The Des Moines Register from Des Moines, Iowa • Page 17

The DesMoines Register Wednesday, July23, 1997 3M CitySuburbs Suburban Report erya session wi Qu "I A fl amitsoD oinair The assistant U.S. attorney reaffirms his innocence in sex abuse trial -y ANKENY -Woman arrested for theft, forgery of his sex abuse and exploitation trial. "It was a physical, living, growing part of her that represented our life together." Query, an assistant U.S. Attorney in Des Moines, is charged with third-degree sexual abuse and sexual exploitation. He reaffirmed his innocence Tuesday to jurors and to District Judge Richard Blane.

i The obsession with hair was just one example of Query's controlling behavior, his wife, Sharon, testified Tuesday. It was this obsessive need to control people that ultimately led to the felony charges against him, witnesses told jurors. Query, 40, is accused of photographing a 12-year-old naked girl and touching her pubic hair. He told jurors he took the pictures merely to document the girl's long hair before she had it cut. Assistant Polk County Attorney Steve Foritano asked Query whether the pictures aroused him.

"These were not the kind of pictures I kept under my pillow if that's what you're insinuating," Query snapped. "I was not asking them for spread eagle nude pictures." Eight photographs were shown to the jury of seven women and five men, while the girl was on the witness stand. A few wrinkled their faces after quickly flipping through the photos. Others glanced at the girl, who was seated a few feet away. The girl, now 13, said she objected He testifies he showered with a 12-year-old because she was not old enough to wash her hair without it becoming tangled.

ByJEFFZELENY Register Staff Writer Kevin Query admits he was obsessed with hair. He became angry when people close to him especially his wife wished to trim their long locks. "It represented the length of our marriage commitment," Query testified Tuesday, during the second day to being photographed. "He said, 'Just do it and get it over the girl testified. Query testified his fixation with hair also was the reason he took showers with the girl.

He said she was not old enough to wash her long hair without it becoming tangled. Query explained his obsession for hair, saying long hair was a sign of perfection and beauty. Finally, he explained his own hair dilemma. "Shortly after we married, it all started falling out," Query said, squirming around in the witness chair, casually leaning down to offer a view of his slight baldness. "I suppose it was also a compensation for -my receding hair." 'We've got to figure out a way to get somewhere in the range of 20 to 30 people moved on to new circumstances." Gene Jones, Coalition for the I tameless The prosecution and the defense rested their cases Tuesday.

Defense attorney J. Keith Rigg asked the judge to dismiss the case because there was no evidence Query touched the girl's genitals, which he said is required to prove! third-degree sexual abuse. The judge denied the motion. Query appeared emotional several times during his testimony Tuesday, including when he looked at his wife on the witness stand. Sharon Query, who said she filed for divorce last fall, now wears her brown hair in a bob cut well above the shoulder.

"She cut her hair and this marriage is over," Kevin Query sobbed. "All my fears are coming true." for the indigent and changes in gov- ernment benefit programs. i Single, jobless adults without chil-! dren are limited to food stamps for three months out of a three-year pe-' riod. And the Social Security Administration this year terminated disa-, bility benefits for people who received them based on drug addiction or alcoholism. In Iowa, 910 peo-; pie received benefits under those conditions, the administration said, and 604 people were estimated to lose them.

mum. I Of "A former employee of an Ankeny retirement community has been ar rested in connection with a series of thefts from residents there. 'Karen D. Ireland, 36, of 1506 S.W. Second St.

in Ankeny, has been charged with two counts of theft and two counts of forgery. According to a news release from the Ankeny Police Department, Ire land allegedly took checks from resi dents at the Mill Pond Retirement Community and cashed them. residents at the facility had reported thefts. members of one woman discovered that a $45,000 check had been written on her account to Ireland, which Ireland deposited into her account at the John Deere Credit Uftion, court records say. In June, police recovered a $35,000 cashier's check that Ireland had turned over to an attorney.

CARLISLE iCenter evacuates residents briefly Carlisle Care Center employees briefly evacuated 92 residents Tuesday morning after a staff member re ported hearing a small explosion and then smelling gas coming from the boiler room. Chris Wolf, administrator of the care center, said a defective valve on a. water heater caused the incident. The valve was replaced Tuesday af ternoon. staff called 911 and they rec ommended we evacuate," Wolf said.

"ft took 10 minutes to get everyone out, and in a half-hour's time, every one was back inside." JOHNSTON Judge dismisses libel suit A Polk County district judge has dismissed a libel lawsuit filed in 1995 against a Johnston business man, Duane Van Hemert, and Kevin Brown, publisher of the now defunct Johnston Advance newspaper. lawsuit was filed by Andrew Christenson, a former member of the Johnston City Council who made an unsuccessful bid for mayor in 1995. He claimed that Van Hemert's letters to the editor of the Johnston Advance contained false and defam atory statements about his character and integrity. Van Hemert's letters were published during Christenson's mayoral campaign. Judge D.J.

Stovall, of the 5th Judi cial District of Iowa, wrote in court documents "this Court finds that no genuine issue of fact exists with re gard to whether the statments in the Oct. 26, 1995, and Nov. 2, 1995, letters were written and published wtyh actual malice. Indeed, there is ri'o evidence whatsoever showing that the statements in the letters were written and published with knowledge that they were false, or with reckless disregard of their truth or falsity. Hemert, who works at Builders in Johnston, said, "I am quite pleased that both the judicial and political system appear to be in working order.

The judicial system has reaffirmed that if you state an opinion based on what you believe to be true, you are still protected by the First Amendment. The political sys tem works when the voters hold any candidate for office accountable for his or her actions, as they did in Johnston." ANKENY Council hires chief of police olAnkeny City Council members on Monday formally hired Paul Scran- ton to be their new chief of police. currently the police chief in Indianola, replaces David Foster, who left the job last September following a 4 a.m. disturbance at the home of an Ankeny woman. "Scranton is scheduled to start ork Aug.

25 at a salary of $61,092. KEVIN wolfRegister Photos John Matthews lies in his bunk bed in the early evening before Mulberry. Officials fear that they may have to turn some home-others pile into the Churches United Shelter located at 15th and less people away because of lack of space. Shelter crowded; homeless may be turned away Ai the shelter's dining area. casino proceeds on.

But he said it hasn't been determined whether the shelter will be included. The growing numbers of people at the shelter seems to be a phenomenon unique to Des Moines. Shelter directors iii Iowa City and Cedar Rapids say they haven't seen similar influxes. Des Moines shelter officials cite a combination of factors, including hot and stormy weather, the closure four years ago of Broadlawns Medical Center's overnight detox center SHELTER Continued from Page 1M isn't yet clear. Fire Marshal Kenneth Danley said an inspection found no overcrowding in the men's dorm, but it found several items the shelter needs to address, including faulty emergency and exit lighting and a blocked exit door.

Fire officials are consulting with the city's Building Division to determine the legal occupancy limit, how ever, because there are different requirements for different uses of space within a building, Danley said. He said the number is believed to be 106 people. "I sure what they re doing is very worthwhile, but we need to provide the same level of protection for those occupants as we do the oc cupants for any building," he said. "If they're using spaces for sleeping quarters that weren't intended, that's a potential problem." If the legal capacity is put at 106, Jones estimates that the shelter would turn away 20 to 30 people a night. "We don want to (cause) any code violations, but I don't know if the city is aware of or effectively re sponding to the true needs of what's going on with the homeless," she said.

Solutions Needed Gene Jones, a board member at the shelter and director of the Des Moines Coalition for the Homeless, believes part of the problem is that the shelter is seen to be the answer to everyone else's problems. But there's not enough financial support to take care of all those problems, he said. Jones said the shelter must figure out ways to move people on, to seek resources to create some shared living situations and single-room-occupancy housing. "It's not as though we're lackadaisical about this," he said. "We've got to figure out a way to get somewhere in the range of 20 to 30 people moved on to new circumstances." Further, some of the people at the shelter need extended support services, such as subsidized housing and case management beyond their stay at the shelter to connect them to a network of people they can depend on for help if they run into trouble on their own, Jones and other shelter officials said.

But that requires more resources than the Churches United Shelter can provide with its $304,000 budget, they said. Jones charges that local government is abdicating its responsibility to homeless people and needs to provide more money. The shelter has received some money controlled by local government, including Community Development Block Grant money, an Emergency Shelter Grant and Polk County financing, officials said. It also depends on corporate and pri- 1. I Tom Smith finishes his ice cream in vate donations as well as a cadre of volunteers.

Growing Numbers None of the money comes from the city of Des Moines' general fund, said Lyle Schwery, the city's homeless assistance coordinator. But he said the fund doesn't have any extra money to give to the shelter. Phil Roeder, the county spokesman, said the Board of Supervisors is looking at human services programs that it might spend Prairie Meadows ut 2VVfM fro Wednesday July 23rd only MV-VEE indUl 12 'GALLON Sale ends tonight at 10 pm 55 Limit 4 il Good today only at Altoona, Ankeny, Des Moines, Johnston, Pleasant Hill, Urbandale, West Des Moines.