MCT: Sunday, March 3, 2019

• Wet Feb
• Monday Break
• Boonville Raid
• Abreu Appeal
• Crane Salvage
• Carrico Girls
• Locals Night
• Ed Note
• Yesterday's Catch
• Unfriended
• Dingus Night
• Nice Threads
• Anti-Vax Movement
• Sickeningly Smug
• The Squeeze
• Flood Learning
• Armed Schools
• Baer Flap
• Legible Print
• Waitress Recommends
• Shooting Journalists
• Autograph Please
• Scrotal Suggestion
• Wolfman Napping
• Marco Radio
• Courtroom B

FEBRUARY 2019 was an incredibly wet month, during which Yorkville received over 2 feet of precipitation. Here are the monthly totals for the 2018-19 rain season thus far:

Boonville (total to date: 39.74")
17.73" Feb
11.54" Jan
03.72" Dec
05.32" Nov
01.43" Oct

Yorkville (total to date: 53.08")
24.88" Feb
14.36" Jan
05.80" Dec
06.04" Nov
01.48" Oct

OCCASIONAL LIGHT SHOWERS will be possible over interior portions of northwest California through Sunday. Thereafter, mainly dry conditions are expected on Monday, followed by widespread rain Tuesday evening into Friday. (National Weather Service)

A TASK FORCE RAID on the Mexican compound next door to the Boonville weekly this morning involved several agencies led by Fish and Game. A total of 15 vehicles, including several unmarked, disgorged some twenty uniformed persons who spent about three hours on the heavily populated property. It is rumored that freshly butchered deer carcasses were found to the rear of the parcel and citations issued but no arrests were made. The raided property is concealed from Highway 128 by a wooden fence. We expect to learn more on Monday.

JUDGE MOORMAN on Thursday morning briskly clarified Tai Abreu's appeal to have his sentence reduced from life without parole, stating that it was now up to the DA to respond to Abreu's clear eligibility under new law to have his sentence reduced to time served, in his case 18 years in state prison.  

TREK II SALVAGE CONTINUES

On Friday the engine and deck area was removed.

On Saturday the cabin was removed

(Photos by Judy Valadao)

GIRLS FOUND SAFE (update, Sunday, 11:22 am): Tears, celebrations, thanks to all who helped--Leia and Caroline have been found safe. Misty, their mom, just texted, "They are found and alive."

---

CARRICO GIRLS MISSING IN HUMCO

"The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office is searching for two missing girls who are believed to have walked away from their home.

Caroline Carrico, age 5, and Leia Carrico, age 8, were last seen at approximately 2:30 p.m. on March 1, outside of their residence, located on the 3000 block of Twin Trees Road in Benbow. The girls are believed to have walked off into the wooded area near their home.

The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office was notified of the girl’s disappearance at about 6 p.m. on March 1. Sheriff’s Special Services deputies, Southern Humboldt Technical Rescue and CALFIRE crews responded and conducted an initial search of the area throughout the night.

Search crews continue to search today, March 2, for the two girls.

Caroline Rose Carrico, age 5, is described as a white female, 3 feet 6 inches tall, 40 pounds, with hazel eyes and blonde hair with bright purple streaks. She was last seen wearing a maroon rain jacket with white horses, blue jeans and pink boots.

Leia Dorice Carrico, age 8, is described as a white female, 4 feet 2 inches tall, 85 pounds, with hazel eyes and blonde hair, with a large freckle on her left cheek. She was last seen wearing a dark gray hooded long sleeve shirt and purple rain boots.

The search area consists of steep, heavily wooded terrain. Search teams from the following agencies are being utilized:

• Mendocino County
• Napa County
• Del Norte County
• State Parks
• National Guard
• United States Coast Guard
• Sothern Humboldt Technical Rescue
• CALFIRE
• Sheriff’s Search and Rescue Posse
• Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office

All available resources are being utilized by searching personnel. Through the collaborated efforts of all the involved agencies, we are working to resolve this incident as quickly and safely as possible.

Rescue personnel will be searching the immediate and surrounding areas and constantly evaluating the conditions during the search efforts.

The public is advised to please avoid the area while search teams are working unless given permission by the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office.

A public tip line has been established for any information regarding the possible whereabouts of Caroline and Leia Carrico at (707) 441-5000.

---

Update:

We have a little bit of good news this morning from searchers scouring the area near Benbow in Southern Humboldt for Leia and Caroline Carrico–eight and five year old sisters lost yesterday around 2:30 p.m.

“One of the searchers found a couple of granola bar wrappers and the mother was able to confirm that she had just bought that brand and style of bars” recently, said Lt. Mike Fridley of the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department. “This is a likely clue that helps the searchers focus on that area. It gives us a direction.” He also said that they had located what might have been an attempted fire pit with fresh branches.

In addition, Fridley explained there are multiple search teams in the area including four with dogs and a Coast Guard helicopter. They will fly until they run low on gas and then the National Guard helicopter should be available at that time.

“We have a drone coming,” he said.

And every team and the route they’ve searched is being recorded.

“Each search team has a tracker that operates over satellite,” Fridley explained.

Lt. Fridley said that the parents are both searching. He said, “The dad has been searching all night long.” The mother who has another child is out again searching today.

He explained that while there is hope with the wrappers, they are still concerned. He pointed out, “The weather is cold. We’re worried about hypothermia…They are young girls and I’m sure they are scared.”

He also said, “We have our criminal investigations crew in case this goes a different direction.” He said at this point there is no indication of foul play. But, he said, law enforcement doesn’t want assumptions to keep them from being ready in any eventuality.

“We’re following the clues,” Lt. Fridley explained.

Update:

The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office held a press conference from Benbow at 2:20 p.m. Saturday. The livestream press conference cut out but we have a reporter on scene who said that law enforcement stated that FBI is consulting and CHP child abduction team is consulting. They will be brought in if it is determined they are needed. Lt. Mike Fridley reaffirmed that law enforcement doesn’t believe there has been any foul play. He stated, “We assume they just walked off but we’re ramped up and ready if this turns out to be an abduction.” If you have any information, please call the special tip line set up by the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office at 707-441-5000.

LOCALS NIGHT at the Little Red Schoolhouse, Wednesday, March 20, 2019.

ED NOTE

REGARDING SOCO SEWAGE SPILLS, an on-line comment: "Yes, but just keep building those subdivisions Santa Rosa, because you cleverly pretend you have a super sewer system that can handle all the sewage under any conditions. Until it inevitability fails. Inflow from flood waters and runoff from impermeable surfaces is a known problem with huge sewer systems that by the way are completely outdated and old school technology. This is not the first time Santa Rosa has used the Russian River for their illegal dumping. Growth is the God of the folks who run the government. But growth never pays for itself and they'll all retire to states without so many rules. We are not responsible for building homes for everyone who want to live here particularly when the result is the ruination of our environment."

THE BATTERED RUSSIAN RIVER, at least the Guerneville-Monte Rio lower stretch, has been used as a leach field for Santa Rosa for years, hence that weird summer-time greenish hue that makes the water look more anti-freeze than the pristine blue of yesteryear. Factor in all the flooded septic systems and…

CATCH OF THE DAY, March 2, 2019

ODDIE BLAGG, Fort Bragg. Probation revocation.

KAYLAN BOWMAN, Fort Bragg. DUI-alcohol&drugs.

JOSE CORNEJO, Ukiah. Failure to appear, probation revocation.

JEREMIAH ECKEL JR., Fort Bragg. Burglary, probation revocation.

JACK ELDER, Fort Bragg. DUI.

MICHAEL FREEMAN JR., Covelo. Probation revocation.

KEVIN JONES, Boonville, DUI-alcohol&drugs, failure to appear.

JEREMIAH JUSZCZAK, Redwood Valley. DUI, probation revocation.

DAVID MAUPIN, Ukiah. Failure to appear.

JACOB MCFADDEN, Willits. Protective order violation.

AMY MESERVE, Lakeport/Ukiah. Failure to appear.

JAIME NAVA-FRANCO, Calpella. DUI with priors, probation revocation.

MATEO PACHECO, Ukiah. Robbery, offenses while on bail.

JAYRO PEREZ-RODRIGUEZ, Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs, no license.

JUSTIN SCHAEFER, Eureka. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation.

BOBBY SOSSAMAN, Willits. Probation revocation.

THOMAS TICE, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

MATTHEW ZWICKY, Ukiah. Felon/addict with firearm, large capacity magazine, offenses while on bail.

ALL RAN ACCORDING TO PLAN AND WITHOUT A HOST

by David Yearsley

For all the narcissism, self-promotion and just plain old bad taste, the annual Academy Awards have an unnerving propensity for making unwanted, Weinsteinian advances on that most alluring of sequined starlets: ontology. This time out these gropings included not just existential questions like is human language fundamentally comprehensible, that is to say, how bad can a tag-team speech be (The Vice squad of makeup and hairstyle artists was perfectly, timelessly terrible—walking [barely] and talking [even more barely] Platonic forms in tuxedoes and ballgowns hologramically projected on the 3-D walls of the cave that is the Dolby Theatre), but also seemingly mundane though in fact more profoundly vital matters like whether the cinematography Oscar should be presented in the commercial breaks (as was originally planned, but then backed away from after the vehement backlash from the filmmaking “community”) while the television viewers were subjected to ads for Google Assistant in which “iconic” scenes from famous movies are blithely rejiggered by means of Artificial Intelligence—these mysterious shenanigans making one wonder even more acutely if any of the goings-on on Oscar night or at any other time in Tinseltown are real in any meaningful sense of the word especially since the recording of motion pictures with a camera is the lifeblood of all movies, and those responsible for that service in the nominated films would have been honored for their crucial contributions off-screen, hidden from the movie-loving masses and spawning suspicions that it had all been done by AI non-human union busters in the first place!

Often these Oscar inquiries come in the form of grand statements uttered ex cathedra, as when Guillermo del Toro, presenting the award for Best Director (he won it last year for The Shape of Water), asserted that the nominees’ films would be exactly the same films after the winner was announced. He then opened the envelope and read off the name of his countryman Alfonso Cuarón, director (and writer and cinematographer) of Roma, the black-and-white semi-realist reverie of 1970s family life in a pleasantly affluent district of Mexico City told from the point of view of the indigenous nanny. (Cuarón took home statuettes for his work in all three categories; he also produced the movie but failed to haul in the award for Best Picture amidst mutterings that malevolent Hollywood powers were displeased at the business-model threat from Netflix, which bankrolled the film.)

A sensitive, sentimental and learned filmmaker, del Toro was trying to assuage his (and our) nagging distrust of, even shame at, the whole enterprise of rating and rewarding what Hollywood likes to call its art but is in fact commerce. But del Toro’s claim seemed to this viewer—one whose own faculties were admittedly garbled after several strong margaritas—to founder on the shoals of schoolmarmish superficiality: the physical features of a film, even a masterpiece of dental prosthesis like Bohemian Rhapsody or the Oscar-bait bagatelle, Green Book that hooked the Best Picture big fish, may remain unchanged after the faux gold dingus is deeded over, but a movie’s status is certainly altered by its reception. Flicks exist in the eye of the beholders, and if these beholders number in the millions all the better. Condemned by the market and opinion makers, a flop will have few friends and be a changed beast—battered, broken. Citizen Kane didn’t get the nod as Best Picture in 1942, while the propaganda piece Mrs. Miniver won the following year. Even during the War on Terror, the kooky and cloying Mrs. Miniver is no longer the film it once was, nor in Trump Time is Citizen Kane. The del Toro platitude didn’t hold water.

It is no coincidence that Mexican filmmakers have done well in the Age of Trump, and even before it during the more numerous deportations of the Obama years. There was much, unsubtitled Spanish spoken on the Dolby stage this year with pointed attacks on walls and jingoism. The most gracious of these critiques came from Cuarón when he lauded the American films he cherished as a kid, characterizing them as contributions to the cinema of the world—a vast theatre without borders. (Never mind that the roughriders of the American movie lobby—like their counterparts in the defense industry—have ceaselessly done their best to subjugate the globe.)

In this vein, Hollywood’s war on Trump took a bizarre turn last Sunday—practical and philosophical at once.

Dominant liberal opinion among the movie-making classes would like to see the leading man of the 24/7 Trump feature film impeached and imprisoned, and if not, then at least scattered—metaphorically speaking in this digital age—on the editing room floor.

Not for thirty years has the Academy Awards show been done without a host, and that edition of 1989 began with Rob Lowe prancing about with a squeaky, fetish sex kitten of a Snow White. Lowe had been chosen for the role thanks to his smash hit of the previous year: his illicit sex tape made at the Democratic National Convention in Atlanta, an appearance winkingly referred to in the White-Lowe duet “Keep the Cameras Rolling.”

This opening Oscar sequence will long endure as the most bizarre male monument to pre-#MeToo Hollywood.

This time around Kevin Hart was slated to lead the proceedings but was given the hook after the firestorm kicked up over the youthful—okay, he was in his thirties—indiscretion of his homophobic tweets. Various overtures were made to former Oscars hosts, but they wisely ran for cover. When in doubt downsize: the idea was hit upon to go without an emcee.

At least this was the story put about by the Academy. I suspect a much more sophisticated plot lay behind the scheme.

Really this was Hollywood’s way of showing what the bigger, more lucrative, round-the clock show in Washington, New York, and Mar-a-Lago (with a recent episode set in in Hanoi, but cut short because the star’s ratings were bested by The Bachelor: Vietnam) would look like without the bad-boy host. The Oscar junta wanted to prove that no-President USA reality tv of the people, by the people and for the people could be far more entertaining and effective. What is Trump but an anti-Bob Hope, the longtime host of the awards back in their heyday? Have the show-running generals solve the problem, the Academy proclaimed: no Trump, no Pence, no none-of-them. Allow the Schumers, Pelosis, McConnells and Grahams to hit their marks and deliver their lines. Viewership goes up, things move along more briskly. Everyone’s happier, from advertisers to critics to John and Jane Doe.

Let the Deep State in Hollywood and in DC do what it does best: make quality entertainment. We don’t have to have a comic with a mike to sell us the rigged, back-channel jockeying of the military-industrial complex or its movie wing out on the Left Coast.

The spectacle would run as if on auto-pilot: this year’s Oscar presenters and winners would speak for themselves. The result was the same only faster—and with higher ratings.

A feel good road movie about racism took home best picture. A Mexican director won again, this time not for a space odyssey (Cuarón’s Gravity was the big winner of 2014) but for a down-to-earth drama that aestheticized class struggle and the enduring legacy of colonialism.

Blatant hucksterism (for Bohemian Rhapsody) collaborated with the panicked search for an opening production number and led to the event’s kickoff—an exercise in infinite regression, with the band Queen (sans Freddie Mercury, not even as hologram, but still with two of its founding members, who also happened to be producers of the biopic in which they featured) blasting through their anthems (“We Are the Champions” and “We Will Rock You”) in an emaciated five minutes to the cheers of happy-clappy stars pulled from their seats by the mysterious forces of Hollywood tribalism.

The effect was post-nostalgic, stopgap, and not even earsplitting. This one didn’t go better in Dolby, but at least it was over quickly.

Kendrick Lamar, content with his Pulitzer rather than the Oscar, wanted no part of the streamlined show, refusing to serve up a truncated version of his own anthem “All the Stars” from Black Panther. There must be no-shows in order to demonize the killjoy snobbery of intellectuals and malcontents: Lamar obliged. That vastly overrated film’s music did not go away empty-handed, however. The Oscar-winning score was the work of a Swedish composer long resident in the USA by the name of Ludwig Göransson. To prepare for his magnum opus, he went on a research safari to Senegal for inspiration (not for plunder!), though his mix of “traditional African” sounds with old-school orchestral grandeur sounded for all the world like appropriation.

Spike Lee did not turn his back on this soundtrack symphony, nor on the best Actress Award being snatched from Glenn Close’s waiting fingers for the eighth time, snubbing her iron-willed performance of the eponymous Wife, and fittingly withholding public appreciation of a woman’s creative genius. Said snatching was somewhat reluctantly done by Olivia Colman as Queen Anne in the salacious ante-chamber romp, The Favourite. It was just fine for the Spike Lees of this world to dismiss Green Book while giving the green light to the Favourite, a film that blithely blacked-out any reference to the South Sea Company founded in Anne’s last year and her part in the expansion of slavery and the racist British Empire. A soundtrack of spooky organ music and ethereal drones removed the Favourite hijinks not to another century but to another planet altogether.

For the Oscar night musical numbers, also clipped back in number and length, a cowboy and cowgirl in fringed buckskin yippee-ki-yayed, Jennifer Hudson belted out a hymn (“I’ll Fight”) to a sitting Supreme Court Justice, and Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga dove, cheek-to-cheek, into their soupy mega-hit “Shallow” from a Star is Born. The peroxide Diva with the world-class voice kicked the number all the way down Hollywood Boulevard and into the Pacific, then landed the Oscar, to boot.

In other words, all ran according plan and without a host. There was nothing radical or visionary, just the usual liberal blasts and business as usual. Who needs an emcee to suffer the blame for a bad show or distract with drolleries when the wrong envelope is opened at a state dinner or the wrong button pressed in the situation room? The Dolby extravaganza went off without a hitch. And so it could be in Washington if Hollywood gets it way.

The coup will not come with impeachment and or a disqualifying diagnosis from army psychiatrists, but simply by pulling the plug on the host. We don’t want a Chief Executive. What we need is a Chief Executive Producer.

(David Yearsley is a long-time contributor to CounterPunch and the Anderson Valley Advertiser. His recording of J. S. Bach’s organ trio sonatas is available from Musica Omnia. He can be reached at dgyearsley@gmail.com.)

ANTI-VAXXERS COZYING UP TO THE FAR RIGHT ONLINE

They’re anti-science and conspiratorial. Together, they’re building a right-wing populist, measle-stricken future.

thedailybeast.com/anti-vaxxers-are-cozying-up-to-the-far-right-online

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I am surprised that anyone might think that any of the political bullshit makes any difference. This is a ship of fools. Ship as in the entire damn country. The three branches of government are ineffective at getting anything important accomplished. So what is important you say. Lots of stuff. Take the 22 trillion debt. Peak oil. Nuclear waste that could become a Fukushima. Fukushima itself poisoning the Pacific. Cybercrime and cyber warfare. Super bacteria. Medical industry run amuck. Out of control law enforcement. Environmental collapse (bees, bats, pollinators). Fresh water scarcity and water pollution. The list is long and scary but when have you heard any of these addressed rationally? We are irrational. Hurricanes destroy billions in property but we rebuild in the same location. What rule of law? Fuhgettaboutit. Generations beyond boomers will hate the memory of those who raped the environment, the economy, raw materials, oil to drive a block for a loaf of bread. Our graves will be spit on. Why not? We are sickeningly smug. We believe in our own bullshit.

FOOL PROOFING

Editor:

I don’t want to add insult to injury, but after traveling along the Russian River to get to Point Arena since 1959, and living in Sonoma County for 30 years, I find myself frustrated that precious taxpayer-financed resources are used every time the river floods to rescue people who refused to evacuate, even with plenty of advance notice. Said resources are also used to rescue those foolish enough to drive through standing and even rushing water on flooded roads with no clue as to what lies beneath. Time to get a clue, people.

Karen McMillen

Santa Rosa

CAN THIS MARRIAGE BE SAVED?

The Giants General Manager Larry Baer always seemed like such a smoothie, so smooth that he’d certainly be likely to confine a struggle with his wife for possession of his cellphone would occur out of public sight. Mrs. Baer seems to have suspected Mr. Baer of…

Pam Baer releases statement through her SF attorney following altercation with husband Larry Baer this morning. (Evan Sernoffsky)

New statement from Giants CEO Larry Baer:

UNLEASHED GRAPHIC DESIGNERS — ART OVER FUNCTION

by Ralph Nader

Many readers object to illegible print in contemporary print newspapers and magazines. In today’s print news, legible print is on a collision course with flights of fancy by graphic artists.

Admittedly, this is the golden age for graphic artists to show their creativity. Editors have convinced themselves that with readers’ shorter attention spans and the younger generation’s aversion to spending time with print publications, the graphic artists must be unleashed. Never mind what the ophthalmologists or the optometrists may think. Space, color, and type size are the domain of liberated gung-ho artists.

There is one additional problem with low expectations for print newsreaders: Even though print readership is shrinking, there will be even fewer readers of print if they physically cannot read the printed word.

I have tried, to no avail, to speak with graphic design editors of some leading newspapers about three pronounced trends that are obscuring content. First is the use of background colors that seriously blur the visibility of the text on the page. Second is print size, which is often so small and light that even readers with good eyesight would need the assistance of a magnifying glass. Third is that graphic designers have been given far too much space to replace content already squeezed by space limitations.

Function should not follow art. Readers should not have to squint to make out the text on the page. Some readers might even abandon an article because of its illegible text! One wonders why editors have ceded control of the readability of their publications to graphic designers. Editors cannot escape responsibility by saying that the graphic designers know best.

I am not taking to task the artists who combine attention-getting graphics with conveyance of substantive content. A good graphic provides emotional readiness for the words that follow.

However, in the February 17, 2019 Sunday edition of the New York Times, the page one article of the Sunday Review Section was titled, “Time to Panic,” about global climate disruption by David Wallace-Wells. He is the author of the forthcoming book, The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming. The editors wanted to strike fear in readers to jolt their attentiveness to such peril, through a lurid two giant fingers with a human eye in between. A dubious attempt. Taking up the entire first page of the precious Sunday Review section (except for a hefty slice of an ad for the Broadway play “To Kill a Mockingbird”), smattered by three paragraphs of small, white and almost unreadable text on a dark pink background, is counterproductive. Less graphic license and clearer type would have had art following function.

Many graphic artists seem to have lost their sense of proportion – unless that is, the editors are pushing them to bleed out more and more valuable space with their increasingly extravagant designs. It is bad enough that print publications have been shrinking due to diminished ad revenue. It is time for better editorial judgment and artistic restraint.

Unfortunately, there is no sign of such prudence. In that same Sunday edition of the Times, over 80% of page one of the Business Section was devoted entirely to a graphic of a presumed taxpayer smothered by flying sheets of the federal tax return – it rendered the page devoid of content. At the bottom of this front page, there was a listing of five articles under the title “Your Taxes 2019.” I can only imagine Times reporters gnashing their teeth about having their prose jettisoned from being featured on this valuable page of the Business Section. That wasn’t all. The artists ran amok on the inside pages with their pointless artistry taking up over half of the next three pages of this section.

Think of all the additional articles on other pressing business topics that never reached readers. Gretchen Morgenson’s prize-winning weekly column exposing corporate wrongdoing used to be on page one of the Business Section. She is now at the Wall Street Journal.

This is happening in, arguably, the most serious newspaper in America – one that tries to adjust its print editions to an Internet age that, it believes, threatens the very existence of print’s superiority for conversation, impact and longevity for readers, scholars, and posterity alike.

I first came across run-a-muck graphic design at the turn of the century in Wired Magazine. Technology has dramatically reduced the cost of multi-colored printing. I could scarcely believe the unreadability and the hop-scotch snippets presented in obscure colors, and small print nestled in-degrading visuals. At the time, I just shrugged it off and did not renew my subscription due to invincible unreadability.

Now, however, the imperialism of graphic designers knows few boundaries. Many graphic designers don’t like to explain themselves or be questioned by readers. After all, to them readers have little understanding of the nuances of the visual arts and, besides, maybe they should see their optometrists.

Well, nearly a year ago, I wrote to Dr. Keith Carter, president of the American Academy of Ophthalmology and Dr. Christopher J. Quinn, president of the American Optometric Association, asking for their reactions (enclosing some examples of designer excess). I urged them to issue a public report suggesting guidelines with pertinent illustrations. After all, they are professionals who should be looking out for their clients’ visual comfort. Who would know more?

Dr. Carter responded, sympathizing with my observations but throwing up his hands in modest despair about not being able to do anything about the plight of readers. I never heard from anybody at the Optometric Association.

Of all the preventable conditions coursing across this tormented Earth, this is one we should be able to remedy. It is time to restore some level of visual sanity. Don’t editors think print readers are an endangered species? One would think!

(Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer and author of Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us!)

THERE IS NO RECORDED INSTANCE of punishment for shooting a newspaperman.

— Ambrose Bierce

GOOD LUCK

Editor,

If I hurt anybody's feelings or make a bad impression, I'm sorry.

We have a professor at UC Davis who is advocating killing cops. He's teaching his students how to kill cops when their backs are turned or they're busy or something. One of his students turned him in. It was on the news. How can a town like Davis support a college that has Professor like that? I can't believe that the police in Davis allow that. Advocating to students how to kill cops. Isn't that typical of California? It's a California college. A lot of the other professors in their own way teach the same thing. He should have a hole sliced in his scrotum sack and his leg run through the hole and then be turned loose on the freeway which would be too mild for him. But with political correctness it won't happen in California. Sanctuary states, the worst infrastructure, filthiest city in the world, San Francisco. And many more to make you cry. Makes me sick.

Mr. Severn, I see where you wrote a long article to spread your stupid gibberish gab that most people can't understand because you sound like a poet who has had a hysterectomy. I don't know what you're talking about. But I know that you hate our president because of the rotten things you say about him. You should get the hell out of the United States and move to another country. I get sick of people who get down on our president. You can say what you want about me but leave the President alone. The only people who don't like President Trump are the liberals who like to kill babies and like open borders and sanctuary cities, who hate law enforcement. They hate everything about the United States of America. When you talk bad about President Trump you are just declaring yourself a liberal, a baby killer, a sanctuary city guy, open borders, climate change, this that and the other, Filthy cities like San Francisco. Good luck Mr. Severn.

Sometimes I wonder why I stay in California. I should sell everything and get out of this shithole. It's not the state's fault, it's the people running it. People like Mr. Severn are so well educated that they become airheads and get stupid. He is the kind of people who make rules like the bullet train to nowhere. They don't care about overpriced medicine or that nobody can afford insurance or that we can't afford workers comp. No respect for law enforcement. Every outlaw radical child molester rapist murderer in the state gets protection. The filthiest slums in the United States: Oakland, San Francisco, Sacramento, Los Angeles. Sickening.

Last week just north of Pudding Creek outside of Fort Bragg there were 14 Caltrans employees and five vehicles there for four and a half hours just to put up a Share The Road sign. They could have done that in half the time and with half the people and fixed the god damn highway next to Taco Bell with the rest. You just about to tear the front end of your car when you hit the bumps there. And that's not the only place. It’s just as bad on the south end of the Caspar Bridge. The southbound lane will make your front wheel go through your radiator when you hit it. It's sad to watch people spending our tax money doing nothing, absolutely god damn nothing!

God Bless Donald Trump.

Jerry Philbrick

Comptche

ACTOR LON CHANEY Jr. resting between takes while filming "The Wolfman", 1941.

MEMO OF THE AIR: WHO'S AFRAID OF WOLFRAM ALPHA?

The recording of last night's (2019-03-01) KNYO Fort Bragg and KMEC Ukiah world-class Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show is available by one or two clicks, depending on whether you want to listen to it now or download it and keep it for later and, speaking of which, it's right here:

https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0322

Guests this time: Stewart Dickson of Wolfram Research; Robin Bliss-Wagner, naturalist, music teacher, rainy-day fiddle busker, seeker, at present, of a treadle-operated sewing machine suitable for leather and sailcloth; and Alex Bosworth, stand-up guy. And featuring the music of the enigmatic Hakaoo, whose throaty, sultry Who By Fire gets stuck in your head and will not shut up. And music of Corwin Zekley, from his band's (Snaps for Sinners) new album, How the Apple Falls.

Besides that, also at http://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you can find a fresh batch of dozens of links to not necessarily radio-useful but nonetheless worthwhile educational items I set aside for you while gathering the show together. Such as:

Nice planet yez got, here. Shame if something wuz to happen to it.

https://newatlas.com/international-landscape-photographer-2018-awards-gallery/58495/

Art.

https://dangerousminds.net/comments/remarkable_story_sofonisba_anguissola

And giant instant ruins of an unfinished atomic plant.

Atomic Ruin

Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

IN COURTROOM B last Thursday morning for the latest round of Tai Abreu hearings, a number of cases were heard by Judge Clayton Brennan prior to Judge Ann Moorman's appearance to preside over the Abreu matter. Brennan ordinarily presides at Ten Mile Court, Fort Bragg. Two prisoners, the first one a catatonic Mexican kid, the second an angry fellow who looked vaguely familiar. The catatonic kid was so extremely catatonic he could have been the Hispanic incarnation of the Buddha, smiling his way through his appearance although he clearly had zero idea of what was happening. The second defendant was angry and became angrier. He was alert and closely accompanied by two bailiffs poised to jump him if he went off. Both defendants had been brought up from Napa State Hospital. The justice system grinds on, whether or not the grindee has any idea of what's happening to him, as was the case with the Mexican kid.

THE ANGRY MAN was Dean Stevens, an occasional writer of letters-to-the-editor to this paper. He didn't look nuts, and maybe he isn't, but to get himself a ticket to Napa isn't easy. The state mental hospital system has been in triage mode for years now. At any one time, there are at least a half-dozen or so people confined to the Mendo County Jail waiting for a Napa vacancy.

DURING HIS HEARING, Stevens frequently offered his own opinions on his case as his portly public defender looked on helplessly. Just as the bailiffs moved into place to suppress him if he didn't shut up, he shut up. And would soon speak again, and the bailiffs would again close in on him, Judge Brennan said that Stevens would continue his allegedly therapeutic stay at the state hospital. Stevens said he hoped to survive, and was marched out of the courtroom, insulting his public defender as he passed him and attempting to shrug off the bailiff's hand steering him. He's charged with parole violation, false ID, evasion. The following includes Bruce McEwen's account of one of his court appearances and a letter to us from Stevens explaining his difficulties from his perspective back in 2013.

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(January 2014) — Public Defender Linda Thompson relayed the DA’s latest offer to her client, Dean Stevens, and he agreed to it after a lengthy conference.

We've recently published two letters from Mr. Stevens alleging bad treatment at the jail and the unsuccessful grievances he'd filed about that bad treatment. One of his gripes had to do with a nurse who was helping a dentist pull one of his teeth. Stevens claimed the nurse wasn’t a qualified dental tech. When I was in the Marines, the dentist, if he was a dentist, jerked teeth out with a tool that looked like vice grips. Stevens other complaint was about his jail number being changed, causing him no end of inconvenience. In a world of injustice, Stevens' beefs wouldn't seem to be of much consequence, but to every ant a crumb is the Matterhorn, every leaf a jungle, every rain drop a tsunami.

“He’ll accept the plea bargain,” Ms. Thompson said. “But will the court be willing to split the sentence? He’s been locked up a long time and would really like to get out.”

“I don’t know as much about the underlying charges as you two [the lawyers] do, but he’s been in almost a year, so we’d be talking about the mandatory supervision to go along with the time he’s already served in the state hospital and the county jail?”

“The word coming down is it’s going to be only 35%,” Stevens volunteered. “I’ll only have to do 35%.”

“I guess I haven’t got the word, yet,” Judge Behnke said.

“It’s coming down, from the top,” Stevens said.

“I’ll keep my ears open,” the judge said.

Public Defender Thompson said, “You’d be looking at a five-year term if you violate the terms of the mandatory supervision.”

“I won’t get in trouble again. That was just an accident, what happened before.”

The judge said, “Mr. Stevens, in addition to prison time you can be fined up to $10,000; and if I’m not mistaken, there was a matter of restitution.”

DA Eyster said, “It came to over $3500.”

“There’s no way,” Stevens said, “absolutely no way I can pay that, so why don’t we just waive it?”

“We can have a hearing,” Behnke said.

“I was wondering if you could give me four years instead, so I could get out in a couple of weeks. I’d like that a lot better. Couldn’t you do that?”

“You’ll be getting out in about a month, anyway,” Behnke answered. “But you’ll be going on supervised probation. Mr. Eyster, do we have a factual basis for the plea?"

Eyster said, “On February 4th, 2013, the defendant took a seatbelt, cut away from a vehicle, and wielding it with the buckle still attached, he repeatedly struck a truck parked out at the sheriff’s office and inflicted $3600 in damage.”

Reverse vehicular assault, it seems.

“Yes,” Stevens objected, “but the insurance covered it. “And it was more like $1,000.”

“No,” DA Eyster said. "That was the estimate, a rough guess at the time. The repairs actually came to $3600.”

“But the insurance covered it!”

Behnke said, “Whether the insurance covered it or not, you did it, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“And do you admit to being convicted of a vandalism charge in Sonoma County in 2012?”

“Yes.”

“And a second vandalism charge in Sonoma County?”

“Yes.”

Sentencing was set for February 7th, but Ms. Thompson had a further request.

“My client was originally deemed 1368 [incompetent to stand trial], and when we agreed to the restoration of competence, Mr. Stevens was moved here [to the Mendo County Jail, from Napa State Hospital]. But he gets better treatment at the state hospital, so we’d be requesting that he be returned there to finish out his few weeks more time.”

“And they’re holding my bed,” Stevens said brightly.

“At Napa?”

“Yes,” Thompson said. “As long as we get him back in 24 hours, he will still have a bed. And the jail will transport him back.”

“That makes sense to me,” Behnke said. “So I’ll put this on for the 14th, instead.”

Mr. Stevens was beaming. “Thank you, judge; thank you, Mr. Eyster; thank you, Ms. Thompson.”

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OPEN WIDE

Editor,

(November 2013) — As regards District Attorney Jill Ravitch, she was okay at first. A criminal lawyer. She busted Sonoma Sheriff sticking a listening bug in attorney-client visiting room inside Sonoma County jail. She cried her head off. I said good girl. Then Caroline Fowler, Sonoma County Counsel, shut attorney Ravitch up. The next thing we heard was that Sheriff Cogbill et al were endorsing Ravitch for District Attorney. I said no, you don't. I drove around town telling people to vote no for Jill Ravitch. Today she will take your babies away. Vote no for Ravitch. Today she'll take your ninos away. Vote no for Ravitch. Today she'll take your bambinos away. So she lost. Holy S___, did I cause one hell of a mess. Ravitch got sent to Ukiah by Fowler. Bob Fowler et al, Sheriff Cogbill quit. All hell broke loose. I was hidden in Napa for a 594 PC vandalism charge then held in solitary so Ms. Ravitch could run for District Attorney for the second time. So in her champagne wine campaign she was able to secure her job. As District Attorney I heard nothing but good news about Ms. Shanahan and hope she puts Ms. Split Tongue District Attorney Ravitch out on her bum. Mr. DA Eyster is a Sonoma resident. Eyster didn't want District Attorney Ravitch in his office. Fowler shut him up too. Ms. Fowler — she cannot shut me up as I have nothing to hide. No skeletons in my closet unlike all her constituents. Ms. Fowler is the head of the heads with the final say. As you can see she put Steve Freitas in office as County Sheriff of Sonoma. The truth is the truth and that's the truth.

Dean Stevens

Ukiah

PS. Duncan James, attorney at everything. He was district attorney from 1969-1979. Attorney James put puppet Eyster in office and if Bob Fowler and Carolyn Fowler tell Duncan James to shut DA Eyster up, then Eyster shuts his mouth. “The power,” “the power.” Absolute power corrupts absolutely. And it did. Sand castles crumble to the sea eventually — Jimi Hendrix. Raging against the machine.

PPS. Governor Jerry Brown's realignment of prisoners to jail program must go. Judge Behnke's court ordered me to undergo involuntary psychiatric medication. Two jail cops held me down while Dr. Robert Hurley injected psychiatric meds in my bum and put me in the rubber room. I feel as if I'm in the USSR. Ho-Lee Fuk. It's a police state. Even the probation officers are packing heat (guns). Under Governor Brown's new realignment program now I'm declared mentally ill by cops, and probation can kill me and justify it by saying, well he was mentally ill and on probation for vandalism. Is this America? No, it's a police state like the USSR. Even the District Attorney is pistol packing. Even 13 year old kids are shot on sight. Soon if not already the only job in America will be in law enforcement and the cops will have to arrest themselves and their kids because all of us will be in prison. A federal court judge has ordered Governor Brown to release thousands of inmates but he realigned us to jail and out-of-state prisons. But Eyster alone has put at least 75 years worth of inmates in prison in the last 10 months. How can Governor Brown shift all the prison overcrowding prisoners onto an already overcrowded jail and court system? And the taxpayers. The jail and prison conditions were just as deplorable and overcrowded. Now it's so bad Sheriff Allman wants three new jail units. Why not declare eminent domain and build a prison in the old courthouse in downtown Ukiah? This realignment program has screwed up everything. For every action there is a reaction and soon Judge Moorman, Behnke and Mayfield will all have guns under their robes. We could put a big fence around California. We taxpayers must repeal this realignment system or we won't have a jail or money to pay taxes unless you become a cop. You only need a GED anyway. Tell all the kids, because all our money will be spent on housing and medical care for a vandal in the County jail. I know a Mendocino County taxpayer with a mentally ill family member is not getting mental health treatment. But I sure the hell am, by force. Plus I have the jail's wellness program. All you have to do is have your mentally ill sons or daughters cut down a tree like George Washington or break a window like me. All I have is a f-in vandalism charge. Ten-month solitary confinement. The jail puts us in solitary confinement saying we are a danger to ourselves and others, or they say it's to protect us from harm and everything goes and we have no rights. Public Defender Linda Thompson doesn't even bring us to court but I get mental health treatment, dental, medical, food and shelter although I don't want or need it. Again it's all for free to me but not the taxpayers. They pay it all. Let me explain this as best I can. Governor Brown is a lawyer and so are all or most of the powers that be. Noreen Evans is a lawyer. And if it wasn't for the prisons and crime all the bar members would be in the food stamp line. Lawyers become supervisors, judges, district attorneys, senators… Lawmakers like Governor Brown and Goldstein and Congressmess. It's all lawyers, by lawyers for lawyers. Death row cases get appealed for 40 years while the taxpayers get the bill. Three strikers get appealed for however much time the person gets. The three strikes law was made up by lawyers in Santa Rosa using Richard Allen Davis and he got death, not life. Do you see what's going on or am I the only one? The rich do not pay taxes. Nevada is a tax-free zone. So get your Congress to petition the rich to pay taxes, then this fleecing of America will stop or slow down. If Nevada state paid taxes it would put us all in the black. So no more emergency laws enacted. We had the bad Act called the Habitual Act Life in Prison for habitual criminals. We had capital punishment and we could give you from one year to a hundred years in prison. That's without the Three Strikes law. So it's an emergency, we must appeal three strikes put a stop to it and to the fleecing of us all by the lawyers for the lawyers and the 1% by the 1% for them. To harm one is to harm all. So harm none and do thy will. Peace to all. Raging against the machine.

Attached: Inmate Grievance Form. Name: Dean Stevens. Location: Dentist Office. July 27, 2013 (on or about) at 9am.

Grievance: Dental malpractice. Temporary dentist on Saturday, July 27, 2013, stated he was not an oral surgeon and could not perform the proper dental treatment I needed. He then used the diamond tipped drill to grind my back right molar tooth down and number 13 upper right down on the left side. The CFMG nurse stated she was a dental assistant, false representation. The dentist was hired by CFMG also stated she, the nurse, was a trained dental assistant, misstating the fact that she was just a nurse. As deputy Page clearly stated, she was just a nurse and Officer Leon stated practice makes perfect. When I said that she, the nurse, did not know what she was doing nor was the dentist trained in oral surgery, clearly medical malpractice. She also took two x-rays. She is not an x-ray technician.

Level 1 response, Corrections Corporal: You are mistaken. The nurse is a licensed nurse who has been trained to assist the dentist. Her training is above and beyond that of a dental assistant. The dentist does not perform oral surgery here at the Mendocino County Jail. There has been no misrepresentation here. It was the deputies who did not know the training background of said nurse. Nor was there a misrepresentation of said dentist. He was acting under the scope of his training. As you wrote, he told you he was not an oral surgeon and he did not perform such. — Corrections Sergeant Knapp.

Inmate: Next level, please.

Resolution: The dentist is licensed by the state and operates under the guidelines set forth by his licensing. The dental assistant is a licensed vocational nurse trained to assist with dental treatments under the guidance and direction of the dentist. — Lt. Bodnar.

Inmate: The dentist ground down my teeth and I was in pain. It was unreal. The door to the dentist's office is open to the elements and the nurses hair was sucked up the air hose. Correction Officer Page and Correction Officer Leon said she was not a dental assistant. Next level, please.

Resolution: Your grievance is noted. Above responses are sufficient. Captain Tim Pearce.

Response: It's not sufficient and you know there are no more levels to appeal. The dentist is not trained in oral surgery and the nurse was not a dental assistant. Sufficient, you say.