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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – The Glenn County Sheriff’s Office said that a man whose body was found in a creek last month appears to have been a homicide victim.
The victim has been identified as 37-year-old Michael Castillo Perea of Willows, according to Glenn County Sheriff Larry Jones.
Perea’s body was found in shallow water in Stony Creek on the evening of April 12, by three Hamilton City teenagers who had gone swimming, Jones said.
Sheriff’s deputies responded, confirmed the find and detectives from the Sheriff’s Major Crimes Unit positively identified the remains as those of Perea, who Jones said was well known to Hamilton City residents.
As a result of an autopsy conducted on April 18, the case was classified as a homicide, Jones said. The final cause of death is pending toxicology testing results.
Jones said the investigation has been ongoing, and it has yet to be determined if Perea was killed at the location he was found or if he was killed at another location and his body dumped in Stony Creek. A motive has yet to be established.
The Glenn County Sheriff’s Office is asking anyone with any information regarding this case to contact Sheriff’s Detective Greg Felton at 707-934-6431 or 707-934-6720.
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has provided the first direct evidence of small meteoroids crashing into Saturn’s rings and breaking into streams of rubble.
These observations make Saturn’s rings the only location besides Earth, the moon and Jupiter where astronomers have been able to observe impacts as they occur.
The meteoroids Cassini detected range in size from about one-half inch to several yards. Scientists scrutinizing images from the probe took years to distinguish tracks left by nine meteoroids in 2005, 2009 and 2012. Details of the observations appear in a paper in the April 25 edition of Science.
The solar system is full of small, speeding objects such as comet dust and chips off asteroids. These objects frequently pummel planetary bodies.
“The new results imply the current-day impact rates for small particles at Saturn are about the same as those at Earth – two very different neighborhoods in our solar system – and this is exciting to see,” said Linda Spilker, Cassini project scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “It took Saturn’s rings acting like a giant meteoroid detector – 100 times the surface area of the Earth – and Cassini’s long-term tour of the Saturn system to address this question.”
The Saturnian equinox in summer 2009 was an especially good time to see the debris left by meteoroid impacts.
The very shallow sun angle on the rings caused the clouds of debris to look bright against the darkened rings in pictures from Cassini’s imaging science subsystem.
“We knew these little impacts were constantly occurring, but we didn’t know how big or how frequent they might be,” said Matt Tiscareno, lead author of the paper and a Cassini participating scientist at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. “Sunlight shining edge-on to the rings at the Saturnian equinox acted like an anti-cloaking device, so these usually invisible features became plain to see.”
Tiscareno and his colleagues now think meteoroids of this size probably break up on a first encounter with the rings, creating smaller, slower pieces that then enter into orbit around Saturn.
The impact into the rings of these secondary meteoroids creates clouds of debris. The tiny particles forming these clouds have a range of orbital speeds around Saturn. As a result they are soon are pulled into diagonal, extended bright streaks such as Cassini observed.
The finding could shed light on a long standing question: How old are Saturn’s rings?
“Saturn’s rings are unusually bright and clean, leading some to suggest that the rings are actually much younger than Saturn,” said Jeff Cuzzi, a co-author of the paper and a Cassini interdisciplinary scientist specializing in planetary rings and dust at NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.
Some estimates have even put the formation of Saturn’s rings during the age of dinosaurs on Earth. That would make the rings very young compared to Saturn.
“To assess this dramatic claim, we must know more about the rate at which outside material is bombarding the rings,” continues Cuzzi. “This latest analysis helps fill in that story with detection of impactors of a size that we weren’t previously able to detect directly.”
For more information about Cassini and its mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/cassini and http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov .
Dr. Tony Phillips works for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Due to increased risk of fire, the National Weather Service has issued a red flag warning for Lake County and several neighboring counties.
Lake County Central Dispatch announced late Friday afternoon that the red flag conditions would begin at 12 a.m. Saturday and continue until 4 p.m. that same day.
The National Weather Service says a red flag warning means that critical fire weather conditions are either occurring or will occur shortly.
Such conditions usually are created by a combination of strong winds, low humidity and warm temperature, the agency said.
Red flag conditions also are in effect in Butte, Colusa, Glenn, Humboldt, Marin, Mendocino, Napa, Placer Shasta, Siskiyou, Solano, Sutter, Tehama, Trinity, Yolo and Yuba counties, according to the National Weather Service.
The National Weather Service said low pressure is retrograding from the Northern Rockies into Northern California and bringing a period of dry and gusty north to northeast winds late Friday night and on Saturday. There also is the possibility of isolated thunderstorms and some rainfall.
Because of dry and windy weather, fuel moisture already has dried to late summer levels in some areas, the agency reported.
Lake County has experienced some small wildland fires and a home fire so far this week, and Lakeport Fire Chief Ken Wells told Lake County News that low humidity has been reported.
In Lake County, forecasters are predicting gusty northerly winds and low humidity Friday night, continuing into Saturday.
The fire weather zone in Lake County is reported to be below the 3,000 foot level, officials said.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Earlier this week law enforcement officials arrested three people and seized marijuana and weapons following the service of search warrants near Clearlake Oaks.
Arrested in the case were Ryan Alan Balletto, 30, of Lakeport; his girlfriend, Christa McConnell, 27, of Upper Lake; and Patrick Steven Pearmain, 24, of Clearlake, according to the Lake County Sheriff’s Office.
All three remained in custody on Friday, with bail for Balletto set at $10 million, Pearmain’s bail set at $1 million and McConnell’s at $200,000, jail records showed.
On Wednesday members of the Lake County Sheriff’s Office SWAT Team, Narcotics Task Force and Major Crimes Unit served a search warrant on approximately 681 acres of property owned by Balletto – who was suspected of illegal marijuana cultivation – in the area of Junction Plaza in Clearlake Oaks, the sheriff’s office reported. Deputies also served a search warrant at Balletto’s home in north Lakeport.
As a result of the searches 1,491 marijuana plants were eradicated, more than $4,000 in cash and 22 weapons – consisting of high powered military grade sniper and assault rifles, automatic assault rifles and pistols – were seized, officials reported.
Other items confiscated during the search warrant service included ammunition, high capacity magazines, military grade body armor and military grade scopes, according to the report.
The sheriff’s office reported that this was the the largest and most sophisticated bulk of weapons seized in the agency’s recent history.
Five children were removed from the home in north Lakeport and taken into custody by CPS, the sheriff’s office reported.
Balletto was booked on drug and weapons charges, McConnell on weapons and child endangerment charges and Pearmain on drug charges, according to jail records.
Lake County Sheriff’s Office detectives also are investigating Balletto and Pairmain for numerous sex-related crimes. The investigation is ongoing and more details will be provided in the future.
Anyone with information regarding either of these investigations should contact the Lake County Sheriff’s Office at 707-263-2690.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The discovery of a pickup down an embankment on the Hopland Grade on Tuesday turned out to be an important piece of evidence in a three-month-old murder case.
The Lake County Sheriff’s Office confirmed on Friday that the pickup was one that they have sought in connection to the Jan. 18 murder of Forrest Seagrave.
Seagrave, a clerk at Mt. Konocti Gas and Mart on Main Street in Kelseyville, was mortally wounded during a late-night robbery by a masked assailant who fled on foot.
The murder of the 33-year-old Seagrave, known for his kindness and generosity, resulted in heightened concerns from community members about safety, and led to a Feb. 7 town hall in Kelseyville ien which local officials offered updates on the case.
Authorities have so far not named any suspect in the case.
The sheriff’s office reported that at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday detectives received a report of a vehicle over an embankment on Highway 175 over the Hopland Grade which matched the description of the pickup they had been seeking in relation to the Seagrave murder.
Detectives responded to the scene and recovered the vehicle, which they identified as a black 2008 Toyota Tacoma, the sheriff’s office reported. Originally, sheriff’s officials had said the pickup model may have been a Dodge Dakota.
The Toyota pickup found down the embankment had been reported stolen from the Kelseyville area on Jan. 18, the same day as Seagrave’s murder, the sheriff’s office reported.
Officials said the Toyota pickup was transported to a secured location and processed for evidence by detectives and crime scene technicians.
Information about what, if anything, detectives located in that processing was not released on Friday.
Detectives from the Lake County Sheriff’s Office continue to investigate the murder of Forrest Seagrave.
A $10,000 reward, raised from community donations, also is being offered for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the person responsible for Seagrave’s death.
Anyone with information related to the Seagrave murder investigation should contact the Lake County Sheriff’s Office at 707-263-2690.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – Fire officials on Friday brought a two-day-old fire in Sonoma County under full control and continued to make progress on other wildland fires that have been burning this week around Northern California.
The Yellow Fire, burning since Wednesday off of Highway 128 in Knight’s Valley, was reported fully contained as of noon on Friday, according to Cal Fire.
It burned 125 acres but had not impacted residences or other structures. Cal Fire said the cause was still under investigation.
While fire crews are to continue patrolling the area for the next few days, all roads in the area are open, Cal Fire said.
In Tehama County, the Panther Fire’s acreage had reached 6,393 acres and 10 percent containment, and the 55-acre Cedar Fire in Butte County was 75-percent contained on Friday afternoon, according to Cal Fire.
In Glenn County, the 306 Fire, burning near Elk Creek, was at 217 acres and 75 percent containment, Cal Fire said Friday afternoon.
Fire officials remain on alert due to red flag warnings and fire weather watches issued by the National Weather Service.
Email Elizabeth Larson at