Area Briefs
Free quilting class
scheduled for Feb. 1
Tender Lovin’ Quilters of Troy is hosting its annual Quilting 101 Day on Saturday, Feb. 1, at the Troy United Methodist Church Fellowship Hall.
This event is offered free to the public, and it is the guild’s way of preserving and teaching the art of quilting to all who have an interest to learn.
The day begins at 9 a.m. with various demonstrations given by guild members.
A baked potato bar lunch is scheduled for noon followed by a hands-on class at 1 p.m. The morning demonstrations and the afternoon class are offered free of charge. Door prizes will be given out to attendees.
Questions on this event or sign up for the afternoon class, may be directed to Quilting 101 coordinator, Tammy Anderson at 295-5340 or tanderson1980@frontier.com.
Police: Man uses
knife during robbery
MISSOULA — Police in Missoula say they’re looking for a man who robbed a coffee stand Sunday morning using a 6-inch hunting knife.
The Missoula Police Department tells The Missoulian that no one was injured and that the man made off with an undisclosed amount of cash from the Florence Coffee Co. stand on Southwest Higgins Avenue.
Missoula Police Cpl. Sean Manraksa says the suspect is a 6-foot-2 white male with an average build and in his mid- to late 50s. He wore a bandanna over his face.
Manraksa says the man during the robbery at about 11 a.m. wore a dark blue hooded sweatshirt, dark jeans and tan work boots.
Police are continuing to investigate.
Police: Fugitive
lived in Montana
THREE FORKS — Nearly every day for six years, Zac Taylor ate at the Three Forks Cafe.
Waitresses tell The Bozeman Daily Chronicle he even had his own bottle of hazelnut syrup for his coffee with the name Zac on it.
But what people didn’t know was that “Zac Taylor,” the computer repairman who lived north of Three Forks, was actually 55-year-old Daniel Chafe, a fugitive who failed to show up for his September 1998 trial on charges of rape, sexual abuse and sodomy in Roseburg, Ore.
The FBI alleges Chafe recruited girls to form what he called the “Cobalt Clan.” Authorities said his goal was to have a large number of children over whom he could rule.
Chafe was arrested near Bozeman on Jan. 15 and awaits extradition back to Oregon, where he faces trial on six charges of rape, five counts of sexual abuse and seven counts of sodomy.
Shortly before Chafe was to face trial, he and a friend apparently went on a fishing trip on the Snake River. The friend said Chafe fell out of the boat and he couldn’t locate him. Authorities believe Chafe tried to fake his death.
The case was featured on national TV programs such as America’s Most Wanted and Unsolved Mysteries.
Even after Chafe’s arrest, some residents didn’t connect him with the man they knew as Zac Taylor because he didn’t look like his old mug shot.
Gallatin County Undersheriff Dan Springer said he had no criminal history in the county.
Kelly Smith, a deputy clerk at Three Forks City Hall, said she knew a lot of people in the community who had used Chafe’s computer repair business. He first applied for a city business license in 2008.