Human trafficking awareness urged

POLSON – As a victim of child sexual abuse, Grace Manchala has a heart for child victims of sex trafficking. 

Manchala spoke about her passion to shed light on the problem before the Lake County Pachyderm Club on Friday, May 26. 

Growing up in India, Manchala suffered from abuse from a relative and later married a man who ran escort services that used women ages 17-25, she said. 

So she divorced him, even though she had a young daughter at the time. “The Holy Spirit said I needed to get out. God said, ‘I’m going to be your provider’,” she said, so she took a “step of faith,” applied for the Youth with A Mission program and was accepted. 

“So much healing happened in my life. I’ve been with (YWAM) since 1993,” said Manchala, who later married YWAM Minister Raju Manchala. 

“My passion is to see we have new laws to protect our girls, boys and women who are vulnerable to the traffickers,” Grace said, noting that victims are not just used for sex but also for labor and their organs. 

Sex trafficking has come to Northwest Montana, she said, citing one example of a 9-year-old girl she met who had been plagued by evil spirits, was cutting herself and bulimic. The girl had been gang raped so she had trouble being in fellowship with people, Grace said. 

In an effort to combat such violence, the Manchalas held a five-hour training in Kalispell recently that involved 42 law enforcement officers and five chaplains. They will host a similar sex trafficking awareness seminar from 6-9 p.m. on Monday, June 12, at Polson High School.

The event will include presentations by Sgt. Jeanne Parker of the Flathead County Sheriff’s Office and Det. Guy Baker of the Missoula Police Department. It’s free and open to the public. 

Grace’s efforts have resulted in Montana’s Legislature passing two new laws in 2013: one that criminalizes the transport of people across state lines for sexual activity and another that makes it a crime to subject a child to sexual servitude. 

“Human trafficking is a very invisible crime and people don’t talk about it,” Grace said, adding that it takes time to see the results of new laws. 

Sometimes law enforcement officers aren’t able to prosecute because the girls won’t talk, Raju said. Law enforcement officers need to be trained how to investigate such crimes, he added. Teachers and healthcare workers also need to be trained to recognize the abuse, Grace said, adding that clues may include girls not being dressed properly for the weather or having different kinds of hairstyles, tattoos or heavy makeup. 

There are 300 homeless children in the Flathead area, Raju said. “Within 72 hours of children leaving their home they are approached for sexual activity,” he said. 

When one sees a child sex trafficking victim, she often will be smiling and “have a very good face,” Grace said. “You have to talk to them for a half hour before you recognize the signs.”

Referring to what she calls a $32 billion worldwide industry, Grace said many victims are not willing to come forward because of language barriers and fears of homelessness, isolation and joblessness. 

“The average age of girls forced into sexual slavery is 12, and they are out by age 18,” Grace said, but some are as young as 5 when they are trafficked. Oftentimes they are used for labor or have their organs harvested when their sexual slavery ends.

The U.S. is involved in the sex trafficking industry “because we have the money to pay,” she said. Natives of over 35 countries have been enslaved in the U.S. Typically it occurs in large cities or at vacation destinations. Half of them are children, she said. 

Traffickers prey on runaways, children and women from broken backgrounds, she said, adding that less than 2 percent are ever found again by their loved ones. 

Although such odds may seem daunting, Grace talks about making a difference “one pebble at a time.” 

In the next Legislative session in 2019, her goal is to require training for law enforcement and teachers on how to recognize or investigate sex trafficking, she said. A bill that was considered this year failed after labor unions opposed it, she said. 

For more information, call 406-885-0292 or go online at: gloryforashes.org. 

Donations can be sent to: Grace Manchala, 501 Blacktail Road, Lakeside, MT 59922.

http://www.valleyjournal.net/Article/17770/Human-trafficking-awareness-urged

Adelos receives $2.5M contract to develop intrusion detection technology

POLSON — A world class technology company is moving forward in Lake County.

Adelos, a subsidiary of S&K Technologies Inc., received a two-year $2.5 million security contract with the U.S. Air Force following a competitive bid process last year. 

According to chief executive officer Scott Colton, Adelos was one of 8,900 companies that submitted proposals to the U.S. Air Force’s Rapid Innovation Fund research and development program. Adelos was one of nine companies selected. 

The five-employee company builds fiber optic sensor systems. The current project will provide an acoustic sensor that uses sound waves to identify drones or other aircraft, people walking or tunneling activity, for example.

Adelos is using and expanding on technology developed by the U.S. Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Newport, Rhode Island, said Alex Philp, Adelos’ chief technology officer who founded the company in 2006.

The contract calls for delivery of one unit at an Air Force base in the spring of 2018. The fiber optic sensor will provide the Air Force with unprecedented situational awareness and an early warning/intrusion detection capability at its intercontinental ballistic missile launch facilities. 

“This sensor is unique,” Philp said, noting it can detect activity in the air, on the ground and under the ground simultaneously. “We can determine where it is, when it is occurring and what it is,” he said. 

The unit, which was manufactured by S&K Electronics in Pablo, consists of a laser in the bottom and electrical optic machinery in the top. 

In expanding the technology, Adelos is competing mainly against companies in Israel and Great Britain, Philp said. 

“We’re the only company in Montana doing anything as remotely sophisticated as the technology in these boxes,” he said. 

The current contract is the third iteration of the project, with predecessors installed at the Idaho National Laboratory and the U.S. Navy facility in Keyport, Washington, Colton said in a press release. 

He notes that Adelos technology has other applications too, including the oil and natural gas industry where a sensor can be deployed inside a well with a fiber optic cable to provide information on changes in oil, gas or water pressures. 

Adelos is 87-percent owned by S&K Technologies, which is wholly owned by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. The company now known as Adelos was founded in Missoula in 2006 as TerraEchos. S&K Technologies purchased it in 2009, renamed the company Adelos and relocated it to Polson in 2012. 

S&K Technologies, which was founded in 1999, also owns S&K Aerospace, S&K Global Solutions, S&K Engineering and Research and S&K Logistics Services. 

The S&K family of companies has offices in nine states, the District of Columbia and Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It has strategic partnerships with a variety of companies, including Booz Allen Hamilton, General Dynamics, Boeing Aerospace, Lockheed Martin, Northrup Grumman, Raytheon, AT&T, Honeywell and ALCOA. 

S&K Technologies, which employs over 400 people, totaled over $350 million sales and paid nearly $30 million in annual dividends to the CSKT’s Tribal Council since its inception, according to a press release. 

Adelos is located at 145 Southlake Crest on a hill in the Ridgewater development in Polson. 

S&K Technologies in located in St. Ignatius. 

http://www.valleyjournal.net/Article/17784/Adelos-receives-2-5M-contract-to-develop-intrusion-detection-technology

Governor signs Real ID law

POLSON – A law creating enhanced driver’s licenses that would allow Montanans to board an airplane and enter federal facilities has been signed into law.

Gov. Steve Bullock signed SB 366 on May 25 after it passed the Senate 33-16 and the House 83- 17.

The bill brings the state into compliance with the federal Real ID law that was passed in 2005 in large part due to four of the 19 9-11 terrorists who used driver’s licenses to board planes.

The Real ID Act sets documentation standards for each state to follow in order to verify the identity and citizenship status of applicants for driver’s licenses and non-driver IDs. There are data requirements that must be met as well, including requiring that state computers contain facial recognition technology, for example. A Real ID-compliant driver’s license may not look different than a regular one, but may be differentiated by a star in the top righthand corner, according to minnesota.cbslocal.com.

A person paying for an enhanced driver’s license would pay an extra $25 or $50, depending on when they apply. It’s $25 during regular renewal periods or $50 if one wants to get a Real ID early or not in their regular renewal period.

The extra fees would fund the equipment and staffing necessary for implementation of the law.

The law authorizes the state Department of Justice to borrow up to $4.6 million to finance implementation costs, which could be paid over 10 years.

Those who want to fly as of Jan. 22, 2018 will need a Real ID-compliant driver’s license or passport. A similar requirement to enter federal facilities began on Jan. 30, although federal courthouses reportedly have allowed exceptions.

According to reports, Bullock has said he plans to ask the federal Department of Homeland Security for two extensions to comply with the Real ID law. The extensions would give the state more time to issue Real ID-compliant driver’s licenses. State residents will still be able to get a non-compliant driver’s license.

Montana had fought compliance with the federal law for years due to concerns over privacy of personal information, costs and states’ rights.

http://www.valleyjournal.net/Article/17817/Governor-signs-Real-ID-law

Father, son share stage at Aber Day Reunion

POLSON – Sam Riddle grew up in New York City, but Montana is in his blood. 

Riddle, who performed with his father Steve at last Saturday’s Aber Day Reunion concert at the Regatta Shoreline Amphitheater, was born in Missoula but spent the first 13 years of his life in New York. 

The Riddles summered in Polson, however, and that never left Sam. 

“We’re definitely Montana boys,” Steve said, noting he and his wife Mary Ann have a cabin on the lake in Polson.  

“When I was in New York City, people thought I was ‘super country,’” Sam said. “When I was in Montana, everybody thought I was from ‘the hood.’” 

Steve, who helped found the Mission Mountain Wood Band in 1971, said the family, including his wife, the former Mary Ann McKenzie, “went elsewhere chasing the dream.” 

She worked on playwright Neil Simon’s production team and Steve was acting or playing bass guitar “every night” and playing at Bluegrass festivals frequently on weekends until the family moved back to Montana when Sam was a teenager. 

“I was exposed to more than usual,” Sam said, reflecting on his life.

Mission Mountain Wood Band, M2WB as they like to be called, played at the Aber Day Keggers that were held in Missoula from 1972-79. Last weekend’s reunion concert commemorated the former annual event that served as a fundraiser for the University of Montana library. 

But the Aber Day Kegger Reunion created memories of its own. 

It will be forever etched in the minds of Sam and Steve and probably many others as well.

Sponsored by Anderson Broadcasting and Missoula Liquid Assets LLC, the event was a surprise to Steve when he heard about it. 

“We’ve talked about it for a long time,” he said. “It never really dawned on us that it would happen in Polson. This is a wonderful moment in time.” 

When asked what his mother thought about it, Sam said, “She just cries. Any excuse for me to come home is great.” 

Sam, who played basketball at Hellgate High School and the University of Montana and had designs on a pro career, was headed to Omaha to meet with a Missoula buddy who played at Sentinel High when the direction of his life took a turn. 

Sam had played pro ball in Puerto Rico and was headed to Omaha to talk to J.R. Casillas about his options in Europe. 

Casillas, who was going to law school at the time, and Sam went out to Harrah’s Casino one night and Sam ended up playing the piano. He remembered “everyone was throwing me $20s and giving me shots.” 

After a short time in Omaha, a man from Las Vegas spotted Sam and the next week he was playing piano on The Strip. 

“I ended up playing every major casino in upscale lounges,” he said. “I looked like I was 16. People were fascinated.” 

That was 2006. 

He was there for several years playing Frank Sinatra standards, Billy Joel songs and the like but wasn’t fulfilled. 

“I was making so much money ... but what was I doing? I felt like I was supposed to do something that was way bigger. It just hit me one day: write songs about what I know and get out from behind the piano and perform. I wanted to represent my dad and Montana.”

He decided to put on his cowboy hat and boots and put a band together. 

Sam said his country band took off “like a rocket” and was headlining 4-5 casinos a week. 

“Within a month I had every gig in town,” he said. “It took over the country scene immediately.”

He was living the dream at that time, but to him he was just “on the way.” 

“I didn’t want to be confined to Vegas,” he said. 

Sam still plays Vegas, but he also takes his band across the country. 

He signed up with a management firm from Los Angeles in 2014 and plans to release a deluxe EP, or extended play record, at the end of the summer and an album by year’s end. 

At age 66, Steve understands that his son is “on the way.” M2WB played with The Band, the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers back in the day. 

M2WB played its country rock and bluegrass until 1982 and then took a 10-year hiatus, starting up again in 1992. Now they do six shows a summer, but Steve stays busy also playing with Singing Sons of Beaches, a “campfire folk” band based out of Polson. 

“It’s funny how these things creep up on you,” Steve said, referring to last week’s event. 

“It’s nerve wracking and very humbling to have something like this happen,” Sam said. “I dreamed about the Mission Mountain Wood Band opening for me at the stadium in Missoula. This is better,” he said. 

People that he met in Vegas and other places “are coming here from all over the world for this,” Sam said. 

Yes, folks. He’s on his way.

http://www.valleyjournal.net/Article/18190/Father-son-share-stage-at-Aber-Day-Reunion

Amphibious planes pose dilemma in anti-AIS effort

POLSON – As the battle to prevent aquatic invasive species moves forward, what to do about sea planes may be the next issue on the horizon. 

Sea planes, or those that only land or take off on water, pose a particular problem: how to regulate them? 

“We’re trying to figure it out,” said Caryn Miske, executive director of the Flathead Basin Commission. “They certainly represent a risk to our waters.”

She noted that mussels can release their bissell threads and colonize a body of water fairly easily. 

Words such as “an impossible dilemma” and “difficult at best to deal with” are some of those she used when discussing the issue of sea planes recently. 

Such a plane can take off from anywhere in the country and land at Flathead Lake without any inspection, although it’s required. The owner of a plane taking off from out of state may not even know about Montana’s regulations. 

Local sea planes aren’t necessarily as much of an issue because locals tend to know about the threat.

Rick Stapleton is such an owner. Stapleton, who lives on Flathead Lake at Dayton, said he is one of some 24 locals who own sea planes, which he called float planes. 

He said these owners are mechanically inclined and tend to be responsible because they have to inspect their planes prior to takeoff. 

He said the number of these planes is “such a small percentage of what’s going on,” however he believes pilots should know about the state’s inspection requirements before landing on Flathead Lake. 

Miske said no one really knows how many of such planes land on Flathead Lake during the year, postulating it could be 20, 30, 40 or 50. Nonetheless she said they present a significant risk to the lake. 

The Flathead Basin Commission will begin considering what to do about sea planes in the near future. The group will meet again on Sept. 27. 

Miske said she wonders if the FBC can make a distinction between resident and non-resident planes when imposing regulations within the Flathead Basin, which basically represents Flathead and Lake counties with a small portion of Missoula County in the Seeley Lake area. A state law that was passed earlier this year (HB622) gave the FBC the authority to regulate the waters in the Flathead Basin. (The CSKT regulates waters located within the Flathead Reservation.) 

“We have no recommended course of action yet,” Miske said. “We would like to visit with sea plane owners.” 

Eric Hanson, the CSKT’s aquatic invasive species coordinator, noted that Colorado banned sea planes in its fight against AIS, but Miske said it’s too early in the process to say whether a ban would be implemented in the Flathead Basin. 

Joe Lorenzen is a Lake Havasu City, Arizona, businessman who operates an amphibious motorized glider from the Polson Airport during the summer. His glider can land or take off from water or land, so it’s a little bit different than a sea plane. Lorenzen said an employee of Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks came to Polson and spent three hours inspecting his plane prior to approval this year. 

However, Stapleton said a CSKT inspector gave him an approval sticker for his sea plane after only viewing a photo of the plane. 

Tom McDonald, director of the CSKT’s Fish, Wildlife, Recreation and Conservation Department, said he wasn’t familiar with Stapleton’s sea plane, but said if the owner doesn’t have a trailer then it possibly could’ve been approved for inspection by use of a photo if it is permanently docked on the water. Normally, a sea plane could be inspected at the CSKT office at 406 Sixth Ave. E. if the owner can transport it on a trailer, he said. 

Nine boats with mussels

Hanson said that inspectors across the state have found nine boats with mussels this year, including two in Browning and one at the Jesco Marine and Power Sports station in Kalispell.

Lorenzen, a Shelby native, moved to Lake Havasu City in 2007. AIS prevention efforts there didn’t work because they started too late, he said. Lake Havasu City began trying to prevent mussels in 2005 due to their presence in Lake Mead on the Nevada/Arizona border. 

He said boat owners on Lake Havasu get an inch of mussels built up on the props and outdrives in the lower units of the boats. 

“They have to take ‘em out twice a year to scrape and clean to keep the cooling systems functioning properly,” he said. 

http://www.valleyjournal.net/Article/18221/Amphibious-planes-pose-dilemma-in-anti-AIS-effort

Manley wants drug court in Lake County by summer

By Caleb M. Soptelean/Valley Journal

POLSON — Lake County District Court Judge James A. Manley is trying to make a difference in the lives of drug users and the community at large.

A $360,000 grant from the U.S. Justice Department presumably will come in the spring and could be implemented by summer, he said. Manley, 67, wants to use those funds to set up a drug court and run it based on one in Billings that’s been in operation about 15 years.

Manley didn’t realize how bad the drug problem was in Lake County when he was appointed a little over three years ago to fill the seat of longtime former Judge C.B. McNeil.

“I knew nothing about the meth epidemic in our community,” Manley said. “It’s exploded since then.”

In 2012, there were 182 felony cases filed in Lake County. For 2016, there were 458 filed through Dec. 19, an increase of more than 250 percent. Of those, at least 90 percent are drug-related, Manley said, and 80 to 90 percent of those involve methamphetamines.

Drug-related crimes can involve possession or sales of drugs, property crimes to pay for one’s habit and other crimes committed as a result of drug use.

Possibly the worst part about the drug epidemic is what it leaves in its wake.

“The number of children born to addicted parents has exploded,” said Manley, noting that St. Joseph’s Hospital has identified that as the No. 1 community problem.

Almost all of the drug addicts that he sees in court are parents.

Manley said he had to go on a “crash course” when he was became district court judge. This involved reading medical and scientific research.

“The more I learned, the more troubled I became,” he said.

The local recidivism rate for drug offenders is at least 75 percent, he said. That means they are arrested and charged with a new crime within two years.

The costs for dealing with drugs are astronomical, he said. “It costs $35,000 to $40,000 to incarcerate a person for one year,” he said.

Using what he calls a conservative estimate, Manley believes it costs around $100,000 per case when someone is charged with a felony. These costs are spread across several agencies, including the sheriff’s office, jail, district court, prosecutors, defense attorneys, probation and parole, prisons and drug treatment programs.

For 500 felonies, that’s $50 million, which represents more than the county or school district budgets combined, Manley said. (The county’s budget is $22.7 million and Polson Schools’ is $17.4 million.)

“We’ve reached critical mass,” he said.

The Lake County Jail, which has a capacity of 46 inmates, usually houses between 50 and 60 people, according to Undersheriff Ben Woods. “We have 1,600 to 1,800 active warrants that we can’t serve because of lack of space,” he said. “We arrest very few warrants. It’s the baddest of the bad, the worst of the worst.”

Sheriff Don Bell said he has been talking to the county commissioners about building a new jail since he was elected in November 2014. The current jail was built in 1923, and the latest remodel, which added a recreation room as a result of a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union, came in 1996. Bell said the county commissioners earlier this year requested a needs assessment be done in regard to the jail. He said a new jail should have a capacity of 175-220.

“The jail is full all of the time,” Manley said. “They have to release serious felony cases sometimes to make room for a more serious felony case.” And those who have been sentenced to the Department of Corrections have to wait in jail for weeks or months until DOC has room for them, he said.

With that in mind, Manley’s former law clerk Matt McKeon and chief deputy county attorney James Lapotka attended drug courts in Billings, Butte, Great Falls and Missoula to look at other options.

“They have figured out a better way,” Manley said, adding that he used to think “you punish people and they won’t do it.” However, “you can’t punish it out of them. You can’t do that anymore than you can punish mental illness out of someone.”

The Billings drug court, which is the oldest in the state, has a recidivism rate of about 17 percent, he said.

Using the Billings’ model, Manley and others would make up a team to screen drug addicts for enrollment in the drug court. Others who have agreed to be on the team include: Lapotka, adult probation officer Katie Campbell, Confederated Salish Kootenai Tribes councilwoman Carole Langford, defense attorneys Britt Cotter and Robert Long, Undersheriff Woods, addiction specialist Jay Brewer and Christina Ellsworth of Community Supervision Alternatives in Missoula.

The program would have two facets: accountability and treatment/rehabilitation. Participants would be drug-tested at least twice a week and would have to complete in- or outpatient treatment and rehab. They would also get education and job training and could receive mental health counseling.

The broad-based program would take about two years to complete. To graduate, one must be clean and sober for six months and be self-supporting, Manley said.

The Lake County Drug Court Team would meet weekly at district court.

The drug court can’t be started too soon because black tar heroin is making its way into the area, Manley said.

“People don’t die of overdoses of meth. They die from overdoses of black tar heroin and other opiates. It’s gonna happen here,” he said.

Another facet of illegal drug use is synthetic drugs, which even though some concoctions have been outlawed, new formulas are being made that closely resemble the chemical makeup of known drugs.

In addition to that, Adderall, which can be prescribed for hyperactivity disorder, is one molecule different than meth but its effect isn’t any different, Manley said.

Desoxyn, which is sometimes prescribed for weight loss, is no different chemically than meth, he said.

“Over 90 percent of people who are prescribed these drugs don’t get addicted,” he said. “Why are those we see getting addicted and others aren’t?”

Contrary to popular belief, “the great majority don’t get addicted after one use or ever,” he said, citing a “rat park” experiment as evidence.

“People can turn it down and quit using,” he said. “Historically, very few addicts are over 40. Some die, but a significant number get tired of it and outgrow it.”

“If they can turn it down, why don’t they? The answers are complex,” he said. “Some may have lost hope, don’t care and are very damaged mentally and emotionally.”

Some of the books that Manley has read recently about the drug epidemic include: “Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic,” by former LA Times reporter Sam Quinones, “Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs,” whose author, Johann Hari, is a British journalist, and “High Price,” written by Columbia University neuroscientist, Dr. Carl Hart.

Manley said it’s not only tiring but also disillusioning to see the same drug-related offenders in court, over and over.

“It’s kind of consumed my job in a way,” he said. “It’s the bulk of what I do.”

Ruby Ridge survivor learns to forgive

CALEB SOPTELEAN/Daily Inter Lake 

| Posted: September 3, 2010

Sara Weaver-Balter

Sara Weaver-Balter of Kalispell at the Redneck Chic store south of town on Tuesday.

Sara Weaver-Balter has forgiven the federal agents who shot and killed her mother and brother 18 years ago on Idaho’s Ruby Ridge.

That’s the message she wants to impart to the nation and especially the people who did the shooting.

An interview with Weaver-Balter was broadcast on the Biography Channel’s “Aftermath with William Shatner” on Monday night.

But for those who didn’t see it, Weaver has a story to tell.

“I’ve prayed that on a national scale I’d be able to effect the healing of Ruby Ridge,” she said. “There’s a huge sore on our country. [But] there’s hope.” 

Weaver-Balter, who has lived in the Marion area since 1996, was 16 when federal agents swarmed her parents’ property west of Bonner’s Ferry in August 1992.

What followed was gunfire and a long standoff that left three people dead and prompted a national furor over the use of force by the federal government.

Weaver-Balter’s brother Sam, 14, was the first to die, followed by a U.S. marshal and then her mother, Vicki. Weaver-Balter was standing next to her mom when Vicki — holding her 10-month-old baby — was shot in the head.

After the shootings the surviving Weavers were under siege in their house for 11 days.

“This was hell on earth, and we were living it,” Weaver-Balter wrote in a book, “The Federal Siege at Ruby Ridge,” that she co-authored with her father, Randy Weaver, in 1998.

[See story below for details of the Ruby Ridge incident.]

The standoff was followed by years of investigations and court cases.

Weaver-Balter and her sisters lived in Iowa with relatives after the shootings and moved to Montana when their dad was released after an 18-month prison sentence.

Randy Weaver, who now lives in Kalispell, also lived in Arkansas for a while. Weaver-Balter’s sister Rachel lives in Kalispell. Elisheba — the baby Vicki was holding — recently enrolled as a freshman in college in Arkansas.

For 10 years, Weaver-Balter lived in darkness and sadness, she said. “I was afraid to laugh because you’re betraying their memory. I lived as a prisoner of depression for a long time.”

The Weaver girls eventually got a $3.2 million settlement from the federal government for the killing of their mother.

Randy Weaver said he has only forgiven those who have admitted the truth, including four or five public officials who testified in court and a few others who later asked for forgiveness. That group, Weaver said, doesn’t include FBI sniper Lon Horiuchi or U.S. Marshal Larry Cooper and Art Roderick — the men responsible for the shootings.

“Remember Ruby Ridge” became the rallying cry for numerous groups, including Timothy McVeigh, who later bombed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

Weaver-Balter regrets this.

“Don’t take life in my name and think you’re doing something good,” she said.

Weaver-Balter said the reason she allowed Shatner to interview her was because she wanted to let the nation know about forgiveness and freedom.

“The anger you hold for someone else imprisons you and keeps you from helping others,” she said.

What made the difference for Weaver-Balter? A passage of Scripture that she memorized as a child: “God loved the world so very, very much that he gave his only Son. Because he did that, everyone who believes in Him will not lose his life, but will live for ever [John 3:16].”

“I hit rock bottom,” she said. “I opened up my Bible and read John 3:16. Jesus made himself very real to me. He started healing me of all my pain. No one drug me to a church and started hitting with the Bible. It was more real to me even than Ruby Ridge. I feel like a huge weight’s come off my shoulders.”

Weaver-Balter said she memorized the verse only because she was given candy at age 7. Her family had been attending a Baptist church at that time. 

Her healing took place in 2003.

Weaver-Balter, who attends Kila Country Church with her husband, Marc, and 9-year-old son Dawson, prayed for the opportunity to tell her story ever since then.

Seven years later, she got the chance.

She added one more thing: “I want to reach my generation that’s going into the FBI, ATF and Marshal’s Service with this story so the mistakes are never repeated.” 

Biography will re-broadcast Weaver-Balter’s interview at 9 p.m. today, 1 a.m. Saturday and 9 p.m. Monday, Mountain Time. It should be available online at bio.com/aftermath next week.

http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2010/sep/09/woman-forgives-federal-agents/

http://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/kalispell-woman-whose-mother-brother-died-at-ruby-ridge-forgives/article_b03ddc7e-be12-11df-a241-001cc4c03286.html

http://mtstandard.com/special-section/local/woman-caught-up-in-ruby-ridge-forgives/article_9ce155da-c398-11df-9b13-001cc4c03286.html

http://helenair.com/lifestyles/woman-caught-up-in-ruby-ridge-shows-forgiveness/article_e62cdf40-c7a6-11df-bacf-001cc4c03286.html

http://www.cdapress.com/news/idaho_news/article_bfa95f08-f0a5-5dd9-9e2e-539648a15c54.html

http://wcfcourier.com/news/local/woman-caught-up-in-ruby-ridge-shows-forgiveness/article_cd84ebe6-bbb6-11df-935e-001cc4c002e0.html