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Missing Bend Man Found Alive

Bend resident John Michael McLerran was reported missing on Christmas Day after stepping out of his home to grab a cup of coffee. Thirty-four-year-old McLerran did not take his wallet or any identification with him. Bend Police responded to a welfare check that evening at his home in the 800 block of NE Norton Avenue, where he had never returned.

McLerran’s friends and family members took to social media, posting images and sending out flyers in an attempt to find him. At approximately 3:07pm on Dec. 27, a community member called 911 and found McLerran stuck in a dry well, below street level, in the parking lot of the gated Norton Street Storage several blocks from his home. Bend Police and Bend Fire and Rescue responded to the scene where they extracted McLerran and transported him to St. Charles Bend for evaluation. According to the press release, McLerran was in good condition when he was found.

—Julianna LaFollette
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Mt. Bachelor Starts New “Play Forever” Promotion

Mt. Bachelor is starting a new promotion, “Play Forever Thursdays.” Every Thursday through the end of March, Mt. Bachelor will offer discounted lift tickets at $99. In addition, $5 from every ticket purchase will go directly to a different local nonprofit every week.

Each Thursday, the ski resort will donate to a select local nonprofit, which will host a booth at the mountain where they can collect additional donations and share information about the services they provide.

“We’re really excited about this initiative,” said Presley Quon, the communications and community relations manager at Mt. Bachelor. “We feel that it’s a great way for our partners to come up to the resort and to interact with our guests and our staff and just share more about what they do.”

According to Quon, the ski resort was intentional about the selected nonprofits, attempting to further the ski resorts’ commitment to protect the environment and support the local community.

—Julianna LaFollette

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Woman Whose Dogs Attacked and Killed Man Pleads Guilty

In July, 57-year-old Joseph Taylor Keeton passed away after a fatal dog attack at a Juniper Ridge campsite. Jessica Rae Charity, the owner of the three dogs who attacked Keeton, was indicted in September and charged with criminally negligent homicide, manslaughter in the second degree and two counts of maintaining a dangerous dog according to court documents.

According to Oregon Law, dog owners are responsible if their negligence results in a dog bite injury. On Dec. 21, Charity pleaded guilty to three of the four charges. A charge of manslaughter in the second degree was dismissed. On Dec. 29, Charity was sentenced to three years in prison, followed by three years of post-prison supervision, according to District Attorney Steve Gunnells.

—Julianna LaFollette

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“I think we could hold the event on the main road with 8-12 inches. But to showcase the area properly we’d need a couple feet. It could happen, it’d just take one huge storm.”

-Ben Husaby, race director for the Tour of Meissner, (hopefully) scheduled for Jan. 21. From this week’s Go Here.

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1/5,000

The number of bans on harmful chemicals proposed to be banned in the U.S. at present (1), compared to the number planned to be banned in the European Union by the year 2030 (5,000).

-From this week’s Feature story, “Corporate Abuse and Environmental Harm Dominate Project Censored Top 10 Stories This Year.”

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In Medford, a series of deadly infections is under investigation. The Asante Rogue Regional Medical Center in Medford is working with law enforcement to investigate allegations that misuse of opioids at the hospital resulted in fatal infections, Jefferson Public Radio reports.

Multiple media reports describe infections that patients acquired when a nurse replaced the opioid painkiller fentanyl with tap water and administered it to patients at the hospital.

According to the Rogue Valley Times, residents of Grants Pass and Klamath Falls were recently notified that deaths of their family members over the last year and a half were the result of infections they acquired during stays at Asante.

Protestors blocked the road into the Portland International Airport Monday, the Oregonian reports. The roughly 50 cars containing protestors were there to protest the war in Gaza, and blocked the road for less than one hour. It did not lead to any flight delays, the O reported.

This article appears in Source Weekly January 4, 2023.