Oregon
More than 1 million acres burned across Oregon, firefighters making some progress
Wildfires across Oregon have so far burned over one million acres. Although milder weather has brought some relief to firefighters, officials say they still have a long way to go.
Firefighters battle the Chalk Fire in this supplied photo from Sunday, July 28, 2024.
Courtesy of U.S. Forest Service via InciWeb
As of Tuesday, there have been over 100 active fires reported across the state, 36 of them are large fires burning 100 acres or more. There are also five “megafires” currently burning over 100,000 acres.
Jessica Neujahr, a public affairs officer with the Oregon Department of Forestry, says the recent dip in temperature has provided some relief and allowed firefighters, especially in northern Oregon, to be proactive.
“We’ve had a little bit of rain and that allowed them to boost up some containment on some of those fires,” said Neujahr.
Firefighters battling the Durkee Fire, which is the state’s largest wildfire, have it 51% contained as of Tuesday. New mapping shows the fire has burned more than 290,000 acres. The Lone Rock Fire in Morrow County also saw an increase in its containment lines as officials reported was 77% contained Tuesday.
Despite the recent cool weather, Neujahr says crews still have a long way to go as wildfire season typically peaks in August. Temperatures are expected to rise, and dry conditions are likely to return by the end of the week, she said.
According to Neujahr, this wildfire season has seen a significant rise in human-caused wildfires. Statewide, there have been 567 human-caused fires which have burned over 170-thousand acres. About 357 fires were caused by lightning strikes.
A comfort dog visits the Oakridge Fires incident command post recently in this supplied photo.
Courtesy of U.S. Forest Service via InciWeb
“The best thing that people can do right now is to check their local fire restrictions to make sure that they’re not bringing a potential fire hazard onto the landscape,” said Neujahr.
Being extra careful and mindful of potential fire starters like avoiding driving over dry grass will help prevent new fires, Neujahr added.
Oregon, along with most of the Pacific Northwest region, remains on a national preparedness level five status, meaning the state has the potential to exhaust most, if not all, its firefighting resources.
Neujahr says officials have been pulling any available resources granted to them through the state’s emergency declaration ordered by Gov. Tina Kotek earlier this month.
This week, ODF pulled additional resources from the Oregon National Guard including ordering four hand crews and two medevac helicopters.
Type a location, such as Oregon or Washington, in the search box at the top right of the graphic below to see the latest on fires in the region:
“It is good for us that we’ll get more resources, “said Neujahr. “But it doesn’t change the fact that resources are still strained across the board.”
ODF and other firefighting agency partners have pulled nearly 10,000 firefighters from more than 20 states to help crews battle wildfires in Oregon.
“We’re really trying to protect our firefighters and our incident management teams,” Neujahr said. “This is very exhaustive work and they’re working immensely hard at trying to keep these fires as small as possible … We’re working towards longevity.”
Get the latest updates at the State of Oregon Fires and Hotspots Dashboard.
Durkee Fire
Location: Baker County
Size: 293,390 acres
Containment: 51%
Injuries: 3
Residences Destroyed: 4
Other structures Destroyed: 19
Falls Fire
Location: Harney County
Size: 142,307 acres
Containment: 69%
Injuries: 11
Fatalities: 1
Residences Destroyed: 13
Other structures Destroyed: 15
Lone Rock Fire
Location: Gilliam County
Size: 137,214 acres
Containment: 80%
Injuries: 7
Residences Destroyed: 3
Other Structures Destroyed: 90
Cow Valley Fire
Location: Malheur County
Size: 133,490 acres
Containment: 99%
Injuries: 1
Residences Destroyed: 2
Other structures Destroyed: 5
Monkey Creek Fire
Location: Umatilla County
Size: 110,414 acres
Containment: 10%
Injuries: 5
Residences Destroyed: 4
Other structures Destroyed: 6
Oregon
Convicted murderer sentenced to life in prison for Falls City, Oregon killing in 2024
FALLS CITY, Ore. — A 63-year-old was sentenced to life in prison for shooting and killing a man with a shotgun during a fight at a Falls City, Oregon property back in 2024.
A jury convicted Terry Lawrence Allwen of second-degree murder back on March 20, the Polk County District Attorney’s Office said.
He was sentenced Friday to serve life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years.
READ MORE | ‘What kind of monster does that?’ mom says as man sentenced for daughter’s killing
Allwen was also convicted of other charges like manslaughter, assault, and felon in possession of a firearm, but the sentences for those crimes will be served concurrently with the life sentence.
Court records show that Allwen was staying in an RV parked on a property owned by the victim, 79-year-old Bo Johnson.
At about 9 a.m. on May 31, 2024, Allwen and Johnson got into a verbal fight over some personal property. During that fight, Allwen got a shotgun from his trunk and shot Johnson once, killing him.
“Mr. Johnson had many more years to spend with his family. His senseless murder destroyed the dreams and plans of so many that loved him. I hope that the fact Mr. Allwen today received the maximum possible sentence will bring the family of Mr. Johnson some relief and sense of justice.”
If Allwen is granted parole, the judge also ordered that he have a lifetime of post-prison supervision.
Oregon
Merkley Announces Additional Oregon Town Halls April 2-4
Oregon
Oregon Supreme Court overturns JonBenét Ramsey photographer conviction
The Oregon Supreme Court has overturned the conviction of a Lane County man who once photographed child beauty queen JonBenét Ramsey and was convicted in 2021 on several child pornography charges.
Randall DeWitt Simons, 73, of Oakridge, was charged in 2019 with 15 counts of first-degree encouraging child sex abuse. He was later convicted on every count and sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Simons was first arrested after authorities began investigating a report from a restaurant in Oakridge that someone had been using the restaurant’s Wi-Fi to download inappropriate and concerning images.
Law enforcement officers directed the business to track, log, and report all of the user’s internet activity to the investigating officer for more than a year, without a warrant.
Police tracked the computer’s IP address from the restaurant’s Wi-Fi system, which led officers to a man who lived near the restaurant and had given Simons a computer, according to a probable cause affidavit filed in Lane County Circuit Court. Investigators obtained a warrant to search the laptop in Simon’s home, relying on information they had collected over time. He was subsequently arrested.
On March 26, the court ruled warrantless internet surveillance on public Wi-Fi violates privacy.
In an opinion written by Justice Bronson D. James, the court held that the Oregon Constitution recognizes people have a right to privacy in their internet browsing activities and the right is not extinguished when they use a publicly accessible wireless network. It’s even true in cases where that access is conditioned on a person accepting a terms-of-service agreement that says a provider may monitor activity and cooperate with law enforcement, James wrote.
During criminal proceedings in the Lane County Circuit Court, Simons moved to controvert the warrant and suppress the evidence obtained by police, arguing the business was a “state actor for purposes of Article I, section 9, and that its year-long warrantless surveillance was an unconstitutional, warrantless search attributable to the state,” the Supreme Court opinion said.
The Circuit Court denied Simon’s motion. The Oregon Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s decision in part and stated Simons had no cognizable privacy interest in his internet activities performed on a third-party network.
The Oregon Supreme Court rejected the state’s argument.
“The mere fact that a person accesses the internet through a public network does not eliminate their Article I, section 9, right to privacy in their online activities,” according to James. “Even when access is expressly conditioned on a user’s acceptance of terms-of-service provisions purporting to alert the user that the provider may monitor activity and cooperate with law enforcement.”
Justice K. Bushong suggested in a partial dissent the Court should reconsider its approach in a future case to what constitutes a “search” under the Oregon Constitution. The court’s decision reverses the Court of Appeals and sends the case back to the Lane County Circuit Court for further proceedings.
Simons has maintained his innocence since he was arrested in 2019.
Simons had been a photographer for 6-year-old Colorado beauty queen JonBenét Ramsey a few months before her still-unsolved 1996 murder, the Associated Press reported in 1998.
In October 1998, Simons was arrested on a charge of indecent exposure in Lincoln County, Colorado. According to the book “Perfect Murder, Perfect Town” by Lawrence Schiller, Simons was arrested in 1998 for allegedly walking nude down a residential street in the small town of Genoa, Colorado. Simons allegedly offered to the arresting deputy unprovoked, “I didn’t kill JonBenét.”
Haleigh Kochanski is a breaking news and public safety reporter for The Register-Guard. You may reach her at HKochanski@gannett.com.
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