I’m not going to go back and explain the Paul Ingram case. Or, the OK Boys Camp scandal/tragedy.

But, suffice to say that both of those events were insane shocks to the core of the Thurston County power structure about 25 years ago. I’d highly suggest reading the links above, just to get an idea of what I’m talking about.

What I really didn’t realize until right now, but that these two seemingly independent events (though similar in content) overlapped a lot.

At the center of this overlap is Ingram himself. Just a note: this is the point that I’m going to start writing as if the reader knows a few details about both Ingram and OK Boys Camp.

As Ingram’s life began dissolving toward his eventual guilty plea, the subsequent retraction of that plea, his prosecution and conviction, he also had a front seat to what was going on a the OK Boys Camp. Ingram was a member of the Kiwanis (not a big surprise as a deputy sheriff and former county Republican chair). But, well into 1989, he was on the board of the OK Boys Camp.

Ingram’s daughter made her first accusation in August of 1988, he was arrested in late November, and the investigation was in full swing the next spring when Ingram was finally removed from the board in March.

It is odd enough for Olympia to have one odd abuse case, it is another for it to have two. And, also two that in hindsight land fairly well on opposite ends of the the varsity scale. The Thurston County criminal justice system went hard at Ingram and the fantastical tales levelled against him, to the point of digging up his entire back yard looking for the remains of babies. But it took a few more years to catch up with the actual abuse happening at the OK Boys Ranch.

And, the question that keeps rolling around in my brain: how much was known (but not approached) by folks about the horrible conditions at the ranch. And, how much of that community knowledge morphed into the fantastical accusations against Ingram by his daughters? Had they heard about the crimes at the ranch? Had they been to the ranch and heard them first hand from residents?