Santa Cruz Sentinel from Santa Cruz, California • Page 6

A-6 Saturday, May 8, 1999 Sentinel Group homes Woman had account, ATM numbers of slain tourist, investigators say Information was in Carole Sund's wallet, found after her death first-aid training and that packaged meat was not dated. Under the agreement, completed April 22, the Hand in Hand adoption and foster-care programs in Santa Cruz will beon probation for two years. Barnes said he is working to accelerate adoption or place the remaining 12 children in foster-care homes. Meanwhile, the homes are not accepting new placements, he said. The pending closure saddened a former group home resident who said Barnes was known for "saving children." "This guy has done a heck of a job with kids," said Mike Cossey, 28, of San Jose: "It really isn't fair." In a separate action, state licensing officials have barred a man from Newell Creek Group Home in Ben Lomond, which is unrelated to Hand in Hand, after allegations he smoked marijuana and had sex with the children.

Investigators said Arturo "Tootie" Castillo, the son of group-home operators Evie and Rosemary Castillo, offered marijuana in exchange for sex. He also allegedly went into the children's bedroom at night in June and July 1997 and asked two children for oral sex. He allegedly smoked marijuana with one of the children. In February, Castillo agreed to not contest the licensing board's allegations, according to state records. State officials barred him from the home and all other licensed care facilities and their clients.

Castillo and his lawyer could not be reached to comment. It could not be determined if Castillo is under criminal investigation. Mordy said there was no evidence that Castillo's parents knew about the alleged abuse. "We removed the perpetrator. In way, we were able to salvage the facility," she said.

Continued from Page A1 Barnes, who has run group homes in Santa Cruz County since 1972. State social-service investigators contend that from December 1995 to August 1997, a boy at one of the homes sexually assaulted three other children. The boy was punished after one incident but a week later was allowed to go to the park with one of the victims without an adult accompanying them, state investigators said. Investigators said the same boy had sex with an 8-year-old boy, and that the house parents didn't report the incident as required. In other incidents, investigators said several boys engaged in sexual touching, including two boys who had been reported for previous sexual incidents.

Another boy reportedly crawled into the beds of two other children and threatened them to keep them from saying anything. The boy had been removed from his home for sexually molesting a younger sibling. Barnes said the homes had accepted children with histories of sexual abuse, knowing they were difficult children, because there weren't other options for them. State investigators said they found other problems at the Hand in Hand homes, including piles of dead ants in a refrigerator, a torn mattress, a bathroom ceiling in danger of collapsing, torn furniture, missing and dirty window screens and a bedroom that was cluttered and needed vacuuming. Barnes said the allegations were "isolated incidents" found over many years of operation.

"We run good houses, high-level houses. We could probably go into any home and find those kinds of things," he said. As part of the agreement with the state, Barnes admitted the bedroom floor needed vacuuming, that house parents lacked and Paiz, who was already incarcerated on an unrelated state parole violation, are charged in the 75-count indictment with massive mail theft. According to the indictment, checks and credit cards stolen from the mail were altered and ultimately converted to cash by Campbell and Paiz. In some instances, they deposited stolen checks into bank accounts opened under false names and wrote checks on the accounts to themselves or for merchandise.

Among the items they purchased were motorcycles, said Postal Inspector Randy Griffin, a key investigator in the mail theft case. "They liked Harleys," he said. Carole Sund, 42, her daughter Juli, 15, and their friend Silvina Pelosso, 16, were last seen alive Feb. 15 at the Cedar Lodge in El Portal, on the western edge of Yosemite National Park. A portion of Carole Sund's wallet turned up on a Modesto street three days later, but it was not until March 18 that the trio's charred rental car was found near the Tuolumne County community of Long Barn.

The car's trunk held the burned bodies of Carole Sund and Pelosso. Juli Sund's body was found a week later on a hillside path about 30 miles away. Three sources close to the investigation said a search of Campbell's residence by a task force investigating the mail theft scheme yielded information relevant to the Yosemite case. They said that, among other things, Campbell had information off of Carole Sund's check identification and ATM cards. At the time of the search, Campbell made "incriminating statements" linking herself to the men being questioned in connection with the deaths of the travelers, a federal source said.

By CYNTHIA HUBERT and DENNY WALSH The Sacramento Bee SACRAMENTO A woman recently indicted in an elaborate mail theft scheme had the checking account and automatic teller machine numbers of Carole Sund, who was abducted and killed along with her daughter and a young traveling companion during a trip to Yosemite, investigators confirmed this week. The Modesto woman, Rachel Lou Campbell, 36, is trying to negotiate a plea deal with authorities and is a key witness in the ongoing murder investigation before a grand jury in Fresno, where she is being held without bail, according to three sources close to the case. Investigators believe that others took information from Sund's ATM and check identification cards and gave it to Campbell with the intention of creating check facsimiles bearing Sund's account number. The cards were in a portion of Sund's wallet that a citizen found on a Modesto street three days after the sightseers disappeared. The bodies of the Eureka mother, her daughter Juli and their young Argentinean friend Silvina Pelosso were found about a month later in two different locations.

Campbell's lawyer, Frank Carson of Modesto, denied that his client had possession of Sund's account numbers or that she has any involvement in the case. "I believe that to be absolutely false," said Carson. He said Campbell "might have some pe ripheral knowledge" of the suspects, but she "knows nothing about any murder." Campbell, authorities said, is not a suspect in the slayings but is associated with a group of parolees with a history of violence and drug abuse who are under suspicion. At least two of the men, Eugene Dykes and Michael Larwick, have been questioned extensively about the murders and are being held without bail on unrelated charges while the grand jury investigation continues. Larwick and Dykes are half brothers who are well known to authorities and recently were involved in separate standoffs with Modesto police.

Investigators refused to disclose whether they have physical evidence linking the men or anyone else directly to the murders. Campbell was an accomplished forger who used sophisticated equipment to bilk individuals and businesses in the San Joaquin Valley of hundreds of thousands of dollars, a top investigator in the case said. An indictment returned last month details the alleged purchase by Campbell and Ben Alex Paiz of a "go cart" with a check stolen from the mail. A joint investigation by local and federal authorities tied Campbell to the Yosemite case, and she began talks with prosecutors through her attorney even before her arrest, authorities said. Campbell and Paiz were indicted April 2 by a federal grand jury in Sacramento.

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