By Mark Gutglueck
An attorney for Carol Plowman, a senior vice president and founding principal of Lee & Associates Commercial Real Estate Services in Ontario, this week characterized as “categorically false” reports linking her to an effort by Alan Wapner, the president of the Ontario International Airport Authority Board of Directors, to force airport staff to undertake the sale of 198 acres of airport property to a consortium consisting of Lee & Associates and Sares Regis at a price far below the actual market price of that land.
“Ms. Plowman did not participate in the proposed acquisition of the airport property, provide campaign funds in exchange for governmental action or any business benefit, or enter into any bribe, payoff, or quid pro quo with Wapner or any other public official,” Theodore Stream, of the law firm Stream Kim Hicks Wrage & Alfaro, which represents Plowman told the Sentinel in a letter dated August 11.
The letter was precipitated by the Sentinel’s July 28 coverage of developments in the FBI’s nine-year ongoing investigation into activity involving the Ontario International Airport Authority that had taken place that day in the form of FBI and other federal agents serving search warrants at the homes and offices of Wapner, who in addition to being the president of the airport authority is also an Ontario city councilman; San Bernardino County Fourth District Supervisor Curt Hagman, who is also a board member with the airport authority; Frank Lizarraga, a one-time Ontario planning commissioner who is Wapner’s personal attorney; James Su, the owner of EDI Media; the business office of Andy Sehrmelis, a major campaign donor to Wapner, Hagman and other local elected officeholders; and at a mansion in the 600 block of North Canon Drive of Beverly Hills. The day of those raids, the FBI also served subpoenas for the production of documents at Ontario City Hall and the administrative offices of the Ontario International Airport and the Ontario International Airport authority.
Stream’s registering of objections with the July 28 article, which ran in the July 31 edition of the Sentinel, extended to a passage within it that chronicled the experiences of Kelly Fredericks, who served as the first executive director of the airport authority and manager of the airport following the transference of ownership and management of the airport to the City of Ontario/the Ontario International Airport Authority from the City of Los Angeles in 2016, and Mark Thorpe, who succeeded Fredericks as the airport authority’s executive director in 2017. The Sentinel article cataloged how Wapner, shortly after the local takeover of the airport, began pressuring Fredericks to inventory airport property to ascertain what parcels might be classified as “surplus,” and be sold off to interested buyers. The article related how Fredericks was reluctant to have the airport/airport authority divest itself of property, even it was not at that time being put to aviation-related use, in that it might be later needed for operational expansion, and described how Fredericks’ resistance to Wapner’s demands ultimately resulted in his being pushed out of the executive director/airport managerial role by the board, essentially at Wapner’s insistence.
Also contained in the July 28 Sentinel narrative was a description of Thorpe’s experience as the airport authority’s executive director, which paralleled that of Fredericks’, but played out over a longer period. The Sentinel related how, while Thorp was running the airport, Wapner’s previously amorphous demand that the airport administration ready what he characterized as “surplus airport property” for eventual sale grew into a more sharply defined instruction that 198 acres east of the runway be readied for sale in accordance with an offer tendered by Lee & Associates and the Sares Regis Group at a price of $101 million. The Sentinel article provided a description of how Thorpe, who shared Fredericks’ reservations against selling off airport property piecemeal or in any fashion based upon its potential for use in future aviation applications, in essence dragged his feat and resisted those instructions until a denouement materialized in which making that sale was not necessary. That resolution, the Sentinel article reported, consisted of an arrangement involving San Antonio, Texas-based USAA Real Estate Company and McDonald Property Group of Newport Beach, functioning as a joint venture under the title of CanAm Ontario, leasing the 198 acres for 55 years rather than purchasing the property outright at an overall cost of $625 million, a number that dwarfed the $101 million offer by Lee & Associates/Sares Regis. The agreement specified that CanAm Ontario was to make a non-refundable $10 million deposit with the airport authority, after which USAA Real Estate Company/McDonald Property Group, functioning jointly, were given time to obtain local jurisdictional entitlement and environmental approvals to construct buildings and improvements on the property. In the first five years, CanAm Ontario agreed to pay the airport authority $25 million per year and in the second five years, $30 million per year, such that at the end of the first ten years, the airport authority will have received $275 million. Over the remaining 35 years of the lease, CanAm was to pay the authority an average of $10 million per year.
The July 28 Sentinel article, in the context of delineating the significance of the FBI’s activity that day and its relationship to the investigation of Wapner and Hagman that had been ongoing at least since 2018, dwelled at length on what were alleged by those who had alerted the FBI to be quid pro quos, i.e., bribes, involving the two members of the airport authority. Under state law, specifically Government Code § 84308, appointed governmental officials in California from 1982 until 2023 were prohibited from accepting $250 or more from a donor and then voting or taking action on any matter impacting that donor financially or otherwise. In 2022, Government Code §84308 was altered, effective January 1, 2023 so that it was made further applicable to elected officials with a threshold donation amount of $500. Those who had lodged the initial complaints with the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office with regard to Wapner and Hagman had done so because of the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office’s unwillingness to pursue action against the pair based on their violations of Government Code §84308, and sought an examination of the prospect of prosecuting Wapner and Hagman, as well as another member of the airport authority board, Jim Bowman, on those areas of U.S. federal law which parallel Government Code §84308, including but not limited to 2 Code of Federal Regulations § 200.303 and related provisions in the Uniform Administrative Requirements, Cost Principles, and Audit Requirements for Federal Awards, which governs conflicts of interest and prohibited contributions for governmental agency officials involved in awarding contracts, grants, or other entitlements.
In illustrating what the FBI had been asked to investigate, the Sentinel reported that corporate officers with both Lee & Associates and the Sares Regis Group had provided Wapner with at least $219,040.07 in political donations between 1998 and 2024, making the further clarification that $123,444 of that came from partners/employees within Sares Regis and $95,596.07 came from individuals associated with Lee & Associates. The Sentinel identified those making the donations on behalf of Sares Regis as that company’s principals John Hagestad and Peter Rooney as well as its employees Larry Lukanish, Kenneth Coatsworth, Patrick Russell, Vincent Ciavarella and William Thormahlen. The Sentinel identified those connected with Lee & Associates who had made the donations as Joe McKay, Mike Wolfe and Carol Plowman.
The Sentinel’s July 28 narrative propounded the theory pursued by the FBI that Wapner’s and Hagman’s demonstrable pattern of accepting campaign donations from donors, who were not solely limited to but did include the Lee and Associates and Sares Regis principals and employees, and then taking action in their official capacity as airport authority directors that was beneficial to those donors potentially constituted bribery and/or soliciting bribes (18 U.S.C. § 666(a)(1)(B)) and honest services wire fraud (18 U.S.C. § 371), which approximate the California state offense of violating Government Code §84308.
In his letter to the Sentinel, Stream took issue with the Sentinel including reference to Plowman in the series of events that led to the FBI investigation and constituted the issues being explored by investigators and evaluated by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for possible prosecution. In this way, Stream asserted, the Sentinel article contained “false and defamatory statements” at least insofar as Plowman is concerned and that the Sentinel had “no factual basis for grouping her with the other identified individuals” who had provided donations above the $250 limit formerly specified in Government Code §84308 or the $500 limit the current version of Government Code §84308 imposes on both appointed and elected public officials.
According to Stream, Plowman “did not make the substantial campaign contributions the article attributes or imputes to her. To the extent the article attributes any portion of the stated $95,596.07 or $219,040.07 collective totals to Ms. Plowman, that attribution is false and materially misleading.”
In his letter, Stream implies that Plowman gave no money to Wapner.
“The article identifies no communication between Ms. Plowman and Wapner concerning the airport property, no role she played in the proposed transaction, and no contribution she made in exchange for official action,” Streams letter states. “Instead, the Sentinel aggregated alleged contributions by numerous people over more than two decades, inserted Ms. Plowman’s name into those collective totals, and then accused the named individuals of graft, bribery, and paying off a public official.”
In suggesting that Plowman did not provide money to Wapner as the July 28 Sentinel article reported, Stream cites the article’s failure to provide the precise dates and amounts contributed to Wapner by Plowman to insinuate that the donations were never made.
“The article provides no breakdown identifying any amount supposedly contributed by Ms. Plowman, no dates of any purported contributions by her, and no factual basis for grouping her with the other identified individuals and attributing that substantial sum to them collectively,” Stream wrote.
While the Sentinel did not include a blow by blow description of the donations from the Lee & Associates and Sares Regis principals and employees in the July 28 article,

By Mark Gutglueck
A decade after the marijuana meltdown in Adelanto which resulted in Adelanto’s mayor and one of its councilmen going into federal prison and a third councilman narrowly ducking the same fate, at least three of Adelanto’s current city leaders have latched onto a different political grift, but one which they will put into their own pockets untold millions of dollars, again believing they can sidestep the regulatory regime that is supposed to be applied to the controversial business they are now promoting.
In this go-round, it appears that the city’s current mayor and possibly three and more likely four of the council’s members believe that instead of devoting square miles of land within the city limits to growing, processing, refining and distributing marijuana and cannabis products, the city can allow dozens or maybe even scores of data centers to set up operation and flourish.
The sense of déjà vu is palpable to those who witnessed the Kerr-and-Wright-led debacle, which includes the recognition that the practical issues that felled the effort to turn Adelanto in the marijuana capital of the world – the lack of adequate electrical utility output and an insufficient supply of water – are equally applicable to the current pipedream. And just like a trio of former councilmen thought they could outsmart a team of FBI agents and a quarter dozen assistant U.S. Attorneys who were monitoring their moves, the current council comes across as believing they can take money from some deep-pocketed entrepreneurs and promise them shelter from federal, state and local regulations.
With the clean sweep that was effectuated in the 2014 election when Rich Kerr ousted Mayor Cari Thomas and John Woodard and Charles Glasper defeated Steve Baisden Charles Valvo, Kerr joined forces with incumbent Councilman Jermaine Wright and Woodard to embrace the long-in-coming liberalization of California’s marijuana laws that were fully effectuated with the passage of Proposition 64 in 2016. Presciently anticipating Proposition 64’s passage, the three spent 2015 acclimating the city’s populace to the concept of simply allowing a limited number of warehouses in the city industrial park zone to operate as indoor marijuana farms where medical marijuana was to be cultivated. Continue reading →

ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE FOR CHANGE OF NAME
CASE NUMBER CIVSB2620226
TO ALL INTERESTED PERSONS: Petitioner ROBYN PORTER filed with this court for a decree changing names as follows:
ROBYN JODI PORTER to ROBYN JODI ABRAMS
THE COURT ORDERS that all persons interested in this matter appear before this court at the hearing indicated below to show cause, if any, why the petition for change of name should not be granted. Any person objecting to the name changes described above must file a written objection that includes the reasons for the objection at least two court days before the matter is scheduled to be heard and must appear at the hearing to show cause why the petition should not be granted. If no written objection is timely filed, the court may grant the petition without a hearing.
Notice of Hearing:
Date: AUGUST 24, 2026
Time: 9:00 a.m.
Department: S24
Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino
San Bernardino District-Civil Division
The address of the court is Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino, 247 West Third Street, San Bernardino, CA 92415
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that a copy of this order be published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel in San Bernardino County California, once a week for four successive weeks prior to the date set for hearing of the petition.
Joseph T. Ortiz
Judge of the Superior Court.
Aryanna Sheehe, Deputy Clerk of the Court
Dated: July 10, 2026
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on July 17, 24 & 31 and August 7, 2026.

ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE FOR CHANGE OF NAME
CASE NUMBER CIV SB 2620549
TO ALL INTERESTED PERSONS: Petitioner DANIEL JAMES MILES filed with this court for a decree changing names as follows:
DANIEL JAMES MILES to DANIEL JAMES WAGNER
THE COURT ORDERS that all persons interested in this matter appear before this court at the hearing indicated below to show cause, if any, why the petition for change of name should not be granted. Any person objecting to the name changes described above must file a written objection that includes the reasons for the objection at least two court days before the matter is scheduled to be heard and must appear at the hearing to show cause why the petition should not be granted. If no written objection is timely filed, the court may grant the petition without a hearing.
Notice of Hearing:
Date: September 3, 2026
Time: 8:30 a.m.
Department: S28
Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino
San Bernardino District-Civil Division
The address of the court is Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino, 247 West Third Street, San Bernardino, CA 92415
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that a copy of this order be published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel in San Bernardino County California, once a week for four successive weeks prior to the date set for hearing of the petition.
Joseph T. Ortiz
Judge of the Superior Court.
Adilene Gutierrez, Deputy Clerk of the Court
Dated: July 15, 2026
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on July 17, 24 & 31 and August 7, 2026.

Continue reading →

In a bid to assist Alan Wapner in his mayoral effort, Ontario Councilwoman Daisy Macias is jumping into the November 3 race.
At the behest of Wapner, who has offered her assistance in funding what both have agreed will be a token campaign not intended to succeed in getting her elected but rather to divide the city’s Hispanic vote, Macias took out mayoral candidacy papers, Ontario Assistant City Clerk Claudia Isbell confirmed on August 4.
Wapner was first elected to the Ontario City Council in 1994, and had contemplated running for mayor in the 2005 special election to replace former Mayor Garry Ovitt after Ovitt left the mayoral position to serve as Fourth District San Bernardino County supervisor following his election to that post in 2004, but did not do so when Paul Leon, who had been on the city council since 1998 beat him to the punch by declaring he was going to seek the office. Leon prevailed in that contest over Sam Crowe, Ontario’s former city attorney and former city councilman.
Wapner and Leon thereafter found themselves on the same electoral cycle, such that each was up for reelection, Leon for mayor and Wapner for councilman, in 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018 and 2022. At each juncture, Wapner deferred his ambition to become mayor to some future point. Wapner was hampered from achieving the city’s highest elective post by the consideration that Leon held the upper hand of being the incumbent and the even more important advantage of his Spanish surname, which redounded to Leon’s benefit in a city which at that time had a population that was then 63 percent Latino and which in the last 21 years has transitioned into being 68.8 percent Hispanic.
At various times during their combined tenure as city leaders, the relationship between Leon and Wapner has broken down and broken into open hostility. In 2009, their enmity reached what was previously a nadir, when Wapner joined with two other members of the council to reduce the mayor’s stipend by $30,000 to match what was paid council members and he hired attorney/private investigator Loerena Nesci to dig up dirt on Leon, and then had Nexci trumpet to the community that Leon was carrying on with Diana Huizar, an executive secretary working at the Ontario Convention Center. Wapner had hoped the matter involving Huizar would damage Leon’s reputation sufficiently to dim the mayor’s prospects for reelection in 2010 or convince him to discontinue in office entirely. When a pollster who took the pulse of the community reported back to Wapner that the Huizar affair had not made sufficient inroads on Leon’s popularity with the city’s electorate and that polls showed Wapner losing to Leon in an head-to-head contest, Wapner opted out of running for mayor in 2010. Instead, he engineered a rapprochement with Leon, and Leon, Wapner and Jim Bowman, another incumbent councilman who shared the same re-election cycle, represented themselves as “Team Ontario,” the trio of dedicated and competent city fathers who were responsible for Ontario being the most economically successful of San Bernardino County’s 24 municipalities. All three were reelected, and in the election years since, Leon and Wapner remained in their respective mayoral and council lanes, endorsing one another for reelection, along with Jim Bowman.
In 2024, the veneer of civility that had existed between Leon and Wapner began to crack when Wapner poached Daisy Macias from Leon as one of his allies. Leon had long been grooming Macias as a potential member of the city council, having hired her to work as a secretary at the church where he is pastor, then assisting her in getting positions in the real estate industry, including most recently a high-profile and lucrative position with Community Renaissance, an affordable housing developer founded by Jeff Burum, who has proven over the years to be one of the deepest-pocketed donors to San Bernardino County politicians, including Leon and Wapner. In a move to begin a redraft of Ontario’s political landscape, Wapner transferred $40,000 out of his political war chest to Macias to assist her in what was to Leon a surprise run for the city council in Ontario’s recently-formed Fourth Council District. Wapner then arranged for a host of donors he had come to rely on to fill out his own campaign coffers to make donations to Macias. In this way, Macias proved successful and was elected Fourth District councilwoman. Once in office, she aligned herself with Wapner.
Last year, when Leon downplayed the concerns expressed by some of the city’s residents about the aggressive tactics of federal law enforcement officers with the onset of Donald Trump’s second term as president, in particular Border Patrol and Department of Immigration and Customs rounding up undocumented aliens, Wapner perceived that to be a major stumble on the mayor’s part, one that would alienate him from a portion of his natural constituency. He seized the day, making statement to the effect that he was horrified by the Leon’s insensitivity to the Latino community. He then reformulated his campaign committee, which was formerly intended to raise money for his 2026 council reelection campaign, instead declaring that he was seeking the mayoralty. Wapner then moved to secure the backing of all of Ontario’s municipal employee unions, including AFSCME, SEIU, the Firefighters Association, the Ontario Police Officers Association and the Ontario Police Management Association. In addition, Wapner, who over the three decades he had been in office had already established himself as the most prolific fundraiser among local elected officials in San Bernardino County history, outhustled Leon in preparing for the 2026 election. From January 1, 2025 through December 31, 2025, Wapner took in $326,100 in political donations. In the same timeframe, Mayor Leon collected $48,600 in contributions. In the first six months of this year, Wapner brought in another 323,199.08 in donations. Leon was able to touch his supporters for $47,849 from January 1 until June 30, 2026. In this way, Wapner was able to obtain $652,248.08 in political donations to fuel his effort in the 2026 mayoral contest, which was 676 percent of the $96,449 in political contributions Leon put together.
With his endorsements and monetary lead, Wapner was confident that he would be able to overcome the two advantages Leon possessed, namely being the incumbent and the readiness of Ontario’s predominantly Hispanic population to embrace a Latino as mayor rather than a Caucasian.
Wapner, however, encountered a major speed bump in the race to become mayor on July 28, when the FBI served search warrants at his home and business office, as well as at the headquarters of the Ontario International Airport Authority, where he is the president of the airports board of directors, as well as at the homes and offices of two of his closest associates, San Bernardino County Supervisor Curt Hagman, who is a member with Wapner of the airport authority board, and Wapner’s personal attorney, Frank Lizarraga. Word on the street was that the FBI already had strong indication that Wapner and Hagman were taking bribes and receiving kickbacks, and that in serving the search warrants the federal agents were looking for even more damning evidence in that regard.
Seeing what had occurred as a major setback to to his mayoral elective effort, Wapner called upon Macias to enter the mayor’s race. Though some saw having another challenger run against Mayor Leon as a questionable strategy, Wapner’s logic is that Macias will siphon off something close to 20 percent of the city’s Latino vote and only a negligible number of the voters that will be voting for Wapner. In this way, Wapner believes, Macias’s presence on the November 3 ballot, will redound to his benefit and likely result in his being able to outpoll Leon, thereby allowing him to take possession of the mayor’s gavel.

By Mark Gutglueck
The homes and offices of Ontario Councilman and mayoral candidate Alan Wapner and Fourth District San Bernardino County Supervisor Curt Hagman were the targets of raids by the FBI on Tuesday July 28.
Both politicians have long been the focus of investigations into pay-to-play politics within the Inland Empire community where they serve as elected officials, as well as their efforts on behalf of foreign governments, corporations and business interests, including the secreting of what was alleged to be bribe money into the country.
The raids relating to Wapner and Hagman took place inside and outside San Bernardino County, where the duo are both career politicians based in the Fourth Supervisorial District, the most geographically compact and densely populated of the county’s five subjurisdictions. San Bernardino County’s Fourth District includes the entirety of the cities of Chino Hills, Chino, Montclair and Ontario, the southern portion of Upland and the unincorporated communities of as well as the Carbon Canyon, Velano, Yorba, West End, Prado, Narod, Ballou, Racimo and Guasti. Hagman’s career as a politician began with his election to the city council and later ascension to mayor, followed by his election the California Assembly, his acceding to the position of chairman of the San Bernardino County Republican Central Committee, and his election as Fourth District San Bernardino County Supervisor and reelection to that post three time. Wapner, who was employed as a police officer, detective and later a sergeant with the Ontario Police Department, began his political career as a member of the Ontario-Montclair School District Board and was first elected to the Ontario City Council in 1994, having been reelected to that post seven times. He is currently vying for Ontario mayor.
In carrying out the raids, FBI agents were seeking evidence and documentation pertaining to quid pro quos – bribes or kickbacks – provided to Wapner and Hagman by individuals, business entities, business owners and principals in businesses which had applications for project approval with the city or the county, which were competing for contracts with the city or county or which were seeking franchises granted by the city or county that ultimately were subject to approval by the Ontario City Council or the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors. Continue reading →

By Rhonda L. Randall
With the resumption of school next month, families are engaged in preparation for the upcoming school year that focus on school supplies, schedules and getting back into routines. Another important back-to-school step parents might consider taking before the first day of class is scheduling a medical examination for their child or children.
Because many pediatric and family practice schedules often fill quickly throughout the summer, now is an ideal time for parents to make appointments. These preventive visits help ensure children and adolescents are ready for the year ahead, not only academically, but physically, emotionally and developmentally.
These annual physicals help track a child’s overall health and development, including growth and developmental milestones, immunizations and preventive screenings, vision and hearing checks, emotional and behavioral health.
Beyond these clinical measures, physicals also give parents a chance to complete school or sports forms and raise any concerns before the school year begins. More importantly, they create dedicated time for families and providers to discuss a child’s overall wellbeing, connecting physical health with emotional wellness and any developmental concerns that may affect success in school and at home.
The broader view of a checkup may be especially important when it comes to mental health. A child’s emotional wellbeing may be closely linked to his or her physical health. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), approximately 1 in 5 children ages 3 to 17 in the U.S. has a diagnosable mental, emotional or behavioral disorder. Continue reading →

A Chino Hills man was killed by a business associate during what appears to have been a botched kidnapping attempt Wednesday night.
According to available information Zhengfeng Bo had already gravely wounded Shakur Aikebaer and had acted in concert with his brother, Jianquan Bo in throwing Aikebaer into his car trunk and was making an effort to leave the scene of the abduction when they were interrupted by responding sheriff’s department personnel. After being stopped, Zhengfeng Bo made a somewhat ambiguous show or surrendering and then shot the helpless Aikebaer while he was still in the car’s trunk. Sheriff’s officers immediately gunned down Zhengfeng Bo in response.
Zhengfeng’s motivation at this point is a mystery and will possibly remain so, as both he and Aikebaer died in the incident, and it is unclear what light the surviving Jianquan Bo will be able to shed on why his brother took the action he did.
A jumble of details has emerged, aided by the availability of both video and audio recordings of the critical moments that culminated in Aikebaer’s and Bo’s deaths, but the narrative of events remains disjointed and marred by Bo’s quirky behavior at several turns.
What is known is that some time shortly after 10 p.m. on Wednesday, July 29, Zhengfeng Bo, 67, and Jianquan Bo, 66, driving in a gray Nissan Altima arrived in the residential neighborhood in the 2100 block of Monteverde Drive in Chino Hills. One of them went to the electrical panel of the home occupied by Aikebaer, 60, his wife and their three daughters and cut the power. Upon Aikebaer going outside to inspect the fuse box, both Bos confronted him. Aikebaer was shot in the torso by one of the brothers. The commotion and firing of the gun elicited the attention of neighbors, at least one of whom saw Aikebaer being bundled into the Altima’s trunk. Continue reading →

The San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office Family Violence Unit on July 28, 2026 secured guilty pleas and convictions against defendants Sergio Mena and Samantha Garver, of Big Bear, for the 2023 death of one-year-old Henry Wheatley-Brown.
Young Wheatley-Brown died as a result of being severely scalded and being denied timely medical care after his mother’s live-in boyfriend left him in a bathtub with water believed to be above 130 degrees Fahrenheit (130°F) while he was reportedly smoking methampetamine.
The death of Wheatley-Brown, considered in conjunction with earlier reports of his mother’s abuse and neglect of his older siblings raised questions about the diligence and thoroughness of, and follow-through by, the San Beranrdino County Department of Children and Family Services.
The couple was arrested on October 1, 2023 after the Big Bear Fire Department responded to a home in the 700 block of Santa Barbara Avevue in Sugarloaf, where they found the 14-month old baby “suffering severe burns to his body,” according to a statement from the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department released at that time.
Garver, now 36, was Henry’s mother. Mena, now 35, was Garver’s boyfriend.
On September 30, 2023, while Garver was out of the home working for a vacation home company in the area near Big Bear Lake, Mena placed Henry in a bathtub filled with what the district attorney’s office described as “scalding water” and left him unattended to engage in drug use. Henry began screaming, and Mena returned to find the child severely burned. He notified Garver, who returned home later that evening. Despite Henry’s extensive and life-threatening injuries, according to the district attorney’s office, neither defendant sought medical care, instead attempting to treat the burns with over-the-counter ointment.
The couple called 911 the following day, reporting that the young boy was having difficulty breathing, prosecutors said.
Responding paramedics found Wheatley-Brown “without a pulse, ice‑cold to the touch, and severely dehydrated,” according to the district attorney’s office. The child died from his injuries, and the death was ruled a homicide. Investigators ultimately determined the boy had been the victim of “ongoing physical abuse,” prosecutors stated.
“Henry had second- and third-degree burns, extensive bruising, petechiae in his eyes, and multiple healing fractures in both arms. Garver was aware of Henry’s injuries,” the district attorney’s office said.
According to scienceinsights.org, exposure to 140°F water can cause a third-degree burn in an adult in as little as five seconds and a second-degree burn in about three seconds. 130°F can result in an adult suffering third-degree burns in roughly 15-to-30 seconds and second-degree burns in about ten seconds. 120°F water canresult in adults sustaining third-degree burns in about five minutes and second-degree burns after ten minutes. 110°F water carries with it a minimal scald risk fro adults, requiring over an hour of continuous contact to reach that level of injury. Hot water transfers heat quickly to skin, causing rapid protein denaturation and tissue destruction. The “zone of coagulation” forms immediately at high temperatures, destroying skin layers in seconds. Children under the age of five have thinner skin and a higher body surface area-to-mass ratio that makes them more susceptible to scalding than adults. In a child, a third-degree burn at 140°F can occur in three seconds, according to biologyinsights.com.
Both Garver and Mena told child welfare investigators that Garver was not home when Henry suffered his fatal burns. It was Garver who informed investigators that Mena was using methamphetamine at the time of the burns. Mena said he did not purposefully injure the child. Henry Wheatley-Brown, whose biological father was Thomas Rios, had turned one-year-old in August 2023.
Garver did not summon paramedics with the Big Bear Fire Department to assist her son until more than 12 hours after the sclading occurred. Mena, in response to questions about burns on the child’s legs said they had resulted from the toddler being placed in a hot bath. Garver said the baby had been fine 40 minutes before paramedics arrived But the firefighters found the child cold to the touch and unresponsive. He was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
“Through extensive investigation, it was discovered Wheatley Brown had additional injuries, indicating abuse,” the sheriff’s department said in a news release relating to the couple’s arrest.
An investigation into the circumstances of the Santa Barbara Avevue domicile where Garver and Mena were living and Garver’s history turned up issues that had been ignored and unaddressed, to Baby Wheatley-Brown’s ultimately fatal peril.
Garver had at least four and possibly five children. The first report about one of them being subjected to abuse had come into local authorities in 2009, when she was 19. Henry was the youngest of her children.
Over the years, family members and a babysitter had phoned the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department and Children and Family Services to report concerns about Garver’s children’s safety and isible injuries. One such report related to one of her other children having suffered severe burns in an incident in 2013, a decade before Henry’s death.
The San Bernardino County Department of Children and Family Services begged off when asked for comment regarding the matters involving Garver and her children.
The death of Henry did spark a more intense examination of the Garver household than had taken place previously. While it is not clear who interviewed Mena and Garver in the aftermath of Wheatley-Brown’s death, both said Garver was not home at the time Henry suffered the injuries that led to the complications that killed him, consisting of second-degree burns from his shins down to his feet as well as “isolated” second-degree burns on his genitals consistent with having been “dipped in hot water,” according the Department of Children and Family Services report that was completed less than a month after the child’s death.
The report, which was dated October 25, 2023, indicated Garner demonstrated a lack of maternal sensitivity.
“The mother allowed the child to suffer for several hours before he eventually died,” it stated.
Jeany Zepeda, the director of the San Bernardino Department of Children and Family Services in 2023 acknowledged that the system had failed Wheatley-Brown and that her office had come to the conclusion that “abuse or neglect led to the child’s death.”
There were repeated safety and welfare issues relating to the children under Garver’s roof. In some cases, though not all, what appeared to be appropriate responses to the situation were made. In virtually all of those entailing referrals, citations and court appearances, however, Garver appears to have slipped around the punishment meted out to, or the conditions imposed on, her.
The report noted that investigators and medical personnel determined Henry had earlier injuries that had gone untreated and unreported, including a dislocated arm and marks and bruises on his face. “The mother failed to seek medical attention for previous injuries that are indicative of possible physical abuse that occurred,” according to the report.
The Department of Children and Family Services first took note of problems relating to Garver’s parenting in 2009 and further instances of neglect were noted at various points thereafter. The following year, a referral came into the department when a doctor reported that she had said she sometimes, when one of her children “wouldn’t stop crying,” she “felt like putting a pillow over” the child’s head.
Garner was reported to the department again in 2013. At that point, Garver had a four-year-old, a two-year-old and an 8-month-old baby. Garver made a posting in a Facebook group chat in which she inquired about the advisability of using duct tape to prevent a child from crying and whether do so constituted abuse. In the same timeframe she made another Facebook posting in which she said her daughter had “blistered burns on her thighs” that came about when she was shopping and the child was under the care of a friend.
Garver posted on the Facebook page that she was afraid of Child and Family Service personnel, suggesting that was one of the reasons she was reluctant to bring her children to the hospital or a doctor for medical treatment.
Based, apparently, on that post and its reference to burns on Garver’s daughter, the San Bernardino County Department of Children and Family Services carried out a child welfare check. When the presence of blisters was confirmed, Garver said they had come about when the baby somehow wedged herself between a wall and a heater.
Further inspection of the home found very unsanitary conditions at the home, including fecal matter smeared in the children’s bedroom and a cockroach infestation. The child was hospitalized and Garver was cited for felony child neglect, felony willful cruelty resulting in injury and leading potentially to death. After a go-round in court, those charges were dismissed, pursuant to Garver’s plea to misdemeanor cruelty to a child. She was given a 100 day sentence to be served in county jail, with the court giving her until July 2013 to make arrangements for the care of her children so she could begin serving her sentence. She did not report to jail that July and was listed as a fugitve from justice. No concerted effort to bring her into custody was made, however.
Despite Garver not having served her sentence, when the sheriff’s department and Children and Family Services Department personnel were called to her home on multiple occasions in the following years, she was not arrested and it is not clear what measures were taken to ensure her children’s safety.
After Henry’s birth, a report about Garver’s poor parenting skills was again made to the Department of Children and Family Services, apparently by Sierra Rivers, Henry’s grandmother. Children and Family Services sent an investigator to Garver’s premises on August 19, 2022. The investigator lodged a report that paradoxically made a finding that while the children were “safe” and “No safety threats are present,” they were at “high risk” of abuse and neglect.
Garver was convicted and sentenced to 14 years in state prison for voluntary manslaughter and child abuse causing great bodily injury.
Mena pled guilty to second-degree murder and child abuse causing great bodily injury. He received a prison term of 21 years to life.
The case was prosecuted by the district attorney’s Family Violence Unit.

A 30-pound channel catfish was caught at Hesperia Lake Park on Sunday, July 26, 2026.
According to Hesperia Recreation and Park District officials, the trophy fish was so heavy it broke the park’s scale during the official weigh‑in. The catch was made by angler Javier Antonio Fuentes, who officials said “brought this legend to the shoreline.”
Fuentes made the catch while braving a brutal heat wave.
Two days previously, on July 24, the lake had been stocked with 1,000 pounds of catfish and 500 pounds of tilapia.
The whopper Fuentes landed, however, had been in the 7-acre lake far longer than two days. The time it would take a five pound catfish to grow to 30 pounds would typically require no fewer than 12 months and most likely more in the range of 18 months. The channel catfish and tilapia stocked into Hesperia Lake come from Pacific Aquafarms in Niland, California. According to recent fish reports, the fish delivered by Pacific Aquafarms are typically in the 1.5 pound to 2.5 pound range, with some larger specimens up to 3-to-4 pounds. It would thus seem the Ictalurus punctatus that Fuentes hooked and then managed to pull in, was likely swimming about Lake Hesperia for at least 21 months and had perhaps been there as long as two years.
The channel catfish, with the scientific moniker Ictalurus punctatus) and known informally as the “channel cat”, is a species of catfish native to North America. They are North America’s most abundant catfish species. As such, it is also the most fished species of catfish in the United States, with around 8 million anglers seeking them out every year. Continue reading →

On July 28, the legendary Catzilla, a 50-pound catfish said to be lurking somewhere below the surface of Hesperia Lake for some time now, was caught, or so the story goes.
An angler, who has been described only by his first name, Justin, was credited snagging the behemoth, which is believed to be the second-largest catfish that has ever haunted California’s 470 wet lakes and reservoirs.
Nearly a dozen nearby fisherman temporarily lost their focus on their own poles and lines as they watched in awe and virtual disbelief as Justin battle with the Leviathan in the late morning heat. It pulled away and he let the reel out. Then, as quickly, when the fish’s resistance temporarily ebbed, he wound in more line than he had just let out. The contest between the fish thrashing as best as it could backward and Justin’s now aching forearms intensified. Beneath the water, the cat’s powerful body momentarily glistened as the sunlight penetrated the lake, but then seemed to disappear as the sun glinting off the water shone with a brightness that obscure the darker blue hue beneath it.
Justin, wet with sweat and the spray of drops of water from the line he wound in ever closer, when momentarily diminishing tension allowed him to do so. For a moment, when he stepped back and encountered a sharp and sudden tug, he almost lost his balance, but then recovered. The angler’s muscled taughtened, and, as if determined to overpower his prey, he pulled and was rewarded with a peculiar sound not unlike suction as the fish for the first time emerged from the water, followed immediately by cacophonous thwack as the fish’s tail slapped the water, the sound echoing away and across the lake, followed by slower ripples of the water in the same direction.
The faintest of smiles grace Justin’s face, signifying that he knew he was drawing very closer to victory. The glimmer of outward happiness lasted on a second or so, as he knew the battle was not yet over, and he could not afford to let anything distract him, particularly at this critical juncture of the contest between man and beast.
At last, the fish as fully out of the water, no mean feat, considering its weight and that equipment between them was a flexible pole and 15-pount-to-20-pound monofilament line. For a brief second, Justin’s eyes and that of the catfish met, and the adversaries held each other’s gaze. Even at that point they were sizing each other up. What did Justin see? The biggest freshwater fish he had ever caught or hoped to catch. What did the fish see? What was the fish looking to see? Some sign of weakness? Some indication that there would be a split-second of opportunity for self-survival?
With sweat streaking his brow, his nearly fatigued hands experiencing a hint of a tremble, Justin landed the prize.
He posed for a photo with the still-living fish, a memento for posterity. Justin then sought to heft the slippery creature into a basket.
That’s when Catzilla moved to make his timed break for it, thrashing and twisting powerfully, unexpectedly and violently, propelling himself out of Justin’s grasp and into the shallow water of the lake and then away to depths, disappearing in a flash into the safety of the lake.
Thus, this week, has the legend of Catzilla enlarged.
There was no opportunity to put Catzilla on a scale.
According to the record books, the largest catfish ever landed in California was a 53.8-pounder that was reeled in from the San Joaquin River by Randall Gilgert Jr. in 2008.
According to the International Game Fish Association, the world record for an all-tackle landing of a channel catfish, weighing 58 pounds, was caught at South Carolina’s Santee-Cooper Reservoir in 1964 by W.H. Whaley.