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During June 1st, 1996 in Seaside Oregon, where the SEA-PAC ham convention was being held, a group of hams belonging to PARG (Phantoms Amateur Radio Group) were down on the beach front enjoying the annual PARG bonfire. One of the hams (KB7YZS) was monitoring the local Seaside Police Dept. He heard someone cursing and yelling at people. At first he thought it was coming from the UHF side on his hand-held transceiver, but to his surprise it was coming from the VHF side which was monitoring the police.
He promptly notified everyone at the bonfire to listen. After a few minutes of listening to the person, the members had figured out that the person was up in a balcony, was with 3 or more people and 2 of which were females. They realized this because of key things he said and voices in the background.
The 4 PARG members in the group (KB7YZS, KB7YZR, N7XMD, and AA7UP) just happen to be most of the PARG Interference Committee. They immediately activated the PARG Interference Committee direction finding operations. They promptly tracked down the interference to a specific location of the Shilo Inn and searched for someone matching the description. After only 5 minutes they saw a group of people on the third floor of the Shilo who matched the description. Then they saw him pick up his hand-held transceiver and speak into it. At the very same moment the voice on the police frequency was saying "Hey, fat ass, yea you in the black pants and the white shirt". While he was saying this on the Seaside Police frequency the members noticed a man wearing those clothes, a little on the heavy side walking directly underneath them.
One of the PARG members saw a Seaside Police patrol car in the area. A PARG representative approached the officer and asked him if he was looking for a person causing interference to the Police Frequency. He seemed very upset and replied "YES"! The PARG representative then informed the Seaside Police Officer where the malicious interference was coming from. Three other PARG members were on their way to the third floor when they saw the people (from the room/balcony where the interference was) come running down the stairs and away from the Shilo.
The officer took a report from the PARG representative, including an exact location of the motel room and spoke to the hotel manager. After 2 hours the interference started up again. The Seaside Police Officer went directly to the room the PARG Interference team pointed out and caught the person in the act of doing the deeds.
The above is known to be facts. The above mentioned is knowledge from speaking the PARG Interference Committee members and to a friend of the suspect.
The man who in is question has a call sign of KE6VNU and is from Central California. He apparently was in Oregon for the ham convention. Information indicates he was released from jail only a short time before this incident, the charge he was in jail for was malicious interference to the local police in his area. This obviously did not teach him his lesson. We understand that he caused a great amount of interference to the Sacramento County and Roseville emergency/public services communications and often identified himself on those malicious transmissions as "The Phantom Jammer". We were told the charge Seaside Police brought against him was "Interference of a police officer in line of duties".
Note: It is an unfortunate coincidence that the malicious interferer used the name "Phantom Jammer". He has absolutely NO association with or relation to PARG (Phantom's Amateur Radio Group), the group which located him & turned the necessary information into the Seaside Police which led to his arrest for the interference. We did not release this information until now at the request of the local law enforcement officials to prevent tainting their investigation.
This was PARG's second year in a row of providing public services during the Seaside Ham Convention. Last year several PARG members apprehended a purse thief (after a brief foot pursuit), returned the purse to the rightful owner, and detained the suspect until police could arrive. PARG also performed crowd control activities at this time due to the large number of people who stopped to watch the purse thief incident.
PARG is the Phantom's Amateur Radio Group in Portland, OR and is Portland's most active VE testing, repeater club, emergency communications, and ham radio group. Please visit our web page at http://www.teleport.com/~mscott/dumb.shtml. You can contact PARG at
PARG, PO Box 1586, Beaverton, Oregon 97075-1586
Phone 503-818-PARG (24 hours)
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