BRIEFLY.

Byline: The Register-Guard

REGION

Police arrest man, 19,

for Siuslaw bomb threats

FLORENCE - A Portland man has been arrested on suspicion of calling in a pair of bomb threats that prompted evacuations and delays at schools in the Siuslaw School District in February.

Paul Christopher Thomas, 19, was being held Tuesday at the Florence Justice Center on misdemeanor charges of menacing, harassment and initiating a false report. Thomas was arrested late Monday in Portland by Florence officers investigating telephone threats made on Feb. 8 and Feb. 25, officials said.

Besides the two calls targeting Florence schools, police believe Thomas phoned in a separate bomb threat on Feb. 25 that resulted in the evacuation of the Florence Justice Center, city spokeswoman Jacque Morgan said.

Thomas has no known connection to the Florence area, Morgan said.

Thomas is expected to be transported today to the Lane County Jail.

NORTHWEST

Imprisoned serial killer dies of natural causes

SALEM - Serial killer Jerome Brudos, the longest-held prisoner in the Oregon State Penitentiary, died Tuesday of natural causes, state officials said. Brudos was 67.

Admitted to prison on June 27, 1969, Brudos was serving three life sentences for murdering three women in his Salem home.

In a brief news release, the state Department of Corrections said he `passed away of natural causes' at 5:10 a.m.

Brudos pleaded guilty in 1969 to the strangulation murders of Jan Susan Whitney, 23, and Karen Elena Sprinker and Linda Dawn Salee, both 19.

Oregon did not have the death penalty at the time.

Brudos, whose crimes were detailed in the Ann Rule book `Lust Killer,' expressed no remorse for the murders.