Concerns Over Proposed Release of Rapist in Santa Cruz County
The Sheriff of Santa Cruz County, California, has urged the community to voice their opposition to the state’s plan to release a convicted rapist near a Girl Scout camp.
Sheriff Chris Clark is asking residents to submit their written comments ahead of a court hearing set for October 30 for Michael Cheek. In a post on the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office’s Facebook page, Clark expressed his worries about Cheek’s potential placement in the Santa Cruz Mountains. He pointed out issues like “remote terrain, limited road access, unreliable cell service and GPS, and proximity to schools, a Girl Scout camp, a church, a public park, and family neighborhoods.”
“Our community deserves to be informed, and every voice deserves to be heard,” the post emphasized.
Previously, Clark had discussed Cheek’s proposed placement in a press release shared on September 23. He stated, “As sheriff, I have a responsibility to inform our community and the Court when a proposed placement raises foreseeable public safety concerns. As someone who calls Santa Cruz County home and is raising my family here, I understand how deeply this news affects all of us throughout the county.”
Clark also noted that Cheek’s victims, whose attacks took place in Santa Cruz County, should not have to “carry the risk of his placement.”
Cheek was convicted of kidnapping, rape, and forcible oral copulation in 1980 and received prison time, according to a 2024 press release from the District Attorney’s Office. After escaping from jail, he committed another rape of a 15-year-old girl at gunpoint, leading to a longer prison sentence. In 1997, he was declared a sexually violent predator under the Sexually Violent Predator Act.
After completing a sex offender program, Cheek was transferred to a psychiatric hospital in 2019, where he was deemed suitable for conditional release. A judge ordered his release that same year. In 2024, it was proposed that Cheek be released to a residence in Aptos, but the District Attorney’s Office and local residents were against it.
Attempts to place Cheek in Bonny Doon and Redwood City in 2021 also fell through, leading to community outcry. “His crimes are heinous, absolutely heinous; why would someone like that get to leave prison?” a Redwood City resident remarked at the time.
