Posted on 10/02/2008 12:36:34 PM PDT by freebilly
LAKE COUNTY -- Two recent convictions highlight the issues of drugs and gangs in the county, according to information from the Lake County District Attorney's Office.
Mendocino County resident Anthony Scott Cape, 42, faces the possibility of 14 years in prison after he was convicted Sept. 9 of five felonies in connection with a December 2004 drug-related incident at a Clearlake home. In another case, Lake County Superior Court Judge Arthur Mann sentenced Nice resident Donald Kirk Horne, 32, Aug. 25 to seven years and four months in prison for Horne's involvement in a June 2006 gang-related assault in Lakeport.
The gang conviction was not an isolated incident, according to Chief Deputy D.A. Richard Hinchcliff.
"We've had several convictions in the last two years," Hinchcliff said.
He cited two prominent cases that resulted in convictions, including the Norteno gang assault on a teenage boy, whose brother was part of the rival Sureno gang, in Lakeport on July 4, 2007. Hinchcliff also cited the stabbing of Lakeport resident Alex Larranaga by five Sureno gang members at Library Park in March 2007.
The Lakeport Police Department, the California Highway Patrol and the Lake County Sheriff's Office have representatives on a gang task force. The task force reported in March that there were an estimated 100-plus known gang members in Lake County.
Horne was convicted of attacking a 28-year-old man and his 19-year-old girlfriend near the Prestige Tattoo shop in Lakeport. According to a D.A. press release, Horne was with a group of "several other members" of the Street Villains gang, aka STV, a documented local Sureno gang. Horne was also convicted of evading a peace officer and driving under the influence, according to a D.A. press release.
A Dec. 4, 2007 drug-related incident resulted in a jury convicting Cape of kidnapping, robbery, assault with a deadly weapon, assault with force likely to produce great bodily injury and making a criminal threat, according to a D.A. press release. A sentencing hearing is scheduled for Oct. 6.
According to Hinchcliff, who prosecuted the case, Cape attacked a Mendocino County resident who was invited to a Clearlake home to obtain marijuana to sell. Cape came out of hiding when the victim used the bathroom, beating him with closed fists, stomping on his head with work boots and knocking him into the empty bathtub.
Two men helped bind Cape's wrists and ankles with plastic zip-ties and load him in the trunk of the victim's car. The victim used a cell phone to call 9-1-1 from his trunk while the men drove around Clearlake, but police were unable to find him. The victim escaped from the trunk while the car was moving, spent the night in a ditch and got help the next day, according to the release.
A handprint on the trunk of the abandoned car was used to identify and convict Cape, according to Hinchcliff.
Contact Tiffany Revelle at trevelle@record-bee.com.
Well, when I lived in Santa Rosa, there were 100 gang members in my neighborhood. Lake County, however, is very small. There are only 60,000 residents in the entire county, but more "illegally" grown pot was seized here in 2007 than in either Mendocino or Sonoma Counties....
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