Family Mourns Death of Boy, 13

Shaun Rhoades had for weeks looked forward to the hiking trip in the Los Padres National Forest along Rose Valley Falls. It was all the 13-year-old talked about with his family and friends.

“He wanted to go so bad,” Shaun’s mother, Tina Voris, 32, said. “I’ve been so overprotective of him, but I let him go this time. I told him not to wander off by himself.”

But while on the trip with friends Saturday, Shaun hiked away from the group. As he scaled the narrow cliff along the falls, he lost his balance and plunged 100 feet to his death.

Monday, Voris and her husband, Robert, mourned quietly at their Oxnard residence. They said they are angry that signs were not posted in the area around the falls to warn their son of the hazardous conditions. And they blame themselves for not being there to prevent Shaun’s death.

“I’m trying not to blame myself,” Tina Voris said. “He wanted to go on the camping trip. I just wish I would have been there. I would have never let him climb on the rocks.”

According to U.S. Forest Service officials, some areas around the falls are dangerous. But they said it is impossible to post signs to warn hikers of every possible hazard.

“If I post signs in one area, I’ve got to post signs in every area,” Ron Bassett, the Ojai District ranger, said. “It would be impossible.”

Still, Voris said, she wishes that more could be done to prevent any future deaths on the rocky falls near Ojai.

“If people are getting killed there, something should be done,” Voris said. “This is so stupid, this is so senseless.”

Voris said she had given permission to several of her friends--all adults--to take Shaun on the camping trip.

“I’ve always been so protective,” Voris said. “I’ve never let him do anything. But the one time I let him go, he didn’t come back.”

Shaun, described by family and friends as outgoing and considerate, was in the seventh grade at Charles F. Blackstock Elementary School in Oxnard. Last year he placed second in the school’s science fair for a project on solar energy.

According to Dave Merkle, who was on the trip with Shaun, the group stopped to rest at the base of the falls. But, Merkle said, Shaun continued hiking.

“He climbed out of our sight,” Merkle said. “We figured he would climb up there and stop, but he just kept on climbing.”

Merkle said the group was alerted that something was wrong after they heard the scream of a woman who saw the boy fall.

“I got a knot in my stomach,” Merkle said. “I prayed to God that he was all right, but I knew he wasn’t.”

Officials at the Ventura County coroner’s office said the boy appeared to have died instantly.

Friends at the Blackstock school were upset Monday about their classmate’s death, David Essel, Shaun’s science teacher, said.

“I’m sure this is the first time some of them have been confronted with death,” Essel said. “When something like this happens, it has repercussions throughout the whole school. This has been quite a shock.”

Memorial services for Shaun will be held at 4 p.m. Thursday at Conrad-Carroll Mortuary in Oxnard.