Michael Mitchell was arrested on several drug-related charges following the service of a search warrant at his home in Clearlake, Calif., on Thursday, May 12, 2011. Lake County Jail photo.

CLEARLAKE, Calif. – A Clearlake man who is the focus of several ongoing criminal cases has been arrested on drug-related charges following a search of his home this week.

On Thursday, May 12, Clearlake Police officers served a search warrant at the 19^th Avenue home of Michael Tremell Mitchell, 25, according to a report from Sgt. Tim Hobbs.

Hobbs said Officer Travis Lenz – one of two officers assigned to the Community Oriented Policing beat in which Mitchell’s residence is located – has taken numerous complaints in the past several months regarding allegations of disturbances and illegal sales of narcotics and controlled substances at Mitchell’s residence.

Court records show that Mitchell has 11 active criminal cases currently, and is named in a wrongful death civil suit regarding the November 2005 shooting death of Eric Moss, an incident which occurred during a house party. A criminal prosecution has so far not been filed in the case.

On May 2, Mitchell was arrested for allegedly being a felon in possession of a firearm, a restrained person in a restraining order in possession of a firearm and possession of a concealed firearm in a vehicle, Hobbs said.

Based on that May 2 arrest, Lenz obtained a search warrant that authorized a search of Mitchell and his residence for firearm-related items, Hobbs said.

During the search no firearm related items were located, however Hobbs said large amounts of marijuana, methamphetamine, ecstasy, drug paraphernalia, scales, packaging material and a deadly weapon – a billy club – were located.

Det. Ryan Peterson, who Hobbs said was assisting Lenz with the search, obtained an additional search warrant that authorized the seizure of marijuana, methamphetamine, ecstasy, drug paraphernalia, scales, packaging material and deadly weapon.

Mitchell was booked into the Lake County Jail for possession of a controlled substance (methamphetamine), possession of a controlled substance (ecstasy), possession of marijuana for sales, cultivation of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia, Hobbs said.

A bail enhancement to $250,000 was obtained on Mitchell, who remained in the Lake County Jail on Saturday.

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The sunrise ceremony will begin at 5 a.m. near the Bloody Island site, located off of Reclamation Road near the Bloody Island marker, a mile and a half east of Upper Lake. Drive a quarter of a mile down Reclamation Road and park on the roadside.

Organizers say the event is held to honor the Pomo Indian people who were killed by US Army forces in May of 1850.

The massacre was in retaliation for the December 1849 murders, on the other side of the lake in what is now Kelseyville, of Andrew Kelsey and Charles Stone, who had brutalized local Indians.

According to historical accounts, some of those Indians fled to the Bloody Island area – known as “old island” or Badon-napo-ti – which was the site of an established village.

Captain Nathaniel Lyon led a US Army company to Lake County in the spring of 1850 to punish Chief Augustine's band of Pomos for Stone's and Kelsey's deaths.

They didn't find the band in Big Valley, and then traveled to Upper Lake, where they found and attacked the band at Bloody Island using whaleboats and two small brass cannons from the Benicia Army arsenal, according to historians.

The estimated number of casualties is between 60 and 100, based on varying accounts.

The Saturday ceremony will be followed by a potluck breakfast with speakers and dancers at the Oddfellows Hall in downtown Upper Lake.

The community also is invited to participate in an all-night campout and dancing ceremony on Friday, May 13. Meals will be served at 6 p.m. and midnight, with a fire at 9 p.m. To get to the camp area, enter Robinson Rancheria on Pomo Way, go to end of road and turn left

Following the Saturday events, dancing at rancheria will continue from 1 p.m. to 9 p.m.

For more information, to donate or to be part of the agenda, contact Clayton Duncan at 707-274-6788 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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In this image, the Voorwerp floats near a spiral galaxy. Credit: NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known,” wrote Carl Sagan.

And now you can be the one to find it, thanks to Zooniverse, a unique citizen science Web site.

Zooniverse volunteers, who call themselves “Zooites,” are working on a project called Galaxy Zoo, classifying distant galaxies imaged by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

“Not only are people better than computers at detecting the subtleties that differentiate galaxies, they can do things computers can't do, like spot things that just look interesting,” explained Zooniverse director Chris Lintott, an astronomer at the University of Oxford.

Zooite Hanny van Arkel, a Dutch schoolteacher, discovered a strange green object floating in her cosmic soup, pictured above.

When van Arkel noticed this unusual greenish object and posted an image of it on the Galaxy Zoo forum, not even the experts knew what it was.

They named it “Voorwerp,” Dutch for “object.”

Another group of Zooites found green “peas” in theirs, and dubbed themselves the “Peas-Corp.”

The peas turned out to be small, round green galaxies about a tenth the size of the Milky Way. These are now believed to be the most efficient star factories in the universe, forming huge numbers of stars in a hurry.

“It was easy to find 'peas' by computer once we knew they were there, but without the human factor we'd never have noticed them,” said Lintott.

Lintott started Zooniverse in 2007 to solve a very large and unique problem: "I had too many galaxies on my hands," he explains.

Lintott was faced with classifying, by shape, one million galaxies imaged by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

First he did what any self-respecting scientist would do: “I asked a graduate student to classify them.”

These

Lake County Sheriff's Special Enforcement Detail K-9 narcotics detection teams seized cocaine, methamphetamine and cash during two felony arrests on Thursday, May 12, and Friday, May 13, 2011. Photo courtesy of the Lake County Sheriff's Office.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The work of Sheriff's Special Enforcement Detail K-9 narcotics detection teams led to the arrests of two local men and the seizure of cocaine, methamphetamine and money this week.

Joseph Lee Williams, 61, of Clearlake and 57-year-old Luther Gene Weathers of Clearlake Oaks were arrested on drug-related charges, according to Capt. James Bauman of the Lake County Sheriff's Office.

Bauman said that on Thursday, May 12, at approximately 4:40 p.m., a Sheriff’s K-9 team assigned to the Sheriff's Special Enforcement Detail stopped a black Chevy Camaro being driven by 52-year-old Cheryl Denise Lewis on Old Highway 53 in the city of Clearlake.

Lewis did not have a valid driver’s license but Williams, who was riding as her passenger, told the deputy he possessed a valid license, Bauman said.

While waiting for sheriff’s dispatch to confirm his license was valid, Williams consented to a search. Bauman said Williams began removing articles from his pockets and was found to have a quantity of “crack” cocaine in one of his pants pockets.

Joseph Williams, 61, of Clearlake, Calif., was arrested for allegedly being in possession of crack cocaine on Thursday, May 12, 2011. Lake County Jail photo.

Williams was arrested and booked at the Lake County Hill Road Correctional Facility for possession of a narcotic controlled substance. He later posted the $10,000 bail and was released, according to jail records.

On Friday, May 13, at approximately 1:30 p.m., Sheriff's Special Enforcement Detail deputies were patrolling the Clearlake Oaks area when they spotted Weathers driving his blue Ford pickup truck on Third Street near Keys Boulevard, according to Bauman.

Deputies knew Weathers’ driver’s license had been suspended and initiated a traffic stop, Bauman said. As Weathers stopped his truck, he abruptly got out and ran around the truck with his hand in his pocket in an apparent attempt to conceal or dispose of contraband.

Weathers was detained and determined to be under the influence of a controlled substance. Bauman said deputies searched Weathers and recovered a bag of methamphetamine and a glass “meth” pipe from his pants pocket. More than $600 also was seized from Weathers as the suspected profits of drug sales.

Due to the furtive movements Weathers made when he exited the truck, Bauman said deputies searched the area around the truck and located a white plastic cylinder in the grass approximately 15 feet from the truck. The cylinder was believed to have been tossed by Weathers and deputies found that it contained over a third of an ounce of methamphetamine packaged in several plastic bags.

Luther Weathers, 57, of Clearlake Oaks, Calif., was arrested for charges including allegedly being in possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia, and being under the influence of a controlled substance. Lake County Jail photo.

Weathers was transported to the Lake County Hill Road Correctional Facility where he was booked for possession of a controlled substance, possession of a controlled substance for sales, transportation of a controlled substance, possession of narcotics paraphernalia, and being under the influence of a controlled substance, Bauman said.

Weathers was arrested on March 14 for similar offenses when a search warrant was served at his home by the Sheriff’s Narcotics Task Force, Bauman said. A quarter ounce of methamphetamine, numerous narcotic medications, and over $1,000.00 in currency were also seized during that arrest.

He was out of custody on bail from that arrest when deputies stopped him on Friday. Bauman said that due to multiple prior arrests for sales of controlled substances, Weathers remained in jail on Friday with an enhanced bail of $150,000.

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Assemblyman Wesley Chesbro, left, and Humboldt Marine Logistics President Stephen Pepper discuss the creation of a Pacific Coast marine highway at the 11th Annual California Maritime Leadership Symposium Wednesday, May 11, 2011, at the Sacramento Convention Center. Courtesy photo.

SACRAMENTO – Assemblyman Wesley Chesbro (D-North Coast) and Humboldt Maritime Logistics President Stephen Pepper were featured speakers on the topic of creating a Pacific Coast marine highway at the 11th Annual California Maritime Leadership Symposium Wednesday in Sacramento.

A marine highway on the West Coast would “save 5.4 million gallons of diesel fuel a year compared to transporting goods the same distance by truck,” said Chesbro, who served as moderator of a panel that that explored the role of the state and federal governments in support of maritime commerce.

“It would also eliminate 60,000 metric tons of CO2 from the atmosphere per year, decrease greenhouse gas emissions by 68 percent, eliminate 34 million truck-travel miles per year, help decrease our dependence on foreign oil and directly work to create jobs,” Chesbro said.

A Pacific Coast Marine Highway, servicing U.S. ports from Canada to Mexico has long been a dream of Stephen Pepper of Arcata, whose Humboldt Marine Logistics won a $275,000 award from the U.S. Department of Transportation to develop a West Coast Hub-Feeder Project.

The project, which Pepper named Blue Coast Intermodal, is a public-private partnership sponsored by the Humboldt Bay Harbor Recreation and Conservation District (HBHRCD).

This marine highway venture will use marine barges to freight goods in and out of secondary ports on the Pacific Coast.

Pepper said he envisions Humboldt Bay and Long Beach becoming the first two terminals.

This mode of shipping has the potential to save West Coast businesses a lot of money compared to over-the-highway trucking, but it also gives “shippers a way to move cargo that is more environmentally responsible when coupled with clean Diesel technologies in the ports,” Pepper said.

Also attending the Symposium were HBHRCD commissioners Mike Wilson and Richard Marks and CEO David Hull.

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Motorcycles lined Main Street in Lakeport, Calif., on Saturday, May 14, 2011, when the Vagos visited town to hold an annual meeting. Photo by Elizabeth Larson.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Officials shut down streets in downtown Lakeport for several hours Saturday in response to the arrival of dozens of members of a group police identified as an outlaw motorcycle gang, and by day's end an effort was going on to block the possible arrival of a rival gang in the county.

The Vagos – sporting black leather jackets and bright green insignia – arrived in the city Saturday morning for an annual meeting, according to the group's sergeant-at-arms, who identified himself as “Sarge.”

Sgt. Jason Ferguson of the Lakeport Police Department said the group is an outlaw motorcycle gang which police had received word would be coming to Lakeport. He said he couldn't release information police had received about the reason the Vagos had come.

Ferguson said police weren't aware of how many Vagos would be coming or how long they would be staying. Between 75 and 100 were said to be in town, Ferguson said.

Police said there were no incidents or arrests related to the meeting.

Throughout the morning police had been contacted by county residents who spotted the group members making their way toward Lakeport, Ferguson said.

Although the Vagos and other motorcycle clubs have been in Lakeport before, “We've never had this type of numbers show up here, which caused us concern,” Ferguson said.

That prompted a mutual aid request, which resulted in the arrival of the Lake County Sheriff's Office, California Highway Patrol, Clearlake Police Department, the Lake County District Attorney's Office and California State Parks.

Main Street from First to Fourth and Third Street from Main to Forbes were closed to vehicles late Saturday morning as a precautionary measure, Ferguson said. Foot traffic was still allowed.

“The safety and security of citizens in our community is paramount,” said Ferguson.

Local law enforcement agencies were posted around downtown Lakeport, Calif., on Saturday, May 14, 2011, in response to the appearance of the Vagos. Photo by Elizabeth Larson.

A command center was set up behind the Lake County District Attorney's Office on N. Forbes Street. District Attorney Don Anderson and Lakeport City Manager Margaret Silveira were on hand with law enforcement to monitor the situation.

Sheriff Frank Rivero also was on scene, having left his son's baseball game to respond.

He said there had been concerns about safety after the large number of bikes arriving in town earlier in the day had stopped or snagged traffic. He said motorcycles had been racing up and down the streets and Vagos were stepping into the middle of the street and clogging traffic while they tried to park their bikes. Vagos also had been blocking the sidewalks and were being “overbearing,” he added.

“When we showed up it all calmed down,” he said.

Close to two dozen motorcycles were parked along Main Street while Vagos gathered inside the nearby Clearlake Club.

Sarge, with fellow members at the bar, estimated there were about 70 members there from club chapters around California and Nevada.

He said the gathering was just an annual party which had been scheduled to take place several weeks ago but was preempted by the death of one of the group's founders.

Sarge said most of the Vagos would be gone by Saturday night.

He complained about the heavy law enforcement presence. Pointing out that so many people are talking about stretched county budgets, he argued a large amount of taxpayer dollars were being spent unnecessarily.

Rivero, standing next to Sarge, said he had a lot of management staff on Saturday.

“I appreciate your concern for our tax dollars,” Rivero told Sarge.

Rivero disputed Sarge's statements about the gathering only being a regular event.

“Our intelligence was very clear on this,” Rivero said.

He explained that a Vagos member was beaten up some weeks ago by two Hells Angels prospects, and that 15 to 30 members were going to come to Lakeport to put on a show of force. Instead, they had two to three times that number show up.

Rivero said the law enforcement turnout was meant to send a message to motorcycle groups that local towns won't be handed over to them.

“I believe our show of force helped diffuse the situation,” he said.

Asked if they were concerned about other rival gangs showing up in response, Ferguson said, “There's always that concern.”

“They do have rival gang members,” he said, adding, “It's the unknown that we are preparing for.”

Groups of Vagos bikers began pulling out around 3:30 p.m., with police and CHP following them out of town, with Lake County News receiving reports that sheriff's units were following the bikes through Cobb and along other local roadways. Numerous other Vagos members continued to stay at the bar until into the evening.

Back in Lakeport, the streets were reopened to traffic close to 4:30 p.m., Rasmussen said.

At that point, action switched to the major entry points into the county.

The concern about rival gangs showing up had appeared to solidify, as Rivero said he and acting Lakeport Police Chief Brad Rasmussen received reports that Hells Angels were heading toward Lake County.

One of the reports, which came from the FBI, said there was a Hells Angels motorcycle run moving along Highway 12, Rivero said.

He said the concern was a potential confrontation between the two groups.

Rivero was directing numerous sheriff's units to gather at the entry points into the county in an effort to block any Hells Angels who might try to enter. Rasmussen said Lakeport Police also sent three units to the south county.

The Sonoma County Sheriff's Henry-1 helicopter responded to check the areas of Highway 101 and Highway 175 over the Hopland Grade, Rivero said. No groups were spotted.

The day's activities received some mixed reactions in town.

Shortly before Lakeport's streets were fully reopened to traffic, two local women, Candy Prairie and Cheryl Ann Oncale, had ridden their motorcycles into town to stop and have a drink at Molly Brennans pub on Main Street.

“They didn't like us coming through but we did it anyway,” said Oncale, sitting at the pub's bar.

The two women said police should have given community members and businesses more notice.

That was a view shared by the pub's bartender, Jeremy Potter, who said the closure hurt businesses and employees who work for tips.

“It would be nice if they were able to keep the street open and just be present,” Potter said.

Down the street at Watershed Books, owner Cheri Holden said many local businesses had closed once the street was closed to traffic, making for a very quiet Saturday.

She also said she felt the police should have given more notice to merchants.

Rasmussen said of the closure, “We just had to make a decision right away.”

Lakeport Police demobilized the command unit at about 6:30 p.m., and at about 7:45 p.m. the Lakeport Police units that had responded to the south county were back in the city, according to Rasmussen.

Rasmussen said that at about 8 p.m. they still had about 15 to 20 Vagos at the Clearlake Club.

Rivero said he was planning on keeping additional units on scene throughout the night. Rasmussen said Lakeport Police was doing the same, and was communicating with Rivero and other agency chiefs.

“We will pool our resources to deal with any issues if they come up,” Rasmussen said.

Rivero said he plans to hold a debriefing with his command staff on Monday and then meet with the gang task force on Tuesday to discuss the situation. Rivero said his agency also will be working on a long-term strategy for dealing with motorcycle gangs.

“It appears like this is heating up,” he said.

Rasmussen and his agency offered thanks to all of the allied agencies that took part in the Saturday operation, noting everyone worked well together.