Woman accused of threatening to destroy Samaritan Hospital

MOSES LAKE — A Moses Lake woman is accused of threatening to blow up and burn down Samaritan Hospital in Moses Lake.

Grant County prosecutors charged Karen McIntosh, 50, of Moses Lake, in Grant County Superior Court with threats to bomb or injure property.

On May 26, the Moses Lake Police Department received a report of a bomb threat that was phoned in at Samaritan Hospital. An employee in the admitting department at the hospital told police she received a phone call from a woman, alleged to be McIntosh, who told her, “I hate your (expletive) doctors and your (expletive) hospital. I’m going to (expletive) blow it up and burn it down,” according to court documents.

The caller hung up the phone after making the comments and did not say who she was. The employee who took the call interpreted McIntosh’s statements as “threatening” and said she took the call as “serious.” Police were later able to look up the phone and link it to a patient from Samaritan, McIntosh. Police were advised McIntosh had an appointment at the hospital on May 26 and she was contacted by an officer after her appointment was over.

“I asked her if she had called Samaritan Hospital earlier in the day and she stated that she had. I asked her if she was upset with them and she stated that she was. I asked her if she made a threat of burning or bombing the hospital and she stated that she didn’t,” wrote the officer. “McIntosh stated that she said she wished all of Grant County would burn down, not the hospital. McIntosh stated that the caller must have misunderstood her.”

Both McIntosh and her boyfriend, Gary Hill, 46, of Moses Lake, were permanently trespassed from Samaritan Hospital and told they could only be at the hospital in the event of a medical emergency. McIntosh was released and left on foot. Hill was taken into custody for an outstanding misdemeanor warrant for an indecent exposure charge.

Richard Byrd can be reached via email at city@columbiabasinherald.com.