Private land for a timber company
Affectionately known as God's Country
"Law enforcement just doesn't have the means to take care of it any longer," Trouette told TPM. The 2011 murder of Fort Bragg, Calif. city councilman Jere Melo by an illegal trespasser tending poppy plants as Melo patrolled private land for a timber company made a big impression on Trouette, he said. Lear was incorporated the same year, and the company has worked with a non-profit founded in Melo's memory.
"That's when the hole began to be filled in my understanding of how to put together a cohesive, legal, organized private security firm that is now dealing with these types of issues," Trouette said, explaining that he sees Lear "on the cutting edge of citizens becoming involved in their communities and utilizing their legal rights to affect positive change in their communities."
Prior to their new assignment, Lear took on a quasi-law enforcement on at least one occasion. Back in 2013, Lear scouted an illegal marijuana grow on private land in rural Mendocino County. As reported by the Willits News they encountered two trespassers, detaining them until police arrived. The two individuals were subsequently arrested for possessing firearms and methamphetamine.
When asked, Trouette described his overall relationship with the county sheriff as "strained at times."
In a phone interview with TPM, Mendocino County Sheriff Tom Allman seemed a little uncomfortable with having armed contractors operating in his jurisdiction. But he said he hadn't been given any evidence that Lear had infringed on marijuana growers' rights -- though he would be quick to investigate if he was. Trouette asserted that his team had only ever conducted marijuana raids on private land where they'd been hired to work.
"I will go out of my way to investigate anybody's who's doing vigilante work in the name of trying to make the world a better place," Allman said. "But I can't open an investigation until somebody says I'm the victim of a crime."