On Wednesday just before noon at the Summit Store, all anyone seemed to be talking about was the upcoming court hearing for the potential release of “sexually violent predator” Michael Cheek to the Loma Prieta neighborhood of Los Gatos.
And at a packed meeting at Loma Prieta Elementary School the night before—with the Santa Cruz County sheriff and multiple deputies in attendance—a question posed by an audience member was about whether Cheek would be allowed to shop for groceries at the mountaintop business or not.
“It’s like your unofficial community center,” Sheriff Chris Clark responded, noting kids like to head to the Summit Store to eat after school. “I’ve had coffee events there.”
He said an order prohibiting Cheek from entering the Summit Store might be one of the items discussed at the Santa Cruz County Superior Court hearing on Friday.
Cheek was convicted of kidnapping, rape and forcible oral copulation back in 1980—and was sentenced for that to 20 years in prison. He escaped and committed another rape in 1981 (the victim in that case was 15). Cheek was subsequently convicted of rape and furnishing a controlled substance to a minor and was given 11 years and four months in addition to the earlier sentence.
(Drew Penner / Los Gatan)
When Cheek’s prison term was almost up, the Santa Cruz County District Attorney had him declared a “sexually violent predator” under the Sexually Violent Predators Act.
However, if a criminal can be treated in a less restrictive setting—and if the public is adequately protected (by close supervision conditions)—they can be conditionally released into the wider world under the supervision of the Department of State Hospitals.
The Department of State Hospitals (DSH) determined Cheek could be released on a conditional basis, finding he could be properly supervised in a less restrictive environment.
Ben Abeln, the manager of the Summit Store, told the crowd he’s been told to be careful about how far to go in opposing the placement in order to avoid a lawsuit. He said some in the community think Check should be allowed to move in.
“I put up a large banner yesterday that somebody took down,” he told the audience. “We’re in uncharted territory.”
The proposed placement site at 25237 Terrace Grove Rd., which would be supervised by Liberty Healthcare, is near schools and neighborhoods where families live, the Sherrif has noted.
Speakers at the meeting kept raising the telephone and wireless connectivity issues that are familiar to Santa Cruz Mountain residents.
Bridget Freiri, director of the Expanded Learning Program for Loma Prieta Joint Union School District, told the Los Gatan she worries the authorities could get so many false reports of Cheek escaping, that if he ever did really go on the lam, they might not take it seriously.
“Our cell service here is so spotty,” she said. “It’s going to be like the boy crying wolf.”
Tara Rasmussen, of Scotts Valley, told the newspaper she’s concerned for her parents who live up on the summit.
Under a 2018-20 contract, the Department of State Hospitals was required to pay Liberty Healthcare of California, Inc. $2,154.21 a month for a “pre-placement patient,” and up to $81,143.41 a month for an “enhanced supervision client add on cost.”
In Oct. 15, 2024, California State Auditor Grant Parks said DSH “does not have an effective oversight process to track and monitor Liberty Healthcare’s implementation of the recommendations that result from its reviews. Consequently, DSH has allowed several known deficiencies to persist since at least 2019 without holding Liberty Healthcare accountable for implementing timely resolutions.”
Parks noted the program’s costs had ballooned from $6.6 million in fiscal 2018–19 to $11.5 million in fiscal year 2022–23.
Cheek’s situation has already been pored over by the California Court of Appeal, Sixth Appellate District, which overturned the lower court’s ruling that a homeschool made official during the drive to keep him out of Bonny Doon could not be considered a preventative factor.
And it’s relevant to this new Santa Cruz Mountains option, because the Sheriff is working to legalize multiple homeschools in order to keep him out of the neighborhood.
No one seemed to have any workable ideas about where exactly to put a “sexually violent predator” such as Cheek. Some suggested a suburban locale like Scotts Valley, but then seemed less certain when pressed about the concept of finding a home for the rapist near a greater density of vulnerable individuals.
But locals have been particularly frustrated about the attempts to allow Cheek to live in the very area where he committed his crimes.
While on the stand in one of the original cases, Cathy Stratton, a woman who was living in Los Gatos with a roommate, described how Cheek met her on the beach in Santa Cruz before driving up into the mountains multiple times.
Her plan had been to read Rich Man, Poor Man, when Cheek approached.
“He did most of the talking,” she said during the preliminary hearing. “He told me about his prior experiences in prison in Hawaii and how Sonny Barker (sic) was a punk and he was in on the Hells Angels and they weren’t getting along, because they had set him up for a cocaine bust and he was going to court that day at 11 o’clock for his trial and he was going to be in jail for quite a long time.”
He used the threat of gun violence to get her to drive away from the beach and into the Pasatiempo area, where he pulled off the road, before they drove back to the ocean, at Aptos, she testified.
“He tried getting me to touch him and everything, and I started to scream and he put his mouth over mine and stopped me from screaming or to kiss me—I don’t know—and I bit his tongue and he started strangling me to get me to stop screaming. So I stopped screaming.”
The forced oral copulation took place while driving away from the beach, she said. Cheek then drove back up into the mountains, where he raped her by the side of the road, she told the court.
Cheek was to go before Nancy De La Peña on Friday at 1:30pm.
But Santa Cruz County District Attorney Jeff Rosell announced on Thursday the hearing had been postposed to Jan. 22 (in Department 6), “while the proposed placement location, 25237 Terrace Grove Road in Los Gatos,” is reviewed further.
“Our office believes that public safety and community concerns must remain central to any decision regarding the proposed release,” Rosell said. “We oppose the release and remain committed to advocating for the safety and well-being of our community.”
