800 plants seized, 4 arrested in Mendocino County pot bust

State and local law enforcement officers seized 800 marijuana plants, shut down a hash oil lab and arrested four out-of-state residents while serving search warrants last week in the rural Laytonville area, the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office said Monday.

Authorities also discovered illegal stream bed alterations and water diversions that threatened to strand juvenile steelhead trout by de-watering the streams, officials said.

Sheriff’s and Fish and Wildlife officers conducted a joint investigation before serving seven search warrants along Registered Guest Road last week, sheriff’s officials said.

They arrested Julian McCorkendale, 25, of Missouri; April Carey, 26, of Kansas; Nathaniel Levy, 25, of Oklahoma; and Kaleie Larson, 30, of Nebraska, on suspicion of cultivating marijuana, possession of marijuana for sale and manufacturing a controlled substance.