DailyAstorian.com // MONDAY, JANUARY 8, 2018
145TH YEAR, NO. 135
ONE DOLLAR
Surf Pines
man found
guilty in
‘peeping
Tom’ case
THE LAST
GILLNETTER
Cazee guilty on 23 counts
By JACK HEFFERNAN
The Daily Astorian
Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Jon Westerholm looks over mementos at the Columbia River Fishermen’s Protective Union office in Astoria.
Magazine documented
the life of fishermen
By KATIE FRANKOWICZ
The Daily Astorian
T
hey cleaned out the office after Christmas. Into the moving van went the old signs and
the newspaper clippings documenting achievements and battles for river fisheries.
Out went the boxes filled with index cards listing the names of past Columbia River
Fishermen’s Protective Union members — and the dates they died. And the faded pho-
tographs and paintings of fishing boats that have sunk, sold or come to rest in museums.
And boxes of old Columbia River Gillnetter magazines, a union publication founded in 1969.
Jon Westerholm, who has edited the Gillnetter since
2003, sifted through papers as his son, Erik, loaded the
van. Each picture of a fishing boat sparked a memory,
sometimes the name of the fisherman who had owned
it. But, Westerholm would often note, “He’s gone now.”
The office on Gateway Avenue was a collection of
vanished and vanishing things.
For years, Westerholm kept the union office open
as a volunteer. In addition to editing and publishing the
Gillnetter, he also coordinated a recycling program to
gather up old gillnets. But at 83 years old, he is transi-
tioning into a different phase of his life. A new issue of
the Gillnetter hasn’t gone out since 2015.
“I’m not ready to throw in the towel,” said union
president Darren Crookshanks, a commercial fisher-
man based out of Longview, Washington. At 49, he’s
the union member Westerholm and secretary Jack
Marincovich call “the young guy.”
For more than 140 years, the Columbia River Fish-
ermen’s Protective Union, first as an aid organization
and later as a union, advocated on behalf of the riv-
er’s gillnet fishermen and salmon conservation. But
longtime union members, volunteers and fishermen
like Westerholm are aging out of the work and step-
ping down from roles they’ve filled for decades. Union
membership has dwindled in step with fishing oppor-
tunities on the Columbia River and no one has raised
their hand to take over the magazine.
“I’m going to get ahold of all our active members,
going to start politicking and see if we can’t get some
new, younger members to help out,” Crookshanks said.
“I’m going to do what I can to keep the doors open.”
The fishery the union defended for more than a
century and the Gillnetter documented remains in
limbo.
The push and pull of endangered salmon species
listed on the Columbia River, changes to regulations
about where and when and how much fishermen can
fish, the ever-present tensions between sport fishing
and commercial fishing — all contribute to a gillnet
fishery that today is hemmed in.
‘Back of the pipeline’
Gillnetting used to be an easy way to feel out a career
in fishing. Men like Westerholm and Marincovich grew
up with Columbia River gillnetters all around them. As
teenagers they’d be recruited to help out on an uncle’s
or family friend’s boat.
See GILLNETTER, Page 7A
A Surf Pines man was found guilty Friday
of 23 charges stemming from several “peep-
ing Tom” incidents in his neighborhood.
Kirk Richard Cazee, 56, peered through
bedroom windows and recorded videos of
residents during private moments, a jury
found after a four-day trial.
Cazee was convicted on multiple counts
of using a child in a display of sexual con-
duct, each of which carries a minimum of
nearly six years in prison. He was also con-
victed of invasion of per-
sonal privacy, stalking and
criminal trespass.
The Clatsop County
Sheriff’s Office had been
investigating a potential
prowler in the Surf Pines
area, based on numerous
Kirk
complaints from residents,
Richard
for more than a year leading
Cazee
up to Cazee’s first arrest in
February. After his release
from jail on those charges, he was arrested
again in April following further investiga-
tion by the sheriff’s office. He has since been
held in jail on $2 million bail
The victims included several young
women — some of whom were under 18
years old — and one man. During the trial,
some of the victims — sometimes with tears
streaming down their faces — recalled see-
ing a subject on their property. A witness
also recounted confronting a shadowy fig-
ure from a distance in his backyard before
the man ran away. Witnesses believed Cazee
was the prowler but were unable to unequiv-
ocally identify him.
Much of the case was based on
videos obtained from Cazee’s phone.
The videos often displayed the victims in a
state of nudity and, occasionally, perform-
ing sexual acts. The videos do not reveal
who took them, but they at times appear to
record the voice of a man sexually pleasing
himself.
“How many other people have video of
the victims in this case?” Chief Deputy Dis-
trict Attorney Ron Brown rhetorically asked
the jury during closing arguments.
Cazee was charged with two counts of
criminal trespass after his original arrest.
Around 10 p.m. that night, sheriff’s depu-
ties found Cazee walking in the area without
a flashlight minutes after yet another com-
plaint of a man searching through windows.
Just before his arrest, deputies found that
Cazee was carrying a pair of binoculars and
some toilet paper.
Cazee told deputies that he brought the
binoculars to observe wildlife, but Brown
called the optical aid one of the “smoking
guns” in the case.
“Good luck unless the wildlife is standing
under a streetlight that doesn’t exist in Surf
Pines,” Brown said.
Brown also presented evidence that
Cazee, a surgical nurse in Portland at the
time, had stolen mail from one of the vic-
tims and kept it at his Portland mobile home.
Cazee’s wife and son testified that he often
went for walks by himself late at night.
See CAZEE, Page 7A
Local baker, chef sets his own table
Davis finally has
place of his own
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
fter more than 25 years
of managing other peo-
ple’s restaurants and bars,
Taz Davis said he feels fortu-
nate to have a place to call his
own.
He and business partner
Julian Villanueva recently
opened Table 360 Bakery &
Bistro inside the former Curi-
ous Caterpillar children’s
store. A lounge and global
dining room is slated to open
upstairs in the spring. Greet-
A
ing passers-by in the display
windows and on the main
floor is a wide assortment of
breads, cakes and other pas-
tries baked by Davis each
morning.
“We’re French countryside
meets Astoria waterfront,” he
said of the bakery’s style.
A native of Southern Cal-
ifornia, Davis moved to the
North Coast several years ago
from Portland, laying roots,
buying a house and man-
aging the Sand Trap Pub in
McMenamins Gearhart Hotel.
He took over as general man-
ager of the Port of Call Bistro
& Bar last year when owner
Marvin James Sawyer was
taking on the operation of the
Astoria Event Center.
Port of Call was forced out
of its location at Ninth and
Commercial streets last year
after falling behind on rent.
But a private catering opera-
tion Davis started in 2016 and
took to Astoria Sunday Mar-
ket was growing in reputation,
he said, and he yearned to get
back to his roots in cooking
and baking.
Edward Stratton/The Daily Astorian
See DAVIS, Page 7A
Taz Davis, co-owner of Table 360 Bakery & Bistro, features a
rotating cast of breads, cakes, cookies and other pastries.