Date: January 25, 2017
Contact: Gary Mott, 530-595-6102
MINERAL, CA – Lassen Volcanic National Park Acting Superintendent Gary Mott announced that the sentencing hearing on January 24 for Nicholas M. Coberley resulted in 27 months in a State Prison and three years of supervised probation. Coberley, age 45, had pled guilty in federal court on October 11, 2016 for charges stemming from an incident on a June night within Lassen Volcanic National Park.
The National Park Service would like to thank the U.S. Attorney’s Office and Plumas County District Attorney’s Office for their support in the successful prosecution of Mr. Coberley. Visitor and employee safety is of paramount importance to the National Park Service, we would like to also thank the Plumas County Sheriff’s Office and California Highway Patrol in helping resolve the situation with no significant injuries.
According to court documents, at about 9:00 p.m. on June 20, 2016, two park visitors alerted a seasonal park ranger to a man walking along a park roadway, shouting and behaving erratically. The ranger observed Coberley walking down the middle of an unlit road towards a guest lodge yelling loudly and gesturing with his arms. Concerned that Coberley could be a danger to himself or others, the ranger requested law enforcement response and approached Coberley to delay him from getting to the lodge and nearby campground.
After initially hiding from the ranger, Coberley then ran at the ranger’s vehicle and leaped into the truck bed. Court documents detail how Coberley picked up two firefighting tools from the truck bed, climbed atop the cab of the truck and repeatedly struck the truck’s roof and windows. He crawled through the shattered rear window into the passenger compartment, choked the ranger and swung a Pulaski at the ranger’s head. The ranger suffered an injury to his hand during the attack.
-NPS-
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