Intrigue now turns to grief

Man whose search dog issued ‘death alert’ months ago says he was ignored • Revealed: How the Trib’s Jim Redden gave the public its first view of Weaver Ñ Page A3 n Death penalty: Why Weaver prosecutors may want to avoid it Ñ Page

By Janine Robben

The Portland Tribune, Aug 27, 2002, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Investigators said Monday that they moved as quickly as they could in the investigation of the two missing Oregon City girls and were precluded from searching Ward Weaver’s property before the weekend.

Those statements failed to satisfy some of the investigation’s most vocal critics, including a private dog handler who castigated Oregon City Chief Gordon Huiras for not following up on what the handler described as significant leads in April.

Weaver’s ex-wife Kristi Sloan also criticized investigators over the weekend for moving too slowly.

“The day we went on this property was the first day we legally could get on this property,” Huiras said at a news conference Monday. “We have a Constitution that has certain rights that everybody’s guaranteed, and part of our job is to make sure those rights are provided.”

The remains of Miranda Gaddis were discovered Saturday, and remains expected to be those of Ashley Pond were found Sunday by investigators searching a shed and under a concrete slab in Weaver’s back yard.

Prosecutors said Monday they would seek an indictment against Weaver.

The seven-month investigation appeared to have focused on Weaver and his property early on. The attention on Weaver then apparently waned until May, when investigators began a flurry of Weaver-related activity, according to the logs of police contacts. The logs are some of the few pieces of information about the missing girls investigation that are public.

The pace of the investigation also raised concerns about whether other people were placed at risk during the probe, including the 19-year-old girlfriend of Weaver’s son, who alleges that Weaver choked and raped her at his house Aug. 13. She told police she thought she was going to die.

Other young women known to have been in Weaver’s house after Ashley’s disappearance included Weaver’s 13-year-old daughter, Mallori; Miranda, who reportedly spent the night there Feb. 23 as part of a birthday party for Mallori; and another 12-year-old girl who Weaver invited to vacation in California with him and his daughter after Ashley and Miranda disappeared.

Weaver has been jailed on the rape charge since Aug. 13.

Warning from detective

The mother of a 12-year-old classmate of Ashley and Miranda, who called the Tribune earlier this month to express support for Weaver, said Sunday that she was devastated by the discovery of the bodies in his yard.

“I can’t begin to tell you how horrible I feel, knowing my daughter was there in his home,” said the woman, who said her daughter spent the night at Weaver’s house a month or six weeks ago. “She sat down and ate dinner with him.”

The woman, who asked to remain anonymous, said that Weaver had invited her daughter to vacation in California with him and his daughter this year, after Ashley and Miranda disappeared. She said that after rumors of the invitation got around school, she received a call from an Oregon City detective who told her “it’s probably not a good idea” to let her go.

“I wish I would have known,” she said of investigators’ apparent level of concern about Weaver at that time. “The thing is, he’s a very good deceiver. And they let his daughter live with him. What about her?”

In early July, Weaver told the Tribune that his daughter was going to stay with her mother in Portland for a while because of pressure from the investigation. But she was present at his house on July 12, when the Tribune contacted him there. Weaver, who is divorced from Mallori’s mother, had legal custody of the girl until shortly after he was arrested on the rape case, when her custody was transferred to the state.

Miranda spent the night at the house as recently as Feb. 23, according to an ex-wife of Weaver, Kristi Sloan, who said in televised interviews that Miranda was there for a birthday party sleepover for Mallori. Miranda disappeared two weeks later.

Local police criticized

Weaver’s ex-wife Kristi Sloan had harsh words for the FBI on Saturday night after the first set of remains, later identified as those of Miranda, were found in a storage shed behind Weaver’s house.

Sloan was included in an Aug. 20 Tribune story on tipsters who had not been contacted by investigators. She complained in televised interviews last weekend that it took investigators five months to thoroughly search Weaver’s property after she reported her concerns about him.

One of the investigation’s most outspoken critics is private dog handler Harry Oakes, himself the subject of criticism by other dog handlers and law enforcement.

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