FF-3-67
Rick Schroeder left me & our son Tad. He never sent any child support and when asked why he said that the church would take care of it
FF-3-82
On Labor Day weekend of 1973 Mickey Touchette told us that she wanted $50.00 to purchase school supplies.
Mickey Touchette ask[ed] her mother to leave the amount open so she could fill in the amount so she could be sure of having enough money and she also said that the amount would not exceed $75.00.
Mickey Touchette took the check and fraudulently made the amount of the check for $300.00.
Mickey Touchette disappeared from us until the following Thanksgiving weekend, on the Friday night of that weekend we saw and spoke to Mickey at the Thrifty Drug Store in Ukiah, California and at this time we ask[ed] Mickey for the money and she refused to pay it back to us.
I swear the above statement is true and factual.
Charles E. Touchette
Joyce Touchette
FF-3-90
Liz Foreman [Forman]
Liz told me numerous times about how she used to be so sick, she couldn’t hold a job down, relied on her relatives for money to live on, and slept 12-16 hours a day just to escape. She often said that she felt healthy physically and mentally since coming to P. T. With her personality deviations and idiosyncrasies only a tolerant group would have been able to work with her. When she first came, her life was palm reading and stargazing. She couldn’t deal with reality, and just about went into hysterics over the thought of poison ivy, or anything not immaculate. Her sexual hangups carried once throughout her personality and her hypochondria
Laura J. [Johnston]
(Dennis Allen should write up something about her too)
Laura J.
FF-3-91
Jeanette Kerns
(Maria Katsaris)
Jeanette and I were both living in the church-sponsored dorms in Santa Rosa. This was in 1975. Jeanette was always talking about her lesbian experiences & fantasies & how much she hated men. One day she told us (myself & some of the other students at the dorms) that she would often masturbate with cucumbers and carrots wrapped in saran wrap from the refrigerator and then return them to the refrigerator. She found it very funny that we would then eat the vegetables without knowing it.
FF-3-92
I, Rita Tupper, used to know David & Donna Conn & was formerly married to Lawrence Tupper.
David Conn used to live with Elmer & Zoe Mertle and their family. They pooled all of their monies and lived communally, in El Sobrante, Ca. with some others.
David Conn used to see Donna Black (Conn) while he was still married to his wife, Iris.
David Conn & Zoe Mertle had a sexual relationship while they were both still married.
Donna Black Conn had sex with Elmer Mertle, while he was still married to Zoe.
Donna Conn had sex with Lawrence Tupper while he was still married; this took place in Donna’s home on several occasions.
The Conns used to go to all-night meetings with the Mertles where a lot of drinking took place. Pairing off occurred after the meetings – stripping took place on occasion.
Donna Conn used to call Mr. Lawrence Tupper up a lot at his home and oftentimes late at night.
FF-3-93
I, Michelle Touchette, being duly sworn, declare:
Mickey Touchette is my natural sister. When I was between the age 8 & 11 I was laying on my bed & Mickey came in & violently threw herself & a pillow over my face. I gasped to get my breath, fighting trying to get away. When she lifted the pillow from my face she was laughing hysterically. My face had turned blue from lack of oxygen, I was shaking trying to get my breath.
Mickey Touchette stole $100.00 from our parents in September of 1974.
FF-3-120
[typed]
19/July/1977
[Three lines deleted, words “Same form” substituted]
To: Jim Jones
From: Laura
Things I remember about Birdie Marable
Janey Brown – she was a diabetic patient at Birdie’s. Birdie used to do the manicuring of the patients to get their money, as she cut Janey knowing that she was diabetic and couldn’t afford to have her skin cut. The cut was infected, and then turned to gangrene before Birdie did anything about it. Janey was first taken to Hillside Hospital, where I remember the nursing staff saying the infection was due to unclean linens and lack of proper care. [Next sentence deleted: “She was then moved to Sneeds [illegible words] in Pasadena, where she died.”]
Victoria – she is Velma Darnes’ great aunt. Velma has something to say about the poor care that Birdie gave Victoria, who was crippled. As I recall, Velma said that the place wasn’t kept clean and that Birdie didn’t try to meet Victoria’s diet for her condition – (Victoria was a patient of Birdie’s for some time.)
Also, someone else in the house was diabetic, but Birdie still gave the person the same diet as others, against the doctor’s orders. I’ve forgotten which patient that applied to.
Birdie also tried to run down one of the high school students – I think it might have been Pam Bradshaw, but I’m not sure.
FF-3-141
Once when my husband and I were reminiscing about our college days, he revealed a strange episode that took place in the dorms. He told me about how Jim Cobb Jr. took his pants down @ the dormitory and verbally demanded, along with using physical force, that all the guys in his room look @ his penis.
Terry and Wayne Pietela [Pietila] were known among those who lived with them to enjoy wife and husband swapping with other couples. Unaware of this, my husband and I, who were staying @ the same trailer, became so disgusted with their sexual carrying on that we moved out as soon as we knew of their perverse activities. Terry Pietela (as was known by young victims), is a child molester. Terry attacked children in the night while they were asleep, which of course has left them mentally scarred, e.g. my closest friend, Patricia Cartmell Jr., was victimized by this woman’s perversions.
D
FF-3-143
Rick Schroeder, to whom I am married, insisted that I push a car when I was 8 months pregnant. He has a violent temper and hit me on two occasions. He told me that at one time he had a gun & went to shoot his mother’s boyfriend and she had to stop him. He has a police record for assaulting an officer. He has been heavily involved in taking illegal drugs and he has sold and bought illegal drugs. He has taken stolen goods (lumber, tools, etc.) from one Bill Driggs, and was involved in stealing an expensive generator from a construction site in Ukiah, Calif. He shot & killed a dog and I have seen Rick Schroeder hit animals because of his temper.
Debby F. Schroeder
FF-3-154, A-B
Report on Sandy Parks:
Denny has been drinking for over 1 week – Sandy says she thinks LS [Larry Swinney] or/and someone else have been talking to him.
She came home from last Weds. night meeting – and he was mad – says she wasn’t taking the girls to any new country etc. She questioned him about LS talking to him & he didn’t deny it – she told Denny to tell LS – “she would live to see her dead.”
Denny says he wants a divorce – but Sandy says he’ll never leave.
She has to drag her girls to meetings – they want to stay home with their father – the kids cry a lot now ‘cause she & Denny fight.
She says no matter how busy LS was – she always found time for Sandy’s kids (I find this hard to believe)
[page 2 of report]
Sandy says Denny talked to Larry S. last week from Ohio for about 45 min etc. Said Larry has a motorcycle and all this good stuff.
Denny says to Sandy that he knows more about PT than she does – that she is left off the board because she is not that trusted etc.
(I mentioned how trusted she was my working with Tim and things J. had told her etc.)
She’s pretty down right now – anything else I should do?
I will be flying down Sat. – so I can do my work – also we will be having a modified finance meeting (Sat. night) to go over the LA report.
FF-3-174, A-B
[This statement appears as an affidavit on this page at FF-12-A-93]
Jeanette Kerns
Husband: Jaffer Hooman
Jeanette works at St. Mary’s Hospital in Long Beach.
Jeanette was on drugs before she came to Peoples Temple. She also has a history of Grand Mall [Mal] Epilepsy and numerous suicide attempts. Shortly after coming to the church she had sex with Jim Cobb. She wrote this in a letter when I lived at Low Gap Rd.
Diana Mertle:
Told me that before she came to Peoples Temple, she went to the Seventh-day Adventist Church and she “fucked all the married men at the church.” She thought this was very funny.
Also, when she worked for this manufacturer in Redwood Valley that Kathy Tropp also worked for, she went through his things continually and read his diary. In his diary he talked about his weird sexual practices – such as liking to fuck women in the bellybutton. She also told Kathy that she was
[page 2 of statement]
sure he was fucking his goat & told of how he would go out to see the goat & would come back with goat hair “all over his pants.” Kathy said Diane had this man blackmailed. Kathy wrote all this up and knows the man’s name. Also, this guy advertised in the newspaper for women.
Ellen Dupont
FF-3-175, A-B
Ruth Kerns b.d. [birthdate] 7-4-55
1801 Baywood Ave.
Davis, Calif.
Last week Ruth went to the SF DA to make a statement against Jim and the church. She stated that at the age of 13 she was taken away from her mother and forced to live with other people. This was stated over TV #9. She had told me on the phone that this was the case and I told her that she knew this wasn’t true – that she didn’t want to live with me but had wanted to live with Houstons & Jack Beams. She was allowed to live where she wanted.
Before leaving the church, Ruth had sex with Danny Pietila and Paul Flowers. She asked Danny to have sex with her and she admitted this to me. She ran away her last year of high school, to see her Dad & then run away from there. She was on drugs & lived with a guy on H [heroin]. She joined a Jesus freak group whose headquarters are in Eureka and was kicked out of the group for being “immoral.” She got pregnant by one of Jeanette’s husband’s friends and had an abortion. She is now supposed to get married next month to some guy.
[page 2 of statement]
When Ruth called me last week, I asked to please not try to hurt us anymore. She said she doesn’t want to “hurt” us – that she wants to help “save” a lot of people from Jim. She said “You think Jim is God don’t you?” I replied, “You know that’s a damned lie, we don’t believe Jim is God – he teaches us to believe in the God within us.” She said she believes in the day of Pentecost.
Jeanette, Ruth and Phil are very thick with one another. Phil lives in Portland, Oregon. Jeanette is going to be at her wedding.
Ruth told Channel 9 that she was in her second year of nursing at Davis. But she told me that she was working as a nurse’s aide and would be going back to school next year.
She also mentioned that JJ has sex with different people.
She said New West’s article was “accurate” and she is afraid that Carol is being “beaten.”
Ruth was on drugs before we joined Peoples Temple. Jeanette said she was on drugs when she got pregnant.
Ellen Dupont
FF-3-183, A-B
[This statement appears as an affidavit on this page at FF-12-A-96.]
Jim Cobb – Use to beat on his sisters who are all younger than he (Ava, Terry, and Sandi) when we were growing up. He talked a lot about revolution, and being a revolutionary. His hatred for capitalism and that he was a communist.
Terry Cobb – When I was 7 yrs. she was 11 yr. She would molest me and never said that anything was wrong with it but she warned me never to tell my mother. When she was young she would kill tiny chickens barehanded saying that they were after her. She also killed a baby kitten for the same reason. She had a lesbian relationship with Micky [Mickey] Touchette.
Wayne Pietila – Told me that Jim Cobb should be killed for leaving the group. He said that in one of their meetings that Jim Cobb conducted he told them that if anybody was to leave the group that they were traitors for leaving. He said someday he may have to kill Jim Cobb for leaving. This was their own teaching no one introduced this to them. Wayne said that he and Jim Cobb would guard Rose with the cancer and that if anyone tried to get them away
[page 2 of statement]
because of attacks on the church at that time that they would eat the cancer. This idea was their own so-called security force ways.
Jim Cobb – use to say how much he hated white people but he was always with a white girl. Him and Terry use to fight always when they were young. She would chase him with knives, and he would constantly fight with her. It puzzles me how they are so united now.
Terry Cobb & Wayne Pietila – She use to pinch Wayne on his penis in front of myself and Johnny, Joel, and Brenda.
Jim Cobb – use to have guns with him. He would always turn to teach me to aim and shoot. I think it was not registered.
Sandi Cobb Jones
FF-3-184, A-B
[This statement appears as an affidavit on this page at FF-12-A-95.]
To whom it ever may concern;
Micki [Mickey] Touchette stated that she worked in the offering room, which was true. I, Shanda Oliver, also worked in the offering room at that time. She said we would write the count of the offering on a piece of paper and send it up to the Pastor. That statement is not true. We never, ever wrote the count down. We’d send one person, usually the same person, to tell the count. I can’t ever recall Mici taking the count to him. Then again Pastor Jones doesn’t say how much the count is, just makes an appeal when necessary.
Shanda Oliver
My sister, Silvia Upshaw, called me Monday evening July 25th, she told me that she had been harassed on her job and wanted to know how the Mertles knew where she worked. She said Diana Mertle, Mert [Elmer] Mertle, Linda Mertle & Ruth Kerns came to talk to her trying to make her come to their side, since she was a former member and left the church. They said they were trying to recruit everyone possible. They told her about beatings, faith healings and all sorts of things she stated. She said they offered her protection, if she [would] say Jim Jones had personally beat & tortured people. They warned her that the Temple would have violence there. She said she didn’t
[page 2 of statement]
know if they meant a bomb or shooting? They also stated that they were getting larger in size and knew so much about the temple than she can imagine. Silvia no longer wanted her son there at the Temple, not because of Jim Jones but because they said “violence will be done to the temple” (those are her words). She told him she didn’t want to speak for them, because she didn’t want to get involved. She also said “she didn’t leave the temple for reasons they were telling her. She left only for personal reasons.
Shanda Oliver
FF-3-185, A-B
Jeanette Kerns is my natural sister.
When she was in college in Santa Rosa she asked Deborah Evans one of the churches [church’s] other students if it would be all right if she had sex with her husband. She told Debbie she should be willing to share him.
Jeanette used to always tell me how awful men were and that I should hate them.
When I was 5 years old and my natural brother Philip Kerns was 11 or 12 years old he raped me. He did this on several occasions. He told me never to tell anyone – He tried to get me to have sex with our dog when we lived in Sanger, Ca.
Philip used to get cats and throw
[page 2 of statement]
them into big bonfires. He used to tie cans to their tails and light them on fire and enjoy watching them run and scream.
Philip used to have a paper route and whenever he wanted money he would go collect from the customers and spend it. He used to take me with him. He taught me how to hotwire my Grandpa’s truck which he used to take several times. He told me when we lived in Sanger he wanted to kill me for telling on him. The only reason he joined the Army was so that he could clear his record. He had spent several years in boys homes and Sacramento Youth Authority. He was supposed to have gone to San Quentin but he escaped from the Youth Authority. He went AWOL from the Army while he was stationed in Germany. As far as I know he is still AWOL.
[no signature, statement by Carol Kerns]
FF-3-188, A-B
[statement by Laura Johnston]
[notations on the Vicky Moore heavily annotated with many deletions]
Vicky Moore
[Annotation: “careful – they may have been interviewed in medical and school stories”] After Jimmy, Vicky’s son went to live with Judi and Norman Ijames, Vicky continue to get welfare for him, though he resided elsewhere. Judi and Norman knew nothing of the welfare till months later.
[Annotation: “Hold off”] Vicky took Tommy Ijames to an S.F. Dr. who wrote up report as part of the bill to say that Vicky was so emotional that she was obviously part of Tommy’s bedwetting problem. Her lack of interest showed up in no follow through.
[Paragraph crossed out] When Vicky was working at a Convalescent Hospital, she gave a man patient the wrong medicine then called up RVPT [Redwood Valley Peoples Temple] to get out of the mess.
[Annotation: “OK”] When Vicky was giving massage and tried to continue into sex act.
Mertles
La Shea came back from Philadelphia and lived with Mertles. He never responded to the care and support of PT because he saw so much special treatment in the Mertles’ home.
Mertles
[Annotation: “OK”] I remember hearing Deanna Mertle stated that she got sexual pleasure when she heard children screaming from pain.
[Annotation: “OK”] I remember seeing Elmer Mertle lying under the bus, while on one of PT’s summer trips, with his two teenage daughters Linda and Diane. When someone else got under the bus to sleep he physically threw them out of the compartment. Joe Wilson I think.
[Page 2 of statement]
[Annotation: “OK”] Rick Cordell. When I was new to PT and suicidal often messing myself up physically and mentally on drugs, Rick purposely tried to set up a sexual relationship, even though he was married and had many children.
[Annotation: “OK”] Jack Arnold Beam. My first 6 months living in RV, I was very confused from my friendship experiences with [several words illegible] specifically being exhorted by Rev. Jim Jones not to pursue me because of my emotional state. Jack Arnold Beam was involved with me and as result I had oral sex with him in a truck in front of his house. He was 7 or 8 years my senior but took advantage of me when I was near suicide, and very unstable emotionally.
Jack Arnold has initiated a sexual relationship with 2 minor girls at least – Mable Cordell and his wife Cindi Ponts (Beam) though he was at least 10 years their senior. He often talked about how he was very grateful that Pastor Jones had helped get him off of drugs and into a productive life. Then again when he was leaving the PT community his ethics again washed out and he beat his foster child cruelly.
FF-3-203
From: Carol Kerns
Re: Elmer Mertle
I was a house guest at the Mertles for a few weeks during the summer vacation of school. I was about fourteen years old. I knocked on Deanna and Mert’s door and they told me to come in. Elmer Mertle was standing there completely nude. I was embarrassed and started to walk out of the room and they said for me not to go, that it never bothered any of the other girls. [Handwritten insertion in different handwriting: “(I’m sure they meant both their own girls & their legal wards.)”] I still walked out because I was not raised this way. I was really young and it made me feel real bad.
Carol Kerns
FF-3-204, A-G
[This statement, as revised, appears as an affidavit on this page at FF-12-A-94]
From: Carol Kerns
Re: Ruth Kerns
My sister Ruth Kerns was always very mean to me, all through our childhood together. She used to tie me up and hit me with switches that would leave welts all over my legs and arms. She and Phillip used to gang up on me & beat me up. She used to hold me down and spit in my face. When my mom would go out and leave Ruth home to babysit with me, Ruth would go off with one of her boyfriends and leave me all alone at night when I was only 10.
When I was in fifth grade Ruth used to teach me how to kiss. I told her I didn’t want to but she told me I had to, that boys
[Page 2 of statement]
wouldn’t like me if I didn’t. So she would kiss me on my mouth for a long time and feel on me. Then when her boyfriends would come over who were much older then she would have them “practice” with me and she would watch.
Ruth used to always brag about her smoking and she gave me my first cigarettes when we lived in Sacramento. I was 10 yrs old. She used to always encourage me to mess around with boys. One time she put me in a room alone with this boy and encouraged us to have sex together. I was in the fifth grade. We just talked, but she wanted to know everything we did.
Ruth used to always, whenever
[Page 3 of statement]
she got a chance, take off all of her clothes and stand up in front of the mirror and jump up and down. She would tell me how nice her breasts were and how ugly mine were. [Next sentence struck through: “She was really hung up on her body.”] She used to mess around with lots of guys and at one time, though she didn’t think I knew it, she got pregnant from Danny Pietila and got an abortion.
Ruth always expected to get whatever she wanted. Even though she was supposed to be best friends with Robin Wages, at the time she was messing around with Danny Pietila while he and Robin were going together.
Ruth used to go into stores and steal clothes, cameras, bathing suits,
[Page 4 of statement]
cigarettes, food, a coat. This was a regular venture for her.
After Ruth left Ukiah she used to come to the Ukiah High School and harass me during my studies. She got my schedule of classes and went to my classrooms looking for me. Another time she made a big scene in the schoolyard yelling & cussing at me. I asked her to please leave me alone but she refused until I walked away and then she still followed me for a while. [Handwritten insertion in different handwriting: “She accused me of having an affair with Rev. Jim Jones. I was in 10th grade and had never even been alone with Rev. Jones. He is the most principled person I have ever known.”] She used to always tell me how much she hated my mom and wanted me to hate her too. Jeanette, my other sister, always told me this too. I used to get beat up by Ruth often because I loved my mother.
[Page 5 of statement]
I have never felt any love or concern from Ruth Kerns. She has always told me since I was very small that she hated me and wished I wasn’t her sister – She also said she wished I was dead.
Ruth used to tell us that the only way we can get rid of our enemys and make any change would [be] to kill them. She thought of herself as a revolutionary out to violently change the world.
Ruth used to work at Hacienda Hospital in Ukiah. I went to visit her one day as a candy striper. She took an old man to the shower and put him in. Then she just went and sat down. I asked if wasn’t she supposed to help him and she said yes but he would be OK. She didn’t think he would fall.
[Page 6 of statement]
I, Carol Kerns, used to visit next door to Birdie Marable’s licensed care home on Snuffin St. her front door faced Oak Street very often –
Birdie used to show me her freezers full of meat and food and brag to me that they were never empty. She was always cooking plenty of food. [Handwritten insertion in different handwriting: “She was obviously lying when she said Peoples Temple took her money and wouldn’t [illegible word] her home enough to eat.”] I saw her drunk on two occasions that I remember specifically. Her husband was staying with her in the little house off of the house. Birdie used to stay out there with him away from her patients – with no intercom either – She was drunk at one time and was screaming and shouting real loud outside her back door, yelling at her husband.
[Page 7 of statement]
She used to drive to the store and other places and leave the patients on their own. She yelled at them and insulted them frequently.
Carol Kerns
FF-3-205, A-D
I, Joyce Parks, being duly sworn, declare: that Jim Cobb Stole athletic equipment from the Ukiah High School Dept. Included were basketballs, footballs, ankle weights and different assorted clothing items.
Jim Cobb would have what he called “revolutionary” meetings and drilled on people in gorilla [guerrilla] warfare. He would insist that they call out obscenities about the government and that all “white” people were the cause of black repression. He made multiple references that he would kill the President and all government officials by bombing, murder or any other thing that would destroy the “system.” He would laugh and say it would be so good to kill “Washington, DC” and turn
[Page 2 of statement]
the world around.
Jim Cobb was also emotionally & physically extremely cruel to several different women. He would have sexual experiences with one woman and say that others came onto him and that he had no choice but to “service” them. He would not work but instead lived off these different people. On many different occasions he stole money out of my purse and would take my car for hours without asking to use it. If you questioned his whereabouts he would threaten to “kick ass” – that no one questions him and that he does as he pleases.
He would have young women have oral sexual experience with him i.e., Jan Wilsey, Mary Ruth, Sharon Cobb and
[Page 3 of statement]
myself. He in my case would make me rub his genitalia and after climax he would insist I spread it over his body with my hands and mouth. He would insist on having intercourse into my rectum and forcefully hold me down to the point of bruising my arms and tell me that I was perverted for not doing these weird sexual practices. I was to the point of losing my mind – he would threaten to beat me and on occasion did if I told anyone what he did. He also would stand over me while I was sleeping like a madman and would laugh hysterically about frightening you.
Jim Cobb decided he wanted to go into dentistry. He said he would use his race
[Page 4 of statement]
to get into school – that he didn’t have to go through channels but that he would use anyone or anybody to graduate so he could make money off of people.
FF-3-208A
Birdie Marable
I worked for Birdie Marable in her rest home on and off for a year. She called me to sit only when she wanted to go to a Party and get drunk. Many times I would have to stay over and take care of Birdie & her patients. Birdie was very cruel to her Patients. I talked to her about treating them cruel. Cussing at them and snatching them around. She wouldn’t comply. So I’d try to help them a lot. She was always borrowing money from them between paydays. If they wouldn’t give it to her she’d cuss at them. I can’t ever recall seeing her pay the money back.
One day her husband was on leave from the hospital. He had a liver ailment. That day they both had been drinking. All of a sudden Birdie ran in the house and told me to come with her because she thought she had killed that son of a bitch (speaking of her husband). When I walked into the back house, her husband was on his knees with his head in a puddle of blood. I asked him what was wrong he was unable to tell me. I washed him up and asked her to get a doctor for him. She wouldn’t call a doctor. She said, “if the doctor came he would report it.[“] I cleaned him & bandaged him up to the best of my knowledge. Two days later she submitted him back to the hospital.
If Patients would urinate on themselves she would just let them soak in their urine. If they had special diets, she’d feed them anything. Such as chitterlings & porkchops, mostly what she liked. These are some of the worst things she’s done to her patients. I can go on & on about the cruelty of her in her rest home in Ukiah.
Annie McGowan
FF-3-209, A-D
I, Robert Johnson, know Birdie Marable. [handwritten addition in another hand: “I previously worked for BM in ’74 helping the patients [illegible words]”]
I know how she refused to give allowance to one of her patients. Ella Mae Hoskins. Birdie would keep Ella Mae’s money on herself. I know Birdie had money in the bank and different times I was with Birdie when she would buy clothes, food & whatever she wanted. Birdie drank constantly when I would go by in the morning Birdie would be drinking and at night when it was time for the patients to go to bed Birdie would be drunk.
[Page 2 of statement]
[next sentence crossed out] This boyfriend of Birdie beat her there @ the house w/ the patients present.
Another lady, Velma Darnes, had an aunt who was a bed patient at Birdie Marable’s. Birdie let this patient stay wet & dirty. Birdie took money from her. This lady wanted to leave Birdie’s home but Birdie refused to let the woman leave.
[paragraph crossed out]
[page 3 of statement]
Another lady Annie Washington was a patient of Birdie’s. Annie did not receive proper medical care. BM did not take her to the doctor when she needed to go. One [In] fact, she did not take care of any of the patients like they needed to be. She did not change bedding on time. BM talk rough to her patients, especially when she was drunk.
When her husband came to visit, she put him in a small cabin at the back of the house. She would whip him w/ her fists & one time she hurt him bad enough to send him to the hospital.
Birdie told me that she had $300.00 from Mrs. LeTourneau, another patient, which she borrowed to get an abortion. I’m fairly certain she never paid Mrs. LeTourneau back.
A man lived at the care home who
[page 3 of statement]
was Birdie’s boyfriend. She said she wanted to marry him except she was already married. He used to beat her up when other patients were present.
FF-3-210
When I lived in Oakland, Jim Cobb had weekend parties & was very aloof from the rest of the groups.
FF-3-211, A-B
Jim Cobb –
At a dormitory meeting in 1972 he pulled down his fly & flopped out his penis & said to all of the boys in the meeting, “see [illegible word] have a little dick.” One of the other students said, “Jim why do you always expose yourself like that.”
His patterns were very sloppy, slept in the living room, left his dishes on the floor & books scattered about.
Once when walking to the bus stop we were both behind Mickey Touchette. Jim Cobb turned to me & indicating Mickey’s rear end said “something
[page 2 of statement]
is wrong with her pussy.”
Made sexual overtures to almost every female student in the dorms.
Larry S.
Mickey Touchette would aspirate air into her vagina & expel it. She demonstrated this for groups of other students.
Elsie Victoria Moore – Tommy Ijames her son was living with me during the summer of 1976. Tommy went home to spend some time with Vicky. When he came back, Thomas told me that he walked into a room and witnessed his mother sexually molesting his younger brother. Anita K. [Kelley]
FF-3-212, A-B
I, Evelyn M. Eichler, being duly sworn, declare:
Ruth Kerns used to stay in my home for a year. At first she seemed to be a very nice person. Later I found that she was a person engrossed with sexual deviation and her temper became violent when she was mad about something. She used to tell me how she would have oral sex with her boyfriends and how she would cheat on each one. She tried to encourage me to do these types of things with her, but I was totally shocked with her behavior and refused to participate.
We started to get into many arguments. She got mad at my sister Erin Eichler, who was only 11 yrs old, and pulled a sharp knife on her, threatening to cut her and said that she would kill her. Those of us at the house stepped in and she backed off from the argument. That night she packed her things and left in her car. I had a bicycle at home which she used to ride a lot. Ruth and her brother Philip
[page 2 of statement]
came back to our house several days later in the evening pounding on our door demanding the bicycle, which was mine, and shouting all kinds of obscenities at me when I wouldn’t give it to her.
My mother, Tish Leroy, was very ill in bed at the time, and Ruth’s brother Philip pushed his way through the door demanding to talk with her. I told him she was sick, but he went into her room and accused her of stealing Ruth’s check from her job at Hacienda Convalescent Hosp. She told him that we had nothing of Ruth’s and had to argue with him until he finally left after making all kinds of threatening remarks, like she would “get it” soon, he would “get us” for taking this check. Later we ask the hosp and found that Ruth had personally picked up all of her checks, that none had been sent in the mail, so we couldn’t possibly have taken a check which she received after leaving the house. Ruth is a sadistic person who doesn’t know how to stop lying.
FF-3-214, A-B
[Editor’s note: The author of this statement is Anita Kelley. This statement appears as an affidavit on this page at FF-12-A-79.]
Linda Mertle reported to me that she observed her dad Elmer Mertle having a sexual affair with Sandy Rozynhko who was a minor.
Mike Kelley constantly used drugs – anything he could get hold of – marijuana, etc. He used to tell doctors that he couldn’t sleep and persuade the doctor to give him narcotics for fictitious chronic headaches and barbiturates for sleep. Mike then shared these drugs with others that he had persuaded to take them with him. Mike also told me that he sexually molested a 15-year-old girl in Los Angeles. He was 28 at the time.
Jim Cobb, Terri Cobb and Wayne Pietila imposed strict rules and heavy mental stress on the other students in the dorms, yet they took special exceptions for themselves, excusing it because they were “Leadership.” Not only did they berate the light-skinned people to degrade themselves, but they also harassed the Black people to get them to express racism.
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Deanna Mertle stated that she was sexually attracted to Sandy Rozynko, a minor. One night Deanna Mertle called PT and stated that there were certain children in her home that she no longer wanted there, and she brought them to the Temple – clothes and all – and left without speaking to anyone about the care or welfare of these children. Among the children she dropped off were three of her own – Linda Faye Mertle, Steve Mertle, and Eddie Mertle. Deanna kept 3 children at home. Sandy Rozynko, Diana Mertle and Lillie Victor, a Black teenager who Deanna kept out of school at the 11th grade level and made her stay home and do the housework and watch the youngest child Daphene Mertle. Lillie expressed resentment later to me about this because the white children in the home were allowed to go to school while she was deprived of her education and made to serve the others. Lillie later left the Mertle household on her own after she became 18 years old.