There were many obvious and long-term warnings about the 1970-94 child abusing Olympia Kiwanis Boys Ranch.
manaco@whidbey.net
The Olympia Washington Kiwanis members and their friends have cost the Washington State taxpayers over $50 million dollars (so far), because of their willful ignorance of long term, merciless and well known, child abuse that occurred at the Olympia Kiwanis Boys Ranch.
October 2006 note: This Olympia Kiwanis stuff is old news. I've left this information on the web, because I like the thought that someone will say to one of these Kiwanis friends or members: "Grandma, (Grandpa), are you still friends with those Olympia Kiwanians?"
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Back to the beginning OKBR Home Page(http://lbloom.net/indexok.html)
Other peoples OKBR statements to the Wash. ST. Patrol.
STATEMENT OF DON ERNST December 13, 1995 95-687
I am Sergeant Glenn Cramer of the Washington State Patrol, Internal
Affairs Section. The date is December 13, 1995. The time is 5:50 p.m. This
is a statement of dictation notes from an interview Sergeant Brian Jones and
I conducted on December 11, 1995 at 10:30 a.m. We met with Don Ernst who was
a Kiwanis Board Member, previous President of Kiwanis Club, and a Board of
Directors for OKBR.
Sgt. Jones and I started the interview by asking Ernst what his role
was with the Kiwanis. Ernst said he'd been a member of the Olympia Kiwanis
Club for 12 -14 years. It was during the late 80s when he became a member of
the Olympia Kiwanis Board of Directors. Approximately 1990 is when he became
a member of the OKBR Board of Directors. Later, in 1991 he became the
president of the OKBR Board of Directors. Ernst indicated the Board of
Directors for the OKBR had bylaws. He knew the bylaws and they were
available to all the directors.
We told him we had information from meeting notes taken at a Kiwanis
Club meeting in 1988. These notes indicated that Kiwanis wanted to flex their political muscle concerning an issue involving the OKBR. We asked
Ernst if he could tell us what context that notation was made in their
meeting notes. He told us he thought this was the time there had been a
discussion concerning DSHS's notation with the OKBR concerning the audit. He
wasn't familiar with this particular notation in their meeting notes,
although he knew there was something going on with DSHS and OKBR concerning
the Art Cantrall audit.
We asked Ernst if he'd ever reviewed the Olympia Police Department
investigative report. He said in the Summer of 1992, possibly in July, he
attended a meeting when Chief Wurner and Detective Nancy Gassett of the
Olympia Police Department were also present. It was during that meeting when
he learned of the "supposed report of Nancy Gassett." Ernst felt the police
report from the OPD was an over exaggeration of the activities at the OKBR.
He said the extent of the activities that were reported by Detective Gassett
were unbelievable. He later went on to say that we had to understand the
kids at the ranch because they were not sweet innocent kids; they were
sexual perverts. Some type of activity at the ranch concerning sexual abuse
was to be expected from those type of boys. Ernst said this type of behavior
occurs in all facilities where these type of boys live. He told us this kind
of behavior was not uncommon with the Department of Corrections for adults.
We asked him to explain how he became aware of this knowledge. He told us
he'd done work for Department of Corrections. Ernst is an engineer, and
indicated that he'd done work at corrections facilities for adults. He went
on to tell us that when you talk to these people they seem like very nice,
innocent people. However, once you learn what they've done you realize they
aren't so nice and innocent.
Ernst said he did not see the OPD report until later on. We asked him to
be more specific as to the time frame. He said he couldn't remember, but he
thought it was sometime in October when he'd heard a report was given to Van
Woerden. He didn't know what board member the report was given to. He
indicated that in the Fall of 1992, he and Bob Van Schoorl went to Gary Tabor's office after they heard the report had surfaced there. We asked him
how he knew the OPD report was as the prosecutor's office. He said he was
told it was there. We asked him who told him. He said he couldn't remember,
but he and Van Schoorl went to talk to Tabor. Tabor talked to them generally
about the police investigation concerning the incidents of physical and
sexual abuse that were alleged to have occurred in the OPD report. Ernst
went on to tell us that what he's read in all the public newspapers, as he
characterized, the Daily 'O', the PI, and the repetition of Nancy Gassett's
police report, he felt the extent of the activities at the OKBR were
unbelievable. He told Sgt. Jones and I that the boys at the ranch were very
aware of the system, and felt they were working the system.
Ernst said they had a board meeting in a church to discuss the situation
at the OKBR. We asked when that might have been. He thought it was later
Summer and again in early Fall when he attended the meeting. He said maybe
late 1992 or early 1993 there may have been another meeting with the OKBR
Board of Directors concerning the situation with Van Woerden.
Ernst went on to tell us that generally he thought Van Woerden was the
source of the problem. We asked how he came to that conclusion. He told us
that Van Woerden had problems, was very private, he resented anyone knowing
much about the boys, and this turned some people off. However, he said Van
Woerden did have the boys best interest in mind.
Sgt. Jones and I asked Ernst if he was familiar with a group called The
Federation of Residential Care Providers. He said he knew of this group, we
asked him about particulars. He said he felt it was a political lobby group
or he presumed it would be. He's received mail from this group, although he
couldn't remember what kind. We asked him if he'd ever contacted any
legislatures concerning the OKBR. In a bragging tone of voice, he told us
that he'd personally contacted a local legislature by the name of Cathy
Wolfe. Ernst said he'd talked to her in great length about the problems they
were having with DSHS at the OKBR. He also indicated that he'd talked to
another legislature, but he couldn't remember her name. He said her husbands
name was Tim Malone. Our research showed that Tim Malone was married to a
Karen Frasier, a local legislature here in the Olympia area. Also, later
research showed, after we'd talked with Ernst, that there was a Catherine
Wolfe (same spelling of last name) who was a member of the Kiwanis Club. We
then asked Ernst if he was familiar with a group called Northwest
Residential Resource, and he said he was not.
We toId Ernst that we'd read documentation where Van Woerden implied he
had influence. We asked him what type of influence Van Woerden would have,
and he told us his influence came from being the director of the OKBR.
Everyone in the Kiwanis knew him and liked him very well. He felt that might
have been his source of influence.
We told Ernst that we had information from Sue Corwin's 1993 inspection
of OKBR concerning an allegation of sexual misconduct by a ----. We asked
him if he was there when Corwin contacted Collett Queener, and he said he
was. He told us he was there doing some work on the ranch with Queener. He
said Jane Skinner and Bob Denning had planned on coming out there later in
the day to go over business about the OKBR. He indicated that Sue Corwin was
out there, and described her as an extremely poor, bureaucratic, and a nit
picker. He said the OKBR was not a wonderful place, however Corwin was too
much of a bureaucratic, nit picker. She'd come out there with out anyone
knowing it because she wouldn't make an appointment with the Board of
Directors. Corwin was there when Skinner and Denning arrived. They were
upset with her and her actions towards Queener, so they told her to get out
of there. Ernst went on to tell us that they told her not to come out on her
own and not to come out without the knowledge of the board. Ernst said ever
since Van Woerden resigned, the Board of Directors has taken a more active
role in the day to day operations of the ranch.
Earlier in our conversation Ernst had told us that he was aware of an
audit in 1988. We asked him for more specific information. He told us it
appeared that the goal of the audit was to get rid of group homes. It seemed
to point in that direction since the number of beds had been decreasing. He
felt this was DSHS's way of decreasing the number group home beds.
We asked Ernst if there was ever a performance evaluation done
concerning Van Woerden. He told us there was no formal evaluation of Van
Woerden.
Sgt. Jones and I told Ernst we had information from the early part
of 1986 where Chief Wurner had gone to a Kiwanis Club meeting to express his
concerns about the calls for service his department was making to the OKBR.
We asked him if he was present at that meeting; he said he was. He thought
Chief Wurner, who was later chastised by Judge Stilz, was out of line. Then
we asked Ernst if he was aware of another OKBR board member who was
chastised for his phone call to DSHS about his concerns for what was going
on a the OKBR. He was not aware of the incident. Ernst became defensive,
backed his chair up a little, and told Sgt. Jones that the people at the
Kiwanis Club were good people trying to do good things.
Below is an e-mail I received from a former Olympia, Washington resident.
From: ~~~~~~~~@aol.com
From: louis a bloom manaco@whidbey.net
To: Louis Bloom manaco@whidbey.net
Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 1999 11:34 AM
Subject: OKBR
Just came across your pages and felt the urge to respond... In the early
80's (81-83) I was at the OKBR frequently as a young kid walking to/from
school, I became friends with some of the boys. At one point a small boy
confided to
me that he was being raped by another boy in the home. The abusing boy
talked about it openly!
Days later I walked the victim to OPD where we both gave statements. Later that evening I began to receive these incredibly
threatening phone calls from a woman employee of the ranch who's name I
believe was Paulette at my home. She kept calling over and over screaming at
me calling me names. It was horrible. I thought I was helping someone.
Nothing came of it. Then all these years later, it all comes out ... one of
the boys that I had known there left as a young adult and still couldn't get
it together, he eventually killed himself. As an adult now I don't often
think back to those times but it still saddens me. All those boys that
needed a safe nurturing place to be, and how many of them were better off
for having been taken there? It's not about money. It cost these boys their
lives, their souls, their trust. Those people who knew, who didn't care,
they should feel such shame. Just my opinion.
To: ~~~~~~~@aol.com
Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 1999 7:30 PM
Subject: Re: OKBR
thanks for your e-mail. from what i've read, dshs, the olympia police department, and other "authorities"
didn't consider child on child rape to be against the law. it was considered
"normal experimentation". The "paulette" you mention, may have been
Collette Queener who was an assistant director at the OKBR. Collette, OKBR
Director Tom Van Woerdan, and OKBR counselor Laura Rambo Russell were
ineptly charged by Wa. St. with "criminal mistreatment for failing to stop abuse". The
charges were dismissed by Thurston County Judge Daniel Berschauer on technicalities. The lawyer who
represented Collette Queener said, (Nov. 14, 1996 Olympian), that it was a
"witch hunt", and that " a more innocent person (than Queener) you could not
have for a client. She's an ex-nun ..... I don't see how you could view her
in an evil or negative light."
I congratulate you for doing the right thing, when all those adults looked
the other way. I repeat on most pages that the " OKBR has cost the
Washington State taxpayers over $35 million dollars (so far)", because I
think most people
don't care about the kids involved, but they may care that it has cost them
(taxpayers) money.
louis bloom
There were many obvious and long-term warnings about the 1970-94 child abusing Olympia Kiwanis Boys Ranch.
manaco@whidbey.net