Lawyers for the state of Washington and South Hill rapist Kevin Coe will argue a series of pre-trial motions next week prior to the Sept. 15 start of Coe’s civil commitment trial.

In 2006, shortly after Coe finished a 25-year prison sentence for a single rape conviction, the Washington state Attorney General’s office filed a petition that seeks to commit him indefinitely as a violent sexual predator.

Among the issues to be discussed Monday and Tuesday in arguments before Spokane County Superior Court Judge Kathleen O’Connor are whether the state will be able to present an expert that has concluded Coe’s rape “signature” was similar in 15 alleged rapes - Coe’s attorneys are objecting to the expert testimony because many of those victims couldn’t identify Coe after his arrest in March 1981.

The judge will also hear arguments over whether jurors can be told that some alleged victims took polygraph exams, and whether Coe’s lawyers can mention that some of his accusers failed to identify him in lineups after they were hypnotized. A Spokane Police Department decision to hypnotize several alleged victims led the Washington Supreme Court in 1988 to overturn three of Coe’s four 1985 rape convictions - the only case that stood was a woman who was not hypnotized.

O’Connor ruled earlier this year that 21 women on a state list of uncharged rape and indecent liberties accusations can be included in the civil commitment trial, which is expected to last up to eight weeks. (Spokesman Review)

A judge in Tacoma has signed the death warrant for Spokane serial killer Robert Yates, setting an execution date of Sept. 19.

Yates’ defense lawyers are expected to immediately ask the state Supreme Court for a stay of execution so they can again appeal his sentence for killing two women in Pierce County. The high court ruled last year that Yates received a fair trial and his death sentence in 2002 was legal.

The former smelter worker and Army National Guard pilot previously pleaded guilty in Spokane to killing 13 women. He avoided the death penalty with a plea deal and got a sentence of 408 years in prison.

Washington utilizes two methods of execution: lethal injection and hanging. Lethal injection is used unless the inmate chooses hanging as the preferred execution method.

77 inmates have been executed in Washington since 1904, the last being murderer James Elledge in Snohomish County in 2001.

A Lewiston woman is in custody in connection with a stabbing on Thursday.

Dora Birch, 44, is being held in the Nez Perce County jail on a charge of aggravated battery after Lewiston police were sent to a 7^th Ave. residence on a report that a 56-year-old man was stabbed in the chest.

The man was transported to St Joseph Regional Medical Center – his condition was not released.

A judge in northern Idaho declared a mistrial after the prosecutor in opening arguments of a domestic violence case lost control of his emotions.
First District Judge Fred Gibler made the ruling Wednesday after determining Kootenai County Prosecutor Shane Greenbank had become emotionally involved in the case.
Gibler says that the prosecutor’s display of emotions could have influenced jurors.
Greenbank denies he was crying, but admits he tends to get emotional when prosecuting cases involving children. (AP)

A man who nearly hanged his wife in the garage of their Spokane home last fall has pleaded guilty to second-degree attempted murder.

Sean Jennings, 38, will spend 12 years in prison under a plea agreement filed this week in Spokane County Superior Court. He had originally faced a first-degree attempted murder charge.

Jennings lured his wife into the noose last October by telling her he had set up a haunted house for Halloween - he released her when she lost consciousness, and told her hanging was better than divorce. The divorce was finalized a month later. (AP)

An ex-Mountain Home, Idaho police officer will spend at least four years in prison after pleading guilty to sex abuse charges involving two girls, one 14 and the other 16 years old.
Glenn Arden Parsons, 25, will serve at least that long behind bars after a 4th District Court judge handed down a maximum 15-year prison sentence.
Parsons worked briefly in 2007 for the Mountain Home Police Department, as well as a short stint as an Elmore County court security officer after that.
Authorities began an investigation after receiving a report from the 16-year-old girl. The mother of the 14-year-old girl later showed detectives sexually explicit text messages sent from Parson’s phone to her daughter’s phone. (AP)

A Sept. 10 preliminary hearing is set for a Lewiston man charged with stalking a woman.

Lewiston police say Larry O’Neal, 54, made death threats against a female acquaintance in violation of a civil protection order. He was arrested following a traffic stop Friday night, after police found a loaded hunting rifle in the back seat of his car.

A criminal complaint alleges O’Neal maintained surveillance on the 46-year-old woman and her family members, called the woman by telephone, and made threats to kill the woman and her relative - at the time of his arrest, investigators believed O’Neal was en route to carry out the reported threats.

O’Neal was originally held on two counts of attempted first-degree murder, but charges were later amended to one count of felony stalking.

He is being held in the Nez Perce County Jail on $200,000 bond.

Federal prosecutors say a U.S. Air Force veteran who allegedly claimed to be paralyzed from the waist down so he could receive about $300,000 in disability benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs has been charged with fraud.
A federal indictment says James Sebero, 58, of Laclede, received federal benefit payments into an Idaho bank from August 2003 to October 2007. But during part of that period, the indictment says, Sebero also worked as a seasonal marine patrol deputy for the Bonner County sheriff’s office, and for that job had completed “rigorous law enforcement and marine training and fulfilled his law enforcement duties without physical restrictions.”
Sebero was charged last month in the U.S. District Court in Coeur d’Alene with 55 counts of wire fraud, one count for each deposit to his account at a Sandpoint bank, a period that corresponds to the four-year period he worked with the sheriff’s department. According to court documents the amount of the deposits ranged from as little as $600 to as much as $6,303.
He also was charged last month in U.S. District Court in Spokane, Washington, with three counts of making false statements during a medical examination in 2007 where he reported to VA authorities that complications from treatment for an injury he received while in the Air Force caused him to lose the use of both legs, control of bodily functions, and to become impotent. He received compensation and medical benefits as a result.
Prosecutors say Sebero reported he was injured while an active member of the Air Force from 1969 to 1975, and that he was medically retired from the service in 1980. According to the Idaho indictment, he received disability benefits connected to his injury beginning in April 1976.
If convicted, Sebero faces up to 20 years in prison for each count in Idaho and a fine of $250,000. (AP)