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THURSDAY FEBRUARY 9, 2012 Breaking news at: Artists to Exhibit Pastimes www.redbluffdailynews.com See Page 4A RED BLUFF Kings Court SPORTS 1B Sunny 70/41 Weather forecast 8B By TANG LOR DN Staff Writer Enticed by the opportunity to save money and pick someone who one council member called a shoo-in, the Red Bluff City Council Tuesday appointed a familiar face to be the next city manager foregoing an open recruitment. Councilwoman Daniele Jackson joked about on which end of the dais the new city manager would sit as Richard Crabtree was officially appoint- DAILYNEWS TEHAMACOUNTY DAILY 50¢ T H E V O I C E O F T E H A M A C O U N T Y S I N C E 1 8 8 5 City hires new head from within ed city manager while keeping his role as city attorney. The combined role will save the city about $41,000. Crabtree will be paid an annual salary of $120,000 as city manager and $50,000 as city attorney. The upfront $41,000 savings and the potential to save more was an attractive offer, Mayor Pro Tem and Budget Commit- tee member Wayne Brown said. "When this proposal came to us it was way out of the box," Brown said. "It took us a few days to wrap our head around the idea. Of course the Budget Commit- tee was excited because of the sav- ings." Unlike outgoing City Manager Martin Nichols, Crabtree will not receive a $4,200 car allowance, but his perks will include a laptop with the nec- essary software and a Crabtree smart cellphone with monthly service fees paid by the city. The council had only nice things to say about Crabtree. Brown described Crabtree as flaw- less, honest and straight forward, among other posi- tive adjectives. "He's never failed us in his advice," Brown said. Councilman Bob Carrel said it was really a huge benefit when Crabtree offered Woman injured by van to do the job. "The city has an opportunity to have its cake and eat it, too," Carrel said. Crabtree was appointed city attorney in December 2002. His legal background working with local government spans nearly 20 years. For the last 16 months Crab- tree has served as the interim Lassen County chief adminis- trative officer and county coun- sel, a position that he has said See CITY, page 7A Man solicits teenage girl A 16-year-old girl walking home from school Tues- day was reportedly approached by a stranger who solicited her for sex. The suspect, described as in his early 20s, 5 feet, 5 inches tall, with spiked blonde hair, dark eyes, a goatee and bad teeth, walked up beside the girl and asked her age before asking her for sex, said Red Bluff Police Sgt. Josiah Ferrin. The incident occurred just after 4 p.m. in the 1200 block of Walnut Street. The man had a medium build and pale skin with a See GIRL, page 7A 2 arrested on meth trafficking Daily News photo by Julie Zeeb Emergency personnel attend to Jessica Harris, 23, of Red Bluff who was injured after being hit by a van at 12:30 p.m.Wednesday at the entrance to the McDonald's parking lot on Sale Lane. Harris, who is four months pregnant, was taken to St. Elizabeth Community Hospital to be treated for moderate injuries to her leg, said Red Bluff Police Sgt. Quintan Ortega. She was walking south on Sale Lane talking on her cellphone. As she crossed the entrance to the parking lot, Donald Rocha, 61, of Red Bluff didn't see Harris and began to exit the lot in a Roach's Plumbing van, running over Harris' ankle, Ortega said. Brown allows parole for murderers at greater rate SACRAMENTO (AP) — Gov. Jerry Brown is allowing murderers to be paroled from California prisons at a far greater pace than his immediate predecessors, a develop- ment that raised alarm Wednesday with victims' rights groups. After a little more than one year in office, the Democratic governor has allowed about 80 percent of the decisions by the state Board of Parole Hearings to free convicted killers. Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, allowed about a quarter of the recommended paroles to stand, while former Gov. Gray Davis, a Democrat, allowed just 2 percent. Evan Westrup, a spokesman for the gover- nor's office, noted the courts often reversed those earlier governors' decisions. Last year alone, judges reversed nearly three-quarters of the 144 Schwarzenegger parole denials they considered, meaning those criminals will be released despite the former governor's attempt to keep them behind bars, Westrup said. Crime Victims Action Alliance, a Sacramento- based group that assists victims and lobbies for their rights, said Brown's decisions put 331 mur- derers back on the street. ''It's a huge jump,'' said Christine Ward, the group's executive direc- tor. ''We're talking about some of the most danger- ous criminals that were put in prison for a very long time for a very good reason. That number is just very concerning to us.'' The group's concern was prompted by a report on parole decisions the governor's office sent Tuesday to the state Leg- islature. The report is required each year. The governor consid- ers public safety, the opinions of law enforce- ment experts on the parole board, and recent legal rulings in making his decisions, said Westrup. He said the state's ongoing budget deficit See BROWN, page 7A 7 5 8 5 5 1 6 9 0 0 1 9 Red Bluff Outdoor Power Two people were arrested in connection to methamphetamine traf- ficking Tuesday near Motel 6. Tehama Interagency Drug Enforcement agents learned at 11 a.m. that Phillip John Craig, 49, of Red Bluff, who had a felony warrant for his arrest, was at the motel, said task force Comman- der Dave Kain. TIDE started surveil- lance on Craig and pulled him over in a traffic stop at 1:45 p.m. and arrested him on the warrant, he said. Then, a sheriff's K9 unit was called in. The drug detection canine alerted officers to drug odors coming from the vehicle, Kain said. The incident involved a 1997 Buick, according to logs. Inside, agents found 60.6 grams of crystal methamphetamine, two See METH, page 7A Turning retirement into research By JULIE ZEEB DN Staff Writer Gerber resident Nor- man Weitzel's findings on the Western Pond Turtle have been published in the German and English editions of Radiata, an international journal for Biology and Husbandry of land turtles. "I taught school for 32 years and I wanted to get out of the classroom and do something construc- tive," said Weitzel, who retired in 1989. "Mostly high school biology, geometry and oceanogra- phy. Some first grade." Weitzel only wanted one thing of his students — for them to want to come to school, he said. "Another word for that is curiosity and the desire to learn," Weitzel said. "The funny thing is curiosity begins in the womb and that's the dri- ving force that still drives me." Weitzel's curiosity led him to begin his study of the turtles, which took place from 1991 to 1998 in the Umpqua River Cor- ridor in Douglas County, Ore. with the help of about 15 people who took notes for him and let him know when they saw the turtles moving. Asked why it took until 2011 to publish findings from a study that was Pond Turtles and when that information is gener- alized it may not be accu- rate. It is called the West- ern Pond Turtle, but it spends 70 percent of its life out of water." Weitzel said he found the turtles' nocturnal activities of particular interest since much of the activity during the day was left to basking in the sun. "There's very little Daily News photo by Julie Zeeb Norman Weitzel of Gerber poses for a picture with the journal articles he has written over the years including his latest, published in November 2011 in Radiata, an international journal for biology and husbandry of land turtles. completed years before, Weitzel said it was because he moved around a lot. "I was in transition moving from Oregon to Reno to Gerber and I wanted to do it right," Weitzel said. "Journals are peer reviewed and of all that's submitted to journals half are rejected, some of which have to be corrected by peer review." Weitzel graduated from California State University, Chico in 1957 with a bachelors in gener- al science and earned a masters from Oregon State University in biolo- gy, but said he does not know everything about the animals he has stud- ied. "I don't consider myself an expert on West- ern Pond Turtles, but I am very knowledgeable about those on the Umpqua River," Weitzel said. "There have been ques- tions on some of the cur- rent thinking on Western that's been published about nocturnal activi- ties," Weitzel said. "It really should be listed as a nocturnal animal because at night it is so active." While this was Weitzel's first internation- al publication, it is not his first study to reach print. The first was an article on nesting site competi- tion between European Starling and native breed- ing birds in Northwestern Nevada published in May 1988 in The Condor, a journal on avian biology. Weitzel's works include an article in the December 1993 edition of The Great Basin Natural- ist on the long-term fluc- tuations of an isolated population of the Pacific Chorus Frog in North- western Nevada. A 2003 article on Western Bluebird fecal See TURNING, page 7A