The Pittsburgh Press from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania • Page 21

The Pittsburgh Press Friday, June 5, 1987 X) Murder suspect led a hunted, haunted life knocked," said Mina Cashman, a "Would you turn him in?" said By Dennis B. Roddy Santa Claus, said the wife of one nephew, because of the beard he now sported and the generosity of the wizened old man who handed out had not heard of him since 1947, when, as prisoner B-8867, Wilford walked away from a farm work detail at the state prison in 'llliw cousin through marriage. "He said, 'Aren't you going to invite me His dad said, 'Well, who are "He said, 'I'm your son. Cashman, who is now nearly deaf, resumed a life interrupted by prison, and, quietly, tentatively, began resuming contacts with his brothers and sisters and, eventually, with some of the four children he had left behind to be raised by their grandparents when he went to jail. "Yes, we knew," Cashman's sister, Edna Clapper, later declared.

Wilford's escape from prison was an open secret never discussed, but always understood. "He didn't talk about it, and I never asked him," Wallace said of his brother's unspoken past. "I figured, if he wanted to talk about it, he would have told me." Russell Mayhue, a neighbor. In Mill Run, Cashman resumed his old life almost as though the intervening years had been a blank. "You just didn't ask him any questions," said Naomi Haines, whose home Cashman would sometimes visit, inevitably turning the discussion to religion.

Whatever the failings of John Burns, or the sins of a young Wilford Cashman, Steve Vance embraced the Bible and renewed the commitment he had made 40 years earlier to the Mennonite Church. As Steve Vance, he received letters from grandchildren he had not gotten to know, and he reconciled with the son raised by a grandfather after Cashman was sentenced to prison. Nieces and nephews called him The Pittsburgh Press MILL RUN A wet heat was still rolling off the mountain as Wallace Cashman thought about the day they came to take away his brother. "Seventeen years? You tell me: if he was a cold killer, in 17 years he wouldn't have done it again?" His eyes filled with tears as he recalled last Saturday, when Wilford Paul Cashman, 77, was taken from the mountain cabin that was home; from the family he had rejoined after a fugitive's life; from the people who kept a secret so well, for so long. His capture ended a secret life that began with his return to the community, near Altoona in Blair County, one night in 1970.

Relatives Kockview. No one in Mill Run knew that Cashman had been living in Michigan under the name of John Edward Burns, that he had been married for 22 years, and that an extramarital love affair ran awry, resulting in the shotgun slaying of Eleanor Farver, a divorced mother of six. Cashman was being hunted, they knew, but they did not know he faced murder charges. When he returned to Mill Run, relatives thought Cashman, who asked to be called Steven Vance, was still running from the 7-to-l 4-year sentence in 1943 on charges of statutory rape and bad checks. "He came to his dad's house and gifts and small offerings of money.

"He did come back," said Mina Cashman, who first came to Mill Run as a young missionary worker when the church was founded there. "He made a real commitment to the Lord." While neighbors and friends lived comfortably with the knowledge that Steve Vance was a man fleeing a 40-year-old prison sentence, wilford rarely ventured outside the small world of Mill Run. He agonized when, after his father's death in 1977, an obituary listed him among the surviving sons, giving his town as Altoona. Please see Cashman. B6 Wilford Cashman Wanted in 1970 slaying County pursues state aid to end N.

Hills floods ft i i mmi wm aiati 1 RIP By Ed Blazina fliii The Pittsburgh Press County Maintenance Director Joseph P. Moses estimates it will cost more than 10 million to dredge Little Pine Creek and its tributaries to prevent further flooding in the North Hills. Moses has had county crews walking the length of the creek this week to identify spots where dredging, widening and bank stabilization are needed. The county plans to present the information to the state Department of Environmental Resources to bolster its contention the state should do the work. Workers have covered nearly 2 miles of the creek along Saxonburg Boulevard, from Route 8 to Harts Run Road.

Moses said it will cost about $5 million just to make changes in that area, which is only about 25 percent of the area the crews will study. "It's going to be well over $10 million," Moses said. The U.S. Soil Conservation Service performed some work last year on the creek after a May 30 flood killed eight persons. But Moses called that work "inadequate." John F.

Graham county director of engineering and construction, said dredging alone won't prevent flooding. Graham said residents have to understand the importance of keeping a clear channel in the creek, Some residents purposely place items in the stream to dam the water, but that usually creates more problems than it eliminates, he said. The county commissioners declared a state of emergency in the creek area yesterday to allow Moses and other departments to spend whatever is needed to examine the creek or prepare for floods. They said they will also call a meeting with the DER and North Hills communities to discuss methods to control storm runoff. Commissioners' Chairman Tom Foerster said the DER has to take a leading role in encouraging the communities to take action.

Commissioner Barbara Hafer, however, said the communities have to take a more active role, noting that only four of 23 municipalities have adopted ordinances to support a storm-water management plan the county prepared last year for new development. "I'm concerned about the cost to the county if those communities don't get together, because this is just going to keep happening," she said. "I'm afraid if we don't strike now, we will have the same problem next year." 48s(Ak Bill WadTh Pittsburgh Pru End of the line Eileen Wilson, 1 7, of Beechview and Linda Yeso, 17, The graduation ceremony, held last night at the Syria of Hazelwood were the last two of 367 graduates of Mosque, was among the first in the city scnooi John A. Brashear High School to get their diplomas, system, which will graduate 2,546 students this year. Legal fees still issue in suit over at-large voting plan by the Republican Party and one from three proposed by the Democrats.

The final appointment is made by the six other members. The commission must conduct public hearings and take comments and criticisms before drawing its map. The final version of the map must be presented to Ziegler by Feb. 15. A public hearing will follow.

Then, the iudge either will give final approval to the plan or, if many objections have been raised, order the commission to draw a new map. order, in the November 1989 election, five councilmen will be elected for two years and four for four years. After that, all council members will be elected for four-year terms. The consent order also requires the apportionment commission to be in place by Aug. 14.

Two members of the seven-member body will be named by the mayor, and two will be named by City Council. The mayor will select one from three candidates submitted legal fees would exceed $75,000. Attorneys for the plaintiffs say they cannot estimate the crusade's legal costs. In civil rights lawsuits, the prevailing party can claim such fees from the losing side. Assistant City Solicitor Robert Smith said the issue of attorneys' fees probably will be taken up next year after the apportionment commission completes its task and the judge approves district boundary lines.

Under the terms of the consent By Janet Williams The Pittsburgh Press A consent order that abolishes at-large Pittsburgh City Council elections by the 1989 primary leaves open the question of who pay legal fees in a lawsuit filed over the issue. Attorneys for the city and the Metropolitan Pittsburgh Crusade for Voters, which filed the voting-rights soit on behalf of the city's black residents, said the cost of litigation was never an issue in negotiations to reach yesterday's settlement. The out-of-court agreement sets up specific guidelines under which Pittsburgh's at-large method of electing council is phased out in favor of a district-election system. Last month, city voters approved a referendum replacing the at-large system with district elections. The consent order, which is expected to be signed by U.S.

District Judge Donald Ziegler next week, also avoided a lengthy and costly federal court trial in the lawsuit. Yesterday, Ziegler commended attorneys for both sides for putting aside private interests for the public good. By agreeing to the consent order, the city doesn't acknowledge that at-large council elections violate the constitutional rights of blacks, as the crusade contended. In addition, neither side has waived the right to seek legal fees from the other. The city earlier estimated that its Home operator sentenced in bilk try Step two Baby pageant to make comeback after ruckus ments rather than criminal acts.

As part of her probation, Mrs. Hopkins will not be allowed to care for people for money. But she has already agreed to stay out of the personal care boarding home business under the terms of a consent order in a civil suit. In December, the Allegheny County Area Agency on Aging sued Mrs. Hopkins, some members of her family and Mrs.

Nolder in federal court for allegedly abusing people in their care. By Janet Williams The Pittsburgh Press A tearful and occasionally incoherent Georgia Hopkins claimed she, was a victim of injustice as U.S. District Judge Barron McCune placed her on probation for three years and fined her $1,500 for trying to bilk an elderly woman of her life savings. "I don't think I've been treated right," said Mrs. Hopkins, who was nicknamed "Mother Hopkins" for helping the downtrodden of the Beaver Valley.

The 70-year-old, dark-haired grandmother who lives in Ben Avon denied she ever hurt or stole from those who lived with her over the years. Mrs. Hopkins and Diane Nolder, 40, were convicted on charges they used a forged power of attorney to attempt to withdraw $43,666 from the accounts of Mary Stadnick at a Bellevue savings and loan. Mrs. Hopkins forged Miss Stadnick's name to the document, and Mrs.

Nolder presented it at the savings and loan in a failed attempt to get the money. On Wednesday, McCune sentenced Mrs. Nolder to three years' probation and fined her $1,400. Before Mrs. Hopkins was sentenced, her attorney, David Roth-man, called a psychiatrist, Dr.

Arthur C. Walsh, who testified that some of her actions were misjudg- By Tom Kukucka Yerusalim tapped to lead Turnpike panel The Pittsburgh Press The kiddies were cute, charming, adorable. The grown-ups acted like brats. When technical problems caused delays at the awards presentation at the first Pittsburgh Area Baby Pageant on a warm Sunday afternoon in October, impatient parents stormed the stage amid the wailing of babies to grab a trophy any trophy at Soldiers 4 Sailors Memorial Hall in Oakland. A police paddy wagon had to be called to restore order.

Despite the problems, the pageant is returning this weekend "Back by Popular Demand," according to advertisements in the Pennysaver shopper. No one was seriously hurt, and no one was arrested. But pageant officials had their hands full answering complaints and scraping up 300 replacement trophies for babies whose awards had been snatched from the stage. Some parents also claimed that prizes were weighted too heavily on the number of fund-raising raffle tickets parents sold. Director Sandra Hobbs said preliminary rounds of the 1987 Please see Pageant.

B7 By Gary A. Warner The Pittsburgh Press HARRISBURG In a move that surprised and disappointed some Pittsburgh-area Democrats, Gov. Robert P. Casey has recommended that Transportation Secretary Howard Yerusalim be named chairman of the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. County Commissioners Chairman Trim Fnerstpr and other loral rvmn.

ment on the choices," said Casey spokesman Ron Jury. Yerusalim is a registered Republican, but is counted as a Democrat on the commission because he serves in the Casey Cabinet. Casey's recommendation of Yerusalim for the largely administrative position is the first step in the reorganization of the commission under a 1985 compromise between Republicans and Democrats. Please see Turnpike. B7 crats had lobbied for the appointment of county Solicitor James J.

Dodaro, a commission member, to the job. "I was shocked well, I guess not shocked, but certainly surprised," Foerster said. While praising Yerusalim as an "outstanding person," Foerster said Dodaro would have been a better choice. "If Gov. Casey wants to tie the to economic development, there would have been no better choice than Jimmy Dodaro," Foerster said.

Dodaro could not be reached for comment. In a statement late yesterday, Casey did ask the commissioners to elect Dodaro vice chairman. The panel, which Democrats control by a 3-2 margin, is expected to ratify the governor's choices today. "There's been contact with the commissioners and there's agree.