COEUR d'ALENE - New and somewhat sinister details have emerged about the flood which wiped out a portion of The Press' historic archives.

What was already known about the great flood was odd and perplexing enough: One lonely weekend nearly a decade ago, an unknown man tried to discard an exceptionally large pair of underwear in the men's upstairs toilet.

The briefs fouled the plumbing, sending water spilling onto the floor. The toilet continued to agonize for hours and water eventually cascaded into the basement and destroyed archives, including a great deal of old photo negatives.

It was assumed to be an ugly and unfortunate accident, which triggered a much costlier one.

As it turns out, however, it might not have been two accidents.

Recently, very recently in fact, a professional "medium" visited The Press offices and toured the facilities. Her visit was supposed to be just plain fun, but what she revealed has left dozens of people at the paper shocked and deeply troubled by the sinister implications of the newspaper tragedy.

Jennifer Von Behren, the medium and the owner of Clarity Center in Dalton Gardens, says she was born with the ability to see and communicate with spirits.

But she can also see what she calls "historical imprints" and "residual hauntings."

"Sometimes an event was strong enough to leave an impression," Von Behren said. "If everything is lined up right, the record will replay."

She explained that "the record" might not play loud enough for everyone else to hear, but it's like a video playing for her.

"It's like watching TV and describing TV to somebody," she said to a reporter, who was operating with only five (normal) human senses.

So about the time she arrived at the basement archive storage room during her tour, Von Behren began hearing water. She was told nothing about the history of the building.

Along with the water, she could see multiple people "scrambling." She threw out the word "flooding."

"It feels like everybody is just trying to grab stuff," she said.

Then, pausing for a moment and sliding the palms of her hands together over and over to keep herself from picking at her nails until they bleed, she caught a glimpse of "him," a larger man.

"It's almost like somebody knew it was going to happen before it even got to the flooding point, too," she said. "So it could have been prevented."

Again, she was told nothing about the flooding incident.

"There was a guy upstairs too, who I kept sensing," she said. "I wasn't getting a really clear shot of him."

"He smelled horribly," she said, rolling a marble-like "fidget tool" between her palms. The tool draws her closer to her special senses, she said, and further away from her consciousness.

Minutes later, information about this unknown man began coming to her in waves, revealing his hideous intentions. She began seeing him grossly upset, "disgruntled."

She could see him lashing out.

"He did it quietly, though," she said.

When a Press reporter and photographer relayed these and other Von Behren insights to the paper's editor, Mike Patrick, he expressed amazement - and concern.

"You've shared with me several things no outsider could know, not even doing a lot of Internet research on The Press," he said. "And this is the first time anyone has suggested the Great Toilet Tragedy might not have been purely accidental. Now the whole mess smells even worse."

Jennifer Von Behren can be reached at (208) 818-8067.