Former radio host was stabbed to death

As a former radio talk show host, Mike Webb made his name by bringing a righteous, raging passion for politics to his late-night broadcasts.

At 52 years old, Webb's voice was silenced by someone wielding a blade.

		Paul Joseph Brown / P-I
	Mike Webb and his attorney, Mark Larranaga, listen as deputy prosecuting attorney Nancy Balin presents evidence at his trial.

Webb's body was found Thursday hidden in a crawl space of his Queen Anne neighborhood home, and it was identified Friday by the King County Medical Examiner's Office. Though the remains were badly decayed -- Webb had been missing for two months -- investigators were able to determine he'd been stabbed repeatedly by his killer.

Police declined to release many details on the investigation, describing the inquiry as "active and ongoing."

Webb, a 10-year veteran of KIRO-AM/710, was fired in December 2005 after being charged with insurance fraud.

He had taken up with "shady" individuals in the months before his disappearance, according to statements his family made to police.

As news of his death spread Friday, fans and friends mourned Webb's passing.

"Mike didn't sound like anybody else, and it was because he was fiery and passionate," said KIRO-AM afternoon host Dori Monson, a former colleague of Webb. "He truly believed everything he said."

Raised in San Francisco, Webb got his start in radio covering anti-war protests for Bay Area stations, according to a biography posted on his Web site, mikewebb.org.

Webb moved to Seattle in the 1980s, working on and off the air at several radio stations before landing at KIRO in 1996.

Webb's colleagues remembered his broadcasts for his acerbic rants and frequent berating of listeners who dared to disagree with him.

"Sometimes, you'd say, 'Holy cow! That's not what you expect to hear on the air,' " said Tom Clendening, who hired Webb at KIRO in 1996. "He certainly was a real strong personality.

"Either you loved him or hated him, but even a lot of people who hated his style listened to him anyway."

Off the air, Webb was reclusive and shy, Clendening said. He relished being in a darkened studio, late at night, talking to strangers from behind a microphone.

An openly gay man who had struggled with drugs and alcohol, Webb often saw himself as standing up for the little guy.

"In some ways, he felt he was one," Clendening said.

Monson, a libertarian, said he often found himself at odds with Webb politically. Monson described Webb as a "radical liberal" -- a moniker Monson insists Webb would embrace.

More than that, though, Monson said Webb was a man of extremes.

"He really enjoyed the role of being an in-your-face combative talk show host," Monson said "He could be engaging, and he could be combative -- on and off the air."

Webb's off-the-air behavior cost him the job he loved in 2005, when he was charged with insurance fraud.

The charge stemmed from a car wreck in which Webb's Lexus was hit by an uninsured driver. King County prosecutors successfully argued that Webb bought a comprehensive insurance plan the day after the crash and filed a claim.

Webb's first trial was thrown out after jurors saw him apparently experiencing the symptoms of a nervous breakdown outside the Seattle courthouse. He later spent 30 days at a mental health facility.

Webb was sentenced to 240 hours of community service, fined $1,000 and required to continue mental health treatment. The judge suspended a 30-day jail term.

Webb also was ordered to continue treatment for an unspecified psychiatric condition. A missing-person report also notes that he was under a doctor's care.

In an in interview with the Seattle P-I following his conviction, Webb made bizarre claims that right-wing hackers had fabricated the case against him. He asserted the hackers had also used his KIRO e-mail account to send inflammatory messages to his superiors at the station.

Freelance writer Michael Hood said he drew Webb's ire while chronicling the trial on his blog, blatherwatch.blog.com. At one point, Hood took out a restraining order against Webb, claiming the talk show host had threatened to kill him.

Watching Webb during the trial, Hood said he started to believe Webb was growing increasingly irrational.

"I laid off of him after the conviction, when it was so obvious that he was ill," Hood said.

Hood said Webb was extremely paranoid, in part because of a death threat he'd received. Webb told him he was concerned he would be murdered like Denver radio host Alan Berg, who was shot to death in his driveway in 1984 by a neo-Nazi.

Webb said in February that the felony conviction and his firing from KIRO turned his life "upside down." All that kept him going, he said, was making nightly broadcasts online at mikewebb.org.

"The one thing that's been a salvation for me is that show that I've done every night," Webb told the P-I in February.

According to a missing-person report filed May 13, Webb's family last spoke to him in mid-April. His family was concerned for his safety because he had recently been spending time with a "shady character" who had previously taken a car from Webb, according to the report.

In a report to police about the missing Nisan sedan, Webb claimed a 27-year-old man who had been living at his home had taken the car. Webb identified the man to police, but police declined to publicly release the name of the man.

Days after he disappeared, Webb's family members received several text messages from Webb's cell phone but did not speak with him, according to police documents.

Several people -- including missing-persons investigators and Webb's family -- had been to the house in the months since he was reported missing.

Officers last examined the home within the past two weeks, police spokesman Jeff Kappel said.

Property manager David Neth, a longtime acquaintance of Webb's, said he discovered the body Thursday while cleaning out a basement crawl space in the abandoned house.

Webb's body was found covered by a blue tarp surrounded by boxes, Neth said in an e-mail to the P-I.

Neth, a Seattle real estate agent for 30 years, said he met Webb 14 years ago when he rented the house to Webb and the talk show host's romantic partner.

Over the years, Neth said, he and Webb sometimes talked about politics. Usually energized, Webb was often lonely after his partner died, Neth said.

On Friday, callers to the Los Angeles-based GAYBC Radio Network tearfully remembered Webb during a memorial show in his honor.

One caller to the online broadcast said Webb inspired her to become an activist. Another said Webb introduced him to progressive radio.

John McMullen, the network's president and chief executive officer, said Webb mentored and inspired many people.

He said Webb had a gift for transforming a kernel of an idea into a provocative show, sharpened with humor, music and Webb's way with words.

"He was loved by a lot of people," McMullen said. "He had one personality on air -- bombastic and very sharp-tongued -- but he was a very compassionate and caring human being in his private personal life."