Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Was killer a vigilante or Date: Tue, 3 Nov 92 15:19:55 EST Message-ID: \SE A;NATION \SS (WS) \HD Was killer a vigilante or vandal? \BY ASSOCIATED PRESS \DT TACOMA, Wash. TACOMA, Wash. (AP) - It had been two years since Kaare Sortland and his wife were acquitted of molesting children at their home day care center, but the harassment never ended. So when Mr. Sortland was shot to death by a gunman in his back yard on Halloween, police naturally asked: Was it a case of vigilantism? "We just don't know," police Sgt. Mike Miller said yesterday. "There's any number of possibilities that still exist." Detectives had interviewed most of the dozen or so parents who had accused the Sortlands of molesting children at their home-run Hugs and Kisses Day-Care Center during the 1980s. All their alibis checked out, and police had no suspects. Other possibilities were being explored. Mr. Sortland was a supervisor at a construction firm, and the killer may have been someone upset over his work, Sgt. Miller said. Or Mr. Sortland could have confronted a Halloween vandal who panicked and shot him. Hours before the killing, someone sprayed an obscenity in huge black letters across a back window of the Sortlands' home. Police don't know if that was connected to the killing. Mr. Sortland, 49, answered his back door about 7 p.m. Saturday, police said. His wife, Judy, who was inside the house, told police she heard her husband shout something like, "I didn't do it!" just before several shots rang out. Mr. Sortland was shot several times in the chest and died later at Tacoma General Hospital. "He made some brief, one-line statements," Sgt. Miller said. "I have a hunch he knew who it was. Unfortunately, he didn't give us anything that specific." The Sortlands were accused of molesting children ranging in age from about 18 months to 4 years at their now-defunct day care center. Charges were filed in three cases. The Sortlands were acquitted at a trial involving one boy. A judge threw out another case involving the two other boys, ruling their testimony was unreliable because they initially denied they had been abused and then changed their minds after therapy and interviews with investigators. Prosecutors have appealed the second case. In September the Sortlands filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Pierce County officials. Friends and neighbors of the Sortlands say the parents' anger never subsided. Before the trial, a vandal broke the windows in the house where the Sortlands lived for 13 years. After the acquittal, parents often confronted the Sortlands in town with insults. But Sgt. Miller said that, aside from the broken windows in 1989, he didn't know of any harassment incidents the Sortlands reported to police. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM