SHATTERED DREAM: DESPITE TROUBLES, NURSE CLINGS TO LAND

CHEROKEE -- Since her childhood in Pasadena, Cynthia Stevenson has
dreamed of living on a farm.

Eighteen months ago, she thought the dream had come true, when she
bought 10 acres in Cherokee, a rural community near Table Mountain.

Stevenson moved into a small cabin and planted an orchard on the
property. She named the place Windsong Ranch.

"You hear the wind in the digger pines and oaks," she said. "It was so quiet."

Stevenson has horses and turkeys and chickens. And she bought three
puppies - Australian shepherds - from a local breeder. She named
them Lenny, Sonny and Cody. She's got a couple of cats, too.

"This is my Shangri-la," she said. "My sanctuary after dealing with people."

Stevenson has worked as a home-health nurse for Feather River
Hospital in Paradise for nearly 20 years.

Windsong Ranch was idyllic for about six months.

At that point, she started having trouble with some people who she
said were growing "medical marijuana" on land they own in the area.

One of their pit bulls attacked one of her turkeys, she said. They
threw big parties and made a lot of noise. One man would walk around
naked, sometimes in view of other people living in the area, she said.

Stevenson said she complained to authorities: county supervisors,
county code-enforcement officers, the district attorney and the sheriff.

She complained that the people who were bothering her were camping
illegally on their property. She raised questions about sanitation
and building codes.

The main result of her complaints was to bring retaliation from
those neighbors, she said. She began noticing people following her.
People connected with the pot-growing operation would try to "stare
her down," she said.

On the evening of Oct. 5, Stevenson said, she came home to find her
three dogs missing.

She talked to neighbors, but none of them had seen the dogs.

She's convinced they were taken by the people who'd been bothering her.

She has four security cameras on her property. They showed the dogs
had been around all day, but then at about 4 p.m., there was no
further sight of them.

Stevenson talked to neighbors but no one had seen the dogs. She put
up posters, she said, put an ad in the newspaper, contacted local
shelters and Australian shepherd rescue organizations. She offered a reward.

Losing the dogs was devastating, she said. "They are very devoted
and so intelligent. I'd clap and they'd come. They were devoted to
me and I was devoted to them. They were always by my side."

Weeks went by with no sign of the dogs.

Late in December, Stevenson said she got a call from Butte Humane
Society, saying that two Australian shepherds had been turned in at
the shelter in Chico. She went and checked but found they weren't her dogs.

A week later, she was checking the Web site of an organization
called NorCal Aussie Rescue, when she saw a dog she was sure was Sonny.

He was said to be at Butte Humane Society in Chico. The listing said
someone had found him wandering in the woods near Forest Ranch,
hungry and bedraggled, with vultures circling over him.

"You don't think I was moved to tears?" Stevenson said.

She contacted the shelter and learned that Sonny had already been
adopted and was now living in the Bay Area.

She tried to get Sonny's new owners to return him, but they were unwilling.

Today, Stevenson is still looking for Lenny and Cody, and she hopes
the family that adopted Sonny might change their minds about keeping him.

She's not happy with the Butte Humane Society and while she knows
local police are very busy, she says she can't understand why
officers kept telling her their "hands were tied" when it came to
dealing with her predicament.

These days, Stevenson's feelings about her Shangri-la are very mixed.

"Had I known there was so much pot being grown out there, I probably
wouldn't have bought the property," she said. "It was just beautiful."

But her neighbors' efforts to intimidate her have strengthened her
resolve to stay there, she said. "It only made me angrier. Makes me
want to dig my heels in. Ain't nobody going to run me off the land.
Sorry, folks."

Staff writer Larry Mitchell can be reached at 896-7759 or
lmitchell@chicoer.com.

BACKGROUND: Cynthia Stevenson, a registered nurse, moved into a
cabin on 10 acres of land she bought in Cherokee.

WHAT HAPPENED: She said some people in the area who were growing
marijuana harassed her continually, trying to get her to move away.

WHAT'S NEXT: Stevenson said she won't leave her land. She hopes for
the return of three dogs she said were stolen from her.