Local Pig Blames Chinn for “Cockroaches”, Priest’s Murder

Eureka, CA Businessman Rob Arkley
If you want to know about the Humboldt County social milieu, this story says it all:

Long time Southern Humboldt resident, Lee Bullock, a 44 year old man, raised in Southern Humboldt, with a home, an address, and family in the area, got arrested after someone in Redway called the Sheriff about a man seen hiding in the bushes and acting “bizarre” in the early afternoon of this past New Year’s Eve. The cops came, picked up Bullock, and deduced that he was intoxicated on drugs of some kind.

That’s a pretty typical Humboldt County thing, and it happens every day around here. Drug use is not only the foundation of our local economy, it is a cherished tradition and way of life in Humboldt County, so sometimes we get a little wild and crazy. Even at 1:30 in the afternoon, Lee Bullock was probably not the first person arrested for public intoxication in Humboldt County that day, and he certainly wasn’t the last. This was New Year’s Eve, after all.

According to the cops, Bullock became “combative” while in custody. From Bullock’s mug shot in the papers, you can easily see that someone became combative with him. None of the cops reported injuries, but Bullock was taken to the hospital upon arrival at the jail in Eureka. Again, nothing unusual there. Cops beat people up all the time in Humboldt County.

After being cleared by medical personnel, Bullock was returned to jail, in Eureka, more than 60 miles from his home west of Redway, where they held him in custody until just after midnight. At a quarter-to-one in the morning, just in time for last call on New Year’s Eve, Sheriff’s deputies released Lee Bullock, on his own recognizance, into Downtown Eureka, the most densely populated city in Humboldt County.

Even though Lee Bullock has lived in Humboldt County for a long time, and has family in the area, no one came to the jail to pick him up. Either he did not call anyone, or the people he called were indisposed, declined the invitation, or failed to show up.

Look, it’s a long drive from Southern Humboldt to Eureka, and it was New Year’s Eve for God’s sake. Even if he had reached someone who cared enough to make the trip, what are the chances they were sober enough to drive?

So, Lee Bullock, no doubt crashing hard from his recent drug binge, found himself wandering aimlessly around Eureka’s residential neighborhoods on a cold night, without adequate clothing, and no way to get home. A little while later, a Eureka PD cop encountered him hanging around St. Bernard’s Catholic Church, and told him to go away.

The next morning, Eureka parishioners found their priest, Father Eric Freed, bludgeoned to death in the rectory of St. Bernard’s Church, and in Southern Humboldt, Father Freed’s car was found parked in the woods near the Bullock family home west of Redway. The cops put two and two together, and called the Bullocks to inquire about Lee’s whereabouts. Rather than have the Sheriff come all the way out to the Bullock family home, Lee’s family agreed to deliver Lee Bullock to the police for questioning.

Why would a Southern Humboldt family be so eager to drive Lee to the cops to face arrest for murder, especially when they couldn’t be bothered to pick him up from jail just the night before? I assume that was because the Bullock family home, like virtually every home in Southern Humboldt, was full of illegal drugs, guns and cash, and they didn’t want cops nosing around. That’s just a guess.

So, Lee Bullock’s step-father got in the truck and took Lee for a ride, without telling his step-son that he was delivering Lee to the authorities to face murder charges. What did Lee’s step-father say to Lee to get him in the truck? “Come on Lee, beer run!” Whatever line he used, apparently it worked.

If Lee’s step-father would have gotten in the truck the night before, he could have saved everyone involved, especially Father Freed, a lot of headaches. As it turned out, they didn’t get far down the road before Sheriff’s deputies pulled them over and arrested Lee Bullock for the murder of Father Eric Freed.

Motive: a ride home.

Now that’s a Humboldt County story, but that’s not the Humboldt County story.

The real icing, and it doesn’t get much icier, on this Humboldt County cake comes to us from the icy heart of Eureka bankster, bloodsucker, and all around swine, Rob Arkley Jr.

In a letter to the Lost Coast Outpost, Mr. Arkley expressed his feelings about this awful tragedy by blaming the murder Father Freed on Eureka philanthropist Betty Chinn.

Betty Chinn works to help poor and homeless people in Eureka, and the need is great. The recent Point-In-Time survey of homeless people, found more than 1,500 people living outside in Humboldt County in the dead of Winter. Betty Chinn does her best to help some, by no means all, of them get a meal, a shower, and maybe a place to sleep at night.

She can’t possibly help all of them, but Ms. Chinn has helped a lot of people who have fallen on hard times, put their lives back together.

Naturally, you can see why this caused a deranged SoHum druggie to murder a Eureka priest.

That’s how Rob Arkley Jr sees it, anyway. In that letter to the Lost Coast Outpost, Arkley erroneously blames Father Freed’s murder on nameless “transients” who he describes as “cockroaches”, and he blames Betty Chinn because, he claims, the services she provides to the poor, attracts more of them to Eureka.

Of course this is ludicrous, but Rob Arkley Jr is the richest man in Humboldt County, so people get paid to listen to him, and local politicians kiss his behind. Arkley hates poor people, even though, as a banker and real-estate tycoon, making people poor is what he does for a living. Arkley hates seeing poor people around town. He views them as vermin. He’d put poison out for them if he could.

Instead, he does the next best thing. Rob Arkley Jr has undertaken a one man, albeit one rich man, campaign to starve poverty out of Eureka. He wants to cut the already meager, county expenditures on social services to the poor, and goes the extra mile by smearing the good name of anyone who dares help the poor privately. That’s the kind of guy he is.

Imagine what it would be like if Rob Arkley Jr were different. Imagine what Rob Arkley Jr the millionaire owner of Security National Bank and Humboldt County real-estate tycoon, might say about the murder of Father Eric Freed, if Arkley were an honest man. I think it would sound something like this:

Eureka Embarrassment Rob Arkley Jr, What if he were honest?
“You want to know why that priest, what’s his name, got killed? That priest got killed because the underground marijuana industry that drives the economic engine of Humboldt County, not to mention my own personal fortune, relies very heavily on black-market drug dealers.

Wherever you have lots of black-market drug dealers, you are bound to have lots of black-market drugs. Whenever you have lots of black-market drugs, you can expect an abundance of drug-crazed freaks like Lee Bullock.

We get the picture Freddy
Now that this underground economy is a couple of generations old, we’re breeding drug-crazed freaks, like Lee Bullock, in the hills all over Humboldt County. These drug-crazed freaks don’t care about anything but themselves and their drugs, and they’ll kill anything that gets in their way. I know that because I have a lot in common with those freaks, except that I don’t care about anything but myself and my money.

Eureka, CA Businessman Rob Arkley
Now, whenever any of those drug-crazed freaks act-up, anywhere in Humboldt County, the Sheriff hauls them to jail, holds them for a few hours, then quietly turns them loose, in the dead of night, into the quiet residential neighborhoods of Eureka. That’s why father what’s his name got killed.”

Father Eric Freed. Eureka Priest murdered in the early morning of New Year’s Day
“Oh, and by the way,” an honest Arkley might add, “That’s also why we have so many homeless people in Humboldt County. Since most of the residential housing in Humboldt County has been converted into, much more lucrative, commercial marijuana farms,

…the remaining, non-drug-dealing populace, has been put out in the cold,

…and I’m damn sick and tired of seeing them there. I think we should put out poison.”

Unfortunately, Rob Arkley Jr is not an honest man, and he did not say that.

Nonetheless, that is the truth about Humboldt County.