September 2, 1999

The Chico Police Department has known who set Chico City Councilmember Rick Keene’s porch on fire for more than two months, and the culprit has been confined in the Butte County Mental Health Facility, Police representative Jose Lara confirmed Thursday. And although the story was played up on the front page of the Enterprise-Record as a potential political attack, neither that paper nor Keene has corrected the impression that the story had given. Keene, at least, has long known the case had been solved, the Examiner has learned.

In the early morning of March 21, somebody stepped up to Keene’s front porch and set a pile of newspapers on fire. The papers, Enterprise-Records which had been dropped off for Keene’s fifteen year-old son Chris to deliver, caught quickly, and the flames soon engulfed part of the house’s siding and an American flag that hung over the porch. Luckily, Chris discovered the fire and alerted his father, who then put out the fire.

The next day the Enterprise Record published a front-page photo of Keene standing on his porch and holding the singed American flag. An accompanying news story, by reporter Michelle MacEachern, reported the circumstances of the fire, the police response, and Police Marshall Mort Myer’s belief that the fire was arson.

But about two-thirds into the story, the article took an abrupt turn from these verifiable facts and veered into speculation on Keene’s part.

"Keene," wrote MacEachern, "said he had no idea who would want to burn his house down, the he acknowledged that he’s a controversial public figure with an easily obtainable address. Though he has received threats in the past, none have come in the last year. And no immediate information was available to point to any specific suspects."

The article concluded by quoting Keene directly: "’If it’s politically motivated, it’s someone who just thinks they’re doing the world a favor,’ Keene said. ‘They tried—it didn’t work. Nothing’s going to change... If someone doesn’t like what I do, they ought to call me up."

While Keene was suggesting, without evidence, that the arson was a political attack, the Chico Police Department had other ideas. "We suspected him from the beginning," said Lara of the man who set the fire. "We connected a gentleman to the fire, a mental health individual who was arrested on for another [unrelated burglary] incident," he continued.

"He acknowledged his participation," continued Lara, "and he had no idea that it was Rick’s house" he had set aflame.

The man was not arrested but rather sent to the Butte County Mental health facility in Chico. His name has not been released.

While Lara said the Police Department does not regularly release the names of people committed to Mental Health, neither Keene nor the police were under any legal obligation to withhold information about the circumstances of the solved case from the public. Certainly, given the prominent placement of the story in the Enterprise-Record, and especially given the implied allegations of politically motivated arson, the withholding of information about the case amounts to a political act.

The E-R’s attack

Besides the emotion-laden photo of the singed flag and the article quoting Keene’s unsupported suspicions that the fire was a politically motivated arson, the Enterprise-Record continued to fan the flames of speculation about the porch fire.

An unsigned March 23 Enterprise-Record editorial, for example, while admitting that "we have no way of knowing whether Keene was being attacked because of his political views," all but declared that in fact it was.

"This was no random act," read the editorial. "This was a purposeful act, and perhaps, an intentional attack on the home of an elected official of the city. If politically motivated, it clearly is tantamount to an attack on our system of government, that would put it in the category of a terrorist act."

After repeating Keene’s comments to MacEachern, the editorial continued on the terrorist theme. "...indications are that Keene was targeted. Although he has no idea who would want to burn his house down, Keene acknowledged that he has received threats in the past."

Neither Keene nor the E-R, however, detailed exactly what those "threats" were.

The editorial continued: "All this is not to say that it is not possible that this was the act of some otherwise deranged fire bug. But that is not likely," the triple negative all but spelling out the E-R’s belief that the fire was a terrorist political act by liberal-minded citizens of Chico.

Where have we seen this before?

Long-time Examiner readers will recall that several years ago the E-R used a similarly damning editorial to suggest that critics of chain stores, including the Examiner Editor, were responsible for some minor vandalism at the downtown Wendy’s outlet. Remarkably, the editorial claimed that these chain store critics, who it compared to "Brown Shirt Nazis," had actually caused the store in question to go out of business.

That editorial was coupled with a series of articles and commentary by E-R business reporter Laura Urseny in which Urseny put forward at least three outright lies supporting the allegation of a politically motivated campaign of violent terror against the Wendy’s.

The Examiner subsequently reviewed the police reports related to Wendy’s, and proved conclusively that there was no politically motivated campaign targeting Wendy’s, and that Urseny had fabricated and repeated lies.

The E-R has yet to retract its editorial about the Wendy’s situation, or Urseny’s lying articles.

We’ll see if in light of this article the paper can find it within itself to do follow-up on the Keene porch fire, a situation that, by implication anyway, it used to wrongly attack those who opposed Keene politically.

Keene could not be reached for comment Thursday night.