Real Change

“The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
What led the 24-year-old Bret Hugh Winch to the Aurora Bridge last October?
The first installment of a three-part series looks at the young man’s early life, one
marked by abuse, mental illness, and a major felony conviction
The Man who Stood on the Bridge
Pt. 1: All around him, bridges
By ROSETTE ROYALE, Staff Reporter
S
tanding on the Aurora Bridge, a
man.
Behind him, along Aurora
Ave., vehicles race north and south.
Some 130 feet below him, on N. 34th
St., the occasional car. It’s a little after
10 in the morning.
He’s been here for — how long? One
minute? Two? Three? Maybe more?
No one can say for sure because no
one knows when he caught the bus that
brought him to the nearest stop. No one
knows just when he set foot on the bridge.
But he won’t be here long. By 10:22 a.m.,
the ordeal on the bridge will be over.
Earlier in the morning, around 9
o’clock, he sat in the day room of the
downtown parole office. His parole officer
had told the man to wait there while he
tried to solve the man’s housing crisis,
even if it meant all day. But when the
parole officer went to check on him, the
man was gone.
And now, here he stands, on the Au-
rora Bridge. It’s Oct. 17, 2007.
The bridge was built in 1932. A regis-
Since its construction,
more than 230 people
have jumped to their
deaths from the Aurora
Bridge. It ranks second
in the nation for most
suicides by jumping.
tered historic landmark, it stretches 898
feet across Lake Union. From a distance,
it resembles a giant silver crown turned
on its points.
Since its construction, more than 230
people have jumped to their deaths here.
The Aurora Bridge ranks second in the
nation for most suicides by jumping.
And now, he stands on the same
bridge where hundreds before him have
leapt to the water or the ground below.
But this man: Who is he? Like all
people, he has many facets.
A son. A friend. A compassionate
being. A vulnerable child. An angel. A
menace to society. A man who hears
voices. A man who sees demons. A reg-
istered sex offender. Quite the character.
A lost soul.
The people who know him see in him
these traits, these identities. In his life, they
find many stories. They acknowledge his
presence has impacted their lives.
Yet this morning, before any of them
are aware where he is, he stands on
the bridge.
But why? Why has he chosen to come
here? Why does he, why does anyone
consider suicide?
Such questions are timeless. They
have been asked before. Surely, they’ll
be asked again. That’s because survivors
seek answers. They look back, mining
the past for clues.
Sadly, none ever fully resolve the ques-
tions, because the questions have no an-
swers. They’re riddles only one person can
solve. He’s the person no longer here.
But no one has reason to ask the un-
answerable this morning, at 10:14 a.m.
That’s the moment Bret Hugh Winch, the
24-year-old standing on the Aurora Bridge
on a mostly sunny day, takes out his cell
phone. He dials a friend who lives just down
the hall. He calls to say he’s on a bridge.
And this time, he intends to jump.
J umpy. The young Bret was jumpy.
And, his uncle, Raymond Shoquist,
remembers, he got into things. Nothing
bad, at least not then, but the boy had a
tendency to misbehave.
Bret played with Shoquist’s children
and as the uncle watched, he could
see his nephew was — what exactly?
Amped up? Hyperactive? “I didn’t know,”
Shoquist confesses. “A trying to fit in,
and half the time, he wasn’t trying hard
enough. Or he was trying too hard.”
Other people saw it in the young boy,
too, including a doctor. Bret’s mother took
the boy to see someone, telling Shoquist
later the child had been prescribed Ritalin,
used to treat children diagnosed with
ADD/ADHD (Attention Deficit & Hyper-
activity Disorder.) And the antidepressant
Prozac: Bret took that too.
These drugs would signal Bret’s entry
into a lifetime of prescription medica-
tions. At points, his adherence to his
ever-changing regimen would prove to
be a struggle. When he failed, he often
made poor decisions, ones that affected
others as well as himself.
In rare cases, Prozac can unmask tics
or symptoms of Tourette’s Syndrome, a
neurological condition characterized by
involuntary muscle movements. Some
doctors eventually would believe Bret
had the syndrome when he got older,
because he developed a habitual blink
that would continue.
His parents were young when he
was born in 1982 — his mother had just
On the morning of Oct. 17, 2007, 24-year old Bret Hugh Winch rode a bus to the
Aurora Bridge. Minutes later, he was standing on the bridge’s western ledge. What
brought him here? Photo by Joel Turner
turned 24 — and they lived north of
Seattle. Not long after the birth of their
only child, their relationship hit a rough
patch. Maybe the drinking played a part.
But the couple, who had never married,
separated. Bret was still a toddler.
His mother had family on Whidbey
Island, connected to the naval base, and
her brother introduced her to a buddy
who was just getting out of the service.
The two hit it off. In 1987, barely five
years old, Bret found himself with an
ex-sailor as a stepfather. Shoquist recalls
visiting his sister-in-law and her new
Prozac and Ritalin would
signal Bret’s entry into a
lifetime of prescription
medications. At points,
his adherence to his ever-
changing regimen would
prove to be a struggle.
When he failed, he often
made poor decisions.
husband, who sometimes fought. “We
used to see them all the time.”
But putting down roots has become a
sometime thing. And the newlyweds, with
Bret in tow, bopped around. With them
being constantly on the move, Shoquist
saw the couple, and his nephew, less
and less. He found it harder to see them
when Bret’s family set anchor in Cowlitz
County, in southwestern Washington,
where all around them lay bridges.
Arcing over the Cowlitz River was
the W. Cowlitz Way Bridge; a few blocks
further south, the Allen St. Bridge. To-
gether, they carried traffic above the
tributary, connecting the city of Kelso
to Longview.
But neither structure, both a few
blocks in length, could compare to what
lay roughly seven miles south: the Lewis
and Clark Bridge, a mile-and-a-half long
behemoth stretching above the steady
flow of the Columbia.
From Longview to Kelso, from Kelso
to Longview Bret and his mother and
stepfather bounced, staying in apart-
ments here, trailers there, traversing the
bridges. A few extended family members
— aunts, uncles, cousins — moved close
by, seeking a quiet place to retire.
Along with Shoquist, other fam-
ily members continued to live in distant
places and once, while still an elementary
school student, Bret went to see a relative
other than his uncle for an overnight visit.
The relative, an older male, invited the
seven-year-old Bret to share his bed. The
older male was naked. Bret wouldn’t talk
about what took place.
Years later, his mother, while discuss-
ing Bret’s sex offense charges with au-
thorities, would reference the sleepover,
but would never say if anything sexual
happened to her son that evening. Though
her actions seemed to speak for her.
Bret, long after grade school, never
had contact with this relative again.
T he school system deemed Bret a “slow
learner.” As a result, he sat in special
education classes. But even in the new
setting, staying on task proved difficult.
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 2

 “The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
The BRIDGE, Continued from Page 1
He had a hard time concentrating.
And sometimes, he couldn’t remember
things.
He did recall, when he was 11, be-
ing admitted to a psychiatric hospital.
Though when he was seven — or eight,
maybe: he wasn’t sure — he spent time
at Dammasch State, another psychiatric
hospital and asylum south of Portland.
Bret never enjoyed being alone,
so, with the relatives who did live
close by, he spent as much time as
he could. He hung out with a male
cousin just a few years younger than
him. They played together and, on a
few occasions, his cousin shared his
porn magazines with Bret. Sometimes,
when the two were alone, they’d watch
the Playboy Channel.
Visits with his cousin and other re-
lations got him out of his own house,
where family life proved dysfunctional, if
not chaotic. Not that he had any trouble
with his mother. They maintained a good
relationship. But when it came to his
stepfather, the two butted heads.
By the time he’d reached his teens,
the battles with his stepdad escalated. If
Bret forgot to take out the garbage, he’d
get beaten. When he turned his music
up too loud, his possessions would be
taken away as punishment. If he came
home late, he’d have to spend the night
outside. His stepfather would get so mad
at him, he wouldn’t allow Bret to sit at the
kitchen table: He’d make him eat from off
the top of the garbage can.
Bret’s mother had it no easier. In
2005, during divorce proceedings, she’d
confess what her dating and married
life to Bret’s stepdad had amounted to:
abuse — verbal, sexual, physical, men-
tal. Cheating, manipulating, controlling.
Ambulances, hospitals. “Eighteen years
of my life was all lies.”
Though Bret dealt with more than
abuse at home. Thanks to five juvenile
offenses he’d racked up by the time he
was 17, he had been in and out of juve-
nile detention centers. Bret tended not
to talk about his early crimes. Instead,
he secreted the information away,
similar to how once, while in juvy, he
hid himself in the empty girls’ locker
room, hoping to see something when
they returned. Staff caught him before
the girls re-entered.
Home, juvy, home, juvy, and, in between,
foster care. From his youth and into his
teens, Bret lived in numerous foster homes.
Not that he enjoyed them. Whenever an op-
portunity arose, he’d run away. That wasn’t
so easy to do from juvy.
During his times at home, tensions
remained at a simmer, flaring to a boil
during confrontations with his stepfa-
ther. Though any referee who might have
observed their run-ins would have sent
them to their corners. Bret’s stepfather
stood 6’2”, tipping the scales at 260. The
17-year-old Bret stood 5’5”, coming in at
135. Heavyweight vs. lightweight.
In early January 2000, right before his
stepfather’s 38th birthday, Bret ran away.
It would take two days before his stepdad
alerted police to the missing teen. As an
identifying feature, he told police the left
side of Bret’s face was red due to a recent
bike accident. His running away amounted
to a parole violation, and when police found
him, they sent him, once again, to juvy.
Out of juvy six months later, he was
By Nov. 7, 2000, he’d
foregone his psychiatric
medications. Some
time before 6 p.m. that
evening, Bret rode his
bike to an adult female
relative’s house.
placed in a foster home in Kalama, WA, 17
miles from his family. History repeated itself
when he ran away. Police picked him up
with two other teens. But that foster home
proved to be his last, because by early No-
vember 2000, Bret, not quite 18, had moved
back in with his mother and stepfather.
By Nov. 7, 2000, he’d foregone his psy-
chiatric medications. Some time before
6 p.m. that evening, Bret rode his bike to
an adult female relative’s house. At home
with her were two of Bret’s younger rela-
tives, a boy and a four-year-old girl. The
children’s bedtime approached.
As the female relative helped the
young boy into his pj’s in the living room,
Bret and the young girl sat in the kids’
bedroom, watching Rugrats. With the boy
changed, the relative went to check on
the young girl. There the child sat, with
Bret, looking at TV. Leaving the room,
the relative told the girl to follow with
her pj’s. The child stayed put.
No surprise, thought the relative. The
girl suffered emotional disabilities and
had a stubborn streak. And she knew
what pj’s meant: bed. The relative sat
down to wait her out.
Then she heard the bedroom door
shut. Walking up the hall came the young
boy. Go back and open the door, she told
him. He obeyed, returning to the room
before closing the door again.
Open, close, open, close. This went on
for about 10 minutes. By then, the relative
had enough. It was time to get the child in
her pj’s. She walked down the hall.
Quietly, she opened the door. And
stopped.
She spotted Bret kneeling in front of
the girl. One of his hands was on her geni-
tals. The other was on its way toward her.
She was lying on her back, legs spread.
Her diaper was under the bed.
What are you doing? she screamed.
Bret hadn’t seen her. He turned to-
ward the door. At first, he didn’t speak.
Then he said, I don’t know.
She ordered him to leave. He fled on
his bike. She dialed 911.
At home, Bret called the relative’s
house. An older male relative answered.
Real Change
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
He told Bret he was no longer welcome.
Bret only stayed home a couple of
minutes. Just long enough to yell to his
stepfather that he had to apologize to
someone. Then off he rode on his bike. His
I’m in trouble with
the Department of
Corrections…I want you
to know I’m not upset
with you…But I have to
do this…I’m on a bridge.
stepfather didn’t hear anything else.
Until later that evening, when the
phone rang. It was Bret, calling from
Rainier, OR. The town sat on the southern
bank of the Columbia River. Longview,
WA, sat on the northern bank.
Connecting the two riverbanks, the
Lewis and Clark Bridge. Some 200 ft. be-
low, the Columbia flows to the Pacific.
Bret told his stepfather he was going to
jump off the Lewis and Clark. He planned
to kill himself. Then he hung up.
Bret’s mother and stepfather raced
to the bridge in their car. But when they
got there, they couldn’t find him. In the
darkness, they searched and searched,
but there was no trace of the boy.
Bret had disappeared.
S
tanding on the Aurora Bridge on
Oct. 17, 2007, Bret makes a call.
He’s just dialed a friend on his cell
phone, but the friend doesn’t pick up.
That’s because the friend can’t hear
his phone ringing. The bus he’s on is
too noisy.
The phone call goes to voicemail, so
Bret leaves a message.
I’m in trouble with the Department of
Corrections…I was supposed to go wait in
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 3
Real Change
“The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
The Aurora Bridge, seen from the west. Construction began in 1931. Since then, more than 230 have leapt to their deaths from the
national historic landmark. It ranks as the nation’s second most sought-out bridge for suicides by jumping. Photo collage by Joel Turner
The BRIDGE, Continued from Page 2
the lobby…I want you to know I’m not upset
with you…I’m still your good friend…But I
have to do this…I’m on a bridge.
Then Bret ends the call, never identi-
fying the bridge as the Aurora Bridge.
And then — what? Does he look
to his left, at the houses climbing up
Queen Anne Hill? To the right, at the
Fremont Baptist Church and the other
buildings heading to Ballard? Does he
feel his heart race standing so close to
the edge?
What is he thinking? What does he do?
He decides to call another friend. He
dials the number. It’s 10:15 a.m.
The phone rings. The friend answers.
Bret tells him he’s on a bridge. About
to jump.
Which bridge? the friend wonders.
Where?
Roughly 130 feet below, down and
off to the right of the Aurora Bridge, a
construction crew excavates a site for a
commercial space. Bret tells him, On a
freeway, near a large crane.
A crane? Where? Where’s the crane?
Bret won’t say.
The friend on the phone knows Bret
has threatened to take his life before. But
this morning, he sounds more despon-
dent. Has he gone off his meds?
In the past, when Bret has threatened
suicide, the friend convinced him to call
his mother. He tries to get him to phone
her now. Bret won’t do it.
Maybe he can find Bret himself.
But where? A freeway, near a crane?
Wait. There’s an overpass to Interstate
5 right outside of the parole office. He
hops in his car.
But that overpass sits in SODO, south
of downtown. The Aurora Bridge lies
north of the city’s urban core.
His friend, without knowing it, heads
out in the wrong direction.
B ut where? Where was Bret? Could
he have —
On Nov. 7, 2000, near the Lewis and
Clark Bridge that crosses the Columbia
River, Bret’s mother and stepfather
looked and looked, but they found no
trace of him. They decided to head
back home, because maybe he might
be — There. Up ahead. Riding a bike
across one of the small bridges that
traversed the Cowlitz River. Bret. He
was alive. They drove him home. He
mentioned what had occurred at the
relative’s house, but said not to worry,
it was no big deal.
Which he probably believed until two
days later, when the detective showed up
at his house. Would Bret come down to
the Kelso Police Station, so they could
talk in private about what had happened
two days prior? Bret thought that would
be OK. His mother didn’t object.
At the station, Bret read over his
juvenile Miranda Warnings from a depart-
ment-issued form. One informed him he
He told his parents what
had happened at the
relative’s house, but said
not to worry, it was no big
deal. Which he probably
believed until two days
later, when a detective
showed up at his house.
could be tried as an adult. Bret signed the
paper. He agreed to speak, even without
a lawyer present.
“I thought I was going to get arrested
after what I did,” Bret said. He was
sweating so much he had to take off his
outer shirt.
Tell me what happened, the detective
said. So Bret told.
He’d gone to an older relative’s house
on Nov. 7, 2000, and found himself in the
bedroom of a younger relative, a four-
year old girl. He didn’t distinguish her as
being a child, merely female. He removed
the girl’s tights and her diaper. Just as
he raised his hand to the girl’s— the
older relative entered the bedroom. She
screamed. He fled on his bike. But he
hadn’t touched the girl.
Oh. And he was supposed to be tak-
ing medication, but he hadn’t been for a
while. And he couldn’t remember what
the pills were for.
After recounting the story, Bret got
worried. He didn’t want to say anything
that would put him in jail.
The detective wondered if Bret would
like to write out a statement. He didn’t.
He wanted the detective’s help.
So the detective settled on a “Q-n-
A” format, writing “Q:”, followed by a
question. Next to “A:”, Bret wrote, “Yes.”
Another question, another “Yes.” A third
question, a fourth. “Yes,” “Yes.”
In response to a fifth question, Bret
wrote a sentence. To a sixth, Bret wrote an-
other. Bret put his initials — “BW” — next
to each answer and signed the statement.
Then the detective gave him a ride home.
A short while later, the detective re-
turned to Bret’s house, accompanied by
a sergeant. When they arrived, Bret had
a bloody nose, and his eyes were red and
watery. The boy had “gotten mouthy,” his
stepfather said, so he’d backhanded him.
Bloody nose or no, backhand or no,
Bret was booked into Cowlitz County Jail
for child molestation in the first degree.
Bail was set at $5,000.
I n jail, Bret was an easy target. Other of-
fenders, even those with special needs,
picked on him. His vulnerability didn’t
surprise the jail’s mental health official. He
assessed Bret’s thinking to be on a third-
or fourth-grade level. For Bret’s safety, the
jail put him into a holding tank.
To ascertain his competency to stand

trial, Bret was admitted to Western State
Hospital, a psychiatric institution. It was
a week before his 18th birthday. The hos-
pital determined Bret functioned in the
“low average range of adult intelligence,”
while posing a moderate risk for com-
mitting future criminal behavior. “At this
point, [Bret] Winch could not adequately
take care of himself.” Still, Western State
found him competent.
In jail, Bret proved to
be an easy target. His
vulnerability didn’t
surprise the jail’s mental
health official. He
assessed Bret’s thinking
to be on a third- or
fourth-grade level.
In determining how to sentence Bret,
the court weighed two options. On one
side of the scale, the standard range of
confinement, ranging anywhere from 62
to 82 months. On the other, a program
called SSOSA, shorthand for Special Sex
Offender Sentencing Alternative.
The first state program of its kind
when enacted in Washington in 1984,
SSOSA is offered to some first-time sex
offenders. Minimal jail time is required.
Of course, the victim’s future safety is
taken into account. The same with the
community. And the offender has to
acknowledge remorse.
In exchange for the shorter sentence,
the offender agrees to a list of offender-
specific conditions, including paying for
outside treatment. Break the conditions,
suffer the consequences.
For Bret, corrections officials recom-
mended option one, with a sentence of
72 months. The victim’s adult relative
who had caught Bret wanted the book
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 4

 “The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
The BRIDGE, Continued from Page 3
thrown at him. “He should have to go to
Texas, if I had my way,” she told police.
“They have the death penalty and are
not afraid to use it the way liberals up
here are.”
Bret didn’t want to admit guilt. After
all, he’d told police he hadn’t touched
the girl. But, with a lawyer, he opted to
plead guilty to first degree child moles-
tation, with a request for SSOSA. The
judge ruled in his favor, granting him a
suspended 72-month sentence.
By the sentencing date, in early May
2001, Bret had already served close to six
months. The judge deemed Bret free to
leave, but his freedom hinged on three
years of outpatient sex offender treat-
Nancy Erckenbrack, of Longview, WA, acted as a times, he would express
surrogate parent for Bret in 2001 after his child moles- frustration to the Erck-
tation conviction. Meeting him for the first time, she enbracks over not being
found him to be like a child. Photo by Rosette Royale
ment along with six years of community
supervision. And he had to abide by a list
of 20 conditions. Case closed.
But those conditions. Bret, 18 by then,
kept breaking them.
The court had ordered he have no
contact with the victim’s family. But the
victim’s relatives happened to be his rela-
tives, too. Less than a week out of jail, he
interacted with a family member of the
victim. One condition broken.
He was supposed to hold down a
steady job, and he did. For a couple
days. Unemployed, he couldn’t af-
ford treatment, and since his parents
wouldn’t pay, he stopped going. He’d
broken a second.
He couldn’t interact with minors.
But kids his own age struck him as too
mature, so when he saw some 12-year-old
boys he knew playing basketball, well, he
joined in. That broke a third.
At home, the battles with his step-
father raged and Bret got kicked out.
Homeless, he broke into the concessions
stand of a neighborhood park to spend
the night. Police charged him with crimi-
nal trespass and theft. Still, the court
didn’t revoke his SSOSA.
A friend helped Bret obtain his own
apartment and attended his court hear-
ings. But unable to attend one hearing, the
friend asked Nancy Erckenbrack if she’d
go in his place, to offer moral support.
Nancy, along with her husband,
Clinton, run the non-denominational
Through Open Doors Ministry in the
basement of their duplex. Bret’s friend
was a member. Even without knowing
Bret’s charge, Nancy agreed, showing
up the next day.
Meeting Bret for the first time in the
courtroom, she thought: Like a child. This
boy is like a child. He held her hand.
Listening to all the rigamarole, the
back and forth between Bret and the
judge, Nancy began to surmise why he’d
been charged. Still, she
didn’t sit in judgment. She
knew God was merciful.
After the hearing, Bret
came back to the Ercken-
brack’s house — just a few
blocks away from his own
apartment — and Nancy
fixed him a sandwich. They
sat and talked. “Then we
and Bret were together
almost every single day,”
says Nancy.
Bret attended their
church services, where
Nancy, 68, played the
electric organ while Clin-
ton, 64, preached to the
congregants in the mis-
matched chairs placed in
even rows. Bret sat down
for meals afterward at the
big maple table in their
dining room upstairs. He
even took to calling them
Mom and Dad.
Not that he ever forgot
his own mother. Often-
with her more. But Bret,
who held his tongue when
it came to speaking ill of others, never
said anything really bad about his step-
father. “Except he could not stay or be
at home because things weren’t right,”
Nancy admits.
That’s how he had wound up over at
the Community House, an emergency
shelter. He’d stayed there for a while
in his late teens, after he’d been kicked
out once, and met a young woman. A
troubled young woman. Bret brought her
to the Erckenbracks.
“I don’t know if you’ve heard of
people having demons,” Nancy confides,
“but she had them.”
“They talked to her,” nods Clinton.
Bret hoped the Erckenbracks could
heal the young woman. So, while Clinton
took Bret downstairs, Nancy sat right in
front of the young woman, talking di-
rectly to her. Nancy specifically ignored
the demons. That made them mad.
They screamed and hollered, but
Nancy paid them no mind. Instead,
she invoked the name of her Savior.
In Jesus’ name, come out of her. In
Jesus’ name, come out of her. In Jesus’
name, in Jesus’ name. Come out of her.
And…they did. The demons left. The
girl looked at Nancy and smiled, her
eyes bright.
Even Bret noticed it, telling them how
the girl had literally changed. But that
was Bret. “When someone was hurting,”
remembers Nancy, “he really had—”
“Compassion,” finishes Clinton.
Though Bret also may have been guided
by an ulterior motive: that he could benefit
Because Bret heard
things. Terrible things.
Voices that told him to
hurt himself.
from an exorcism of the type Nancy had
performed. Because he heard things too.
Terrible things. Though there’s a difference
between someone having demons and
someone having a mental disorder.
“If someone is crippled in his mind,”
says Nancy, “they say he has demons.”
Criticizing the person won’t help.
“They need someone to love them,”
Clinton offers.
So that’s what they did for Bret. They
loved him. And sat with him and prayed
with him. Whatever they could do to help
him counteract the voices he heard.
The ones that told him to harm
himself.
B ret didn’t tell Nancy and Clinton
Erckenbrack about his treatments
in psychiatric institutions when he was
young. But he shared with them a diag-
nosis: schizophrenia.
A chronic disorder, schizophrenia dis-
rupts how the brain functions. Thoughts
become disorganized. Hallucinations alter
reality. Behaviors shift. Confusion reigns.
Bret’s schizophrenia produced command
hallucinations, which issue orders.
And he told the pastor-and-wife cou-
ple something else: he’d been diagnosed
as having bipolar disorder.
Huge mood swings, moving from ma-
nia to depression and thoughts of suicide,
characterize the disorder. But symptoms
of bipolar disorder can often mimic or be
confused with those of schizophrenia.
Taken together, schizophrenia and bi-
polar disorder amount to what clinicians
call schizoaffective disorder. The ailment
has no cure, but treatment, involving
anti-psychotic medications, exist. Find-
ing a psycho-pharmaceutical regimen
a patient can adhere to, however, is a
continual process of trial and error.
To suppress the illness that influ-
enced his actions and decisions, he took
a range of anti-psychotic medications,
and in his basement apartment, he kept
a calendar. Upon it, he’d write what meds
to take and when. After he took a pill,
he’d mark it off.
But sometimes, he couldn’t recall the
prescriptions or whether he’d taken them.
That happens. It’s not always easy to
remember to take every pill when you’re
supposed to, and consistency with psycho-
tropic meds didn’t come easily to Bret.
Neither did keeping his appointments
at a nearby outpatient mental health fa-
cility. By mid-February 2002, nine months
Real Change
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
after his sentencing, he had missed seven
out of 10 scheduled appointments. An-
other condition broken.
On the last day of February, Nancy
Erckenbrack’s phone rang. It was Bret.
A scared Bret. He’d overslept and missed
his required daily meeting with his parole
officer. Now the PO was on his way to
Bret’s place. Would Nancy and Clinton
come over too? Of course, no question.
The Erckenbracks arrived to find
Bret’s apartment spotless, like it always
was. A few minutes later, the PO showed
up, with a plainclothes officer. As he
walked through the place, the PO kept an
eye peeled for any violation. He found it
in the garbage. Empty beer cans. Nancy
hadn’t even seen them.
The PO wondered how they got
there. Bret explained that some friends
had come over the night before. They
brought beer, but Bret didn’t touch a
drop. It turned into a late night and after
cleaning up, he went to bed, forgetting
to set the alarm. That’s why he missed
his appointment.
One of Bret’s conditions forbade him
to drink alcohol. He swore to his PO he
hadn’t. His PO reminded him he couldn’t
possess it either.
Bret felt he hadn’t done anything
wrong. But when the PO looked back over
the past year, he saw Bret break one condi-
tion after another. Now it was too late.
Bret was beside himself. Go quietly,
Nancy told him, don’t raise heck. They
handcuffed him and took him to the jail.
Bret sat in a cell, awaiting his sen-
tence. The jail was only a few blocks
away and the Erckenbracks visited him
as much as they could.
At the March 19, 2002, sentencing, the
judge let Nancy speak on Bret’s behalf. The
boy is struggling with so many things, she
told the judge, and he’s trying to put his life
right. The judge informed her Bret was a
menace to society. Nancy had never heard
such stuff. She and her husband, Clinton,
spent weeks with the boy, so they knew.
The judge informed Nancy
Erckenbrack that Bret
was a menace to society.
She had never heard
such stuff. “More on the
whole,” she said, “society
was a menace to him.”
“It wasn’t that he was such a detriment
to society,” says Nancy. “More on the
whole, society was a menace to him.”
But the judge had the final word. He
revoked Bret’s sentencing alternative, re-
instating the full sentence of 72 months,
minus six months for time served.
The Erckenbracks tried to prepare
him for what lay ahead. Bret didn’t think
he could handle it. But he had little choice,
because three days later, on March 22,
2002, Bret put on an orange jumpsuit. Jail
staff cuffed and shackled his ankles and
wrists. And, aboard a white bus, he set off
for a prison 85 miles away.
Bret’s five and a half years in state
prison had just begun. n
To be continued…
Real Change
“The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
What led Bret Hugh Winch to the Aurora Bridge last October?
The second installment of a three-part series finds Bret doing time in state prison
for a sex offense. There, while awaiting sex offender treatment, he battles with
hallucinations but is buoyed by a new friendship
The Man who Stood on the Bridge
Pt. 2: Waiting, on the inside
By ROSETTE ROYALE, Staff Reporter
T
he police station receives the call at
10:17 a.m.: A male says he’s going to
kill himself. The station’s mapping
program shows the Aurora Bridge.
And standing on the bridge, a man.
Bret Hugh Winch. It’s Oct. 17, 2007.
Within seconds, the station dispatch-
es a cruiser. The three officers inside race
to the scene.
Seen from a distance, the bridge
resembles an overturned silver crown.
Construction began in 1931 and since
then, more than 230 people have leapt to
their deaths from the Aurora Bridge. This
makes it the nation’s second most sought-
out bridge for suicide by jumping.
Arriving at the half-mile long bridge,
the first cruiser. It’s 10:18 a.m.
One of the officers locates a man on
the ledge. He wears a light blue hat and
a hoodie. The officer estimates the man
to be 24 years old. He’s right.
Below him, cars drive by.
He tells his friend on the
phone about them. They
look so small. He plans
to jump on one of them.
There’s not a lot of room to stand on
the ledge. Barely 7.5 inches. Bret grips
the rail with one hand. With the other,
he holds a cell phone to his ear.
Some 130 ft. below his feet lies the
blacktop of N. 34th St. Along Aurora Ave.
runs a pedestrian walkway. To get close to
Bret, the officer must step upon it. Slowly,
he approaches.
But why: Why does Bret plant his
feet on the western ledge of the Aurora
Bridge this morning? And how long ago
did he lift one leg, then the other, over the
rail? Three minutes? Four? Five?
People will wonder. Only one person
knows.
Barely two minutes have passed since
the call came into the station. But there’s
not a lot of time left.
By 10:22 a.m., under a mostly blue
sky, the ordeal on the bridge will come
to an end.
T he Bluebird.
That’s what prisoners call the bus
that ferries them from one jail or prison
to another. The Bluebird came calling for
Bret Hugh Winch at the Cowlitz County

Jail on March 22, 2002, bound for the
Washington Corrections Center in Shel-
ton, 85 miles away. With his wrists cuffed,
his ankles shackled, and these restraints
connected to a longer chain about his
waist, Bret, dressed in an orange jump-
suit like all offenders during movement,
boarded the bus. Then off it flew.
He had a hard ride. Other prisoners
on the Bluebird wanted to see Bret’s
paperwork, they were interested in his
charge. But he kept silent. Perhaps ex-
perience had taught him why.
The year before, the then 18 year old
had been convicted of child molestation
in the first degree. On the totem pole of
criminal offenses recognized even among
criminals, nothing sits lower than child
molestation. Nothing.
In prison, those convicted of such
crimes can fall victim to assaults, both
physical and sexual. Standing 5’5” and
weighing 135 pounds, Bret must have
been well aware he’d be an easy target
for harassment. It had already happened
Vehicles traveling south on the Aurora Bridge. A few feet beyond the lamppost in the
foreground, Bret manuevered over the rail to the barely 7.5-inch ledge. Photo by Joel Turner
in the jail he just left.
Bret’s charge carried a standard sen- unit has a mix of medium- and maximum- Bret had told friends in the months
tence ranging from 62 to 82 months. But security cells. Because of the threats prior to entering prison that he suffered
a judge had granted him an alternative Bret received on the Bluebird, he was from schizophrenia. He heard voices.
sentence — one designed specifically for put on administrative segregation, a sort They told him to hurt himself. And, he’d
sex offenders — involving six months of corrections center limbo where you said, he’d been diagnosed with bipolar
of incarceration and adherence to a list wait to be moved somewhere else safe. disorder. Yet his evaluation in prison de-
of 20 conditions, including outpatient Prisoners on ad seg stay in their cells, termined he had “unspecified psychosis”
sex-offender treatment. Break the condi- alone, for 23 hours a day. Everyone calls — a diagnosis that acknowledged Bret’s
tions, suffer the consequences. it the Hole. psychotic states, but couldn’t pinpoint
Not long after receiving the alterna- their origin. After his evaluation, he
tive, he failed to maintain a job. Unable to
afford treatment, he stopped attending.
The Bluebird prison stayed in the Intensive Management Unit
for another six weeks.
He had contact with the victim’s family, bus came calling for Murderers, rapists, arsonists, thieves,
to whom he was related. He played bas- Bret Hugh Winch at the assault-and-batterers, pushers, pimps: all
ketball with two teenaged boys when he state criminals, except for Death Row
was supposed to avoid minors. Cowlitz County Jail on inmates, go to Shelton for initial pro-
Those broken conditions, and others, March 22, 2002, bound cessing and classification. Not long after
none of which were sexual in nature, Bret joined the rest of the population,
led the judge to revoke Bret’s shortened
for the Washington he worked as a porter, doing his best to
sentence. He ordered him to serve 66 Corrections Center in keep away from physical harm. Mentally,
months in state prison. That day on the
Bluebird marked the start of his five-and-
Shelton. He had a hard however, he struggled, and his moods
gravitated from one pole to another.
a-half-year term. ride. In the prison chapel one afternoon,
As Bret sat chained to another pris- Bret encountered a guard. The chapel
oner on a bench inside the Bluebird, he Bret had been there only a week be- was closed, the guard told him, so he
kept mum about his charge. But his re- fore he underwent psychiatric evaluation. had to leave. Where’s your ID card? the
fusal egged the other prisoners on. They He’d already undergone an evaluation at guard asked. Bret wouldn’t hand it over.
hounded him the whole ride. When he Western State Hospital shortly after his Instead, he mouthed off. He got tossed
arrived at Shelton — that’s what prison- crime, where, even though they put Bret back into the Hole.
ers call the prison — he was terrified the in the “low average range of adult intel- There, hallucinations overwhelmed
other riders would hurt him. Or kill him. ligence,” the facility viewed him fit to him. He pressed his call button. I’m
“They were going to ‘beat my ass,’” he told
prison officials.
Shelton, encompassing 400 acres, has
stand trial. As a child, he’d undergone
treatment at a psychiatric institution. Or
maybe it had been two institutions. Bret
seeing and hearing things in my cell, he
four different facilities, one of them the wasn’t sure. And he’d been prescribed a
Intensive Management Unit (IMU). The host of medications. See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 6

 “The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
THE BRIDGE, Continued from Page 5
told a staff member. She ignored him.
Again and again, he laid his finger on
the button.
“The dead people [are] getting mad
at me,” he said over the speaker, “and
telling me to—”
A sergeant kicked the cell door. Stay
off the button, he told him. Bret tried
to explain what was happening, but the
sergeant laughed. For repeatedly hitting
the call button, he was written up for
staff interference.
Having witnessed his vulnerability
and mental health struggles, Shelton
transferred him, some 10 months after
his arrival, to another prison, Monroe
Correctional Complex, 35 miles north-
east of Seattle. Like Shelton, Monroe has
a number of separate institutions — five,
in this case — on several hundred acres.
Aboard another Bluebird, Bret set off for
Monroe and the two-hour ride. Destina-
tion: the Special Offender Unit, where
they house mentally ill offenders.
M any prisons, in light of shrinking
mental-health services on the out-
side, have become, in effect, de facto psy-
chiatric hospitals. Human rights advo-
cates estimate the nation’s prisons house
three to four times as many mentally ill
people as psychiatric hospitals.
In Washington state, offenders with
mental health disorders often find them-
selves in the Special Offender Unit, a 420-
bed facility designed to keep vulnerable
populations at a remove. Trouble was, the
vulnerable, housed together, often targeted
their own. This is where Bret landed.
On the inside, inmates communicate
to the higher ups by using a kite, a stan-
dardized slip of paper dropped into desig-
nated boxes. Officials reply on the same
form. In mid-April 2003, someone slipped
an anonymous kite into a sergeant’s box:
A prisoner had threatened Bret’s life.
The sergeant called Bret into his office.
For your own safety, the sergeant told him,
we’re going to place you in administrative
segregation. Bret didn’t want to go.
Perhaps he feared his recent experi-
ences would replay themselves: that,
alone in a cell, he would be unable
In the Hole,
hallucinations
overwhelmed him. He
pressed his call button.
“The dead people [are]
getting mad at me,” he
said over the speaker,
“and telling me to—” A
sergeant kicked the cell
door. Stay off the button,
he told him.
to silence his hallucinations, that he
couldn’t refuse their demands. Hearing
about his imminent move, Bret, seated
in a chair in the sergeant’s office, yelled
and cried.
A portion of the Aurora Bridge, as seen from below, near N. 34th St. Stretching 898
ft., it spans a small section of Lake Union. Photo by Joel Turner
This discussion is over, the ser-
geant said.
But Bret wouldn’t budge. I’m not go-
ing, he said. Prison staff came and, after
placing him in a hold and cutting off his
prison uniform, placed his rigid body in a
wheelchair. They rolled him to a cell.
Day turned to night, nighttime shifted
to dawn. By the evening, his hallucina-
tions grew in strength. Bret tried to get
staff members’ attention. He pressed a
call button. When someone showed up,
he found Bret squatting on the floor of
his cell. A cord from a house phone had
been pulled into the cell.
Take the phone cord off and give it
to me, an officer ordered. Bret complied.
They took him to the prison hospital,
where he was placed on suicide watch.
For refusing to leave the chair in the
sergeant’s office, and for using the phone
cord, he was given 20 days of disciplinary
segregation. Nearly three more weeks in
the Hole.
And then…he and trouble seemed to
part ways. Once he mixed back in with
the general population, his interactions
with staff weren’t marked by such ag-
gression. His mental illness and their
symptoms stabilized.
Mental-health professionals say this
can happen: that even serious mental ill-
ness, aided by treatment, can be mitigated
by long stretches of relative calm. For
certain individuals affected by psychotic
episodes, however, periods of hallucina-
tions or suicidal thoughts may return to
pierce the bubble of serenity. Even so,
perhaps Bret found hope in the future.
Back when he’d pleaded guilty to
child molestation, he’d requested the
judge send him to Twin Rivers, another
facility at Monroe. Twin Rivers houses
one of the state’s sex offender treatment
programs, known to offenders and prison
officials as SOTP. Sex offenders express-
ing interest in the program must submit
an application.
Bret applied soon after entering pris-
on. He already knew he’d been accepted,
but offenders enter treatment 12 to 18
months before their release. Bret was
still looking at a couple years’ wait. He’d
enter SOTP soon, but when precisely, he
didn’t know. One day.
In the meantime, Bret kept in contact
with the outside. Word from his mother
was that things were bad at home. Much
like it had been when Bret lived with her
and his stepfather. She did her best to
send him money, which allowed him to
buy official prison goods, like radios.
But each time he received money,
the prison deducted 20 percent off the
Real Change
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
top to pay for incarceration, 10 percent
for a prisoner savings account to be paid
out upon release, and 5 percent for a
Victim Compensation Fund. (Though the
mother of Bret’s victim had already told
police, “That Victim Compensation Fund
you all talk about never helped me.”)
He made collect calls to the pastor-
and-wife couple who had helped him
when he’d been kicked out of his home
after his sex offense charge. Their phone
bill went sky high. When he mentioned
that the voices still spoke to him, they
counseled him to pray to the Lord, to
ask for His help.
But at some point, his devotion
toward Christianity waned and he felt
drawn to Wicca, a religion that, de-
pending on one’s viewpoint, is a recent
creation or an ancient practice. The
energy of the feminine balances that of
the masculine in Wiccan beliefs, and hu-
man sexuality — a gift from the Goddess
— is praised.
In his cell, he kept vessels used in the
pagan practice, and one day, when he re-
turned, he found the door open: His store
had been stolen. Bret had debts he owed
to another offender, for fixing his radio,
and, without the money, he was in a bind.
To pay off the balance, Bret relinquished
one of his Wiccan tools, a smudge bowl
— used for the burning of sage, a cleans-
ing herb — to stay in the black.
Smudge did little, however, to cleanse
the prison of those who preyed upon him.
Threats continued. The staff considered
placing him in ad seg again.
Just as a kite had warned of a threat
on his safety, Bret passed a Sept. 2003
kite on to the records department, re-
questing information about an incident
that occurred in July. Records personnel
wrote back that no reports involving that
time period were in his file.
There has to be a record, he kited
back: “I was raped in F Unit.”
He hadn’t wanted to press charges at
the time, he wrote, due to fear of retali-
ation from the alleged perpetrator. But
three months after the fact, he’d changed
his mind. “Please contact the appropriate
agency and inform them that I wish to
file felony criminal charges for the crime
committed against me.”
Maybe Bret had been emboldened
to speak out because he had heard what
took place shortly after his rape: in
September 2003, in a unanimous vote,
Congress enacted the Prison Rape Elimi-
nation Act. A 2004 review of criminal
records by the Bureau of Justice Statis-
tics discovered more than 5,300 acts of
sexual violence had been reported in the
nation’s adult correctional facilities.
But those numbers, as human rights
advocates assert, represent a fraction of
prison sexual assaults. For Bret, the prison
superintendent forwarded his assault alle-
gations to the Intelligence & Investiagations
division. Whether futher action was taken is
unknown, but Bret told friends no charges
against the alleged rapist were ever filed.
Bret would report no other assaults,
sexual or otherwise, while in the Special
Offenders Unit. Other than a fighting
match in Dec. 2004 that resulted in him
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 7
Real Change
“The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
THE BRIDGE, Continued from Page 6
serving seven days in isolation, he re-
mained infraction-free.
And then, the news the 22-year-old
had been waiting for: He’d be going to
Twin Rivers in January 2005. After wait-
ing close to three years, Bret would begin
sex offender treatment.
Finally, it seemed, he faced a
brighter future.
F
rom where Bret stands on the Au-
rora Bridge on Oct. 17, 2007, Queen
Anne Hill rises to the south. To the
north, the buildings of Fremont stretch
into the distance.
Immediately to his right, a white
tower crane reaches skyward. With its
looming presence, it could be the mast
and jib of a ghostly ship devoid of sail.
In front of him, open air. Directly
behind him, a waist-high rail. Bret holds
onto it with one hand.
Can he feel the cool metal that’s ex-
posed through the rail’s chipped paint?
Does his body sense the concrete ledge
vibrate from the vehicles passing along
Aurora Ave.?
And his mind? How is his mental
state? Does he hear the voices? Are they
issuing their commands? And the visual
hallucinations. Can he see—
The officer. He treads the pedes-
trian walkway. He moves to within 30 ft.
Twenty. Fifteen.
Don’t come closer, Bret tells him. The
officer obeys.
The Aurora Bridge spans a thin sec-
tion of Lake Union. People have leapt into
these waters before. Even though there’s
no water below Bret, the police station dis-
patches two divers. The time, 10:20 a.m.
Two minutes left.
Bret keeps hold of his cell phone. He’s
called a friend to tell him he’s on a bridge. clothing or prison-approved apparel
Which one? Bret won’t say. But there’s a
large crane nearby.
An empty cell at Twin Rivers. Bret stayed in a similar cell, live together in A Unit, the
with a cellmate, on A Unit, C Wing while taking part in the layout of which recalls a
Sex Offender Treatment Program. Photo by Rosette Royale
Almost 130 feet below him, running
perpendicular to the Aurora Bridge, N.
34th St. The occasional vehicle passes
beneath him. On the bridge, at some point,
police stop all southbound traffic.
The officer can tell Bret’s upset, so he
wants him on the safe side of the rail. He
attempts to talk him back. Bret doesn’t
respond. Instead, he tells the officer
about himself.
The Department of Corrections
considers me on escape status…I’m
a sex offender…I’m homeless…I’m
unemployed.
But his name: that he will not say.
Below him, on N. 34th St., cars drive
by. He tells his friend on the phone about
them. They look so small. He plans to
jump on one of them.
His friend asks him not to do it.
But Bret has made up his mind. That
is what he will do.
I
gnore the double rows of chain link
fence topped with razor wire and the
armed guard keeping watch in the forti-
fied tower, and Twin Rivers, home to the
Sex Offender Treatment Program, brings
to mind a community college campus.
On its western border, four cream-
colored housing units, trimmed in ma-
rine blue, act as dormitories for roughly
800 medium-custody prisoners. Set
along the eastern boundary, a prison
library, infirmary, dining hall, chapel,
and gymnasium. Running alongside
these communal areas, a blacktop walk-
way stretches north to administrative
buildings and south to the Yard, the
outdoor recreational area. Prisoners at
Twin Rivers — 60-70 percent of whom
have been convicted of a sex offense
— have given the walkway a nickname:
the Boulevard.
When allowed out of their cell, pris-
oners, either in their state-issued khaki
from the outside, and guards, clad in
dark blue enforcement uniforms, stroll
the Boulevard. Near their
feet, blackbirds patrol the
grounds for insects. Above
them, swallows delight in
the freedom of open air.
Bret showed up at
Twin Rivers in January
2005, transported from the
Special Offender Unit in a
white van, ready to start
treatment. But he had to
wait for a vacancy.
Anyone convicted of
a sex offense in Washing-
ton state since 1998 can
volunteer to take part in
the treatment program at
Twin Rivers. Space allows
for only 200 participants
at a time. The program
is popular: The five-year
waiting list stretches to
1,000 would-be partici-
pants. (A much smaller
program, for female sex
offenders, exists in Gig
Harbor.) Active enrollees
giant hand, open wide.
Three dorm wings branch outward
from a centralized day room like the
extended ring, middle, and forefinger
of an open hand. At the points where
fingers would join to palm, thick walls of
shatterproof Plexiglas reach from floor
to ceiling. Imagine the wrist. Here, on an
elevated platform, sitting behind another
Plexiglas wall, a guard keeps watch on all
activities: pool games, channel surfing,
daytime showers.
Bret took a cell on A Unit, C Wing, at
first playing the “house mouse,” sticking
close to his cell, too afraid to interact
with everyone else. Other offenders
The first time Lawrence McCollum met Bret in Twin Rivers in early 2005, he just thought
of him as another prisoner. But after their second meeting, their friendship clicked. “Bret
was very happy when Bret and I were together at Twin Rivers.” Photo by Joel Turner
prodded him to enter more fully into the
unit’s life and, after some cajoling, he did.
In no time, pretty much everyone knew
Bret’s name.
Not that they called him Bret. Nick-
names are popular inside and when pris-
oners hit upon one for Bret, they based it
on a physical characteristic: He blinked.
A lot. He would be looking at you, and
for no reason, his lids — for a second,
maybe a little more — would clamp shut.
Practically everyone took to calling him
Grow old? That’s not
going to happen, Bret
said. I’ll never see 30. I’m
going to commit suicide.
It’ll be by jumping, he
said.
Blinky, which he hated. Lawrence Mc-
Collum called him Bret .
They met over dinner. McCollum
hadn’t been at Twin Rivers long and, one
evening, as he scanned the dining hall
looking for a place to sit, he spied an open
seat. Seconds after he placed his tray on
the table, Bret plopped down across from
him. The two chatted while they ate. Mc-
Collum didn’t think much of it.
A few days later, in the Yard, Bret ran
up to McCollum: He’d been looking for
him. They talked some more. “And we
just hit it off,” says McCollum. During
free time, they became inseparable. Bret
taught him cribbage, dominoes, bocce
ball, horseshoes. McCollum was struck

by his wit and intelligence. as he listened
while Bret talked. And talked. And talk-
ed. “Bret was very happy when Bret and
I were together at Twin Rivers.”
If the weather proved agreeable,
offenders spent free time in the Yard,
shooting hoops or walking laps around
the track. One afternoon, a group of of-
fenders, taking in the sunshine, hung out
on the grass in the Yard. A conversation
broke out, topics changing with great
ease. Someone heckled McCollum, crack-
ing a joke about his age. Bret laughed.
Come on, McCollum, 54, told him,
you’ll get your turn. You’ll grow old.
That’s not going to happen, Bret re-
plied. I’ll never see 30. I’m going to com-
mit suicide. It’ll be by jumping, he said.
But: What do you do, when someone
says he’s thinking of suicide? Experts
advise to take the threat seriously. Seek
assistance. Get help.
Yet the offenders in the Yard treated
Bret’s admission with nonchalance.
Perhaps it was because people say crazy
stuff in prison and who can tell if some-
one’s just being funny. And Bret could be
funny. Or perhaps the very notion of tak-
ing one’s own life unsettled them more
than the violence they had experienced
or witnessed on the outside. Whatever
their reasons, none of them made much
of Bret’s comment.
Yet McCollum couldn’t ignore Bret’s
never-see-30 fatalism. He’d stood next
to Bret in the meds line while a nurse
watched him swallow down pills, some
prescribed to combat suicidal thoughts
and depression. He knew that voices
commanded Bret to jump, head first,
from a tall structure. But would he re-
ally do it? McCollum didn’t act that day
in the Yard. But if a situation ever arose,
McCollum swore he’d tell the staff.
He’d do whatever it took.
I ntellectually, Sally Neiland knew the
sex offenders wouldn’t be bogeymen.
But still, the men were so nice, they took
her by surprise.
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 8

 “The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
THE BRIDGE, Continued from Page 7
She’d been working with victims of
sexual assault — both women and men
— for several years when Twin Rivers
invited her to speak. They wanted her
to dialogue with clinicians about victim
empathy. Her plan was simple: just talk
to the clinicians and get out. There would
be no hanging around.
But when she arrived, clinicians
asked her to sit in on a group. She did.
As the offenders talked, she watched the
men. They weren’t scary-looking. And
they appeared to be working on making
changes in their lives. “It was like being
at a PTA meeting that was all men,” says
Neiland, the current Sex Offender Treat-
ment Program director.
Yet Neiland knows that in the Sex Of-
fender Treatment Program, the men don’t
sit around talking about bake sales. In
groups involving 10 to 14 offenders, each
participant addresses his past criminal
behavior and its potential causes.
Groups employ cognitive behavior
therapy, a form of psychotherapy fo-
cused on how one’s thoughts impact
one’s feelings and actions. The therapy
also challenges distortions about vulner-
What makes a sex
offender? If Twin Rivers
is an example, then no
black-and-white answer
exists.
able victims. A trained clinician facili-
tates the group.
Treatment also incorporates a prac-
tice known as arousal reconditioning.
Here, the emphasis is to redirect a
participant’s usual pathway to sexual
stimulation through the introduction of
an unpleasant sensation — say, a nause-
ating smell — prior to the initial stage
of arousal.
By program’s end, an offender has
undergone between 350 and 500 hours
of treatment, not including a varying
number of one-on-one hours with a
clinician. The purpose of treatment
is to stop the men from re-offending
again— forever. Indeed, only 1.3 percent
of those who complete treatment are
A sign adorning the entrance to one of
the two buildings that house the Sex Of-
fender Treatment Program (SOTP) at Twin
Rivers. Up to 200 offenders participate
in the program at a time, which lasts
anywhere from 12 to 18 months. Photo by
Rosette Royale
convicted of another felony sex offense
within five years.
Bret fared well in his treatment
group. He got along with fellow mem-
bers and sought out his clinician for
one-on-ones several times a week.
Before entering the group, he’d worked
with the clinician on an individual plan,
which he followed. One of his issues
was impulse control: When he wanted
something, he would go get it. And
boundaries, he had problems setting
his own and respecting others’.
Participants confronting mental ill-
ness — a low percentage, Neiland says,
since most sex offenders aren’t mentally
ill — present significant challenges. In
the case of someone who suffers audi-
tory hallucinations, a group clinician
could, for example, write down what
those voices say on sheets of paper.
Taped to the walls of the treatment room,
the other group members, prior to the
mentally ill offender’s arrival, can famil-
iarize themselves with the challenges
their incoming member faces.
Doctors, teachers, lawyers, janitors,
Boeing executives, clergy members,
cops: all of these people have taken part
in SOTP. But what led these men here in
the first place? What makes a sex offend-
er? If Twin Rivers is an example, then no
black-and-white answer exists.
One third of the men in SOTP have
been sexually assaulted. Another third
report witnessing abuse in the home.
“And the last third report an absence of
identifiable trauma,” says Neiland. Bret
seemed to fit the first two categories.
As for those who offend against
children, the causes can be numerous.
The act may have occurred because the
offender merely had access to the young
victim, not because the offender carries
an attraction toward all children. “Or
they may be emotionally congruent with
children,” Neiland says, “versus those
their own peer age.”
Outside of group, a community of
caring people sprang up around Bret, one
that extended to staff members, who en-
joyed his presence. He could have them
laughing in a manner of minutes.
He worked in the kitchen — pay rate,
42 cents an hour — on the lunch-dinner
crew. When he took off his food-service
cap at the end of his shift, he’d make a
beeline for Lawrence McCollum’s cell so
they could hang out. Numerous times, in
their conversations, Bret spoke of the
voices or predicted his early death.
On two occasions, he told McCollum
he had to do it: He was going to jump
from the interior second-floor balcony
of A Unit to the ground floor. Then once
more he repeated the claim. Why? Mc-
Colllum asked. Because the voices are
telling me to, he said.
McCollum didn’t need to hear it a
fourth time. With Bret’s permission,
he went to the sergeant’s office. The
sergeant declared a medical emergency.
A Unit went on lockdown. Medical
staff assessed Bret’s condition. They
escorted him to a hospital within the
correctional complex.
What worried McCollum more than
anything was that, at the time, Bret had
been keeping his appointments in the
meds line. He’d seen him take his pills. “If
he’s doing all this while he’s medicating,”
Real Change
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
says McCollum, “imagine what must be The man chosen to be Bret’s parole
happening when he’s not?” officer on the outside, Randy Van Zandt,
Bret returned to the unit days later. thought not. He felt it best to wait. After
He told McCollum he was all right. Still, reconsideration, officials shifted the
most people knew. Even though he acted date. Bulletins sent to sheriff offices in
happy-go-lucky, they were aware, behind King and Cowlitz Counties informed law
his smiles, his men-
tal state plagued
him. Yet nothing
could diminish the
beacon on the hori-
zon: his release.
In March of
2002, he’d been
sentenced to five
and a half years.
That would have
taken him to Sep-
tember 2007. The
End of Sentence
Review Board, af-
ter examining his
file and taking into
account time for
good behavior, de-
termined that Bret
could be released in
October 2006. They
also decided, based
upon a point sys-
tem that factored in
his single offense,
he’d be classified
as a Level 2 sex of-
fender, a mid-level
designation.
A second com-
Every day, Bret stopped by this window — the Meds Line — to
mittee deemed Bret
pick up his prescriptions. A nurse would watch as he swallowed
them. Still, hallucinations plagued him. Photo by Rosette Royale
a good match for a
state program that
assisted seriously mentally ill offend- enforcement Bret Hugh Winch would be
ers upon release. The program even released on Nov. 1.
contracted with a building. It seemed September passed without incident.
perfect, until the committee realized In October, he completed his Sex Of-
the building sat close to a school, which fender Treatment Program, agreeing to
would have broken one of his release outside treatment. When Nov. 1 rolled
conditions. In short order, the program around, Bret met Van Zandt outside of
secured him a small room in one of the Twin Rivers’ locked doors. It was the
few Seattle apartment complexes willing first time in more than five and a half
years he’d stepped on the open side
McCollum had stood of razor-wire fences and locked metal
doors without handcuffs or shackles.
next to Bret in the With him, he had two boxes of belong-
meds line while a nurse ings. Withdrawn from his prisoner
account: checks totaling $42.
watched him swallow What was he thinking as he slid into
down pills, some the car seat? Was he excited to finally be
free? Did he worry he might screw up
prescribed to combat and find himself under the eyes of armed
suicidal thoughts. guards again? Or were all of his thoughts
drowned out by voices commanding him
He knew that voices to hurt himself, overpowered by crea-
commanded Bret to tures snarling nearby?
jump, head first, from a His treatment clinician on the out-
side, whom he had yet to meet, would
tall structure. But would claim later that Bret would do a lot
he really do it? better than anyone had expected. Yet,
within a year, he would be standing on
the Aurora Bridge.
to accept Level 2 sex offenders. McCol- And the last person he knew to see
lum, who had already been released, took him before he’d clamber over the out-
pictures of Bret’s soon-to-be home, and side rail would be Van Zandt, the man
mailed them to his friend. The room was who’d come to meet him for his journey
located in a seedy building on a gritty to Seattle, where the two would take
street on Capitol Hill, near downtown. part in a destiny Bret had been predict-
His earned release date of Oct. 21, ing for years. n
2006 was finalized. But there was another
problem: Halloween. Did it make sense to
release Bret on the proposed date, when,
10 days later, the streets could be full of To be continued…
trouble? Not to mention children?
Real Change
“The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
What led Bret Hugh Winch to the Aurora Bridge last October?
In the last of a three-part series, Bret moves into his own place in Seattle. But when he
faces potential homelessness, he makes a rash decision
The Man Who
Stood on the Bridge
Pt. 3: Home, it’s better than prison
By ROSETTE ROYALE,
Staff Reporter
A
few hundred feet away from him,
on the Aurora Bridge, police have
stopped traffic. More than 120 ft.
below him, on N. 34th St., cars slow down
for a speed bump. Not a lot of cars, but
a few. They look so small.
It’s 10:21 in the morning and Bret
Hugh Winch heaved one leg, then the
other over the railing at least seven min-
utes ago. It could be longer. But not by
much. That’s around the time the ordeal
on the bridge began.
Some construction workers see him.
They’re excavating a site just north of N.
34th. St. A white tower crane rises into
the air like a toy made from an oversized
erector set.
Don’t do it, one of them yells. It’s not
worth it.
Standing 15 feet away from Bret, an
officer. He’s tried to move closer, but Bret
told him not to. He’s tried to get Bret to
climb back over the 42-inch rail, but, no
way, he won’t do it.
Bret tells the officer he’s on Depart-
ment of Corrections Escape Status, he’s
a Level 3 sex offender, he has no place
to live, he has no job.
Is that why? Does this explain why
he’s come here today, on Oct. 17, 2007?
Are the reasons for considering suicide
this easy to comprehend?
But what if Bret is wrong
about being homeless?
What if his PO, this very
minute, is working to
secure him housing?
Bret holds a cell phone to one ear, talk-
ing to a friend. The friend knows Bret is on
a bridge, but doesn’t know which one.
Seattle has more than 150 bridges. Hun-
dreds of overpasses, too. The friend tries an
overpass to the interstate near the Seattle
Community Justice Center, the parole of-
fice. He’s about five miles off the mark.
Bret left the justice center not even an
hour ago. He’d been kicked out of his apart-
ment and he needed help from his parole
officer to get a new place. That’s why he tells
the officer on the bridge he’s homeless.
At least, this is what Bret thinks. But
what if he’s wrong? What if his PO, this
very minute, is working to secure him
housing? Would Bret still be here?
He has a lot competing for his atten-
tion. Construction workers. His friend
on the phone. The officer nearby. His
own thoughts.
These thoughts cause him to hear
voices that tell him to hurt himself. These
thoughts cause him to see demons that
hiss and snarl.
All of these people, these hallucina-
tions are with Bret as he stands on the
bridge. But by 10:22 a.m., everything
will shift.
And that moment is a mere heart-
beat away.
B ret saw his new place and thought:
“It definitely beats being in prison.”
It was Nov. 1, 2006 and he’d just been
released from Twin Rivers, a state prison
that houses a Sex Offender Treatment
Program. It had taken more than 12 months
and several hundred hours of treatment.
And now, here he was. In his own place.
Randy Van Zandt, Bret’s parole of-
ficer, had met the 23-year-old at the
prison’s front doors earlier that morning
and driven him into Seattle. Van Zandt
specialized in overseeing offenders con-
fronting chronic mental illness and Bret
fit the bill: Bret had told friends he had
schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. A
prison psychiatric exam diagnosed him
with unspecified psychosis.
His new offender, Van Zandt saw, was
high maintenance and would require a lot
of hand holding. “Bret was someone who
benefited a lot with someone walking
through things with him,” says Van Zandt.
The two were looking at a long walk
together: Bret was slated to be under
supervision for four years, until 2010.
The apartment was pretty small. Actu-
ally, it was a hotel room, in a 54-room no-
tell hotel that rented by the week, even to
Level 2 sex offenders like Bret. Forty-six of
the rooms shared bathrooms and showers
that lay at the eastern end of each floor. The
rooms came with a bed, a mini-fridge, a mi-
crowave, a table, and a couple of chairs.
The manager gave Bret a key to Room
107. Outside his southern-facing window,
an alleyway strewn with broken bottles. In
his building, drug deals took place through
ground-floor windows. Prostitutes climbed
through to meet their johns. Tenants left
porn mags in the shared bathrooms.
Out on the street, police cars, with
sirens blaring, made regular appearances.
The view from the ledge of the Aurora Bridge, looking down to N. 34th St., some
130 ft. below. Photo by Joel Turner
Ambulances took people away on stretch-
ers. Arguments broke out into fistfights.
But, hey: it was home.
And finding a place to live as a regis-
tered sex offender is no easy feat. Most
people don’t think of sex offenders as
good neighbors and landlords can be
skittish about renting to them. For those
with meager financial resources, like Bret,
housing becomes even tougher. This may
help to explain why, of the nearly 4,000
registered sex offenders in King County,
400 of them are homeless.
A fair number of offenders Bret had
known at Twin Rivers lived in other rooms
Finding a place to live as
a registered sex offender
is no easy feat. Most
people don’t want one as
a neighbor and landlords
can be skittish about
renting to one.
at the hotel. In prison, they noticed he
opened and closed his eyes uncontrolla-
bly, so they gave him a nickname: Blinky.
Bret hated the name. But it stuck.
Still, having people around proved
good, because it meant Bret had company.
He did whatever he could to keep anyone
around, as another person nearby silenced
the demons, sending the apparitions to

the wall where they stood, mute.
Bret had described the demons to
Lawrence McCollum, whom he’d met at
Twin Rivers. They stood about three feet
tall, floating just a few inches from the
ground. Horns curved out of their heads.
“To me,” says McCollum, “they sounded
like something out of Dante.”
Their faces were humanoid and they
snarled and hissed from angry mouths.
Whether on the bus, at Safeway, or the
justice center downtown, the demons
were there. They were always there.
Nighttime, though: that was the
worst. Alone, with no one around, the
voices, the demons, they nearly over-
whelmed him. Sometimes, they even
invaded his dreams. He talked over his
symptoms with his treatment program
clinician, Judy McCullough, during a
one-on-one session. She told him she’d
email Van Zandt, his PO, who could
forward his concerns to Sound Mental
Health, where Bret went for his meds
and mental health meetings.
He’d mentioned the voices to Clinton
and Nancy Erckenbrack, too. The pas-
tor-and-wife couple from southwestern
Washington had cared for him when Bret
was in his teens, right after his first-degree
child molestation charge. He wrote them a
letter, thanking them for their encourage-
ment. God Bless You. “Would you consider
coming to visit me in Seattle?” he asked.
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 10

10 “The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
THE BRIDGE, Continued from Page 9
They wanted to, but their ministry was
thriving. They couldn’t get away. So he
called them around Thanksgiving. Clinton
spoke to him. “Just talk to the Lord,” the
pastor advised, “tell him your problems.”
But in his new place, with his 24th
birthday having come and gone, and with
the possibility of spending Christmas
with his mother and grandmother out of
state growing dim, Bret stopped eating.
Did he forget? Even with the canned spa-
ghetti and junk food and soda around?
His memory did fail him at times.
But five days before Christmas, Mc-
Cullough got a phone call: Bret had been
taken to the ER in an ambulance. After
pumping him with IV fluids, Swedish Hos-
pital sent Bret back to the tiny apartment,
where the ever-present demons awaited.
And so the holidays came and went.
Happy New Year.
B oundaries. Bret knew he had to set
boundaries. But he just couldn’t
seem to do it.
In his room, he returned to a regular
eating schedule. But the other tenants in
the building kept coming by. Would he
share some of his food? Sure, no prob-
lem. McCullough knew he wanted to be
liked. “And with that,” she says, “he was
taken advantage of.”
By the time the third week of January
2007 had rolled around, he only had $1 to
his name. Did he have enough food left?
He told McCullough he thought he did.
Still, the money. She wanted him to
work on his money management. Thanks
to a program called the Mentally Ill Of-
fender Community Transition Program,
his rent — $165 a week, reduced to $150
— and mental health treatments were
covered. But social services only gave
him $226 a month and a bus pass.
Bret thought if he had another $100
a month, he’d be fine. Maybe he could
donate plasma. Was that a good idea? His
treatment providers worried the proce-
dure might affect his meds. Besides, what
did he need the money for?
Things. Like a new pre-paid cell
phone. And a used laptop. And CD’s.
He already had hundreds of them, all
categorized, alphabetically, in his tidy
room. Of course, the dopest ones had
been dropped by the Real Slim Shady
himself, Eminem. Bret loved Eminem.
He gave him mad props. Sometimes, with
the baseball caps and hoodies, he tried to
emulate the look of the hip-hop star who
had attempted suicide once himself.
Bret’s mother bought him a new stereo
with huge speakers. He would turn the sys-
tem up and let it rip. Of course, not everyone
was in the mood for Eminem’s illin’ rhymes.
Tenants complained, a manager warned him
about the volume. So he got headphones to
keep the bass line up close to his ears. All
the better to drown out the voices.
Though, when it came to boundaries,
he had one he tried to enforce: his living
space. He wanted to move. Even with the
friends he knew there, the hotel wasn’t the
best place for him. Stuff kept happening.
A prostitute, let in the building by a
john, was curious: Did Bret want a little
action? In treatment, he’d addressed
what appropriate sexual conduct looked
like for him. A partner, with the house
and the white picket fence, that’s what
he longed for. The prostitute did not fit
the picture, so he told her no.
He dreamed of a place in the Univer-
sity District that took offenders, where
he’d visited a friend. His PO, Randy Van
Zandt, agreed to set up an appointment
with the landlord. It would take time.
Luckily for Bret, he’d played the wait-
ing game before. Sure, he was impatient,
even impulsive on occasion. But he’d had
to wait three and a half years in various
state prisons before entering the treat-
ment program at Twin Rivers. He would
have to hold on again.
To keep himself occupied, Bret visited
Sound Mental Health five days a week to
get his meds and to take part in meetings.
His Friday visit provided medication for
the whole weekend. But sometimes, he
suffered side effects.
The pills caused him to gain weight.
Occasionally, he became constipated.
Worse than both of these, however, he
couldn’t sleep. He’d stay up until the wee
hours, playing video games. Being a night
owl kept him from getting to his Sound
Mental Health appointments on time.
Van Zandt could see how insomnia
wore on Bret. He was lethargic, forgetful.
You need to start prioritizing awake time,
the PO told him, so you can get things
done in the day. Bret did his best.
Randy Van Zandt served as Bret’s parole officer. He saw Bret in his office, before
he headed to the Aurora Bridge. Photo by Joel Turner
And then, in May 2007: his dream was
answered. An apartment in the Universi-
ty District house had opened up. Finally,
he could leave the seedy hotel and move
on to something new, something better.
Bret felt ready.
B ody English. That’s what Carol
Clarke read. People’s body English.
When Bret had come in with Van
Zandt for a standard interview in March
2007, Clarke sat and watched him. For
close to 20 years, she’d been renting
spaces to sex offenders, including those
rated Level 3, the most serious designa-
tion. Somewhere close to 100 offenders
had rented from her over that time, and
she’d had some wonderful successes.
Maybe Bret could be another.
Even though she knew of his child
molestation charge, she didn’t see him
as a bad person. Actually, she found him
precious. She wanted to help him up the
road to something better for himself. So,
yes, he could stay.
But Clarke had rules. Strict rules. No
drugs, no drinking, no overnight guests.
“We make sure the rules are obeyed,” she
says. There were other tenants there, bro-
ken people, and she couldn’t jeopardize all
of them for one person’s actions.
In some ways, the hotel and the new
place had similarities. Both had private
rooms with a bathroom down the hall.
But Clarke’s place was cheaper — almost
by half — the rooms were bigger, and
nicer, and there was a communal kitchen.
One night Bret heated up some food for
himself. He ate his meal.
Soon after, another tenant smelled
something: gas. A fire truck came and
evacuated the whole house. No one could
reenter for hours, until well after midnight.
The manager pieced together that Bret had
forgotten to turn off the burner completely.
He could’ve blown the whole house up.
Bret still had to attend his Monday eve-
ning treatment meetings and Sound Mental
Health appointments, even though he lived
two bus rides away. But he became adept
at riding the bus, and he rode them to malls,
down to Southcenter, up to Northgate.
He decided to head to north Seattle
on a shopping trip. The bus traveled
north up Aurora Ave. And there it was:
the Aurora Bridge.
Did he know that since it had been built,
more than 230 people had jumped to their
deaths from this place? That only one other
bridge in the country saw more suicides?
Perhaps. But when he crossed over Lake
Union, he knew. This would be the place.
He told a friend at the hotel about it.
When Bret wasn’t out looking for some-
thing to buy, he’d head downtown and talk
to people. That included his peeps at the
hotel. “Hey, homeskillet,” he was fond of
saying. “What’s crack-a-lating?”
Yet the situation at the hotel hadn’t
changed. People still sought out ways to
make fast money or get the quick fix. These
attitudes coupled perfectly with Bret’s
desire to help out anyone he could.
Real Change
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
That’s how he met the woman in the
SUV. She pulled up outside the hotel and
got his attention. Then she took him for
a ride. By the time it was over, she’d
drained him of more than $400, getting
him to cash hot checks.
“He fell for that kind of stuff,” says
Clarke.
Still, he befriended those he saw in
need and, in August 2007, he encoun-
tered another woman, this one at Sound
Mental Health.
He’d gone there for a meeting. When
they talked, she told him she’d gotten out of
Bret went down to
the justice center and
handed over the keys to
his place. He was put in
handcuffs.
Western State Hospital, a psychiatric institu-
tion. Bret had been there, too, right after his
child molestation charge. They’d decided he
was mentally competent to stand trial.
The woman, released to the streets,
was homeless. Bret had been kicked out
by his stepdad as well. They bussed back
to his place.
He closed the door and they hung
out for a while. Sometime later, inside
his room, she started screaming she was
being attacked. The police were called.
Clarke doesn’t believe Bret did any-
thing to harm the young woman. His
clinician, Judy McCullough, says the
consensus among his providers is that
Bret was innocent of assaulting his guest.
“That just doesn’t fit what you’d think of
with Bret,” says McCullough. And police
and staff at Sound Mental Health never
identified the alleged victim.
Even though Bret said nothing hap-
pened, he had broken a house rule: no
uninvited guests. Add that to leaving the
gas on and a few noise complaints, and
Clarke was left with no choice. Even as
much as it hurt her, she had to evict him.
“I’ve learned the hard way,” she says. “I
can’t save everybody.”
By no longer having a legal address
at Clarke’s, Bret violated a condition of
his housing program. That meant the De-
partment of Corrections had no choice
either: Bret had to be arrested.
Bret went down to the justice center
and handed over the keys to Clarke’s
place. They put him in handcuffs, then
took him to the King County Jail. He’d
been out of prison for only nine months.
Now he was locked up again.
M essed up. Everything. Was weird.
And messed. Up.
When he got out of jail 12 days later,
Bret couldn’t figure out what was happen-
ing: his mind, he couldn’t concentrate. He
called his friend Lawrence McCollum.
He told McCollum he hadn’t re-
ceived any of his meds while in jail and
couldn’t find his way home. McCollum
stayed on the phone with Bret while he
rode the bus from downtown.
Though jail may seem like an extreme
response to the violation, Van Zandt says
that at least there, people could keep an
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 11
Real Change
“The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008
THE BRIDGE, Continued from Page 10
eye on Bret. For him, that was better than
being homeless. “He sat in jail,” Van Zandt
admits, “until we found his housing.”
The hotel. Bret moved back into his
old room. As soon as he checked in, he
went to Sound Mental Health to see his
treatment provider. He had to get his
meds straightened out. And as his drug
regimen changed, so did Bret.
For a while, he became obsessed with
horizontal lines. He might be looking at
someone and then, a horizontal surface
— a window sill, say, or the top edge of
an open laptop — would catch his eye.
From the person, to the horizontal line,
the person, the line. Back and forth his
vision would bounce, until his eyesight
would land on the horizontal surface and
linger…for a second…or two…or thr
— and then he’d snap out of it. Until it
happened again. Mental health providers
tweaked his prescription.
By mid-September 2007, he still
couldn’t find the right regimen. Van Zandt
listened as Bret sat in his office, amped
up. Bret’s hallucinations were scaring
him, and the insomnia, it had gotten
worse. Van Zandt suggested another
visit to Sound Mental Health, along with
watching his diet and sleep. When that
didn’t work, Bret returned to the clinic
for an emergency visit.
The next day, he missed his appoint-
ment with his treatment group. For
months, he’d been working on integrat-
ing back into the community. He’d re-
examined the charge that had led him
to prison, and established more empathy
for his victim. Group was important. His
clinician, Judy McCullough, wanted to
know why he hadn’t shown up.
With October’s arrival,
Bret had to re-register as
a sex offender, because
he moved down the hall.
Because, he said, he’d signed an un-
known man into the building, who then
accused Bret of stealing his cell phone.
Bret confronted him and the man raised his
hand, threatening to hit him. His stepfather
used to do the same. Afraid he would be
hurt, Bret dared not leave his room.
Boundaries, McCullough reminded
him. “You are not setting appropriate
external boundaries.” His mental health
case manager felt the same.
With October’s arrival, Bret had to
re-register as a sex offender, because he
moved down the hall, into Room 111. The
same size as the room he’d just left, it sat
closer to the bathroom and showers. And
while the room didn’t pose a problem,
someone he’d met on his journeys did.
A male transvestite had been harass-
ing Bret. He told some friends about it,
and they suggested he ignore him and not
to let him in his room. The transvestite
called Bret’s phone instead. Bret wor-
ried that the person would say he’d done
something wrong, get him trouble, even
wind up having Bret thrown back in jail.
He told his treatment group he didn’t
want that. He’d rather kill himself.
Throughout that night, suicidal thoughts
ran wild in his mind. When he saw Van Zan-
dt the next morning, the PO suggested Bret
call the Crisis Clinic hotline, or perhaps
consider hospitalization. But what about
the harasser? Bret wondered. If he got in
trouble, he could wind up in jail again. And
might be raped. Again. Van Zandt offered
to help with a no-contact order.
On Fri., Oct. 12, 2007, Bret missed his
meds pick-up appointment at Sound Mental
Health. When his friend Lawrence McCol-
lum spoke to him on Sun., Oct. 14, Bret was
in a manic phase, going 100 mph. McCollum
Bret Hugh Winch, on Capitol Hill in April 2007.
had seen or heard him in similar states, so
he hoped Bret would be able to recover, the
same as before. “I had no reason to believe
that he wouldn’t,” McCollum says.
And it seemed McCollum was right.
People who saw Bret that Monday and
Tuesday thought he seemed OK, normal.
Except for Van Zandt.
Bret came by to see him on Tues.,
Oct. 16. He still hadn’t picked up his
meds. It had been six days. Not taking
his medication amounted to a violation,
Van Zandt told him. He had to do it. Van
Zandt wanted him to come back in two
days, to check in. Bret said he would.
But Bret couldn’t wait that long. In-
stead, he showed up the next day.
W ednesday, Oct. 17, 2007.
Bret came down to the Seattle
Community Justice Center at 8 a.m. and
sat in the day room. He had to talk to
Van Zandt.
In Van Zandt’s office, he took a seat.
Something had happened at the hotel last
night. Van Zandt focused on Bret, while
he explained.
He’d had an altercation with one of
the hotel managers. They’d known each
other in prison and now, on the outside,
as manager, he kept bothering Bret.
He had come into his room before and
hugged Bret, not letting go. Another time,
he lay on Bret’s bed and pulled Bret on
top him. Bret had to fight to get away.
Friends had told Bret to ignore the
manager, so he tried. Then last night, the
manager wanted to know why he was
getting the cold shoulder. Bret fled to his
room. The manager stormed down the hall.
“I’ll beat your ass,” he shouted. The man-
ager went back to the office. Bret locked
himself in his room. The manager returned
and beat on Bret’s door. Inside, afraid, Bret
called 911. The police arrived.
But the hotel landlord didn’t want cops
around. “It’s easier to find people to live
here than it is to find people to work here,”
the landlord said. That meant Bret was out.
He had until noon the next day.
It was the next day. By the time Bret
finished the story, it was going on 9 a.m.
He had three hours left to move.
I don’t want to be homeless, Bret told
Van Zandt.
Van Zandt didn’t either. He suggested
they come up with a contingency plan,
Photo courtesy of Lawrence McCollum
maybe have Bret stay in a motel for the
short term.
If worse came to worse, Bret offered
to sleep under the overpass to Interstate 5,
right outside the justice center. That way,
he’d be there first thing every morning.
Van Zandt was surprised. Bret seemed
willing to work out the problem. Though
he did appear nervous, a little distraught, it
looked like Bret needed less hand-holding.
But Van Zandt wanted to verify Bret’s
story. If he’d really been thrown out, he
could face jail time again for breaking
his housing condition. Van Zandt didn’t
want to arrest him. But he didn’t want to
get Bret’s hopes up either and tell Bret
he’d be able to move back in to the hotel.
What should he do? Van Zandt decided to
try find him a place to live. Fast.
He couldn’t do it with Bret sitting in
the office, though. So he suggested Bret
hang out in the day room, even if meant
waiting for hours. “We’re going to figure
this out,” Van Zandt assured him. Bret
seemed relieved.
The clock read just past nine.
Back in his office, Van Zandt got on
the phone and started calling Bret’s case
manager and others who had worked
with him. He wanted them all on board to
advocate returning him to the hotel.
One of the people he wanted to speak
to was Bret’s clinician, Judy McCullough,
and she came to work not too long after 9
a.m. She saw Bret sitting in the day room,
acknowledged him, then went to her office,
around the corner from Van Zandt’s.
Van Zandt told her the story. Would
she work with him to put a plan together
to advocate for Bret? Of course, Mc-
Cullough said.
In looking at the options, Van Zandt
considered putting Bret in a motel. He
knew of one on Aurora Ave. It wasn’t a
great place, but still. “A lousy place is a
place,” he says.
11
Around 9:15 a.m., he went out to the
day room, looking for Bret. He wasn’t there.
Van Zandt returned to his office to work the
phones. He wasn’t worried. Maybe Bret had
gone to get his meds or a bite to eat. He’d be
back. Van Zandt was sure of it.
N
o one sees Bret leave the justice
center. No one pays attention to
the clock. But sometime after
9:15 a.m., on Oct. 17, 2007, he begins his
journey to the Aurora Bridge.
He heads for a bus stop. There are
two situated nearby and both have buses
going his way. To make it in time, he
boards a bus that leaves no later than 9:39
a.m. The bus heads downtown.
From the corner of Fourth Ave. S. and
Royal Brougham Way, near where the
bus stops are located, there’s no direct
route to the Aurora Bridge. Somewhere
downtown, maybe near the Pike St./Pine
St. corridor, he has to make a transfer.
But which bus from there?
Two buses travel north across the
Aurora Bridge, but only one stops near
its northern entrance. The 5. Maybe he
catches the 5 that arrives at Winslow Pl.
N. and N. 38th St. at 10:09 a.m.
From here, he can walk west along
N. 38th St. and pass under Aurora Ave.
He can wait for the Walk signal, then
cross to the sidewalk on Fremont Way
N., just before the bridge’s northwestern
entrance. Even with the light, the walk
takes no more than a minute.
Then what? The sidewalk becomes a
pedestrian walkway leading to the Aurora
Bridge. A plaque proclaims the bridge’s
true name: the George Washington Memo-
rial Bridge, dedicated in February 1932.
A rail is the only physical barrier that
keeps a pedestrian from walking right
A yellow phone box on the Aurora Bridge.
Inside, buttons dial either the 24-hr Sui-
cide Crisis Line or 911. Photo by Joel Turner
off the bridge. Rising from the rail are
light poles. Attached to one is a yellow
phone box.
Two red buttons inside dial the 24-hr
Suicide Crisis Line or 911. Below the
rail, a sign reads, “SUICIDAL?”, with a
phone number.
Further south along the walkway,
another “SUICIDAL?” sign. To its left, a
light pole. Ten paces south of the light
pole, outside of the rail, a section of the
7.5-inch-wide ledge.
The 42-inch-high rail is too tall for the
5’5” Bret to clear easily. He must have to
maneuver one leg, then the other over it,
See THE BRIDGE, Continued on Page 12
 Real Change
12 “The Man who Stood on the Bridge”
June 25 - July 1; July 2 - 8; July 9 - 15, 2008

THE BRIDGE, Continued from Page 11 And the sight? No one wants to talk
about it.
before he secures his footing. Does he fear Bret sustains skull, rib, pelvic, and
he’ll slip and fall onto N. 34th St. below? vertebral fractures, with lacerations of the
The walk from the bus stop, to the brain, lungs, liver, spleen, and aorta.
bridge’s northern entrance to this section No one considers resuscitation, be-
of the bridge takes just over five minutes. cause death comes— one, two, thr—
And when does Bret arrive here? No Instantly.
one knows.
But at 10:14 a.m., Bret calls a friend who
doesn’t answer. He leaves a message.
At 10:15 a.m., Bret calls another
friend. He tells him he’s on a bridge.
T he phone rang in Randy Van Zandt’s
office at approximately 10:45 a.m. He
picked up to hear Bret’s case manager.
Soon, the friend drives to the overpass A friend of Bret’s had called her to say
near the justice center to find him. Bret was on a bridge somewhere. That’s
At 10:16 a.m., Bret stands on the all she knew. Van Zandt sat in his chair
bridge. and thought: But he was just here.
10:17 a.m.: The police station receives a By 10:53 a.m., the friend on the phone
call that a man has threatened to kill him- told police all that he knew. The police
self. The station dispatches a cruiser. didn’t tell him Bret had jumped.
10:18 a.m.: The cruiser arrives. An Almost two hours later, Van Zandt’s
officer approaches Bret along the pedes- phone rang again. The case manager.
trian walkway. She’d spoken to the medical examiner. A pedestrian walks along N. 34th St. In an area nearby, Bret’s friend Lawrence Mc-
10:19 a.m.: The officer gets within 15 Van Zandt hung up. He prepared to meet Collum spread seeds to remember him by. Photo by Joel Turner
ft. Don’t come closer, Bret tells him. with Bret’s treatment team to discuss the
10:20 a.m.: Divers are called in.
10:21 a.m.: Don’t do it, it’s not worth
events of the day.
Early that afternoon, a chaplain from
It took Lawrence and found it…not so much peaceful, but
different than he expected. He thought
it, a construction worker yells. the police station met with construction McCollum months to about the people he could see below
10:22 a.m.: Bret holds his cell phone
to his ear with one hand.
workers who saw Bret fall. He counseled
them in a spare office in the Adobe build-
muster the courage to enjoying the day, close to where he’d
seeded the ground. He realized they
He grasps the rail with the other. ing, on the south side of N. 34th St. visit the Aurora Bridge. didn’t know they didn’t know Bret. They
The officer stands close by. On Thurs., Oct. 18, while at work, It was a beautiful day. didn’t know what had happened there.
Bret takes a look around him. Bret’s good friend Lawrence McCollum But that’s always the case. Anywhere
He mumbles something. To the saw a co-worker. He looked upset. What’s
Sunny and warm. you go, he says, there’s no telling what
voices, perhaps? The demons? wrong? McCollum asked. Didn’t you They began to have a bad feeling. Clinton happened before in that same place. You
He lets go of the rail. hear? the associate asked. Hear what? mailed another letter to the hotel, looking could be having the worst day you could
He leaps. When he told him, McCollum cried so for Bret. He was gone, someone replied, imagine, while someone nearby could be
And falls, headfirst, into the mid- much, his boss sent him home. no one knew where. In late March 2008, a falling in love. “Life goes on,” he says.
morning air. Some of the construction workers friend told the couple what had happened. “This is the case everywhere.”
were still in shock. The company brought Just what they had feared. As McCollum left the Aurora Bridge,
in a grief counselor. thinking, fondly, of Bret, the people below
One. The next week, in the chapel at Twin
Rivers, home to a state prison Sex Of-
fender Treatment Program, offenders
A utumn tightens into winter. Spring
unfolds into summer. And the Erck-
enbracks haven’t stopped thinking about
enjoyed their afternoon, the traffic raced
north and south, drivers and passengers
heading to countless destinations. McCol-
Two. gathered to remember Bret. Bret. Yes, they knew he was needy, and lum holds on to the memory of that day.
On Wed., Oct. 24, Sound Mental yes, he had troubles and was impulsive. And life, it goes on. n
Health held a memorial. Close to 50 peo- But he had the laughter of a 14-year-old.
Thr— ple attended, including Van Zandt, Bret’s In their eyes, he didn’t commit suicide
That’s about how long it takes him to clinician, Judy McCullough, his uncle because he wanted to. He did it because
fall. Not even three seconds. Raymond Shoquist, and Lawrence Mc- he was scared. And, sure, some people
His body plummets roughly 130 ft. be- Collum. Bret’s mother and grandmother may view his suicide as a sin, but what if
fore striking the pavement of N. 34th St. He came from out of state. His mother was he had cancer that had been eating him
attains a speed of approximately 60 mph. so grief stricken, she couldn’t speak. all up? People would understand that,
Witnesses liken the sound to a bag The pastor-and-wife couple, Clinton and wouldn’t they?
of melons dropped from a great height. Nancy Erckenbrack, who cared for Bret in Besides, Nancy knows God to be mer-
A burlap sack filled with potatoes and southwestern Washington after his charge, ciful. “I don’t believe God is cruel,” she
water and bones. A huge drum, but much didn’t attend. They had no idea a memorial says. “He never made hell for us.”
louder, much more percussive than can had taken place. They mailed Bret a letter Randy Van Zandt’s thoughts turn to
be imagined. Like something you’d never at the hotel. It came back returned. They Bret often. When he looks back, he won-
want to hear again. called. His number had been disconnected. ders if he should have arrested Bret that
day he came in, in need of a new place. He
To write this series, staff reporter Rosette Royale obtained close to 600 pages of documents doesn’t blame himself. He feels he tried to
from the Department of Corrections (DOC) through multiple public disclosure requests. help Bret the best he could. How could he
Supporting documentation was also obtained through numerous websites. Interviews were
conducted with more than 20 individuals, including family, friends, former prisoners, mental- have known he’d go to the bridge?
health professionals, and DOC personnel. But every once in a while, he imagines
Any quotes attributed to Bret derive from DOC documents where he was directly quoted by others, what might have happened if things had
department forms written in his own hand, or letters he’d mailed. Thoughts attributed to him stem gone another way. After all, Bret had been
from descriptions others made of him, whether in interviews or as part of DOC documents. right next to him. Just inches away. “If I
Descriptions of Longview and Kelso, WA, the Lewis and Clark Bridge, the home of Nancy and had decided to arrest him,” he says, “he
Clinton Erckenbrack come from a one-day visit the reporter made to southwestern Washing- may be sitting in this chair with us.”
ton. Descriptions of Twin Rivers come from two separate visits to the prison made this past
spring and summer. Descriptions of the Capitol Hill hotel he lived in upon his release are For a while, Lawrence McCollum had
based upon numerous firsthand visits. slipped into depression. But now he’s
Descriptions of the Aurora Bridge and surrounding areas are based upon multiple firsthand pulled out of it. And it’s taken him months
visits the reporter made to the site. Measurements of the bridge either come from various to muster the courage to visit the Aurora
websites or were ascertained through measurements conducted by the reporter himself. Other Bridge. A friend went with him.
descriptions of Bret or his environs are based upon the memories of those who knew him. It was a beautiful day. Sunny and warm.
The narrative of the last moments on the bridge stems from interviews, a police report of the Under the bridge, near the water, people
incident, and a “Computer Assisted Dispatch,” a transcript of law enforcement communica-
tion in relation to the incident.
jogged and rode bikes. McCollum found a
spot nearby and spread some seeds. Bach-
The series got its genesis from a police incident report printed in the Street Watch column of
Real Change last autumn. The entire reporting process lasted more than seven months. elor buttons and Johnny jump-ups.
Then he walked on the bridge himself