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Christopher Andrew Puryear, 23, of Kelseyville, accepted a plea bargain in which he pleaded guilty to felony sexual battery on a 14-year-old girl, according to his defense attorney, Stephen Carter.
That puts Puryear on a fast track to sentencing, which Carter said is scheduled for 9 a.m. Friday, March 5.
In exchange for the guilty plea, Deputy District Attorney Ed Borg dropped felony charges of oral copulation and threatening a witness, and a misdemeanor domestic violence charge, Carter said.
Puryear previously was a youth group leader for Gateway Ministries in Finley, formerly Big Valley Community Church, as Lake County News has reported.
Last November, Lake County Sheriff's deputies responded to a report that Puryear was having “inappropriate relations” with one of the teenage girls in the youth group, according to a sheriff's office report.
On Nov. 25, Puryear allegedly asked a 14-year-old girl to go outside with him to talk during a church function, at which point he allegedly made physical and sexual advances towards her. Officials alleged that Puryear only stopped when he was interrupted by someone else exiting the church.
Puryear's attorney said the young man can expect to receive a five-year sentence, and will probably serve about half of that time due to credits including time served. He's remained in the Lake County Jail since his Dec. 19 arrest, with bail set at $250,000.
Without the plea deal, Puryear was facing eight years in prison, Carter said. The sexual battery charge is not a strike but it will require Puryear to register as a sex offender.
“Mr. Borg and I worked hard to work on a resolution that was acceptable to both sides,” said Carter, adding that he thought Borg “took a very good approach in the case.”
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
THE US GEOLOGICAL SURVEY HAS UPGRADED THE MAGNITUDE OF THIS QUAKE FROM 3.4 TO 3.6.
THE GEYSERS – A 3.6-magnitude earthquake was reported near The Geysers early Saturday morning.
The quake occurred at 1:32 a.m. and was centered two miles north of The Geysers, four miles west of Cobb and seven miles west northwest of Anderson Springs, according to the US Geological Survey.
The survey reported that the earthquake was reported at a depth of 1.7 miles.
Among those making shake reports to the US Geological Survey were residents of Kelseyville, Middletown, Geyserville, Cloverdale and Calistoga. A report even came in from Cupertino, 180 miles away.
Cobb resident and Lake County News contributor Roger Kinney felt the quake and called it a “pretty good shaker,” which he said felt stronger and seemed to last longer than quakes in the area usually do.
The most recent earthquake measuring 3.0 in magnitude or above was reported Dec. 20. That quake, a 3.8, was recorded two miles east southeast of The Geysers, four miles southwest of Cobb and four miles west of Anderson Springs at a depth of 2.7 miles, as Lake County News has reported.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
On Thursday, following a preliminary hearing that stretched over two and a half days, Sonoma County Judge Kenneth Gnoss ruled that Thomas Boccaleoni, 44, will stand trial on eight felony counts of sexual assault, according to the office of Sonoma County District Attorney Stephan Passalacqua.
“We are pleased with the judge’s ruling to advance this case to the next stage,” Passalacqua said. “We are confident that once this case goes in front of a jury, there will be a positive outcome.”
The prosecution has charged Boccaleoni with sexual penetration by force, two counts of assault with intent to commit rape or penetration with a foreign object, two counts of making criminal threats, one count of sexual assault while victim is unlawfully restrained, and two counts of false imprisonment.
During the preliminary hearing, two of the victims testified, as well as a DNA expert and the case’s lead detective, Sonoma County Sheriff’s Deputy Joel Pedersen. Judge Gnoss found there was sufficient evidence for Boccaleoni’s case to be held over for jury trial, according to Passalacqua's report.
The case goes back to court on Monday, Feb. 1, for a ruling on a third count of assault with intent to commit rape or penetration with a foreign object, relating to the third victim, Passalacqua's office reported.
The acts occurred on rural roads in Sonoma County from November 2008 to April 2009, officials reported.
The three women allegedly were followed by a vehicle flashing its headlights while following behind them on rural Bennett Valley Road and Calistoga Road, and on Bodega Highway west of Sebastopol, according to Passalacqua's report.
In each of the three cases the women pulled their cars over and were eventually sexually assaulted, officials said. Two of the victims were able to identify Boccaleoni as the man who assaulted them. DNA evidence linked Boccaleoni to the third victim.
Deputy District Attorney Jason Riehl is the prosecutor assigned to the case.
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Michael Diaz, 35, and David Diaz, 37, both of Redwood Valley, were arrested by Mendocino County Sheriff's deputies and booked on charges of robbery, burglary, vandalism and assault with serious bodily injury, according to Capt. Kurt Smallcomb.
Bail for the two, he added, has been set at $750,000.
Other possible suspects are alleged to have been involved in the incident, Smallcomb reported.
Just after 3 a.m. Jan. 17 Mendocino County Sheriff's deputies responded to a residence in the 3000 block of Eastside Calpella Road regarding a home invasion robbery, he said.
Several victims at the residence – four males and two females, ranging in age from 19 to 21, and all from Ukiah, according to Smallcomb – reported that a small group of suspects had arrived and entered the residence by force, assaulted and terrorized several people inside the residence while demanding money.
Smallcomb said the suspects demanded future money from the victims and threatened to kill the victims if they reported the incident to law enforcement.
The incident was under investigation and deputies developed information that Michael Diaz and David Diaz were part of the small group of suspects, according to the report.
Smallcomb said both men were taken into custody in the 600 Block of North State Street in Ukiah and incarcerated at the Mendocino County Jail.
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Glenn Bridges of Kelseyville flew into the airport in Haiti’s capital city of Port-au-Prince on Wednesday evening with his colleague, Art Berry, who runs a ministry in Haiti.
Bridges is working with Washington-based Starfish Ministries' earthquake relief effort in Haiti. The country was hit by a 7.0 earthquake on Jan. 12 and has been hit by dozens of large aftershocks since then.
Media reports from Haiti and international news services estimate that as many as 1.5 million people in the country of 9 million have been left homeless by the disaster, with the death count possibly as high as 200,000.
“Right now, I’m on my way to the Dominican Republic to pick up nearly 40,000 pounds of dried soup mix which will be delivered to a compound in Port-au-Prince and distributed by a local church that is partnered with Starfish Ministries,” Bridges said Thursday.
Bridges is the director of building operations for Starfish Ministries. The group began in 1998 when Bernie and Sheryl Bovenkamp decided to take over a project to build an orphanage that was being dropped by Childcare International, a Christian relief organization.
Since then, one orphanage has turned into many; they've also established many schools that provide education and four meals per week for more than 7,000 Haitian children, Bridges said.
None of the children served in those orphanages or schools were harmed during the quakes, he added.
“Life is beginning to move forward,” said Bridges. “There are piles of supplies sitting at the airport and I've seen big truckloads of pure cement for the rebuilding process.”
Bernie Bovenkamp and Bridges are very good friends and have traveled to Haiti together nearly 50 times.
“This is my 52nd trip,” said Bridges. “I plan to be here for several weeks; my wife doesn’t like me to be gone very long.”
“She’s used to it,” Glenn’s son, Boone, said about his mother Thursday morning. “I was going to go with my dad but the plane we were going to take fell through. Plus my wife wasn’t too keen on the idea of me taking a one-way trip to Haiti either.”
Bridges and Berry were able to snag two free seats on Wednesday on a private jet that was filled with about 500 pounds of medical supplies.
“We actually met with five surgeons who were literally waiting for the plane to land so they could get the supplies they needed,” said Bridges.
When he arrived, he was happy to see Doug Jarvie, president of the Starfish Ministries in Canada, on the tarmac awaiting their arrival. Bridges went to Haiti now to allow Jarvie to go home to his family.
Jarvie arrived in Cap Haitien, a city on Haiti's north coast, on Jan. 15, just three days after the first big earthquake hit. He is attending meetings with the United Nations and World Food Program to apply for food to distribute to Haitians while Bridges drives to the Dominican Republic to pick up more food.
The ministry’s distribution effort has gone smoothly so far. On Jan. 19, the group purchased 10,000 pounds of food which was distributed.
The food Starfish is delivering has come from numerous generous organizations and people, the group reported.
A lot of the food was bought using money from the Starfish Ministries members' and supporters' own pockets.
The Feed My Starving Children organization is one group which donated some food, according to the updated blog for Starfish Ministries at http://starfishministries.org . Churches in the Dominican Republic also have donated bottled water.
Bridges said he had a hard time getting on the road to deliver that food because his delivery truck broke down.
On Thursday morning, Boone Bridges reported that the last he heard, his dad was on a “tap-tap,” a rented Haitian motorcycle, riding around looking for parts to fix the brakes on the truck, which has a 10,000-pound capacity.
Later in the day, Glenn Bridges had fixed the truck and was on the road again.
The food Bridges was on his way to pick up will be distributed to a “tent town” of nearly 5,000 people who were living in Port-au-Prince and are now homeless as a result of the earthquakes.
After the deliveries, he said he planned to head about 80 miles north of Port-au-Prince to where most of Starfish Ministries' schools are located. Bridges wants to visit every school to see the people and assess any damage that has been done.
Boone Bridges said the ministry plans to send a team from Lake County to Haiti in the next three to six months. The last group went in 2000.
Another group is a local connection, Seaplanes Operations LLC, is getting involved by sending a seaplane to Haiti to help with the disaster relief efforts as well, according to their Web site, http://haiti.seaplaneops.com/Haiti/Welcome.html .
With roads impassable, seaplane are offering an important alternative because they can land on the water all around the country to reach the people that haven’t gotten much help due to the closures, the group reported.
E-mail Tera deVroede at
Shannon Lee Edmonds, 35, and Melvin Dale Norton, 38, are each facing a murder charge for the Sept. 22 murder of Shelby Uehling, 25, who had moved to Clearlake from Montana earlier in 2009.
Edmonds also is charged with murder with a special allegation of using a knife, and Norton faces charges of murder with a special allegation that he used a billy club, and assault with a deadly weapon with a special allegation of causing great bodily injury, as Lake County News has reported.
Jury selection in the case started earlier this month, and on Wednesday an evidentiary hearing was held before Judge Arthur Mann, who is presiding over the case.
Prosecutor Art Grothe used his opening statements to give the six-woman, six-man jury an overview of the case.
Between 1 a.m. and 1:30 a.m. Sept. 22 Clearlake Police dispatch received a 911 call reporting that a fight was taking place somewhere along Old Highway 53. When officers arrived on scene, they found Uehling face down on the side of the road, lying next to an oak tree, his carotid artery slashed. A large blood trail started about 10 feet away from his body.
Fifty yards down Old Highway 53 Uehling's red Honda was still running, with the windows down, the driver's side door open and the head of a golf club buried in the dash. The shaft of the club was found between the car and Uehling's body.
Among the numerous wounds Uehling suffered was a deep, penetrating wound on his right buttock, which Grothe said a pathologist will testify is not consistent with a knife but with a golf club shaft.
Grothe discussed Edmonds and his relationship with 23-year-old Patricia Campbell, with whom he had an on again, off again relationship.
During a brief period in which Campbell and Edmonds were broken up, Campbell and Uehling became romantically involved, a fact Edmonds became aware of a week before Uehling died, Grothe said.
Grothe shared some text messages Edmonds is alleged to have sent Uehling in which he made it clear that he didn't want Uehling near the young woman.
In one message Edmonds called Campbell a “bag whore” – a term for a woman who will trade sex for drugs – and told Uehling, “She'll never be yours.”
Grothe alleged that the messages also carried threats. In another of the texts, Edmonds told Uehling, “What goes around comes around,” and “I know a lot of bad people in this town.”
“That was a week before Mr. Uehling's throat was slit,” Grothe said.
He alleged that Norton, walking home from a barbecue at Edmonds' home late on the night of Sept. 21, saw Uehling's car parked at Mendo Mill on Highway 53. Norton then allegedly called Edmonds, took a golf club and went with his friend to Uehling's parked car.
Edmonds' defense attorney, Doug Rhoades, said the fatal confrontation didn't start either on Sept. 21 or 22, but weeks before, when Uehling and Campbell had been in that brief relationship.
He said that Uehling, who was using methamphetamine, gave the drug to Campbell, and Edmonds found out about it.
Then Uehling and Campbell broke up. “It terminated not on the best of terms,” said Rhoades. “She got tired of him. He became demanding,” with Campbell telling him in no uncertain terms to leave her alone.
Rhoades alleged that Uehling didn't like being told no, and that on the night of Sept. 21 he was parked in an area off of Old Highway 53, near Campbell's home – nowhere near the place in the Avenues where he had been staying.
The only reason for him to have parked there, said Rhoades, was to watch traffic. “There's no reason for him to be there at all, no legitimate reason,” he said.
Rhoades said Norton and Edmond met up and found Uehling still in the area. “There is an argument, a confrontation of some kind,” Rhoades said. “I don't know who said what to whom first, who was more aggressive than the other.”
Uehling was stabbed, Edmonds was knifed in the arm, and afterward Edmonds and Norton panicked, going to Norton's home, changing their clothes and hiding them and the weapons, Rhoades said.
“Our contention is that Mr. Edmonds was defending two people – one was present, one was not,” said Rhoades, referring to Norton and Campbell, respectively.
Norton's attorney, Stephen Carter, told the jury that the evidence will show that the dispute arose out of a desire to protect Campbell. “That's how this whole dispute started.”
While Edmonds had romantic feelings for Campbell, Norton's family had been close to hers, and he felt protective of her, Carter explained.
The thing that “gets this rolling,” said Carter, was Campbell's brief breakup with Edmonds and relationship with Uehling, with whom she used methamphetamine. “That's the start of the case, the evidence will show,” he said.
Even after Campbell broke up with him, Uehling couldn't forget about her, Carter stated. He recounted an episode in which Uehling came to her trailer and Norton and Edmonds told him to leave, with Norton holding Uehling's car door so he couldn't get out.
“There is worry here about what's going on with Mr. Uehling and his plans for Ms. Campbell,” Carter said.
Carter asserted that when the confrontation occurred between Uehling and Edmonds and Norton, Uehling was high on methamphetamine. He said Uehling had in his car an ax handle with a homemade grip and a screwdriver, and a fixed blade knife in his shoe.
After the fight, Norton and Edmonds left the scene. Carter said the blood on Norton appeared to be more from “incidental contact” with Edmonds, who he said had more blood on him, than directly from Uehling.
“I think the evidence will show that Mr. Norton was scared,” said Carter, explaining that Norton saw his friend Edmond with blood on his hands on the knife.
Officer describes crime scene
The first witness of the day, and the one who spent the longest time on the stand Thursday, was Clearlake Police Officer Michael Carpenter, the first person to arrive on the scene and discover Uehling's body.
Responding to the area of Clement and Lotowana, Carpenter recalled that as he pulled up to the scene, his squad car's lights moved over the pool of blood and then illuminated Uehling's body lying next to the tree.
Carpenter said he got out of the vehicle and started yelling at Uehling to see if there was movement. He then put on safety gloves due to the large amount of blood and began assessing the scene. “I didn't know what we had at the time,” he said.
When Sgt. Brenda Crandall arrived just a few minutes later, Carpenter said he tried to find Uehling's pulse.
Paramedics also responded and Uehling was taken to the hospital, where Carpenter responded to take pictures of his body and bag his hands. He and other investigators later went to Norton's and Edmonds' residences; the two men later ended up at the Clearlake Police Department for questioning.
Edmonds had a cut on his left forearm, which he said he received from a fence, Carpenter said.
Using an overhead projector, Grothe led Carpenter through a series of photos that showed the crime scene, including a closeup of Uehling's body near the tree, face down, but his torso partially propped up on his elbows.
Carpenter also explained several photos of Uehling's body which showed signs of the assault, including long gashes that he suggested were the result of an asp, or foldout club that Edmonds is alleged to have had in his possession along with a knife.
Uehling's torso showed signs of bruising across the chest, stomach and around his waist, and his knees – bare because he had been wearing shorts – looked bruised and dirty from having been in the dirt and weeds during the final struggle. Uehling's blood was found up the trunk of the oak tree next to him, Carpenter said.
The photos showed what Carpenter estimated to be a nickel-sized wound on Uehling's right buttock where it's alleged he was stabbed with the shaft of the golf club. They also showed what appeared to be a stab wound across the middle part of the right side of his back.
In Uehling's right shoe investigators found the fixed blade knife, which was sticking out near the base of the tongue of the shoe. Carter had said during his opening arguments that no blood from either Edmonds or Norton was found on the knife. Grothe showed the knife – contained in a clear plastic bag – to the jury.
Other pictures shown to the jury included pictures of the cut on Edmonds' left forearm, a small nick on his neck, and pictures of his hands and the inside of his leg, none of which appeared to show any signs of injury.
Also on the stand Thursday were neighbors who lived in the area of the assault, including Phillip Adams, who was outside that night, smoking a small marijuana roach, when he began to hear arguing, yelling and screaming, which became “louder and more terrifying” over the two to three minutes it lasted.
Adams said he didn't have a telephone and didn't wake the neighbors. Instead, he walked in the direction of the screams but couldn't see anything because it was so dark. In less than five minutes after the screaming stopped, he said he saw two people walking into Lotowana Village.
Testimony in the case will continue at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Feb. 2, in Department 3.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at