Shining the light on Shasta's long journey

This isn’t so much a book review as it is a revelation. Greg Olsen’s book, "Out of the Woods," written with Shasta Groene, is profound. Yes, there are parts that are hard and uncomfortable to read and insight into the past two decades of Shasta’s life journey, but what I took away from the book is simply this ... awe at what resilience and strength an 8-year-old could possess and respect for the 28-year-old woman, now a mother, who tells her story, finally.

For those of us who were here when the horrific tragedy unfolded and lived here through the challenges she faced on every front, growing up in the public eye as “that girl,” the one who was kidnapped when her family was murdered, she humbles me. Her desire to be heard, to have a normal life, is not too much to ask.
The little girl I wrote about in my column (reprinted below) two decades ago is still standing, still dreaming, still doing much more than just putting one foot in front of the other. Shasta didn’t owe us her story, but I think we owe her the respect of knowing it, on her terms, in her words. We see you, we hear you Shasta ... finally.

Main Street, July 13, 2005

With the first news of a horrific triple murder and two young children kidnapped in the dead of night, it’s been hard to fathom that something like that could happen here. Although it’s rather unreasonable to think that bad things only happen to other people who live in other towns with names national newscasters mispronounce. We all waited for news we knew would not be good and speculated on who could have done such a thing and why they would do such a thing and where could those innocent young children be ... and how their families must suffer the not knowing.

I’ll admit that it seemed somewhat removed from my life and the life of my friends and neighbors who don’t live life on the fringes of the drug culture or have arrest records. Surely that was the motive or at least an explanation for the unexplainable, that allowed us to sleep at night.

Then miracle of miracles, little Shasta Groene was rescued and we had a brief fleeting moment to rejoice, as long as we didn’t think too much about the tragic, horrible fact that she’d been nearly two months in the clutches of a genuinely evil and perverted predator and that her brother, Dylan, was nowhere to be found. He would be found and then it became too awful again to imagine what unspeakable terror Shasta must have survived and that Dylan did not.

Joseph Duncan has visited a lifetime of sorrow and tragedy on three families. He’s unsettled an entire community and stolen a bit of innocence from thousands of our children. Because of him, I’ve visited www.isp.state.id.us/so_viewer/search.jsp and discovered there are 58 registered sex offenders in my 83854 zip code, 74 in 83814, 26 in 83835 and 24 in 83858. I studied their pictures and for the most part, they look like anyone you might see at the grocery store and gas station, just like Joseph Duncan.

As darkness fell on this warm summer evening, I realized I no longer felt safe sitting under the stars on my backyard patio. Too many trees and shrubs and shadows ... too much evil made all too real in recent weeks.

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The Aug. 31 deadline to register for the Sept. 6 Coeur d’Alene High School 50+ All Class reunion is coming soon. Here’s the website to register: https://bit.ly/4lDlH5M

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Happy birthday today to Mary Condie, Nancy Scofield, Elaine Carda, Louise Gillespie, Christina Gardner, Gene Colley and Art Elliott. Tomorrow, Crystal Shofner-Moore, Jared Phay, Matthew Behringer (40!) and Doris McCaulley mark another year. On Friday, Ed Hatter, Brett Seright, Leanne Campbell, Mary Gomer, Cathy Smith, David Walrath, Cecilia Peterson and Lilliana Raynor blow out the candles. Saturday celebrations for Art Flagan, Susie Heitstuman, Debbie Berger, Bobby Bunch, Donnie Goodnature and Rod Robins. On Sunday, Peggy Turrell, Karen Sorbel, Mike Dodge, Linda Fox, Lori Chissie, Sarah Rasmussen and Eric Burgeson blow out the candles. JJ Jaegar, Jeff Selle, Ali Shute, Angie Penzkover, Rhonda Budvarson, Staci Anderson, Cindi Carlson, Jack Mannschreck and Lydia Myers take another trip around the sun Monday. On Aug. 26, Sofia Armstrong (Sweet 16!), Pam Grenny, Cam Crollard, Juilianne Rinard, Perry Peterson, Warren Bakes, Irene Watkins, Troy Blood, Lita Balbin and Phil Higgs will celebrate.

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Kerri Rankin Thoreson is a member of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists and the former publisher of the Post Falls Tribune. Main Street appears every Wednesday in The Press and Kerri can be contacted on Facebook or via email [email protected].