Two men killed in Highway 2 crash

Two men died Monday in a head-on collision on Highway 2 between Monroe and Sultan.

Killed were Richard M. Montgomery, 56, of Monroe and Roy B. Griffin, 76, of Gold Bar. Griffin's westbound minivan crossed the center line near Fern Bluff Road and struck Montgomery's eastbound minivan at 10:16 a.m., said State Patrol Trooper Keith Leary.

Montgomery's passenger, William C. Wicker, 17, of Monroe, was flown to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, Leary said. He was in stable condition last night.

The highway was closed for about three hours after the collision while traffic was rerouted and the State Patrol investigated.

Man remains in jail after confession

A man was being held in the Pierce County Jail after he called police Saturday to say he had killed his wife in the Spokane area, said Tacoma police spokesman Mark Fulghum.

The man, who walked into the Pierce County Jail to call police, was detained while police there contacted authorities in Spokane, who found his wife dead, Fulghum said.

Authorities in Spokane are investigating the death, he said.

Homes regaining power after storm

Power was expected to be restored by Monday night to all customers in the Puget Sound region who lost power as a result of Sunday's windstorm.

By 6 a.m. Monday, power had been restored to all Puget Sound Energy customers, said spokeswoman Dorothy Bracken. At the height of the outage, 15,000 to 20,000 customers lost power in King County, east Pierce County, Thurston County, Puyallup, Whidbey Island and Kitsap County.

In Seattle, about 6,000 customers who lost power Sunday had it restored by midday Monday, said Seattle City Light spokesman Larry Vogel. Areas affected included South Park, Shoreline and Magnolia.

The Snohomish County Public Utility District had about 18,000 customers without power Sunday. Affected areas included Sultan, Canyon Park, Brier, Floral Hills, Granite Falls and parts of Everett and Mountlake Terrace, said Neil Neroutsos, a spokesman for Snohomish County PUD. Power was restored to all but a few of them by Monday night, he said.

PLU provost finalist for South Dakota job

James Pence of Tacoma is among three finalists to be the next president of Augustana College in Sioux Falls, S.D.

The finalists are:

• Pence, provost and dean of graduate studies at Pacific Lutheran University in Parkland, Pierce County.

• Matthew Moen, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of South Dakota.

• Rob Oliver, chair of Augustana's department of business.

The three will visit the Sioux Falls campus next week. After that, a committee will make a recommendation to the Augustana Board of Trustees. An appointment is expected this month.

President Bruce Halverson, who has been in the job since 2000, plans to retire in July.

Augustana is a liberal-arts college affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The college had 1,621 full-time students this fall, and its total enrollment, including graduate students, is 1,745.

Late-night fires damage high school

Fire officials are investigating a spate of arsons at a Eugene high school that caused up to $500,000 worth of damage.

The fires, which occurred late Friday, destroyed a hallway next to the gym at North Eugene High School and left about a quarter of the school with smoke damage.

In all, 14 firetrucks and medic units responded to the blaze, said Craig Callicotte, Eugene Fire Department district chief.

A few hours before the fires apparently were set, the gym had been the site of a boys basketball game between North Eugene and McNary High School of Salem.

School officials believe the person or people who set the fires either stayed around after the basketball game or were let in one of the doors, said Jon Lauch, assistant director of facilities management.

The blaze was the second arson this year involving Eugene School District property. In June, firefighters responded to a blaze that destroyed the gymnasium at Santa Clara Elementary School, which had not been used since the school closed in June 2002.

Eugene police arrested two teenagers in connection with that fire.

Man held in death of 15-year-old boy

A 20-year-old man has been arrested in the New Year's Eve shooting death of a 15-year-old boy that is believed to have been gang-related.

The man was arrested within hours of the death of the teen, identified by the Yakima County Medical Examiner's Office as Mario Rosales-Martinez.

It was Yakima's third homicide in four days and the sixth in December. The county's 2005 tally of 24 homicides was the highest since 1987, when 25 people were killed.

Yakima police spokesman Capt. Jeff Schneider blamed the latest death on almost-casual gunplay that erupts between rival gangs in the city.

The weekend slaying began with the victim and several friends trying to steal beer Saturday evening from a Wal-Mart store, police said. A guard tried to stop the teens and they fled without the beer, running to a pickup.

Soon after that, the truck engine began sputtering — apparently low on gas, police said.

Rosales and his friends got out of the truck and wound up in a confrontation with the occupants of a passing car.

Rosales was shot once in the chest. Paramedics were unable to revive him.

Based on witness information, detectives arrested the 20-year-old before midnight. Schneider said police also seized a .22-caliber semiautomatic pistol believed to have been used in the shooting.

Sawmill brings back second-shift workers

About 70 employees at the Boise Cascade sawmill in La Grande, Ore., are being called back to work, companies officials said.

The company is restarting the second shift, which was curtailed on Oct. 31 because of high natural-gas prices. All of the employees should be back to work by the end of this month and new employees will be hired to fill spots left by laid-off workers who got jobs at other Boise mills.

"The pine lumber market has rebounded to a level that allows us to restart the second shift in the sawmill," said Tom Insko, manager for Boise's Inland Region. "We continue to contend with excessively high natural-gas prices and are looking into alternatives that will eliminate or greatly reduce our dependency on natural gas for drying lumber."

The company, based in Boise, Idaho, manufactures engineered wood products, plywood, lumber and particleboard.

Times staff and news services