving north on North Monroe Street near West Dalke Avenue on July 20 when she saw a man running with orange powder coming from a bag he was carrying.
She turned around to follow him and memorized the license plate of his getaway vehicle. Smith gave the information to police, who were searching for a man who held up the Wells Fargo bank at Monroe and West Francis Avenue.
Police spotted the car and followed it; suspect Lawrence A. Wideman was arrested after driving through a metal fence into a cemetery and trying to escape in the Spokane River.
Wideman, 44, is a level 2 sex offender with a conviction in 2009 for third-degree rape of a child. He pleaded guilty to the bank robbery in October and was sentenced to 162 months in prison.
WSU-Spokane site for drug trial
WSU-Spokane will be among the sites for a drug trial next year to compare the effectiveness of treatments for type 2 diabetes.
Researchers will enroll 50 patients in each of the first three years of the study, beginning in fall 2012. The trial at WSU will receive $2.5 million in funding from the National Institutes of Health and is scheduled to last eight years.
Dr. Carol Wysham, an adjunct faculty member and Rockwood Clinic endocrinologist, will share the job of lead investigator for the project with Joshua Neumiller, a WSU College of Pharmacy faculty member.
Man gets 10 years for beating wife
HELENA – A 60-year-old Helena man who acknowledged beating his wife with a cane, breaking several bones in her face, has been sentenced to 10 years with the state Department of Public Health and Human Services.
The Independent Record reports District Judge Jeffrey Sherlock sentenced Roy Lee Kaufman on Thursday. Kaufman previously pleaded guilty to felony aggravated assault but said mental illness led to the attack.
He argued he was unable to act in a law-abiding manner due to damage from multiple sclerosis and because he did not take his anxiety medication the day before the June 3, 2010, attack.
Court records say his now ex-wife suffered a crushed cheekbone, a broken nose and a fractured eye socket.
Road trip slayings sentence upheld
BOISE – The Idaho Supreme Court has upheld the conviction and sentencing of a Boise man who pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the slayings of two college students during an erratic, 6,500-mile road trip across the West in 2007.
John Delling was sentenced to two life terms in prison without parole in 2009 for the deaths of David Boss and Bradley Morse, both of Idaho. Delling appealed and said the state’s prohibition of insanity as a defense was unconstitutional, but the justices rejected that argument in a ruling Thursday.
Delling was 21 when authorities arrested him for killing Boss and Morse while wounding a third man, Jacob Thompson, in Arizona. Delling had attended a Boise high school with Boss and Thompson, while police say he met Morse on a gaming website.
Wife, kids appear in court over killing
THE DALLES, Ore. – A Hood River woman and two of her children accused in the 2003 killing of her husband have made an initial court appearance on murder and conspiracy charges.
At a hearing Wednesday, their bail was set at $500,000 each. KATU-TV reports they are due back in court Dec. 22. They were arrested last week.
Faustino Garcia Garcia was found shot to death two blocks from his home.
The accused are 46-year-old Rosario DeGarcia, 27-year-old Guadalupe Garcia and 24-year-old Jorge Garcia Munoz.
EVERETT – The Snohomish County sheriff’s office says a Stanwood woman who disappeared 17 years ago recently called to say she’s OK and living in California.
Detectives confirmed Judith Bello is alive and well and that she left in 1994 due to domestic issues with her husband.
She left her job one day, did not pick up her son from day care and did not go home.
Her car was later found abandoned.
Her disappearance was featured by Crime Stoppers of Puget Sound, and detectives once made her the eight of hearts in a deck of cold-case playing cards.
Bello said she called Nov. 23 after she noticed her profile on the sheriff’s office website.