SACRAMENTO, Calif., July 2 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The McClatchy Company (NYSE: MNI) announced today that Lynn Dickerson, vice president, operations, will leave the company July 17. "We continue to restructure and transition to a new business model - one that requires us to be smaller and more efficient in every area of the organization.

A sheriff's deputy examining a suspicious package outside a California courthouse found two toy guns and a live rattlesnake in a trash bag. Merced County Sheriff's Deputy Tom MacKenzie said the venomous snake was an adult 3 to 4 feet in length, The Modesto Bee reported.

A Modesto, Calif., woman said what appeared to be an early Christmas present in her driveway turned out to be a stolen 2005 Bentley Continental GT. Rosa Warren, 45, said she called her boyfriend after she and her daughter discovered the car in their driveway Tuesday morning but he confirmed that it was not a gift and told her to call police, The Modesto Bee reported Thursday. Police Sgt.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Emily Kay Shrader, a junior at Enochs High School in Modesto, Calif., and a member of The Modesto Bee's Teens in the Newsroom program, is playing Dorothy in YES Company's production of "The Wizard of Oz," which opens Aug. 8. She kept a journal during the several weeks of rehearsal.

By The Modesto Bee, Calif. Aug. 4--National Night Out is Tuesday and, as usual, Modesto is more than ready.