Deputies Dennis Melum of Yreka, Johnny Evans and Chuck Rehdorf of Happy Camp, speak to concerned community members at an emergency meeting after our Neighborhood Watch had to be temporarily suspended.

Neighborhood Watch
Duties and Procedures
To Be Clarified

The word was all over town. Happy Camp News reporters heard it from several sources. The rumor was that Happy Camp's Neighborhood Watch was suspended. Local residents feared that criminal activity might increase. An emergency meeting was scheduled for that evening, Monday January 10, 2005, and about fifty concerned citizens gathered at the Grange Hall to discuss the matter.

Dennis Melum, Deputy Sheriff and Community Crime Prevention Officer, runs the county-wide Neighborhood Watch program. He was there to speak to the community volunteers and others who attended the meeting. People here appreciated that he cared enough about our town to come all the way out here to resolve the matter right away.

He assured us that our Neighborhood Watch program will continue and that the Sheriff's department appreciates the work volunteers here do to make Happy Camp a safer place to live. Melum briefly discussed the history of our Neighborhood Watch and announced a new one is being started in Somes Bar due to a series of burglaries in that area.

He told us Sheriff Riggin's goal is to have five deputies in Happy Camp. This will be a big change from having just two resident deputies plus whoever is assigned here from out of town. Melum said Riggins was interviewing two deputies for the job that very night. There will be new law enforcement officers assigned here soon.

Melum said background checks on volunteers and training sessions must be done. He said those who patrol must follow a manual and that further training will take place at the next Neighborhood Watch meeting so everyone will be informed of important policies.

He explained that by not following the department's policies Neighborhood Watch patrols could put a deputy's life in danger. "You are not to interfere with a case. You are to be eyes and ears," he said. He said volunteers could stay back and observe but that they might be more helpful by patrolling the rest of the town while the deputy is occupied with detaining a suspect.

We learned that Neighborhood Watch volunteers have four rules that must be followed: (1) never chase a suspect; (2) be available as eyes and ears to assist the deputies; (3) do not approach an officer during a traffic stop unless waived in; and (4) make contact by radio before going to a crime scene - this would allow the deputy to tell them where they should park.

The two deputies now assigned to Happy Camp were also at the meeting and took turns speaking. Johnny Evans is now the deputy in charge of our sub-station. He replaced Bucky Jefferson in the leadership position after Jefferson was reassigned to Yreka last year. Chuck Rehdorf moved here a few months ago and has already been a great help to Johnny Evans and the rest of our community.

Legal Writing in Plain English: A Text With Exercises
By Bryan A. Garner

Admirably clear, concise, down-to-earth, and powerful-unfortunately, these adjectives rarely describe legal writing, whether in the form of briefs, opinions, contracts, or statutes. In Legal Writing in Plain English, Bryan A. Garner provides lawyers, judges, paralegals, law students, and legal scholars sound advice and practical tools for improving their written work. The book encourages legal writers to challenge conventions and offers valuable insights into the writing process: how to organize ideas, create and refine prose, and improve editing skills. In essence, it teaches straight thinking--a skill inseparable from good writing.

Replete with common sense and wit, the book draws on real-life writing samples that Garner has gathered through more than a decade of teaching in the field. Trenchant advice covers all types of legal materials, from analytical and persuasive writing to legal drafting. Meanwhile, Garner explores important aspects of document design. Basic, intermediate, and advanced exercises in each section reinforce the book's principles. (An answer key to basic exercises is included in the book; answers to intermediate and advanced exercises are provided in a separate Instructor's Manual, free of charge to instructors.) Appendixes include a comprehensive punctuation guide with advice and examples, and four model documents.

Today more than ever before, legal professionals cannot afford to ignore the trend toward clear language shorn of jargon. Clients demand it, and courts reward it. Despite the age-old tradition of poor writing in law, Legal Writing in Plain English shows how legal writers can unshackle themselves.

Legal Writing in Plain English includes:

*Tips on generating thoughts, organizing them, and creating outlines.
*Sound advice on expressing your ideas clearly and powerfully.
*Dozens of real-life writing examples to illustrate writing problems and solutions.
*Exercises to reinforce principles of good writing (also available on the Internet).
*Helpful guidance on page layout.
*A punctuation guide that shows the correct uses of every punctuation mark.
*Model legal documents that demonstrate the power of plain English.

Wounded Innocents
By Richard Wexler

From Publishers Weekly:
"The war against child abuse has become a war against children," charges Wexler, a reporter for the Albany, N.Y., Times Union , in a well-argued, in-depth study of the "child protection system" in the U.S. and the politics that enmesh it. He maintains that even more alarming than the alleged abuses suffered by children at the hands of their parents are the disruption of home life and the long-lasting trauma of minors assigned to institutions and foster homes that are either as bad as or worse than their own families. He asserts also that "witch-hunts" of foster parents suspected of improper conduct and harried supporting care system administrators, at times involving false accusations of sexual abuse, are all too common. While crediting competent, dedicated caseworkers who struggle in an overloaded welfare system, Wexler deplores what he considers misleading statistics and the presumption of parental guilt that underlie much child protection work. Preventive programs, legal measures and financial incentives meant to preserve original families figure in his detailed recommendations for reform.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.