A gang of SWAT toughs rips through the woods, weaving in and out of conifers and vines. They creep slowly, side by side, in camouflage ski masks and safari hats.
Black gloves. Dark shades. Kevlar vests. A symphony of semiautomatic projectiles. Pistols pop, peppering the soundscape.
“The members of the Jackson County SWAT team regularly encounter armed growers willing to protect their money and crop.”
Lieutenant Matt Thomson mugs for the camera. Even for his debut on the Discovery Channel reality show “Weed Country,” his mustache is untamed, an inverted bushy arch that circles ’round his upper lip and crashes on his jawbone.
“That’s why we do it — we don’t want to lose anybody.” Thomson is training his crew “to stay alive” during the upcoming harvest season. Plus, there’s a larger mission: “If we can save one person from getting hooked on drugs, or from smoking a bowl and driving a car and killing somebody, then it’s all worth it.”
Unlike the eviction raid on Tom Roach and Melinda Starba’s home in neighboring Josephine County, for which SWAT from Jackson loaned artillery and manpower, the menacing spectacle on “Weed Country” is staged, just one of several optics Jackson County Sheriff Mike Winters showcased on Discovery to demonstrate his squad’s ferocity.
“I’ve seen a decline … of America from great to good.” Winters loathes grass even more than he loves guns; though he opposes bans on assault weapons, the sheriff has a rep for his attempts to block medical cannabis patients from being able to obtain gun licenses. He scolds the camera: “Drugs are going to be the downfall of this country … We have to stop it!”
WINTERS SPRINGS, SOME WILL FALL
For appearing on cable and for deploying extravagant measures to hunt cannabis cultivators — one interview was conducted while the sheriff scanned for grow fields from a chartered chopper — Winters was heavily criticized by his opponent in the 2014 sheriff’s race. It didn’t help that during the same month as his debut on the Discovery Channel, he laid off more than 60 workers due to budget cuts. The scenario was similar for Sheriff Gil Gilbertson in the next county; while funding shortages in Josephine left law enforcement crippled, unable to even respond to distress calls at night and on weekends, his department also declared war on growers.
Gilbertson and Winters have shared the regional spotlight. In 2009 they co-appeared in front of more than 50 admirers from the Josephine County chapter of the John Birch Society, members of which lobbed questions at them pertaining to gun rights and other conservative soft spots. According to the Illinois Valley News, following a couple of terse remarks about the United Nations and the American Civil Liberties Union, Gilbertson was asked about the precedent set in Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina, which led to mass arrests and the removal of firearms from some individuals. In response, the Josephine sheriff noted that he actually served on an ad hoc SWAT outfit in New Orleans following the storm, and said that any drastic measures there were justified.
“They were taking shots at us. It was truly a zoo down there,” the sheriff told the room. Southwest Oregonians, he assured, face no such threat. “You’re not going to have your weapon taken away by this person.” Applause. He also addressed concerns about a UN invasion of the Pacific Northwest: “They’ll never step foot on this turf … We’re going to fight this tooth and nail to protect you. All the sheriffs are behind you on this.”
By 2013, the Gilbertson and Winters Show had taken a depressing turn. In one instance the latter held a press conference in Jackson to commiserate with Gilbertson and nine other officials from five Oregon counties about their paralyzed municipalities. “I know what we are facing and it is not good,” Winters told reporters. “What we’re talking about today is a system that is broke, and badly broken.” Gilbertson, who in 2012 lost approximately two-thirds of his force due to budget cuts, offered “a preview of coming attractions.” “We are buried,” the Josephine sheriff said. He then piled on statistics that his critics claim are exaggerated to push voters toward supporting tax levies.
“Burglary has increased 1,594 percent over the last year. Auto theft has increased 1,714 percent. Theft increased 1,435 percent. Domestic assault, 1,100 percent increase.”
TAX-PAYING PROPERTY OWNERS
It’s May 2014, and the political season is swinging. The Daily Courier is brimming with letters and op-eds that rail against government waste. Campaign signs hang on every corner downtown; placards wider than redwoods are fixed to the roadside corners of farm parcels and fences with crude wooden stakes and zip-ties.
Grants Pass resembles what I imagine Everywhere, US of A, looked like about 60 years ago, when even neighbors in major American metropolises spoke to one another in public, ink from morning broadsheets under their fingernails, and yapped about the bums in public office. Most people I interview about the coming election harbor some grudge or another, and even younger residents have political opinions. A twentysomething activist I meet at a hipster coffee shop downtown suggests I visit the Josephine Democrats in a nearby strip mall, but their doors are locked, the lights out. They’re probably out canvassing.
A few blocks away, I have a lot more luck with the Josephine County Republicans. Three older women in their storefront office adore Gilbertson, but say area officials in general have done little to prove that taxes are well spent. They tell me to examine how much money their county commissioners pocket in salary and reimbursements, and suggest I visit the public worker parking lot and take an inventory of the late-model vehicles. Asked about the looming ballot referendum that would free up roughly $2 million for patrols, prisons, and prosecutors, they shake their heads in mutual disgust. Diane, who requests her surname be withheld but asks to be distinguished as a “tax-paying property owner,” says, “I’m 100 percent against it. As far as I’m concerned, the way they spend money is a deep dark secret.”
The scene changes dramatically across the street. There are seven protesters waving signs for the group Veterans for Peace, among other progressive causes, and making a minor commotion on a sidewalk by the county courthouse. During the height of Occupy intensity two and one-half years ago, Ruth and Ray say they drove in from the farms and communes in the Josephine highlands of Takilma once a week to holler. These days, they come down more like once a month. Their concerns are boilerplate lefty, with one sign in support of whistleblower Edward Snowden, and another condemning “corporate fascism.”
At the same time, Ray and Ruth have strong opinions on the hot topics embroiling the region. “I think we need the levy,” Ray says. A seasoned demonstrator, he impressively maneuvers two signs, one in each hand, around his floppy straw hat without dropping the fliers tucked in his armpit. Ray breaks down the race that all of Josephine is blabbing about:
“Gilbertson is lost in being a constitutional sheriff. He’s supposed to be the chief law enforcement officer in the county, and he gets really distracted by this: ‘We’re here to enforce the Constitution of the United States.’ That’s not what he’s here for. It just kind of distresses me.” Ray pauses, puts one sign down, and uses the other one to scratch his head.
“On the other hand, in my 42 years here, he’s the best sheriff we’ve ever had.”
WHEN THE LEVY BREAKS
It’s hard to make sense of what’s happening in Southwest Oregon. At the very least I’m confident the overarching hunch that lured me here in the first place was spot-on: Something stinks. A relatively impartial observer, I sympathize with those who support a tax levy as well as those who oppose them. Nonetheless, it seems insane that any official would go so far out of his way to use force against green thumbs and homeowners while also trumpeting his inability to protect citizens. In one bit worthy of “Saturday Night Live” mockery, Gilbertson announced that he bridged gaps in his investigative budget by recruiting volunteers to dust for fingerprints where robberies had been reported, sort of like a community CSI squad.
In other news, odd criminal behavior persists. On my second-to-last day, the body of a middle-aged man was found near a creek that spiders off the Rogue River. Police said the deceased was living in a trailer on the property and working as a caretaker. The next week, not too far from that scene, a pair of bat-wielding degenerates chased a guy they’d lit on fire into a Grants Pass 7-Eleven, where the victim proceeded to extinguish himself with a Slurpee. Once again, Josephine made major headlines, and for something far from positive.
Despite such token insanity and a significant increase in property crimes in particular since 2012, last May the people of Josephine rejected, for a third time in three years, a small land tax increase to fund safety measures. On the same day at the polls, voters also banned genetically modified crops through a different ballot measure, and nudged Gilbertson over a primary hurdle and into the general election against former Oregon State Trooper Dave Daniel. The incumbent lost steam soon after though; in November, apparently out of the momentum that kept him in office for two terms, Gilbertson was defeated by Daniel, who, I was reminded by several people in Grants Pass, is of no relation to the Josephine sheriff before Gilbertson, whose name was also Dave Daniel. Meanwhile, over in Jackson County, Sheriff Mike Winters dropped out of the race for a fourth term following a lackluster primary performance.
Through it all, Tom and Melinda paid little attention to the electoral circus. They lost hope early on after a candidate’s forum in which Daniel the latter casually mentioned that his favorite years in law enforcement were the ones he spent in special weapons and tactics. Whether dealing with his apparent SWAT fetish or Gilbertson’s, Melinda and Tom saw scant promise of help for constituents in their situation. In their experience, the political establishment has proven unusually cruel. Take Stephen Campbell, the district attorney whose office is prosecuting the misdemeanor criminal trespassing charges against the couple stemming from their 2014 eviction. Campbell was one of the officials at the 2013 press event with Winters and Gilbertson in Jackson County, where the district attorney said, “With regards to our caseload, we have had to cut almost all our misdemeanors.” Still, with budget shortfalls remaining, Campbell presses on with his case against Tom and Melinda. All this as their public defender works to punch holes in the seemingly compromised search warrant that landed them in court and resulted in the loss of their home. On top of expert testimony that the documents were forged, there is reason to believe that, to quote one recent request for a court hearing, a sheriff’s deputy failed “to disclose relevant information, known to him at the time of application for a warrant, that had significant relevance to the finding, of probable cause to issue the warrant.”
And so they wait.
As for the caretaker found by the river … Authorities found no evidence of foul play, and think he may have been intoxicated at the time of death. After a daylong investigation, they ruled it a suicide.
NEXT: The ‘Oregon Tale’ team returns to Josephine County to investigate a real estate racket run out of John Wayne’s Oregon ranch (a story featuring a few familiar characters). Plus: The sheriff speaks! And much, much more …
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