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Mikiemoderator
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Jun-06-02, 09:47 AM (GMT)
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"Amber Swartz"
 
   http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/06/06/MN95165.DTL
Excavation at ex-priest's home
Police dig in yard at Truckee vacation house for possible remains of missing kids

Janine DeFao, Kevin Fagan and Jaxon Vanderbeken, Chronicle Staff Writers Thursday, June 6, 2002

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Truckee, Nevada County -- Bay Area police agencies mounted a massive search at the vacation home of a defrocked Catholic priest Wednesday to see if he had any connection to the disappearance of four missing Northern California girls -- including Pinole's Amber Swartz.

Using cadaver-sniffing dogs and a backhoe, authorities said they will continue to search the front and back yards of the home of accused child molester Stephen Kiesle, 55, today for any signs of human remains.

The dogs have picked up scents that indicate either human or animal remains are probably under the dirt in front of or behind the Swiss chalet-style vacation home, which sits on a quiet mountain street surrounded by pines.

Kiesle already faces charges he molested three girls 30 years ago in Fremont. But Pinole police came to Truckee after they learned he had been living 1 1/2 blocks from 7-year-old Amber Swartz at the time she vanished in 1988.

The now-retired computer consultant, whose regular home is still in Pinole, was a priest in the 1970s but was defrocked in 1978 after being convicted of child molestation.


MISSED OPPORTUNITY
Amber's mother, Kim Swartz, on Wednesday nervously awaited word of the search in the Sierra and said she was dismayed to learn from authorities that Kiesle's 1978 conviction had been legally expunged from court records before her daughter disappeared. Because of that, she said, his name never came up when police queried every child molester on file in the area after Amber was snatched from the family driveway.

"They could have sent dogs there back then, in 1988, to determine if her scent was in his home," Swartz said. "This could have given them a lot of direction back then."

Former Pinole police Sgt. Douglas MacArthur, who led the investigation in 1988, agreed.

"I know for a fact that if we had known at the time that he had been let go from a church because of molestation, it would have been very different," MacArthur said.

Swartz said she remembers seeing Kiesle in the neighborhood when she lived there with Amber, and they may have been in the same Rotary Club for a while after the disappearance.

"I only remembered him when I saw him in passing," she said. "He was just a neighbor, and he seemed like a pretty nice, gentle kind of guy."


GUARDED HOPES
Swartz said two of Kiesle's earlier alleged molestation victims looked like Amber when they were her age, which is when the alleged crimes took place. That, plus his proximity to her former home -- she hasn't lived in Pinole for years -- raised her hopes about this latest lead. But not too high, she cautioned.

Since her daughter's disappearance, several major leads have come and gone, including one in 1995 that sent detectives digging around a Richmond home in much the same manner as this latest search.

"You've just got to hold on to the seat of your pants, keep a clear head and stay calm, or you won't be able to get out of the bed in the morning," Swartz said.

In addition to officers from Pinole, Contra Costa County and Fremont, El Dorado County sheriff's deputies were on hand Wednesday to see whether Kiesle was involved in the disappearance of 11-year-old Jaycee Dugard, who was reported missing in 1991 from her home in South Lake Tahoe.

"We haven't found anything yet," said Cmdr. Scott Berry of the Truckee police, who helped in the search. "There were four or five locations on the property where dogs were interested. We focused on one of them. We are still focusing on the front yard."


'ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO THIS'
Kiesle's attorney, Bill Gagen, said his client is being smeared by overzealous investigators who acted without any firm evidence of anything.

"After they're finished digging and doing what they're going to do, they're not going to find anything, and the damage is done," he said.

"There's absolutely nothing to this," Gagen added.

"It's bad enough to be charged with things that occurred (30 years ago) and then to be related to the well-known disappearance of a child without any evidence," he said, describing Kiesle and his wife as being devastated by the unjustified scrutiny.

Kiesle has been free in lieu of $180,000 bail. Kiesle's wife, reached at their Pinole home, referred calls to the attorney.

Authorities said that in addition to seeing if Kiesle is connected to the Amber or Jaycee cases, they are searching for clues to the disappearances of two other missing Northern California girls, whom they would not identify. The parents of Michaela Garecht and Ilene Misheloff, two East Bay girls who vanished around the same time as Amber, said they had not been contacted by police.

Fremont police were the first to search Kiesle's remote vacation home on Tuesday, looking for diaries, photos and computer files in connection with the pending case against him. They recovered a small box with documents and other information they say is relevant.

Fremont police spokesman Detective Bill Veteran said Pinole police became involved after they learned Kiesle had lived down the street from Amber.

"If you've got a missing child that was the same age as the victims of a guy who lived down street, who was in the area at the time she disappeared," you need to check it out, he said.

Police found no evidence at Kiesle's Pinole home linking him to her disappearance, however, and Fremont police found nothing inside the Truckee home either.

Chronicle staff writers Mark Martin and Jim Herron Zamora contributed to this report. / E-mail the writers at jdefao@sfchronicle.com, kfagan@sfchronicle.com and jvanderbeken@sfchronicle.com.



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jamesonadmin
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Jun-06-02, 09:50 AM (GMT)
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1. "AARGHHH!"
In response to message #0
 
   Can't we PLEASE brand every sex pervert on the forehead with a record of his crimes???


This is SO WRONG!!!!!


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ourputer
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Jun-07-02, 12:33 PM (GMT)
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2. "No remains found..."
In response to message #1
 
   No remains of missing children found at defrocked priest's home
Mark Martin, Kevin Fagan, Janine DeFao, Chronicle Staff Writers
Friday, June 7, 2002
©2002 San Francisco Chronicle

URL: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/06/07/BA124797.DTL

Truckee, Nevada County -- Investigators finished digging up the yard of a defrocked Catholic priest's vacation home Thursday, and said they found no signs of the remains of four missing children from Northern California.

However, authorities said the allegations of molestation being investigated against Stephen Kiesle, 55, now involve more than a dozen people, including several from the East Bay.

Investigators, aided by cadaver-sniffing dogs and a backhoe, had been hunting around Kiesle's vacation home for clues linking him to the disappearances of four girls, including 7-year-old Amber Swartz of Pinole and 11-year-old Jaycee Lee Dugard of South Lake Tahoe. They had suspected a connection to Amber's disappearance because Kiesle lived a block and a half from the girl when she vanished in 1988.

The dogs had picked up human or animal scents around Kiesle's Swiss chalet- style home, which sits on a street where neighbors are more used to bears foraging in the pines than swarms of investigators. But after excavating holes as large as 8 feet deep and 15 feet wide, authorities gave up.

"We have nothing to show that there's anybody in the ground," said Truckee Police Cmdr. Scott Berry. If they see a need for it later, investigators may return with sonar devices, he said.

Kiesle, who still lives in Pinole, recently retired as a computer consultant at ChevronTexaco in San Ramon. He was ordained in 1972 but was stripped of his priesthood in 1981 after being convicted of child molestation.

He already faces charges he molested five children 30 years ago when he was a priest at Santa Paula Church in Fremont.

The end of the hunt dashed the latest round of hopes for Amber's mother that after 14 years, she would learn what happened to her daughter. Kim Swartz has endured several false alarms in that time, and wasn't counting on this one panning out.

"For some weird reason, even though I was surprised this thing came up involving a former neighbor who just seemed like a nice man, I really didn't feel like we were going to find anything," Swartz said. "But then you never know."

Pinole Police Cmdr. John Miner said the end of the digging is also the end of investigators' focus on Kiesle in Amber's disappearance.

"There's nothing for us to pursue the Amber case at this point, but if something comes up we'll do that," he said.

Kiesle's attorney, Bill Gagen, said the excavation was "a complete red herring."

"It's an unfortunate coincidence they (Amber and his client) were in the same neighborhood," he said. Kiesle says he knows nothing about the girl's disappearance, Gagen added.

With the excavation done, investigators now are turning their attention to the molestation cases.

Three people called Pinole police Wednesday night to say Kiesle molested them as children in mid- to late 1970s, and investigators revealed Thursday that three similar cases have cropped in the Fremont area from the mid-1990s.

In recent weeks, two other people have contacted authorities saying Kiesle molested them in Pinole in the mid-1980s, authorities said.

Combined with the charges filed last month involving incidents of 30 years ago in Fremont, the number of people involved in molestation complaints against Kiesle now totals 13.

"There will be charges filed," Berry said.

Kiesle pleaded not guilty May 20 in the decades-old Fremont cases and has been free on $180,000 bail.

Gagen said said he knew of one new molestation allegation against his client, but had no direct knowledge of others. "I think all the complaints relate to what can generally be called inappropriate touching, and nothing more," he said.

Miner said some of the allegations go beyond touching, but he would not elaborate.

Gagen also said the week's developments are taking an emotional toll on his client.

"It's bad enough having to deal with problems in your life that are a direct result of an unfortunate seminary process that takes 12- and 13-year- olds and expects them to be normal," Gagen said. Kiesle entered the seminary at 13.

"We're not contesting the fact where there was a point in his life where his hands ended up where they didn't belong," Gagen said. "We know he had a problem. (But) it was a long time ago."

Kiesle was arrested in 1978 on charges of molesting two teenage boys at Our Lady of the Rosary parish school in Union City, where he was a priest and teacher. Kiesle was sentenced to three years' probation and was defrocked in 1981.

"My only excuse for getting into this situation was that I was somehow able to convince myself that I was not hurting the children," he said at the time.

The conviction was expunged from court records before Amber disappeared, under a law that has since been changed. Because there was no record, Kiesle's name never came up when police queried every child molester on file in the area after Amber was snatched -- something that had Kim Swartz and the families of other missing children seething.

Chronicle staff writers Henry K. Lee, Ryan Kim and Charlie Goodyear contributed to this report. / E-mail the writers at mmartin@sfchronicle.com, kfagan@sfchronicle.com and jdefao@sfchronicle.com.

©2002 San Francisco Chronicle Page A - 23


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