A Lake County sheriff's deputy Wednesday shot and killed a man who leveled a rifle at officers investigating a large, illegal marijuana garden on public land between Cobb and Middletown, the Sheriff's Office said.
The man was armed with a rifle when deputies and federal Bureau of Land Management agents confronted him around 6:30 a.m. in an area planted with thousands of pot plants off Socrates Mine Road, authorities said.
Deputies ordered him to drop his weapon, but he raised it toward them and was shot, Sheriff's Sgt. Brian Martin said. The man, who was not identified, was pronounced dead at the scene.
He is the third person to be shot and killed in the last five weeks on the North Coast by officers investigating cultivation of pot during what's become an especially violent marijuana enforcement season.
Armed guards pose an increasing threat for people in the region's public lands as well as for officers airlifted into rugged terrain where clandestine gardens often are found, said Bob Nishiyama, who commands the Mendocino Major Crimes Task Force.
"Last year, we recovered more guns in gardens than any year prior," Nishiyama said.
Task force officers seized 105 weapons in 2009, compared to 39 in 2007. The figures include marijuana garden raids and other missions, according to the unit's annual reports.
This year, agents with the task force, which runs as many as three raids a week, often hear gunshots as they're lowered by helicopter into illegal gardens, he said.
Informants have said the gardens' guards now are told by their employers, many of whom are thought to be connected to Mexican drug cartels, to stay and fight or they won't get paid, he said.
"We'd assume they were shooting to slow us down as they try to escape," Nishiyama said. "But now we have to rethink that."
In Napa County, a Fresno man was fatally shot June 30 in a garden raid near Lake Berryessa when he drew his handgun and refused orders by Napa Special Investigations Bureau officers to put it down.
In Mendocino County, a deputy on July 27 shot and killed a man who leveled a rifle at authorities raiding a garden in the northeastern part of the county near Tehama County, officials said.
Mendocino County Sheriff Tom Allman has declined to release the deputy's name, saying it would be made public at the end of an internal investigation.
But other law enforcement sources said the deputy is Sgt. Bruce Smith, who heads the County of Mendocino Marijuana Eradication Team, COMMET.
Allman said he would "neither confirm nor deny" that the deputy was Smith. But he previously said the deputy had been involved in a shooting in "about 1989."
Smith shot an armed suspect in 1990 during a routine traffic stop near Leggett, the only officer-involved shooting for which news records could be found during that time frame.
Six bullets were fired at Smith but Smith was not hurt, investigators said at the time. The District Attorney's Office ruled the shooting self defense.
On July 21, a suspect was shot by a Santa Clara County deputy during a raid in the hills between Santa Clara and Alameda counties.
The Lake County incident occurred on Bureau of Land Management property between Socrates Mine and Ford Flat roads, about half a mile from Socrates Mine Road, Martin said.
Although it would be typical for more than one person to tend and guard a grow of that size, no other suspects were seen by officers. The garden of immature plants included some that measured 6 feet tall, Martin said.
The name of the deputy who shot the suspect and the number of times the suspect was shot were not released.
The deputy remained on duty Wednesday but may be put on administrative leave pending an investigation into the shooting by the District Attorney's Office and the Sheriff's Office, Martin said.
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