A former Mendocino County Supervisor claims he never saw an email at the heart of a claim by suspended county auditor Chamise Cubbison signalling a vendetta against her by DA David Eyster. A preliminary hearing continues this week for a judge to decide whether Cubbison and former county Payroll Manager Paula Kennedy will go to trial for felony misappropriation of public funds for allegedly overpaying Kennedy during the pandemic. Cubbison’s attorney’s claim Eyster was orchestrating a plan to get rid of Cubbison because she questioned his expenses. The Ukiah Daily Journal reports on Monday, former Supervisor Glenn McGourty testified he never saw a three-page email written to him from Eyster that was distributed to several staff members, outlining a plan to oust Cubbison and consolidate the financial departments under Supervisor control.
A Fort Bragg woman is recovering after being out all night in the Jackson Demonstration Forest where she got lost mushroom hunting. The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office says the 59-year-old woman was mushroom hunting with friends Monday when they got separated and she didn’t come out of the dense woods when it got dark. Deputies searched late into the night with no sign of her but at first light Tuesday the Mendocino County Search and Rescue Team was deployed. Around 7am the woman walked out of the woods near the Mendocino Volunteer Fire Station on Road 409. The Sheriff’s Office says she has a minor injury but was otherwise OK and released to go home.
Expired plates have led to the arrest of a Lake County man on gun and drug charges. A Ukiah police officer says he saw a pickup truck with an expired registration and fogged up windows parked in the lot of a closed business late Saturday night. The officer claims he found Greg Burnett asleep in the driver’s seat with a record check showing an active warrant for his arrest out of Lake County. But police also allege a search of the truck turned up a loaded handgun, which Burnett cannot have as a convicted felon, as well as a baggie of meth, and hundreds of apparently stolen and forged checks.
A man on parole for carjacking has been busted with some alleged meth and fentanyl. The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office says a deputy on patrol on Albion Ridge Road stopped a car for having an expired registration and learned the driver Ashley Schucker was on parole, which triggered a search. That search allegedly produced meth, fentanyl, and Oxycodone pills all packaged for sales along with other gear related to drug sales. Schucker was hauled to the jail where he is being held without bail because of the parole violation.
The coastal highway area of Mendocino County known as the Lost Coast Redwoods is now back in public ownership. In an announcement earlier this month the Bureau of Land Management said they’ve acquired the 4500 acre Lost Coast Redwoods property from the Save the Redwoods League which bought it to save it from timber production. The deal was paid for by the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund, Save the Redwoods League, and the State of California’s Wildlife Conservation Board. BLM says it puts eight miles of coastline and forests into public ownership that will be managed in cooperation with tribes. It’s part of a $2 million endowment that sets up a sustained source of funding for BLM to allow for public access and long-term conservation.
