Robert “Mickey” Dale Huber
September 10, 1940 – August 21, 2025

Robert “Mickey” Dale Huber passed away at the age of 84 on August 21, 2025, at his home surrounded by family.

He was born on September 10, 1940, in Ukiah to John and Agnes Huber, the youngest of nine children. In the 4th grade, his family moved to Eureka, where he would spend the rest of his life.

Mickey met the love of his life, Gloria Joyce Richardson, around 1960 through mutual friends. They married on May 4, 1962, and together raised three children: Michael Bennett, Debra Bennett-Stauffacher, and Julie Huber-Schaefer.

He worked nearly 30 years for Simpson Timber Company. When the plywood mill closed, he began a new chapter as a bartender, working at Rico’s, Gloria’s Pub, and Myrtlewood. Later, he joined the road crews for Mercer Fraser, where he finished his career.

Mickey had a gift for building and fixing anything, with a tool for every project and a love for guns and reloading. He was known for his pranks, his stories, and his sense of humor. Remembering names wasn’t his strong suit—everyone was simply “sweet pea” or “dickhead.” He was one of a kind, the end of an era, and will be deeply missed.

He is survived by his daughters, Debra Bennett-Stauffacher and Julie Huber-Schaefer (husband Jim); his daughter-in-law, Beth Bennett; his grandchildren, Clay Bennett, Michael Bennett, Samantha Bennett, Gracelyn Bennett, Dustin Veatch, Thomas and Karen Bennett, James Cameron, Danielle Cameron-Sproul, Brandy and Melissa Parker, Jynelle and Jayme Schaefer; and many great-grandchildren.

He was preceded in death by his wife, Gloria Huber (2012); his parents, John (1979) and Agnes (1968); his siblings John, Oliver, Eugene, Stanley, Lois (Pat), Ralph, Jerry, and Larry; his stepson Michael Bennett (2008); and his granddaughter Jessica Clark-Cameron (2005).

A casual potluck in Mickey’s honor will be held on Sunday, August 31, 2025, at 1 p.m. at the family home, 1474 Terrace Way, Eureka.

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Passed away Aug. 20, 2025 at 11 a.m.

Barbara was born in 1937 in Redwood City, California. Barabara was preceded in death by her father Fred Schuler and mother Ethel, brother James, husband Bill Hight and daughter Cheryl Yanchunis.

She is survived by her son Ken Strombeck from Crescent City, daughter Leesa McCluskey and husband Jerry from Loleta, stepson Tom Hight from Fallen, Nevada.

Her family moved to Petaluma when she was six and bought a chicken ranch. Moved to Carlotta, where she attended the old Cuddeback School. Moved to Loleta (Beatrice) and went to Eureka Junior High and Eureka High School. Graduated class of 1955.

In 1969 she was married to Bill Hight. They had a trucking business and owned Hunters Inn in Loleta.

They started Hight Community Service in 1997 (Representative Payees for Social Security) and had the Community Thrift Store, which helped the low-income elderly with food, clothes, etc. They were in business for 22 years.

Barbara enjoyed her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren, and working in her yard was her hobby until she could no longer do it.

Barbara will be cremated and placed next to her husband at Oceanview Cemetery in Eureka.

Press release on the Dillon Fire, from Six Rivers National Forest:

Estimated size: 1,233 acres
Containment: 0%
Date of Origin: 8/25/25
Cause: Under investigation

Update: Firefighters on the Six Rivers National Forest are continuing response on the Dillon Fire located near Ti Bar north of Somes Bar in Siskiyou County. The fire was reported yesterday at approximately 6:30 p.m. A complex incident management team (CIMT) was ordered this morning.

Fire Behavior: The Dillon Fire is burning in steep, rugged terrain with heavy fuels. Firefighters are working on full suppression with a focus on public and firefighter safety as the highest priority.

Roads and Highways: California State Highway 96 is currently open, but that status can change by the moment. The public should watch for increased firefighter traffic in the area as resources respond and check the Caltrans Quickmap for up-to-date road status information at this link.

Current Evacuation Information:

If you are in the following zones, LEAVE IMMEDIATELY:

• SIS - 1402-A *NEW ORDER & NEW SPLIT*
• SIS - 1503-A *NEW ORDER & NEW SPLIT*
• SIS - 1509-B *NEW ORDER & NEW SPLIT*
• SIS - 1506 

If you are in these zones are now under an EVACUATION WARNING:

• SIS-1402-B *NEW SPLIT*
• SIS-1509-A *NEW SPLIT*
• SIS-1604 *NEW WARNING*
• SIS-1503-B *NEW SPLIT*
• SIS-1300 *NEW WARNING*
• SIS-1301*NEW WARNING*
• SIS-1405 SIS-1408

How You Can Help: Our wildland fire crews are well equipped and cared for. Creating defensible space around your home is the BEST thing you can do to help firefighters. Learn how: https://www.ready.gov/. Banners and signs boosting morale are also appreciated. Please confirm needs by contacting organizations of your choice before donating items.

Recreation Opportunities: Many recreation areas remain open. However, Dillion Creek Campground has been closed due to the Dillion Fire.

With Labor Day weekend approaching, area residents and visitors are reminded to be careful with anything that can spark a wildfire. Visitors should also be aware of any road or recreation site closures due to wildfire suppression.

For more information about this incident and the Six Rivers National Forest, visit our webpage or Facebook page.

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PREVIOUSLY

• Officers Recount Threatening Phone Calls to Schools During Preliminary Hearing in Trial of Daryl Jones

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Jones in court Monday. | Photo by John Chiv.

Deputy District Attorney Roger Rees offered apologies to the court and its staff this afternoon while taking responsibility for a filing mistake that will cause a nearly two-month delay in the preliminary hearing of Daryl Ray Jones, the man accused of making dozens of threatening phone calls to local schools and businesses earlier this year.

After hearing about an hour of testimony from Arcata Police Officer Jayme Lewallen this morning, Judge Timothy Canning announced that the court would break early for lunch because the People (as represented by Rees) had just turned over some additional documents to the defense counsel, Meagan O’Connell with the county’s Conflict Counsel office.

When everyone filed back into the courtroom shortly after 1:30 p.m., O’Connell revealed that Rees had just this morning turned over 23 previously undisclosed supplemental reports from the Arcata Police Department, which contained information about additional alleged victims and locations. She’d had an opportunity to read through some of those documents during the extended lunch break, but not all of them. 

“My client’s wish is to continue [the preliminary hearing] to a future date … and proceed once all of the charges have been incorporated into a single complaint,” O’Connell said. 

Rees said the late delivery of those supplemental reports to the defense was “entirely our fault.” He explained that the Arcata Police Department had finished the reports back in May, though it didn’t send them to the DA’s Office until Aug. 14. Still, he acknowledged, that was nearly two weeks ago.

“It’s my mistake,” he reiterated, noting that he hadn’t read all of the information himself until just this morning. The documents contain “a lot of additional potential victims and witnesses,” he said.

Jones was again seated at the defense table in a white dress shirt, having been granted the opportunity to change out of his orange inmate’s jumpsuit at yesterday’s hearing. Judge Canning asked him if he was willing to waive his right to a continuous preliminary hearing, and he replied, “Yes.”

The hearing was then scheduled to continue on Monday, Oct. 20 at 1:30 p.m.

So that’s that. In the meantime, we can marvel at the obsessive persistence of the person behind the threatening phone calls. It wasn’t just local public schools that were threatened. Officer Lewallen, who worked for the Yurok Tribal Police and the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office before getting hired by APD in January, testified that one local business, NorthPoint Consulting Group, received 64 phone calls in February alone from a caller with a male voice. The man often made threatening statements, though other times he hung up within seconds, Lewallen said.

On Feb. 28 she responded to a call for service at NorthPoint Consulting, which is located on Samoa Boulevard. An employee told her that after answering a recent call she’d heard the male voice reply, “Wuddup, bitch? You know who this is. Look outside.” 

That same day, Lewallen responded to calls from both Arcata High School and Humboldt Brews. Employees at both locations had been receiving harassing phone calls. A secretary at AHS said the male voice had asked, “What would you do if I came over and beat your ass?” When the secretary asked for his name, the man said, “You already know” and later gave the name Jeremiah, Lewallen recalled on the stand. 

A witness at yesterday’s hearing said the mysterious caller had given the name Jeremiah to employees of the Fortuna office of the California Conservation Corps, which was receiving phoned-in threats that same week.  

No students were on campus at Arcata High since it was Presidents’ Week, but the school’s administrative office was placed on lockdown.

At Humboldt Brews, a female employee reported that the caller had expressed a desire to murder her, told her there was no need to call the cops and said he planned to follow her home, Lewallen testified. 

As she recounted these events from the stand, Officer Lewallen periodically checked her report to refresh her memory. The Humboldt Brews employee reported getting nine calls from the man in a single hour and said she was not initially concerned but eventually grew more worried.

Taken together with yesterday’s testimony, the case thus far has seen three law enforcement officers recounting reports of nearly 100 threatening phone calls received at local preschools, elementary schools, high schools, businesses and a nonprofit. The calls prompted a series of lockdowns at local schools, terrorizing children, their families and school employees.

Jones, who is facing 19 felony counts related to criminal threats, underwent two mental health evaluations earlier this year to evaluate his competency to stand trial. The evaluations were ordered by the judge after both Jones and O’Connell said he didn’t entirely understand the charges or court proceedings.

With today’s delay, the preliminary hearing is now on a mid-season hiatus, of sorts — to be continued in October. 

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UPDATE 4:47 p.m.: District Attorney Stacey Eads provided the following details regarding the charges and potential terms that Jones is facing:

In the criminal complaint filed by my office in court docket case CR2500835 on April 15, 2025, there are nineteen felony charges with eighteen separate alleged victims. Most of the charges are Penal Code section 422 violations, criminal threats, each of which carries a maximum 3 years in prison. 

Additionally, he is charged with a single charge of stalking in violation of Penal Code section 646.9, which absent special allegations also carries a maximum of 3 years, and two felony attempted criminal threats, which carry 1.5 years each. 

In the criminal complaint filed on April 29, 2025, in CR2500921, he Is charged with two violations of criminal threats with the same victim. 

There are numerous sentencing laws and rules that may come into play in the event Mr. Jones suffers convictions for the alleged offenses, but as currently charged he faces a potential prison sentence in the range of 12 years in prison.

Additionally, as we continue to receive additional information it is plausible there could be modifications to charges, potentially changing the exposure.  In sum, it is fair to say he faces a potential prison sentence in double digits. 

Press release from the Environmental Protection Information Center:

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has denied listing for the Northern California/Southern Oregon population of Pacific fishers.

Fishers are relatives of mink, otters, and martens. Fishers once roamed West Coast forests from Southern California through British Colubmia, however trapping and habitat destruction have reduced the species to two native populations: one in Southern Oregon/Northern California one in the Southern Sierra Nevada mountains.

Conservation groups including EPIC, the Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center and the Center for Biological Diversity first petitioned to list the species in 2000. Consideration of that petition has been repeatedly stalled, with the agency repeatedly evading its responsibilities under the law, forcing litigation by conservation groups.

Following the 2000 listing petition, conservation groups sued the Service to force a determination. In 2004, the Service found that listing was warranted but precluded by higher-priority activities. Following inaction by the Service, in 2010 conservation groups again sued the Service to force the government to complete a final decision. In 2014, the Service returned with a draft decision to list the species. Curiously, two years later the Service reversed its decision, finding that listing was not warranted. Conservation groups again sued and won, with a judge ordering the agency to try again. In 2020, the Service split the larger species into two smaller populations, listing one (Southern Sierra population) as threatened while denying protections to the other (Northern California/Southern Oregon). This decision was, again, overturned, with a settlement to re-consider listing.

“It’s clear that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is doing its best to stop the listing of the Pacific fisher,” said Tom Wheeler, Executive Director of the Environmental Protection Information Center. “The law, however, requires that science drive decisions, not the whims and wishes of the timber industry.”

The Pacific Fisher is under threat from numerous stressors, each compounding the effects of the other: climate change, including larger and more severe wildfires; rodenticide exposure; logging of the mature forest habitats required by the species; and enhanced predation from changes to forest ecosystems.

“This reckless decision ignores the recommendations of professional wildlife biologists,” said KS Wild’s Conservation Director George Sexton. “Widespread use of toxic rodenticide poisons has Fishers dropping dead across the landscape and the Trump Administration just doesn’t seem to care.”

“Fishers are emblems of the Pacific Northwest’s wild forests, and we have to help them avoid extinction and persevere for future generations,” said Tierra Curry, senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity. “We’ll keep working to protect these carnivores and the special places they live.”

Press release from Six Rivers National Forest:

This morning firefighters on the Six Rivers National Forest are continuing response on the Dillon Fire located near T Bar north of Somes Bar in Siskiyou County.

The fire was reported yesterday at approximately 6:30 p.m. and as of the last acreage report round 10pm Monday night has grown rapidly to an estimated 923 acres. A new acreage estimate has been requested, and the cause is under investigation.

The Dillon Fire is burning in steep, rugged terrain with heavy fuels. Firefighters are working on full suppression with a focus on public and firefighter safety as the highest priority.

A type 1 incident management team was ordered this morning.

California State Highway 96 is closed. The public should watch for increased firefighter traffic in the area as resources respond.

Evacuation orders in the area are in place and being managed by Siskiyou County of Emergency Services. Please visit the county OES facebook page for up to date information at facebook.com/SiskiyouCountyOES

With Labor Day weekend approaching, area residents and visitors are reminded to be careful with anything that can spark a wildfire. Visitors should also be aware of any road or recreation site closures due to wildfire suppression.

For more information about this incident and the Six Rivers National Forest, visit our webpage or Facebook page.

The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors today voted 4-0 to expand – a little bit — the types of grants available under the county’s “Project Trellis” program, which offers support to the cannabis industry. The county has some $600,000 in the kitty to give away this year, according to staff testimony – money kicked back to local government by the state, which collects state licensing fees on cannabis producers.

Supervisor Steve Madrone was absent.

Project Trellis, in its early days, was open for all sorts of projects that growers might wish to undertake. That changed on April 15th of this year, when the board voted to limit grants from the fund only to pay back taxes growers might owe to the county – specifically, property taxes and taxes due under the Measure S program. (Measure S has long been suspended, due to the general failure of the industry, but some growers still owe money from the early days of the tax.) In other words, the board voted to prioritize getting the county paid first.

Today, though, supervisors were asked whether they might want to loosen up the purse strings a bit, in response to “feedback that there is a potential need to consider other options for eligible expenses.” So staff presented the board with a couple of options, if it so chose:

• Option A: In addition to paying property taxes and Measure S taxes, Project Trellis can pay fees owed to the county’s Planning and Building Department.
• Option B: More or less a return to the status quo before April 15. In addition to the above, Project Trellis funds could pay for “rent; leases; local and state application, licensing and regulatory fees; legal assistance; regulatory compliance; testing of cannabis; furniture; fixtures and equipment; capital improvements; training and retention of qualified workforce; consulting fees: independent, regulatory, bookkeeping; start-up costs/financial solvency.”

Ross Gordon, policy specialist for the Humboldt County Growers’ Alliance, spoke in favor of Option B, and gave a few reasons. First, he noted that the purpose of the state funds flowing into Trellis was specifically for “equity” — to right past wrongs.

“The purpose of the equity funds from both the state and county level is to provide support to individuals who are impacted by the War on Drugs,” Gordon said. “If the decision from the board is to limit the use of those funds only to repaying county debts, it’s not really funds that are being distributed to people impacted by the War on Drugs.”

Gordon also noted that by limiting the use of Trellis funds only to pay back taxes, the county was effectively penalizing growers who had kept current. If you’ve already paid the county what you owe, you’re not eligible for this grant.

Supervisor Mike Wilson – a child of Southern Humboldt during the worst years of prohibition – pushed back a bit on the idea that Humboldt County growers had been historical victims of the War on Drugs. Had they not also been its beneficiaries?

“I mean, there is a basic construct that this wouldn’t even be an industry had there not been a War on Drugs, at least not in this space,” Wilson said. “And the investment in the infrastructure and the businesses that all occurred due to the elevated prices because of the War on Drugs — it was double-edged, I guess you would say. So a lot of people wouldn’t have had the opportunity to own land and all the other things that come with this had there not been this price structure that was created because of the legal status of the product.”

But that was more or less an aside. His main question was about how much more staff time would have to be devoted to grant compliance, were the board to go the route of Option B. It’s a lot harder to check whether grant money is being spent appropriately when it can go to any of a long list of private sector suppliers; much easier when its just a simple check written out to a governmental agency.

When it was her turn to speak, Supervisor Michelle Bushnell hit upon a happy compromise that seemed to answer both Gordon’s and Wilson’s concerns. While she herself supported Option B, she said, perhaps the board could modify Option A such that grant funds could be used to pay a grower’s state licensing fees. All licensed growers have to pay these fees every year, whether they are current with their county taxes or not, so all licensed growers can apply.

After a bit more discussion, it became apparent that this was acceptable to everyone, including the growers in the audience and county staff, and so Bushnell made a motion to that effect. It passed unanimously.