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Marci:—Marci Pronsolino— Luis:—Luis Mendoza— Jessica:—and Jessica Waggoner, student historians from the North Coast Rural Challenge Network in Anderson Valley. Gabe: We are here with long-time resident deputy in Anderson Valley, eith Squires. Thank you, Mr. Squires, for letting us chat with you. Deputy Squires: OK. Gabe: Will you tell us about your childhood? Deputy Squires: Childhood. I was born in Montreal, Canada, and moved when I was five or six years old. My parents moved to San Fernando Valley, which is in LA. While going to school there, I attended several elementary schools, and then moved into a military school. Then from there I attended San Fernando High School for one year. Then the family moved up to Potter Valley, where I attended Potter Valley High School through my sophomore through senior year. Gabe: What was military school like? Deputy Squires: Well, in them years what the deal was is they moved you to military school to permanently house you. It was almost like a group home up here now where you actually wore uniforms. And it was a discipline control situation. Gabe: So how was high school in Potter Valley? Did you play sports? Deputy Squires: Oh yeah, I played sports at San Fernando High School where I went out for the freshmen team with two hundred other kids. And then sophomore year, I moved up to Potter Valley and played varsity football with thirteen kids on the team. So it was quite a difference moving into that area. And even in the baseball team you had twelve kids on the team and stuff. I played primarily football and baseball while I was in high school in Potter Valley. Gabe: Heard you spent some time in juvenile hall—could you tell us about that? Deputy Squires: Well, it wasn't so much that I was living in juvenile hall. I was threatened to be taken to juvenile hall. I was picked up; I wasn't arrested as a juvenile. But down in San Fernando Valley—I mean it’s a lot worse now—down in there it was still rough. I got picked up for—what they called attempted murder, but what it was that I had sling-shots along the railroad track, slinging rocks at the bums hanging on the trains going by. And then the police officers took me and a friend to the station and they threatened to put you to juvenile hall. They told me they were going to stop the train and check for any dead bums and stuff like that. That was my first experience with the law enforcement. Gabe: Where did you attend college? Deputy Squires: I attended—from high school, I attended Napa JC for two years, and then from there I went to Fresno State. I didn't play sports in college, I had knee surgeries in high school so I pretty much stayed out of the sports thing until I came to Boonville. I played some semi-pro football, town team football stuff. Marci: So, how did you get into law enforcement? Deputy Squires: It was a fluke—I went to Napa JC originally to play football, but found out that because of my knee surgeries, I couldn't. But I went there to be a mechanic to take—major in mechanics. And once I got there and there was no—the school was new—there was no auto shop or nothin’ to work on cars or nothin’ like that. The counselor talked me into attending law enforcement classes so he could fill the classes in order to justify payin’ the instructors, so it was just a matter—I was in these classes, two or three classes, law enforcement classes and I just got addicted. Loved it. I went on from Napa JC to Fresno in law enforcement—administration of justice—where I received a B.S. degree in administration of justice. Marci: So, were you an officer before you came to the Valley? Deputy Squires: I was a part-time officer when I was in college where they paid me an hourly wage to work in the jail, work in the hospital, guard situation and stuff. I was actually a lieutenant at the campus police where I assigned shifts for other—these part-time officers to work in the jail or hospital. Then when I graduated from college, I applied for Mendocino County and came up here to work within two weeks. Mendocino County was my first full-time job. Luis: How did you get to the Valley? Deputy Squires: They forced me over here. They—I worked in Ukiah for three months for Mendocino County and they were having such a problem over here with bar fights, things getting out of control, and at that time Reno Bartlomea was the sheriff and whenever he—he was one of those old-time sheriffs—when a problem arose, he'd just grab whoever he could to go fix it and there wasn't anything about any union contract—it wasn't anything—you know, you're young, you're doing this, you're doing that, you don't have any experience. He called me in one day and said, "Well, you're the resident deputy in Boonville. Be over there tomorrow." So, that's the situation back in the early ’70s—that's how it was dealt with. Gabe: So, mostly crimes, just bar fights or— Deputy Squires: Back then, back then there was a lot of fights, thefts, burglaries where people would actually in—at that time they were burglarizing the vacation homes and stuff like that, just looking for things to either sell on the side or stuff like that. At that time in the ’70s, juveniles drinking beer, partying, racing around and then you had the younger adults, bar fights and then a lot of times—a lot of the situations is a lot of the bar fights pretty much grow out of themselves—kid that’s gettin’ to where—twenty-eight, twenty-nine years old usually grows up and stays away from the bar fight type situations. Marci: So, what did you think about the Valley when you got to come here? Deputy Squires: It wasn’t a shock for me because I was raised in Potter Valley and what really helped me is—when I was going to Potter Valley High School and playing football, I knew probably six or seven of the kids that I played against from Anderson Valley. There was one kid, uh, I can’t remember if he moved from Potter Valley and came over here or he moved from Anderson Valley came to Potter Valley, but he knew it and while the J.V. game was going on, actually a lot of us were talking because when I came over here I knew Charlie Hiatt really well, I knew Dave Knight real well and, uh, Danny Huey, and from there even from the high school, when I went to Napa JC some of the kids from here were at the Napa JC also in the dorms where I was staying. So, when I came over here I like knew—I probably knew about ten people and, and being new in the Valley you just kind of look those up to have somebody to talk to and you just spread out from there. Marci: So, why’d you stay here in the Valley like—how did you stay? Deputy Squires: I get—well, actually I get asked a lot from other law enforcement people in Mendocino County, the guys that live in Ukiah, and stuff like they like the city life, they’re young, they like living in Ukiah, faster pace you know, and mommies are closer to shopping and stuff like that. Whenever they ask me I tell them that I’m too lazy to move, but the real reason is that I like living in a smaller, slowed-down community and looking at the situation I could either—when I first moved up here to go to work for Mendocino County, I moved back into Potter Valley, but at that time they eliminated the resident spot in Potter Valley so then I was assigned over here, but they still don’t have a resident deputy in Potter Valley; they answer the calls out of Ukiah, so over here, I liked it. My wife works in Ukiah, but she doesn’t mind commuting, so this is a nice area to work in, and it’s a real nice area to live in. Marci: So, what was your secret for solving the crime around the Valley? Deputy Squires: (Laughs) Is—the real secret is forming snitches and it’s not so much making them snitches or anything, like it’s giving them a break—the ones that solve most of the crimes are the people that I’ll give a break to on a speeding ticket, no seat belts, exhibition of speed, I usually give a younger kid one chance and then, he doesn’t realize it, but then once you start communicating with him and stuff like that, you stop him again to talk to him and then pretty soon he’ll tell you what he knows and he’ll thank you for giving him a break and then he’ll try to give me a break as to who was involved, and where the property’s at and stuff like that. It’s just a matter of being able to communicate. Whether you’re communicating with a kid, adults, whatever—they’ll all want to tell you something. Gabe: What about murder, has there ever been murder in, ah, Anderson Valley that you had to solve the crime for? Deputy Squires: Oh yeah, there was a situation where, ah, I built the Little League softball field down on the Fairgrounds, and it was either the first or the second tournament that I ran, ah, some kid out of Santa Rosa, attended the, ah, actually went down to the bar down in Boonville, and, ah, tried to hitch a ride over to Ukiah for the bigger and better parties. And then, ah, he was actually murdered half way over the hill. A kid from the back seat reached over into the front seat and stabbed him right in the heart, and it just so happened they dumped him out on, ah, Stipp Lane over there at the end of 253, and they traced it back, and he was at the tournament that weekend, here, and then the investigation focused on over here from Boonville. Gabe: And you arrested the guy? Deputy Squires: We arrested—we arrested three people, and it was, ah, one of my, one of my people, ah, came to me and told me what had happened, what she knew about it and where the vehicle was, and where the suspects were. And, ah, I called in some of our top investigators from Ukiah and, ah, we found the vehicle, we arrested two people out of the apartment, and then they, ah, ended up telling us who the main killer was, and we arrested him from Elk, actually. Gabe: Speaking of murderers, um, didn't Leonard Lake and Charles Ng used to live here? Deputy Squires: Oh yeah, they lived in Philo. Gabe: Were they doing any crimes when they were here? Deputy Squires: No, ah, I think he and his wife, Leonard and his wife were, ah, were running the Philo Motel, and then later moved down into the Unicorn Youth Services building down in Philo on Ray’s Road there. But, ah, his whole crime spree, I guess what they figured out was, was his thing with this Charles Ng was, ah, over in Calaveras County where he'd built a bunker, and then, ah, tortured women that they picked up on the streets of San Francisco. The situation in Philo—we made a raid out there, ah, situation was, ah, we understood that he had rifles and property stolen from Ukiah area, and, ah, we arrested him at that time for possession of hand grenades, throwing stars, and, ah, coupla weapons that, ah, he was actually converting into fully automatic weapons. But him and Ng were arrested then, they did a short stint in jail, and right after that is when they moved to Calaveras County. Gabe: Do you do a lot of drug busts mostly in the Anderson Valley area, I mean is that the most current crime? Deputy Squires: Well, yeah, it’s the growing trend around here the, it used to be a marijuana thing and, ah, now a lot of methamphetamines in the Valley; it’s cheaper. It’s, uh, it doesn’t—a lot of the kids use it, and lots of the people use it because it gives them a quicker high, and it doesn’t stink as bad as marijuana. I remember the kids and people around say well, we smoke marijuana because if you drink beer, you have a hangover in the morning so that was the—that was the big thing for a long time, uh, marijuana, you have no hangovers, and then now it is slowly progressing to the, ah, powder stuff, methamphetamines, cocaine. I mean, methamphetamines were first used by the women around here for weight control more than anything else, and then now, it’s spread out to where everybody is using it as a party drug and they, ah—I mean there’s a lot of people around here who are addicted to it. It starts just like everything else; alcohol starts as a party drug, then marijuana and methamphetamines are right next in line. It’s party time and that’s what they use. Marci: You think there is more crime now than there was when you first started in Boonville? Deputy
Squires: There’s definitely more crime, and there isn’t as many
people getting arrested—there’s only one deputy over here now—but,
ah, it’s a little more sophisticated crime that’s going on now—lot
of it is, ah—a lot you can look at the, the, the women’s libbers,
what we call them—where they develop the felony crime, and, and,
now they have misdemeanor crime, the alternative to it—in spousal
abuse—it used to be what a lot of people call it, ah, wintertime
crimes where it’s a cabin fever where you are stuck with your spouse
because it’s wintertime, and you are stuck indoors with her all day
long and then pretty soon, one of them is beatin’ on the other, and
a lotta—that used to be where you’d show up and you’d separate
’em, and without one wanting to prosecute the other there was actually
no crime considered. Now it’s gotten to where it’s, ah, really
enforced and it’s actually gotten to where if we don’t enforce
it we lose our jobs and that’s how strict things are now as far as
spousal abuse, whether it’s him or her, you know, pulling the hair,
slapping somebody or anything like that. You can be arrested for the felony,
it’ll be dropped to a misdemeanor, but if it’s a bruising or
laceration or just stuff like that, they can fully enforce the situation
as a felony. A lot of it—first time they realize cabin fever stuff,
and first time you can, ah, ah, be sentenced for it, convicted of it,
but they actually try to put you in, ah, they actually do have, ah, domestic
violence counseling where you are counseled for a year, to domestic violence.
Gabe: What do you think? Deputy Squires: I’m—I don’t smoke dope. (Laughs). Anybody that—I don’t even smoke cigarettes. Anybody that, uh—I’m not that liberated, I’m still redneck. And the law is the law. If I don’t smoke it, I’m really not interested in anybody else doing it either. But I see—I see a lot of the big profit in it too. Last Wednesday, I dealt with confiscating forty-six pounds of bud. This is already manicured bud, and people having worked all summer long and they’re looking at $200,000 profit, tax-free. I’m going, ‘Nah, I don’t think so!’ So, you know it really—it really kind of detours you away from legalizing it, or even dealing with it actually. Gabe: Do you remember any humorous on-the-job stories? Deputy
Squires: On-the-job stories—ah, oh, there’s a few of them, I
dealt with—I dealt with Troy Huron stuck in what he thought was quicksand—thought
he was going to die. He was down in the Anderson Creek down here and it—it
was sand. It was real mucky loam sand combination type of thing, but the
fire department had a tough time getting him out and, you know, on the
side we’re sittin’ there laughing at him, (laughing), but as
long as he got out. He got out alive. But it took them two or three hours
and they finally figured a way to get him out. Jessica: So when did you get your dog? Deputy Squires: It’s been three years now. I got him like right in the football season. I was coaching over in Ukiah, and—realized that it was so much work I had to either choose continuing football coaching, or work the dog so—ah, I’ve already—I did like twenty some years here coaching in Boonville, and then one of my friends asked me to help him for a couple years over in Ukiah. He was given the head coaching job—football in Ukiah. So, I helped him for a couple years. Then with the dog, I had—I was burnt out on coaching and so I told them I would go ahead and accept the dog situation and train the dog—work with him rather than coach. Gabe: So is there like a manual that teaches you how to teach the dog, or do you have someone—? Deputy Squires: No, there’s like—when I got this dog, it was like a bitin’ machine. He was—two deputies had already taken him out of their house, and didn’t want to work with him, because he was turnin’ around and bitin’ them. He was out of control, but when I took him—he’s a breed—he’s a Belgian Malinois—and he’s a breed, that—they call them "Malinuts" because you just never know when he’s gonna go off and start bitin’ and stuff like that, but what I decided to do, and what I was pretty much instructed to do—there was a real good instructor that worked for our county over there in Ukiah, and he told me that he’d help me with this dog, and it was a—the whole thing was, he says, in order to get this dog the way you want it, you would have to involve yourself in three and four hours of training every day. So he pretty much laid out a manual as to how to do it, and then you’d just pick up on the dog’s strengths and weaknesses and then work on them every day. But—even until today, it’s been three years now and he’s dual purpose. He does everything, but you have to work that same—you have to work tracking and searching and stuff twice a week. It’s just—it’s an ongoing, continuing type of thing. You have a lot of—well what you do is you train so much with him and then when you get a call where you can use him, it’s like ‘all right!’ (laughs) you know, then you’re ‘let’s go do this’ (laughs), you know, ‘it’s about time!’. But, ah, it was a good deal, but there’s a lot of work involved, and, like I say, there’s no manual to do it, the manual is—the written manual is how to use him when you’re working, the restrictions you have with him, but training is nothing but getting in there and learning it with him and then working on the specialty stuff. Gabe: Is he dangerous? Deputy Squires: He’s very dangerous when he’s told to be. I could bring him in here now, and if I tell him to lie down, he’ll lay down. If you go over there and start petting him, he’ll roll over and want you to rub his belly and everything, you know. He’s not dangerous unless he feels that you are smothering him type thing, not—you know, a lot of times you see dogs on TV, even K-9 dogs, this dog all of a sudden just turns around and bites something whether it’s the handler or the guy talking to him, anything like that. These are well-trained dogs, but once in a while they can be spooked into something. When I got him I thought he was like a lion, for Christ’s sake. I mean he was trying to—turning around, every time you would walk up to him, he would whip his head around and start biting. He thought that’s what his whole job was. Now you can actually have him laying on the floor and then one word will get him jacked—one word from my voice will get him jacked up, and I can have him charge anybody and bite, but the whole thing is that’s not what you use him for—it’s, ah—I use him as a scare tactic. I mean, I show up to these large Latino dances and the dog gets out and people pay attention. But I’ve used him to search down robbers, I’ve used him to search down people that fled felony charges type of thing that are high grade felony charges that you can use him to search for them and stuff. Gabe: Has he ever hurt anybody severely? Deputy Squires: Ah, he hasn’t—he’s bitten a couple innocent people that have walked up to him. He’s real protective of the patrol car, I mean when he’s in the car he thinks that is his domain, and if you walk by he barks, and barks, and barks. You could actually walk by and open the door and he’ll lick you. But people that are—people that are a little stressed out, if you’re by him and you’re acting like a kid, running around in circles and stuff, then pretty soon he thinks that’s stress time, you know, and stuff like that. He might end up turning around and bitin’ the kid, I know he’ll turn and bark because the louder I make my voice, the more stressed he gets, and that’s when he gets excited. Then he’s just waiting for the command type of thing But he’s, uh—yeah, he could—he could bite some innocent people. He’s tracked down—the kid out in Philo, and if you consider—you know, the kid acting like a total idiot, I’m saying a kid, he was twenty-three, twenty-four years old. But, ah—he tried to run away once the dog found him and ended up with five or six stitches on the back of his calf. You know just—the dog held him there, he’s dangerous if you’re a criminal, (laughs), but as far as—I don’t think you want to come over to Jessica’s and jump over my fence to get in the backyard (laughs). But actually I don’t—I’ve had people come over and use the pool, they’re scared to death, but it doesn’t bother him any. Luis: You were involved in many sports in the Valley. Can you tell us about that? Deputy
Squires: Well, what happened was, when I moved here like in ’72,
the football program—the coach quit—moved out of the Valley,
and that is what—just what happened in that year that was coming
up—I was a weight lifter and I was using the weight room up here
at the school. And then some of the kids started showing up that was going
to be seniors the next year and then they knew that there was no coach
available. They didn’t have anything to do all summer long, so they
got to where actually two or three started coming down and working out
weights with me and then they told more and more. About that time football
season came around; the school didn’t hire anybody until the first
day of school. I played football, but coaching it is a whole different
thing, so I ended up taking ’em through a lot of drills to try to
get ’em in shape the two weeks of school. Gabe: I heard you played semi-pro football? Deputy Squires: Well, yeah it’s considered, even now it’s considered semi pro-football. When I first came here, like I say, I knew some of these kids around here and then pretty soon it was, you know, come up play with us for playing town team where Boonville was playing Mendocino and we were all twenty-four and twenty-five years old so….we organized one game here for awhile and then it got to work that it was two games and then Philbrick actually picked like an all-star team from the two towns and in the rest of the county and then we were playing Lake County, Sacramento, Santa Rosa teams, and then they actually started—formulated a league for my last—probably five or six years. We are playing like ten games a year and it was pretty much a league formed out of the northern California and Sacramento area. Gabe: What position did you play? Deputy Squires: I was a defensive tackle. Gabe: Hmmm… Deputy Squires: Yeah, we had a real strong team, we were probably the only team in the league that actually practiced. We practiced twice a week. And then, uh, played our games. So, we were a little better organized. There were, ah, when you get out of the Valley you see a lot more talent that, uh, guys show up at uh…the talent you see is, is uh, you watch Northern California runnin’ backs, and stuff like that and then you start seeing runnin’ backs from out of the area and stuff like that, that are a second faster in the forty and stuff like that, and really, you really see the difference between the opportunity you would have in northern California and, uh, the southern valley.
Deputy Squires: ’Course the wife, but, uh, I've been married for over thirty years now, and then, uh, I told you I liked living in Boonville. My daughter didn’t—it’s too small a town and, uh, a lot of girls in these small areas, that—it’s not enough, uh, it’s too boring for ’em and stuff like that. We fought her through it, and uh, Jason loved it ’cuz it was a year-round sports not only here, but, uh, the commute we made over the hill—he was into sports so bad, all three sports we had him play here in Boonville, and then, uh, slowly moved him into the Ukiah leagues at the same time period, so, it was like five days a week for him. But, he enjoys sports. Shelly, she played all the way up until she—like junior or senior probably junior in high school, basketball and volleyball and stuff like that. Then that was boring for her, but they moved on now. They, uh, Shelly’s in her last semester of a masters degree in Cal State LA, and then, uh, she also works full time for, uh, a DA's in Los Angeles—the County of Los Angeles; she's an investigator for the deadbeat dad section. And then uh, Jason went to Santa Rosa JC, and played two years of football. He didn't want to—burn out I think’s what it was—he didn't want to go to class. Class was enough. So then he played the two years and now he's working for Sonoma County Sheriff’s Department in Santa Rosa. Gabe: So how many more years do you plan to be a deputy in Anderson Valley? When do you, when do you want to retire? Deputy Squires: I, ah, I guess when you get fifty and you put in this many years and every one asks you that, but, uh, my situation right now is I’m watchin’ guys that are my age and a couple years older than me retire from, ah, the sheriff’s department—within six months they’re bored to death so they’re hiring back on with the sheriff’s department as a bailiff for half the pay. So, I’m thinking, I have no hobbies, right now my whole day consists of just working with the dog and working my ten-hour shift. So, uh, they ask me and I honestly don’t know—my wife works over in Ukiah and she’s worked for thirty years in the same business and she doesn’t know when she’s going to retire either. So, it’s, uh, I don’t know; I tell the brass that asks me that I’m going to stay here until you fire me type situation, but until I find a hobby or another interest where I can go do that, and still live on retirement pay, I’m more happy to go, I’m ready to go. But uh, I think I’m going to be here for awhile. Gabe: Well, good luck to you. Deputy Squires: Yeah… Gabe: Thank you very much. Deputy Squires: OK. |
