Deadly toll from marijuana violence grows in Sebastopol as Californians face vote

One week after three people were gunned down at a rural Sebastopol home during a marijuana deal that left two dead and one seriously wounded, Sonoma County Sheriff’s officials have offered almost no new information about the case with an unknown gunman or gunmen still at large.

The deadly shooting echoes the troubling eruption, played out time and again on the North Coast, of violence among people involved with one of the region’s most lucrative crops.

Sheriff’s officials have repeatedly declined to elaborate on what they know about how much pot and cash were at play when the group gathered Oct. 15 at the Highway 116 South property in the Hessel area southeast of Sebastopol. They are still searching for a killer, who left behind a small mature marijuana garden and an unspecified amount of processed pot.

“We won’t give those intimate details,” Sgt. Spencer Crum said about the case. “Only the killer or someone in the house at the time of the killing should know that. We don’t want a false or tainted confession in the future.”

On Saturday morning, the Sheriff’s Office released several photographs showing a man that investigators say was tied to the incident but not a suspect at this point. They asked for help in identifying the man and a woman seen with him in the aftermath of the crime.

The shooting occurred less than a month before California voters will decide whether to legalize recreational use of marijuana for adults. Legalization’s impact on crime is a key concern for both supporters and opponents of Proposition 64, the measure that will go before California voters next month. Some supporters say it would bring a black market industry out of the shadows, allowing regulated commerce that could make the industry safer.

At the same time, law enforcement groups, many of whom oppose legalization, have warned against a ‘‘yes’’ vote that they fear would bring more marijuana business to the state, expanding ties to unsanctioned markets elsewhere.

The specter of past violence continues to factor heavily in the debate.

Seven of 26 people murdered in Sonoma County since 2013 died during marijuana deals. Saturday’s shooting was the deadliest pot robbery since 2013, when three men were gunned down when a partner double-crossed them at a Forestville home.

In the Sebastopol slaying last week, former Cloverdale teacher Nathan Proto, 36, was shot at his home alongside two of his friends, including John Jessie Mariana, 28, of Guerneville, who died three days later from his injuries. The other victim, a 23-year-old woman who was shot in the head, is expected to survive.

Proto, who tended a marijuana garden where he lived, was a familiar face in the cannabis community, said Tawnie Logan, Sonoma County Growers Alliance’s executive director. Proto was not a member of the group.

“This hit close to home for quite a number of people,” said Logan. “The response is outrage, rage and fear. Then, ‘We have to address this.’?”

The alliance opposes Proposition 64 because its members believe it’s written to favor big companies and disadvantage small-scale farmers.

But regulations now in the works for medical cannabis - approved by voters in 1996 but largely ungoverned since - are essential to bringing people into the legal market and boosting public safety, Logan said.

“This is a crime that could have been prevented with regulation,” Logan said.

Sonoma County Sheriff Steve Freitas said he will vote against Proposition 64 because he believes it will draw more marijuana-related crimes fueled by black markets elsewhere.

“I’m absolutely convinced that the only way to legalize it is to do it federally,” Freitas said. “As long as it’s illegal in Texas, they’re going to come here to get it.”

Officials and researchers in Colorado have sought to quantify changes in crime since marijuana’s recreational use was legalized in 2013.

Violent crime statewide rose about 13 percent between 2013 and 2015, according to a report released last month by the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, a law enforcement group that coordinates federal and state drug-suppression efforts.

But a June 2015 research project by students with the Metropolitan State University of Denver found no conclusive connection between marijuana legalization and rising crime rates.

Still, seizures of Colorado marijuana interdicted while being shipped in U.S. mail parcels have increased 427 percent when analyzing two-year time periods ending in 2012 and 2015, according to the drug trafficking group.

Tom Gorman, the group’s director, said his group is focused on tracking marijuana being shipped out of state. Gorman said they’ve observed an influx of organized crime growing marijuana in Colorado to be sold elsewhere.