The Laytonville-Pot Home Invasion

This past weekend there was a home invasion in the northern Laytonville area that stretched over several days starting on last Thursday, Sept. 17. The MCSO press release that’s been published does a good job of laying out the basics of the crime.

The mastermind, I guess you could call him, was Louis Bagliere, 73, now of San Jose but formerly a resident of Laytonville. Evidently Baglierereturned to the area to rob some people who he had rented his former property for the purpose of growing weed.

How do you rent property that you don’t own? I don’t know but evidently that’s what Bagliere did.

According to a number of people I know, Bagliere sold his property — which by the way and ironically was the site of the Jeffrey Settler pot grow murder four years ago — a couple of years after that homicide was committed. Reportedly, it was sold to a San Jose real estate investor. It’s a 160-acre parcel located five miles north of Laytonville and five or six miles west of Highway 101.

Bagliere, who has been a mid-level career criminal his whole life, reportedly has been arrested and/or charged, and/or served time for mostly drug-related offenses in California, Texas and Utah. He’s been looked at by California authorities for a couple of murders but was never arrested or charged for them, and is known to have associations with Bay Area street gangs, and had some type of “business” relationship (most likely meth) with the Hell’s Angels. 

Anyway, apparently he “rented” his old property to these folks who were growing weed. Most likely, they had some kind of deal with Bagliere over the grow.

The Sheriff’s report has all the details of what ensued when Bagliere and his Bay Area crew of heavily armed crooks/gang members showed up Thursday at his old homestead. They relieved the “renters” of 20 pounds of weed and said they’d be back Saturday presumably for more weed and/or money.

Bagliere’s crew returned to the property on Saturday confronting the renters comprised of three men, a woman, and young child. They demanded money from the renters, firing off three or four shots to show their demand was serious. 

But it was bad news for Bagliere and his gangsters in that they were all caught and arrested, including the one bad guy who managed to evade the cops for a day, but he was nabbed by an alert resident who placed him under citizen’s arrest, trussed him up with zip ties, and delivered the violent dolt to Sheriff’s deputies who arrived on the scene. That citizen deserves a commendation from the County.

By the way, the one inexplicable thing that occurred was the authorities released Bagliere due to “pre-existing medical conditions.” How can somebody who was medically fit enough to plot this caper, arm himself with an assault rifle, and ride around in a van on rough country roads for part of a weekend, be released for any reason at all, medical or otherwise? If he’s physically fit enough to carry out several days of violent mayhem, he’s well enough to have his ass locked up with the rest of homies.

Also, the cops released a young woman who obviously was part of Bagliere’s crew acting as their “lookout”, according to a several people I know. 

At the very beginning of this Saturday felonious matinée, she was observed by a neighbor sitting in a car for a long time in front of a gate (on which the lock had been cut) on the road leading to where Bagliere’s “renters” lived, a very remote area needless to say.

So this person walked down the road to ask the woman what was up, could they be of any assistance? The young lady’s response to the inquiry? “Why you asking, what’s the matter, don’t you like niggers?”

And so it goes in the timeless world of crooks and crime.