The family of Aaron Christensen, 49, a Portland resident who was shot and killed by another climber while climbing Cascade Mountain with his dog last summer, plans to file a lawsuit against the Lewis County Sheriff’s Department. Christensen went on a camping trip with his friends and left on August 19 with his 4-month-old puppy, Buzo, to visit Wallup Lake, a 10-mile round trip. But he didn’t return until the next day, and the Sheriff’s Department received reports from other hikers of the body of a man and dog halfway down the trail.<\/p>\n
The sheriff dispatched to the scene reported that the man (Christensen) had been stabbed in the chest by a tree branch and that there was no need to investigate as it was not a murder case. But two days later, Lewis County resident Isan Asvak, 20, appeared before the Sheriff’s Department and confessed to shooting Christensen. He said he was going up to meet his father, who had gone on a bear hunt near the lake with his girlfriend at the time (16), in the middle of the night, when he heard what appeared to be a mountain lion roaring and became frightened and fired a single shot at the black object.<\/p>\n
The investigation went astray again during the autopsy process. The coroner confirmed that the bullet that killed Christensen was fired from Asbak’s handgun, but he may have suffered a heart attack before being shot, and marijuana was found in his body tissue, suggesting drug addiction may have been the cause.<\/p>\n
Further complicating the matter, DNA from the puppies was found in the bullets extracted from Christensen’s body. Prosecutor Jonathan Meyer, who oversaw the case, found that the coroners dissected both Christensen and the puppy at the same time with the same instrument (surgical knife).<\/p>\n
Autopsies do not have veterinary licenses. Prosecutor Mayer told Christensen’s family in April, half a year after the incident, that if the Lewis County Sheriff’s Department had investigated the case with suspicion from the beginning as a murder case, other evidence might have come out. Park was not prosecuted as a criminal offender for reckless or negligent shooting. The Christensen family initially expressed their intention to sue the county coroner, who did not have a veterinary license, in federal district court for allegedly delaying the investigation by mutilating Pazzo’s body.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"