The Last Time We Saw Her Page 5

  Diana Simpson, a spokesperson in the investigation, said that initially no one in law enforcement had spoken to this young woman. Like everyone else, they had read about it for the first time on May 27 when Birky and Raethke mentioned the incident in the Gazette-Times. It was only after that, that law enforcement was able to contact the young woman.

  CPD captain Bob Deutsch told reporters, “If indeed there was some connection between the two cases, especially if the vehicle had some connection to one of our persons of interest, then we’d have some really hot leads.” Deutsch did not say who the particular person of interest was or why the type of vehicle mentioned was important. But he did add that as of June 1, there were five persons of interest whom they were still looking at. And then he admitted that the detectives were starting to shorten their hours of working on Brooke’s case. About this aspect, Diana Simpson said, “It’s a bad situation, but there are still good motivated spirits. They want to work hard and be successful at this.”

  So did Brooke Wilberger’s parents. On the afternoon of June 1, Brooke’s family members and close to five hundred people gathered in front of the Benton County Courthouse in Corvallis for a prayer vigil. Larry Blake, bishop of the Veneta Ward of LDS, prayed for Brooke’s safe return. He thanked God for the good weather that helped searchers and thanked all the volunteers for their efforts. Blake declared, “We are so grateful for the blessing of unity. We have felt this week the oneness in searching for Brooke. So much has been donated. So many of the communities have given so much.”

  Ron Noble noted on that same day that the number of volunteers on June 1 had shrunk to around two hundred. At its peak there were well over a thousand people searching at any given time. Hope may have been waning in the community at large, but the Wilberger family was still staying strong in this regard. Cammy Wilberger told the volunteers, who had shown up at the stake center in Corvallis that day, “We feel the love.”

  In fact, help came in from multiple directions. By that time two regional cable companies were airing public service announcements about Brooke. These announcements reached 1.5 million cable viewers in Oregon, Northern California, and Southern Washington. A website on the Internet about Brooke’s case had 120,000 hits in the previous week.

  The newest areas searched were along the southern border of Highway 20/34, east of the Willamette River, and on some private property near Payne Road and Highway 99W. The reason that property was being searched was because of a tip phoned in by a psychic. Like many of the other tips by psychics, however, this one also came up empty, as far as anything relating to Brooke Wilberger.

  Despite their optimism, the Wilberger family knew that the search effort could not go on forever. On Friday, June 4, the Wilbergers asked for one last major search over the upcoming weekend. They asked landlords to search vacant buildings, vacant lots, and backyards. Greg Wilberger declared, “We really need your help. Then we can be at peace. We’ll let the Lord take care of it after that.”

  Even the Wilberger family was trying to get back to some degree of normality by that point. Cammy had spent the previous day correcting her third-grade students’ papers and writing report cards. It was one small attempt to bring some ordinary structure to her life. She said that she missed her students and they missed her. One little boy in her class told her that he’d been a good boy while she was away.

  In this last rush of searching, two hundred tips came in over a twenty-four-hour period. And it was learned by the media that one “person of interest” had gone beyond that designation. His name was Sung Koo Kim, a thirty-year-old unemployed micro-biologist who lived in Tigard, Oregon. Kim had recently been arrested for stealing female students’ panties at George Fox University in Newberg, Oregon. Additionally, he had also been arrested for stealing female students’ panties from Sackett Hall on the Oregon State University campus in Corvallis. When Kim was arrested, officers seized more than one thousand items of evidence. What they found absolutely stunned them and they began to wonder if at last they had found the person who had abducted Brooke Wilberger.

  CHAPTER 6

  KIM

  The incident with Sung Koo Kim came to light when a student named Beth observed an Asian male entering Macy Residence Hall on George Fox University in Newberg, Oregon, on April 22, 2004. Macy Hall was a female-only dormitory on campus. Beth saw the Asian male, who appeared to be about thirty years old, walk up to the third floor of the dormitory and then down the hall. Beth later told police, “The man was acting suspiciously and would not look at anyone in the face.”

  Detective Todd Baltzell, of the Newberg Police Department (NPD), contacted Beth and she told him of her concerns. Around the same time Baltzell contacted other female students who attended George Fox University. One of these was a young woman named Lacey, and she, too, spoke of an Asian man who had been at Macy Hall on April 18, at about 5:00 P.M. Lacey had gone to the laundry room in the dorm and saw an Asian man kneeling down looking into a dryer. When he caught a glimpse of her, he immediately stood up and left the building in a hurry. Lacey didn’t notify police about this until two other female students reported some of their undergarments missing.

  Because of the missing undergarments and reports by Beth and Lacey about a strange Asian man who seemed to be prowling around the women’s dormitory, Detective Baltzell went to George Fox University to talk in person with these women. He eventually contacted Beth and Lacey, along with female students named Jenna, Whitney, Stephanie, and Meredith. Whitney told him that on April 18, at around five o’clock, she noticed that her track uniform and two bras were missing from her laundry load. She checked the laundry basket and the washer and dryer, to no avail. Whitney was sure that she had not misplaced them somewhere, and the last time she saw them they had been in the dryer. She said that the top of her track uniform was a blue spandex top with GFU in gold lettering on the front. The bottom part of the uniform was blue spandex with a white stripe down the side. She was missing two new bras, size 32A, with a bow in the middle.

  Jenna told Baltzell that she was sure she was missing a Victoria’s Secret black strapless bra, size 36C. She was also missing a pair of hot pink Victoria’s Secret panties and a beige pair of Victoria’s Secret panties. She was confident that she hadn’t misplaced these items.

  Stephanie reported that three weeks previously she had noticed that she was missing three brand-new white bras, size 36B, a black spandex thong-type pair of panties, and a beige spandex thong-type pair.

  Beth told the detective that on April 22 she’d spied the Asian man walk into Macy Hall behind a group of female students. She was pretty sure the man was not a student at the university, so she followed him. She walked behind him up a stairway and then all the way down a hallway. He was acting so strangely that she decided to call security from the room of a fellow student she knew.

  Security requested that Beth keep watching the man to see where he was going. She went out the door of the hallway and down some stairs, but she didn’t see him anymore. She stood outside the building for about a minute and a half, when suddenly the man came into view. She called out to him, “Hey!” But he just grunted and walked right past her.

  Now Beth was very alarmed. She went up to a dorm window of a student named Meredith and rapped on the window. When Meredith went to investigate what was happening, Beth told her about the strange man, and they both were soon on his tail. Beth and Meredith followed him through campus and out to a parking lot, where the Asian man got into a black Honda Accord and then drove away. Beth memorized the letters on the license plate, while Meredith memorized the numbers. Then they repeated to themselves what they recalled. It was after this incident that Beth contacted the Newberg PD.

  Detective Baltzell had the various young women walk him through every location where they had spotted the strange man. Baltzell asked Beth if the man had asked her for directions. She said no. Baltzell asked if he seemed to be lost. Once again she said no, and added that he seemed to be “walking purposefully.
”

  Lacey took Detective Baltzell to the laundry room in the dorm and showed him the dryer where the man had been kneeling down, looking inside the dryer. When she first spotted him, she thought he might have been a repairman. His hands were actually in the dryer. She passed him and threw something into a garbage can nearby. When she did so, he immediately got up and hurried out of the laundry room.

  It was this strange behavior that made her think that he wasn’t a repairman, after all. She followed him down the hall to see what he would do next. He left the hall in a hurry. Her description of him was an Asian man about five-ten, 175 pounds, clean shaven, no glasses, and no noticeable scars or tattoos.

  After interviewing these students, Detective Baltzell got the identity of the owner of a Honda with the license plate that Beth and Meredith had memorized. It turned out to be Sung Koo Kim, born on April 17, 1974, and now living in Tigard, Oregon. Baltzell requested a photo of Kim from the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Baltzell later arranged this photo with five others in what he termed a “throw down.” (More commonly known as a photo lineup.)

  On May 7, 2004, Detective Baltzell showed the photo lineup to Beth. Within five seconds of looking at the photos, Beth picked out the photo of Sung Koo Kim as the man she had seen on campus. On May 11, Baltzell showed Lacey the photo lineup. She wasn’t certain if the man she had seen was in the photo array.

  Because of what he’d learned from these women, especially Beth picking out Sung Koo Kim from the photos, Detective Baltzell contacted Detective Hocken, of the Tigard Police Department (TPD). Hocken looked through records and discovered a report from the Portland Police Department (PPD) about Sung Koo Kim. Kim was a suspect in a daytime burglary on the Lewis & Clark College campus. Security found him there with some female undergarments, and they escorted him off campus. He wasn’t arrested at the time, merely told to leave the area.

  On May 12, 2004, Detective Baltzell drove to Kim’s address and noticed a black Honda in the driveway—with the license plate that Beth and Meredith had memorized. Baltzell also wrote down pertinent information about the house in preparation for requesting a search warrant. When he made the request, he noted that he had been a full-time officer with the TPD for nine years, and had over eleven hundred hours of training. His current duties included narcotics and sex abuse crimes. In that regard he had investigated over one hundred sex-related crimes.

  Baltzell stated that he knew from his experience and training that an individual who was into fetishes would often take panties, bras, lingerie, or stockings. Baltzell wrote: A person who does burglary to obtain undergarments to satisfy an arousal is known as a fetish burglar and is often considered extremely dangerous because in many circumstances the fetish burglary is a prelude to a sexual assault or lust murder.

  It was this combination of burglary and female intimate items that made Sung Koo Kim appear potentially dangerous in Detective Baltzell’s eyes. He wanted something done about the situation before a serious crime occurred. Baltzell put in his search warrant request to a judge and was eventually given the go-ahead to search and seize items at the Kim household. Within the warrant Baltzell was to look for the specific items mentioned as missing by the George Fox University female students.

  When the Tigard police searched Kim’s residence on May 13, they were stunned to find that he was in possession of more than one thousand pairs of women’s undergarments. This evidence was collected and Sung Koo Kim was arrested on burglary charges. At that point it was a fairly minor crime.

  Things were about to change, however. Once the news about Brooke Wilberger broke, the Tigard PD sent information on to the Oregon State Police, which then contacted the Corvallis Police Department. Lieutenant Phillip “Phil” Zerzan, of the Oregon State University Police Department (OSUPD), was also contacted about Kim. Zerzan informed CPD on May 28 that one of the undergarments in Kim’s possession was a pair of underwear with a label that said, Sackett Hall, OSU, First Floor. The underwear had belonged to a young female student named Stacey. She had noticed that some of her underwear had gone missing from the laundry room earlier, so that’s why she had made a tag about Sackett Hall. And then those underwear had been stolen as well.

  On May 28, Trooper Timothy Gallagher, of the OSP, contacted Stacey. She told him that a month previously six pairs of her panties had disappeared from a laundry load. Her roomate, Ashley, also had some underwear that disappeared. Detective Todd Baltzell contacted Stacey and Ashley, and they were able to identify underwear that Sung Koo Kim had possessed.

  Trooper Gallagher then spoke with Detective Kenneth Pecyna, of the OSP. Pecyna had been a detective since 1986 and had investigated major crimes, including murders, rapes, sexual assaults, and burglaries. He informed Gallagher that in cases involving the theft of women’s underwear, many times trace evidence on the underwear could identify the owner. This evidence included hairs, body fluids, and secretions. All of these could be traced by DNA back to the rightful owner.

  Detective Pecyna also told Gallagher that women’s undergarment thieves would often clandestinely observe their victims by use of cameras, video recorders, and cell phones that had camera capability. These images were often downloaded to a computer so that the thief could then connect the victim to the undergarments he had stolen. These types of photos were also stored on CDs and DVDs. It was a way of keeping a permanent record of items and victims, and also of reliving the scenario.

  Gallagher learned from Detective Eric Ronning, of the NPD, that Kim’s computer had been seized during the implementation of the search warrant. Gallagher also learned that other computers in the house had not been seized, nor had items in Sung Koo Kim’s Honda.

  Gallagher learned one more thing as well. Law enforcement had seized receipts, tickets, credit card information, and ATM slips, and a few of these proved that Kim had taken trips to Corvallis. Gallagher noted on one report that in his experience a person often would keep more receipts in his vehicle, especially in the glove box. Also, trace evidence might be found in a vehicle as well.

  With that in mind Gallagher wrote up a probable-cause report, asking for a new search warrant on Sung Koo Kim’s residence: I believe that evidence of the crime of burglary in the second degree and thefts will be found at Sung Koo Kim’s residence in Tigard, Oregon. Also evidence may be found in a vehicle; to wit, a 1991 black Honda Accord.

  Then there was one more chilling notation. Gallagher wrote, Detective Ronning indicates that when they executed their search warrant, Mr. Kim had substantial rifles and pistols, all of which were loaded and ready for immediate use. Gallagher said that based on that, he requested a nighttime search and seizure by officers, because Kim might either be asleep or very drowsy. This might aid in keeping the officers safe during a raid upon the house.

  In the early-morning hours of Saturday, May 29, 2004, the search and seizure in Tigard took place, and it wasn’t by just a few uniformed officers going in with a search warrant. An entire SWAT team descended upon the Kim residence and arrested Sung Koo Kim. His parents and sister, who had no idea what was taking place or why, were absolutely traumatized. Luckily for everyone involved, Sung Koo Kim did not pick up any weapons before being handcuffed and taken to jail.

  The actual items seized were as varied as the list was long. From the top shelf of the entertainment room, a box full of bras and panties was seized. From the top of a refrigerator, the officers got a digital camera, and from a bedroom table, a laptop computer. From Sung Koo Kim’s parents’ room, they seized a computer tower. Other items included a black spiral notebook, twenty CDs, seven floppy disks, three commercially packaged videos, twenty-three unmarked videotapes, a cell phone with a camera, and a Sony Handycam. There were various receipts seized as well from all over the house, and a pair of female panties taken from an outdoor garbage can. Two items were of particular interest. One was a book, The Beginners’ Guide to Lock Picking; the other was what appeared to be a bloodstain on the garage floor.

  Sung Koo Kim
’s vehicle also came in for search and seizure. The officers took the floor mats and the mat from the trunk as well. A screwdriver was taken, various gas receipts, a pair of scissors, and a blue surgical mask. Prints were lifted from the dashboard, seat backs, and side windows.

  The Salem Statesman Journal soon began tying Kim’s arrest to the Brooke Wilberger case. In headlines the newspaper proclaimed POLICE ARREST MAN IN 19-YEAR-OLD’S DISAPPEARANCE. Beneath the headline was a photo of Brooke Wilberger. The Statesman Journal also related that a SWAT team consisting of the Oregon State Police, Newberg PD, and Corvallis PD were in on the early-morning arrest of Kim. And yet it was with a note of caution that CPD lieutenant Ron Noble stated that Kim was “only a person of interest” in Brooke’s disappearance, and not under arrest for that incident.

  After Sung Koo Kim was arrested, he didn’t stay behind bars for very long. Even though his bail was set at $1.5 million, his parents were able to raise over $150,000 in bond money to spring him from jail. This covered the bail amount for the charges in Yamhill and Benton counties. Kim was now free until trial.

  Sung Koo Kim obtained an attorney, Michael Greenlick, of Portland. Because of the possible ties to the Brooke Wilberger abduction, there were plenty of reporters interested in Kim now. Greenlick told the media that Sung Koo Kim had been born in South Korea, but he had moved with his family to the United States when he was very young. Greenlick added, “Mr. Kim had nothing to do with Brooke Wilberger’s disappearance. He is just a target of police speculation.”

  Michael Greenlick was not Kim’s attorney for long, however. Since Kim’s parents, Joo and Dong, had spent so much money on bailing him out of jail, they didn’t have enough now to pay for Greenlick’s future attorney fees. Sung Koo Kim had to take on public defenders Janet Lee Hoffman and Joseph O’Leary as his lawyers.