NORTHWEST
East Oregonian
A2
Saturday, March 20, 2021
Recalling a close call with wrong-way driver
Court Judge Matt Shirt-
cliff on Tuesday, March 16,
granted Deuel-Clinken-
beard a conditional release.
He is required to stay with
his father in Montana and to
attend a status check hearing,
by phone, on April 1.
Benge, who has worked
for Superior Towing in Baker
City for about seven months,
was driving eastbound,
toward Ontario, on March 12.
He said he had just picked
up a couple whose car had
hit a deer near Milepost 327.
He was towing their car to
Ontario, and they were riding
with him in the tow truck.
Benge said he was near
Ash Grove Cement, where
the freeway enters a series
of curves in the Burnt River
Canyon, when he saw the
silver car, traveling west in
the eastbound lanes.
The car was rounding a
corner when Benge saw it.
He estimated its speed at
more than 90 mph.
“The whole car was lifting
to one side from the force,”
Benge said.
After the near colli-
sion, Benge continued east
to Ontario to drop off the
couple, who are from Wash-
ington, and their vehicle.
He said the couple was
already “shaken up” from
hitting the deer, and the close
call with the wrong-way
driver added to their anxiety.
By JAYSON JACOBY
Baker City Herald
BAKER CITY — When
Terry Benge saw the silver
car speeding straight at him,
he scarcely had time to react.
Benge, who was driving
a tow truck, swerved to the
shoulder of Interstate 84.
Maybe a second later, the
car whizzed past.
Benge estimates the
distance between the car and
his truck was a couple feet.
“It was close enough
I could tell he was clean-
shaven,” Benge said.
A few miles farther along
the freeway, the driver of
the silver car, Logan Raye
Deuel-Clinkenbeard, 28,
collided with an Oregon
State Police SUV driven by
Sr. Trooper Andrew McClay.
Neither was seriously hurt
in the crash, which happened
about 2:10 p.m. on Friday,
March 12, near Milepost 327,
near Durkee about 23 miles
east of Baker City.
Deuel- Clin kenbeard,
whose address was listed as
Missoula, Montana, by the
Baker County Jail but who
also has a Camas, Washing-
ton, address, according to
court records, was arrested
and charged with second-de-
gree attempted assault, reck-
less driving and recklessly
endangering another person.
Baker County Circuit
Oregon State Police/Contributed Photo/Baker City Herald
A 2011 Toyota Camry driven by Logan Deuel-Clinkenbeard
suff ered major damage after being hit by an Oregon State
Police vehicle while driving the wrong way on I-84.
Benge said his boss,
hav i ng hea rd over a
police sca n ner about
Deuel-Clinkenbeard’s colli-
sion with McClay’s patrol
SUV, radioed him to tell him
what had happened.
Benge said workers were
still cleaning up the scene at
Milepost 327 when he was on
his way back to Baker City
from Ontario.
He ended up towing the
Forecast for Pendleton Area
TODAY
SUNDAY
| Go to AccuWeather.com
MONDAY
Partly sunny, a
shower; windy
Mostly cloudy and
breezy
54° 35°
52° 40°
TUESDAY
Windy with a
couple of showers
WEDNESDAY
Intervals of clouds
and sunshine
Cloudy and breezy
OSP vehicle, which suff ered
major damage, to Baker City.
Benge said it was his fi rst
encounter with a wrong-way
driver on the freeway.
Sgt. Craig Rilee of the
Baker County Sheriff’s
Offi ce, who investigated the
case and interviewed both
McClay and Benge, wrote
in his report that the Baker
County Dispatch Center
received more than 35 calls
Walla Walla church
fi nds more than
1,200 pounds of
candles left at door
56° 37°
56° 38°
By SHEILA HAGAR
Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
HERMISTON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
58° 37°
55° 42°
58° 37°
59° 37°
60° 39°
OREGON FORECAST
ALMANAC
Shown is today’s weather. Temperatures are today’s highs and tonight’s lows.
PENDLETON
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Seattle
Olympia
47/41
47/32
58/31
Longview
Kennewick Walla Walla
54/36
Lewiston
50/36
61/37
Astoria
48/38
Pullman
Yakima 60/34
50/35
54/37
Portland
Hermiston
52/38
The Dalles 58/37
Salem
Corvallis
50/36
Yesterday
Normals
Records
La Grande
45/31
PRECIPITATION
John Day
Eugene
Bend
51/36
47/27
46/28
Ontario
57/32
Caldwell
Burns
61°
42°
59°
35°
80° (1934) 13° (1965)
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
Albany
50/35
0.01"
0.08"
0.58"
1.16"
0.48"
2.82"
WINDS (in mph)
57/32
46/25
0.06"
0.15"
0.81"
3.17"
4.67"
3.32"
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Pendleton 42/28
51/36
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
HERMISTON
Enterprise
54/35
55/39
57°
42°
56°
36°
80° (1934) 18° (1965)
PRECIPITATION
Moses
Lake
51/36
Aberdeen
49/31
55/36
Tacoma
Yesterday
Normals
Records
Spokane
Wenatchee
52/39
Today
Sun.
Boardman WSW 10-20
Pendleton WSW 12-25
Medford
54/37
WSW 10-20
WSW 10-20
SUN AND MOON
Klamath Falls
45/20
Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2021
Sunrise today
Sunset tonight
Moonrise today
Moonset today
6:58 a.m.
7:08 p.m.
10:34 a.m.
1:46 a.m.
First
Full
Last
New
Mar 21
Mar 28
Apr 4
Apr 11
NATIONAL EXTREMES
Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states)
High 88° in Boca Raton, Fla. Low -2° in Lake George, Colo.
NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY
In his own report, McClay
wrote that he “rammed the
vehicle to get it off the road-
way.”
McClay was not available
for an interview because
the criminal investigation is
ongoing, OSP Capt. Timothy
Fox, the state police govern-
ment and media relations offi -
cial, wrote in an email to the
Baker City Herald.
In a document filed on
Monday, March 15, in Baker
County Circuit Court in
support of a motion seeking
to release Deuel-Clinken-
beard to either his father
or on conditions set by the
court, the father said his son
has “severe mental health
conditions for which we have
been seeking treatment.” The
document also states that
Deuel-Clinkenbeard has no
prior criminal history and
“needs consistent mental
health treatment.”
None of the police reports
mentions Deuel-Clinken-
beard being tested for intox-
icants.
Fox, the OSP spokes-
man, said the driver likely
wouldn’t be tested if he did
not show any signs of impair-
ment.
One of the conditions
of the release agreement
requires Deuel-Clinken-
beard to meet with a doctor
and to take any medications
prescribed.
Donation, prank or call for help?
PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
52° 34°
to 911 about the wrong-way
driver.
It’s not clear where
Deuel-Clinkenbeard starting
driving the wrong way, but
callers reported the silver car
driving west in the eastbound
lanes starting around Mile-
post 342, near the Lime exit.
Deuel-Clinkenbeard then
drove through the Burnt
River Canyon, which is
one of the curviest sections
of Interstate 84 in East-
ern Oregon, and continued
through the Durkee Valley
toward Baker City.
According to Rilee’s
report, McClay was driving
eastbound near Milepost 327
when he saw, about one-half
mile ahead, a vehicle swerve
to avoid colliding with a
silver car traveling west.
McClay had his emer-
gency lights fl ashing and his
siren blaring.
In his report, Rilee wrote
that McClay “was unable to
safely maneuver out of the
path of the oncoming vehi-
cle so he made the deci-
sion to stop the wrong way
vehicle from continuing the
wrong way. The left front
of (McClay’s) patrol vehicle
collided with the left front of
the wrong way vehicle.”
Deuel-Clinkenbeard’s
Camry stopped in the free-
way median, about 50 yards
from McClay’s vehicle, Rilee
wrote.
WALLA WALLA, Wash.
— The Rev. David Sibley
remains puzzled over a
mysterious event this week,
but he’s not expecting any
more light to be shed on the
situation.
Sibley is the pastor of St.
Paul’s Episcopal Church in
Walla Walla, where, on two
consecutive nights, a massive
dumping of candles took
place.
“On (Monday, March 15),
I came to the church to fi nd
someone had dumped a large
quantity of candles,” Sibley
said Thursday, March 18.
“We cleaned it up, and when
I came back on (Tuesday,
March 16), there were even
more candles.”
Altogether, more than
1,200 pounds of candles went
to the city of Walla Walla’s
Sudbury Landfi ll, he said.
Video camera foot-
age shows that from about
9:30 p.m. to around 2 a.m.,
on both nights, a person
who appears to be male and
wearing a winter camoufl age
jacket goes to and from the
front entry
of the church
at Catherine
and Birch
streets.
Each time
the person
Sibley
approaches
St. Paul’s, he
or she wears a backpack and
carries two or three duff el-
style bags, bends over for
a few minutes at the church
door and exits the scene with
bags that look empty.
In one video clip, two
women leaving the church
appear to not notice the bags
being emptied just a few feet
away.
The candle bearer does not
appear to lag in energy during
the several on-and-off trips
each night.
Sibley said most of the
candles left behind were pillar
candles, some had Goodwill
stickers, some were still in
wrappers, and many had been
previously burned.
In terms of wax and cost,
the candle dump was “not
insignifi cant,” he said.
Both events resulted in
volunteers having to clean up
the site and make a dump run.
“As I said to a friend, it
was just bizarre enough to
be amusing and quantita-
tive enough to be annoying,”
Sibley said.
The church did not initially
alert police over what seemed
definitely weird, but not
particularly suspicious. After
all, it is not completely out of
the ordinary to fi nd donated
items left at any church door,
he pointed out.
“It’s a little annoying; we
wish people would call us
fi rst,” he said. “But it’s part
of life.”
The two-night candle
caper, however, is diff erent.
Not that the person leaving the
loot necessarily has ill inten-
tions toward St. Paul’s, but a
massive quantity of candles
does present an opportunis-
tic prankster plenty of fuel to
start havoc, Sibley said.
“That’s a lot of paraffi n in
a small place,” he said.
If the deed was an oddly
distributed donation, no
church needs that many
candles, he said.
“And if it is a prank, guys
please. … All right, well
played, but please, don’t do
that again,” Sibley said.
However, the pastor
most wonders if the unusual
moment comes from a mental
health issue, maybe even a
psychotic break.
“I’m concerned this
person is suff ering. It’s a good
reminder people are strug-
gling. … We want to encour-
age people to seek help, and
encourage us to have compas-
sion for each other,” Sibley
said. “There’s no shame in
talking about this.”
IN BRIEF
EOU No. 3 on list of Oregon
colleges COVID-19 cases
SALEM — A New York Times review of
COVID-19 cases published on March 2 shows
3,189 cases of the disease linked to Oregon
colleges since February 2020.
The University of Oregon had the highest
reported positive test count at 1,479. Oregon
State is second at 787 cases and Eastern
Oregon University was third at 111 cases.
The Times put an asterisk next to Oregon
Health & Science University in Port-
land, which reported 335 cases early in the
pandemic. The campus includes a medi-
cal center and other facilities that serve the
community.
The review compiled 535,000 cases at
more than 1,900 colleges and universities.
— EO Media Group
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