Judge revokes divorce of pregnant woman
In a case that pits a woman's bid to divorce an abusive husband against a law designed to protect the rights of children and the state, a judge has revoked a pregnant woman's divorce until after she gives birth.
Spokane County Superior Court Judge Paul Bastine ruled that because Shawnna Hughes' ex-husband was not told she was pregnant at the time the divorce was granted, the divorce is illegal and must be revoked. Hughes said her estranged husband is not the father.
State officials had worried that the divorce would leave no father financially responsible for the child.
Lawyers for Hughes say Bastine is misinterpreting a state law intended to standardize paternity and preserve the rights of children and the state. They have appealed Bastine's Nov. 4 revocation of the divorce to the state Court of Appeals.
SEATTLE
Case review by Justice Department sought
The Justice Department has been asked to review an investigation by the local U.S. attorney's office into the fatal shooting of a black man by a white King County sheriff's deputy.
In a letter sent Tuesday to U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, Bradley Marshall, a lawyer for the family of Robert Lee Thomas Sr. wrote that the probe was biased in favor of deputy Melvin Miller, who shot Thomas to death in a confrontation nearly three years ago.
According to Marshall's letter, someone in the U.S. attorney's office wrote Miller's lawyer on Dec. 14 to "instruct Deputy Miller's attorneys on how to overcome physical evidence problems they have within their case."
The letter to Miller's lawyer also made "false representations and conclusions" about the case, Marshall asserted, adding that he received it by accident from Miller's lawyers in a related civil case.
Elderly woman dies in house fire
An elderly woman who was ailing from Alzheimer's disease died in a smoky fire at the home she shared with a friend of 40 years, friends and fire officials said.
The fire began in wiring between the basement and the bathroom on the first floor of the two-story house Monday morning and caused damage estimated at $225,000, Fire Department spokeswoman Helen Fitzpatrick said.
Firefighters found a woman identified by friends as Marie-Therese Breysach, 75, unconscious on the floor near the front door but were unable to revive her and she died at the scene.
John Mack, who was renovating a neighboring house, said he and an employee, Antonio Hernandez, smelled smoke but thought it was from a nearby fireplace until they saw smoke billowing from the women's home.
EVERETT
Woman sentenced for taping kids having sex
A woman who directed and videotaped her two children and an older teenager having sex at her home has been sentenced to seven years and three months in prison.
Michelle Lynn Houser, 34, of Bothell, who pleaded guilty last fall to second-degree child molestation and two counts of sexual exploitation of a minor, wept as she told Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Richard Thorpe her crimes were out of character.
"I just know I would never do anything like this again to my children, anyone's children," Houser said.
The sentence issued by Thorpe followed the recommendation of prosecutors. Defense lawyer Natalie Tarantino proposed a prison term of about a year less, at the bottom of the standard range.
Houser's boyfriend, David Ernest Hill, 34, also of Bothell, faces trial next month on several charges in the case.