Dr. Charles T. Thompson, the man allegedly involved in a car vs. bike road rage incident in Mandeville Canyon on July 4, has been arrested on suspicion of felony assault with a deadly weapon -- his car -- our police reporter, Richard Winton, says.
Cyclists at the scene say Thompson exchanged angry words with two riders, then pulled ahead, blocked the road and slammed on his brakes. The cyclists went flying, one onto the side of the road.
The other cyclist, Ron Peterson, a 40-year-old cameraman, went head-first into Thompson's rear window. Peterson broke his nose, two of his front teeth and has numerous cuts on his face.
Pat DeNatale, one of the Sierra Hotshots, sets backfires with a drip torch above Goleta in the Santa Ynez mountains Monday as hand crews cleared brush from hills that haven't burned in 53 years, all part of an effort to keep flames from cresting the mountains. See story here, and more pix here.
They looked the other way for decades, but now officials say they're going to start enforcing the law on a clothing-optional stretch of San Onofre State
Beach.
Citing ongoing complaints from park visitors and the fear of workplace
harassment lawsuits from employees, officials say they will begin
citing skinny dippers who refuse to cover up after Labor Day. New large
signs warning that nudity is prohibited have recently sprouted up
throughout the park, and rangers are telling nude sunbathers that their
endless summer is about to end.
"Times have changed," said Rich Haydon, acting superintendent of the
California Parks and Recreation Department's Orange Coast District.
"The population growth within a two-hour
drive of San Onofre has grown
tremendously through the years. It can no long be
considered a remote
beach."
Angered naturists say they intend to fight the move lying down -- in
the sand, as hundreds of nude sunbathers do every summer weekend.
"Do you think one or two rangers could cite all those people? No way,"
said R. Allen Baylis, who heads Friends of San Onofre Beach, a naturist
group. "There's going to be no way to effectively enforce this policy."
Highway 1 is shut down, condor chicks are in jeopardy and firefighters seem to be losing the 11-day-old battle against the Basin Complex blaze. Now this, gas at $5.20 per gallon. For regular!
The LAT story is here, and a photo gallery is here.
David Allen Crawford, known in the Valley's booming porn industry as 'David Lord' ("Pinks" and "Bad Ass School Girls 2") is in a bit of hot water as police question statements he made on immigration applications for Hungarian women. Basically, he's accused of tricking women into moving to the U.S. to be prostitutes, the Daily News reports:
Two Hungarian nationals and a San Fernando Valley porn director were arrested on suspicion of tricking Hungarian women to come to the United States and work as prostitutes in a Sherman Oaks brothel, authorities said today.
David Allen Crawford, 37, known in the adult film industry as David Lord, was arrested today at his Reseda home on suspicion of making false statements on immigration applications related to sham marriages.
The owner of Primal Productions is charged with perjury in relation to an immigration application for his Hungarian "spouse," Agnes Jeges, who also was arrested today at her Van Nuys apartment.
We Googled and (surprise!) couldn't find a single image suitable for the blog. Merely searching took us to sites that, should human Resources have questions, will take some serious explaining. The full Daily News story is here.
Four acres burned and three homes were threatened In the Sand Canyon area near Santa Clarita Tuesday before firefighters and water-dropping helicopters brought this grass fire under control. No one was hurt, and the homes were saved. The Goleta fire, meanwhile, rages on.
Evacuations have been ordered along a 20-mile stretch of coast as firefighters prepare to set a series of back-fires as the fight against the Basin Complex fire continues. Full story here.
Seems no one remembered to pay taxes for the last four years on a beachfront condo in La Jolla owned by Cindy McCain, Newsweek is reporting:
When you're poor, it can be hard to pay the bills. When you're rich, it's hard to keep track of all the bills that need paying. It's a lesson Cindy McCain learned the hard way when NEWSWEEK raised questions about an overdue property-tax bill on a La Jolla, Calif., property owned by a trust she oversees. Mrs. McCain is a beer heiress, with an estimated $100 million fortune and, along with her husband, she owns at least seven properties, including condos in California and Arizona.
Apparently an elderly aunt lives in the condo and the bank that handles the trust didn't receive the tax bills. Soon after the news weekly asked McCain about the tax bill, San Diego county received a $6,744.42 payment. But Newsweek says she owes another $1,742 which, if not paid by July 1, throws the property back into default. The full story in Newsweek is here.
Got an idea for a better battery? John McCain wants to give you $300 million to invent one:
Sen. John McCain added an unusual twist to his emerging energy agenda
Monday, promising to award a $300-million prize to the inventor of a
next-generation battery that could power electric vehicles. The prize
amount is small relative to the billions of dollars the federal
government spends on other energy industries. The Bush administration
has already pledged $1.2 billion toward research on hydrogen fuel
cells, a technology that proponents say is 10 or more years from
viability.
But the Arizona senator spoke expansively Monday of the potential of
American ingenuity. "We are the country of Edison, Fulton and two
brothers named Wright," he said at a town hall event at Fresno State
University's Satellite Student Union. "Think of all the highest
scientific endeavors of our age: the invention of the silicon chip, the
creation of the Internet, the mapping of the human genome."
Juan Manuel Alvarez, 29, who caused a Metrolink crash in 2005 that killed 11 people and injured 180 others, has been convicted of murder, arson and a special circumstances allegation, which makes him eligible for the death penalty. He showed no emotion as the verdicts were announced. The full article is here.
Japan's Crown Prince Naruhito, the 48-year-old heir to the Chrysanthemum Throne, the world's oldest monarchy, arrived in L.A. today for a two-day visit.
He is pictured touring the Japanese American National Museum this afternoon. In the background are stacks of suitcases carried by ethnic Japanese when they were forced into internment camps during World War II.
No stories about the visit, yet — we'll post some links as they come in. When the crown prince visited Brazil earlier this month, many news stories focused on the absence of his wife, Crown Princess Masako, who has been absent from the public eye for years.
A federal judge in San Francisco ruled today that the Department of Veterans Affairs has not systematically denied mental health care to veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder or unreasonably weighed down the benefits system, adding such grievances should be addressed by Congress or the secretary of Veterans Affairs.
“The court can find no systemic violations system-wide that would compel district court intervention,” Judge Samuel Conti wrote.
Conti found that individual members would have standing to sue. “Given the dire consequences many of these veterans face without timely receipt of benefits or prompt treatment for medical conditions, especially depression and PTSD, these injuries are anything but conjectural or hypothetical,” he wrote.
So we're sitting here on the deck of my house (well, trailer, really) in Paradise Cove yesterday, minding our own business and trying to stay cool, when a sheriff's helicopter starts circling above. It's about 6 p.m., the heat is breaking and the Paradise Cove Beach Cafe, a wildly popular restaurant on the sand, is jammed.
A friend, Diana, is here to shoot an assignment for a photo class -- environmental portraits -- and she heads to the beach to find surfers. What she gets instead is a series of increasingly hostile questions about what she's doing on the beach with a camera (already answered) and whether she's a paparazzo. (Ummm, no.)
Diana says as much to several young men who clearly don't believe her. (And don't have the sense of a sand flea, considering she's got a tripod, a flash and one of those white photo flash umbrellas tucked into her beach tote, which has her initials on it. Not exactly the crash-and-grab set-up of a pap rat.) They threaten her a bit and scare her a lot until a tatooed surfer believes her and lets Diana shoot his photo for her assignment.
Turns out the helicopter that circled for 20 minutes and the sirens that followed were L.A. County sheriff's deputies responding to a brawl near the cafe, where a pack of paparazzi were trying to get a shot of (we're told, but didn't see him) Colin Farrell.
Considering the dust-up that happened on Saturday at Little Dume, a lovely cove just a quarter mile north of here, where a bunch of surfers menaced the pack of papratz stalking Matthew McConaughey, and the anti-paparazzi law our fair city of Malibu has vowed to pass, this isn't the last we'll be hearing on this particular topic. (Oh -- and that's a shot of the pack waiting at the foot of the road to Britney Spears' house last fall.)
She's baaaack, Ojai's Pastie Lady, now known as the Naked Lady of Ashland, Ore. Jen Moss is her name and the definition of the word "genitalia" is presently her game. Specifically, what the word means as cited in the Oregon state law that covers public nudity.
Moss is betting the law doesn't cover breasts, so she's not planning to cover hers. She wants to roller skate in the the town's annual July 4 parade, blowing a conch shell, dressed in just a G-string, according to an AP story.
The
Ashland Chamber of Commerce learned of her coverage plans from an
online posting.
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"We don't feel that
someone in the parade who is topless or nearly naked is appropriate for
a family audience," said parade chairman James Kidd.
He said a
letter was sent to Moss on Monday and wouldn't speak specifically about
the chamber's position until he was certain that she had received the
letter.
Kidd did say that parade rules clearly indicate that
entries must be appropriate for a family audience. He also said he
understood that the Ashland city ordinance allows women to be topless.
"She's welcome on any other day of the year to do that," he said. "But not on the Fourth of July while in the parade."
But with City Council member Eric Navickas saying he's on Moss' side, there's bound to be more naked drama to come.
The good news -- the salmonella-tainted tomatoes that sickened nine people weren't grown here in California. The bad news -- the FDA won't tell us much more than that.
In a story by Tiffany Hsu, we learn the tomatoes were served at two different outlets of a chain restaurant. (That sure narrows things down.) And here's what the Food and Drug Administration refused to tell reporters during a conference call:
1. The name of the restaurant chain where the tomatoes were served
2. The location of said chain
3. Whether the restaurants were in the same state
4. The time frame during which the tomatoes were served
How, exactly, is this helpful? And why is it "confidential" information?
... mingled with the Hollywood film crowd last night as Warren Beatty got a lifetime achievement award at AFI. Here's a (somewhat tart) note from Susan, one of our readers, who was at the event:
Maybe we have [his] nephew to thank for Clinton showing up at the AFI Life Achievement Award for Warren Beatty tonight -- those of us in the audience were surprised to see him. A frail but very sharp McGovern was there, so were Jerry Brown and a few others.
Besides of course, Jack and Dyan who raced over from the Lakers' loss. Faye Dunaway and Elaine May looked like they had the same doctor for cheek implants; makes you appreciate Diane Keaton's natural approach to aging gracefully.
More coverage -- actually about Warren -- from Anne Thompsons excellent "On Hollywood" blog, People, The Gossip Girls (where Hugh Hefner and his posse of blonds take center stage), USA Today, the ever-cranky Fox News (Hollywood Left-fest!) and of course, AP.
George Calvarescu bought a kayak, saw the L.A. River, had an epiphany and, 52 miles later — dressed in his business suit — the San Fernando Valley resident had paddled the L.A. River downstream to work in Long Beach. Full story in the LaLa Times.
That's what the San Gabriel Valley Tribune is reporting after league officials sat down with the billionaire for football talks earlier this week. Roski, you may recall, is the developer who wants to build the "Los Angeles Stadium" on a 600-acre parcel he owns in the City of Industry. Here's more from the Trib:
National Football League officials, who initially had little reaction to Roski's proposal, now call the plan "an interesting possibility" after a sit-down meeting earlier this week with officials from Roski's Majestic Realty Co.
"At their request, the Roski group provided us an update on their stadium project," wrote NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy in an email to this paper. "Mr. Roski's site certainly seems to present an interesting possibility. The permitting and construction processes seem to be more defined than other sites we have seen."
Majestic proposed the stadium in April, and McCarthy at the time said NFL staffers are "monitoring all stadium-related developments at this time."
Majestic Realty Co. Vice President John Semcken, who is the lead for the project, said the NFL brass are now showing a little enthusiasm.
"They have seen the plan now," he said of a meeting he had Monday at the NFL headquarters in New York. "They're very impressed."
Out in the real world, the plan has as many skeptics as supporters. Online though, several thousand football-starved fans have already signed up for tickets. The full story from the SGV Trib is here.
We mentioned yesterday that we'd heard Bill Clinton is in town to deliver the commencement speech -- they call it an "advancement speech" at his nephew's school in Redondo Beach. Now comes news the rumor was right: graduating 8th graders at Riviera Hall Lutheran School will get the benefit of the former president's advice. The Daily Breeze reports:
The K-8 institution rescheduled
its annual advancement event to accommodate Clinton, whose nephew Tyler
(son of his brother, Roger) is among the students being feted with a
4:30 p.m. private ceremony.
Only ticket holders will gain entrance to the graduation, which also has been closed to the media.
School
representatives have called Clinton's impending appearance both
"exciting" and "an honor" -- same as it was the first time he dropped in
on the Palos Verdes Boulevard campus.
It's Clinton's second visit to the school. Details in the Breeze's full story here.
A conservative Christian group based in Virgina filed legal papers today to try to delay the start of same-sex marriages in California on Tuesday, the Associated Press is reporting:
The Virginia-based Liberty Counsel filed court documents Thursday arguing that the wording of the California Supreme Court ruling last month legalizing gay marriages allows the lower court to implement the decision on its own terms and schedule.
Liberty Counsel argued that the ruling put dozens of state laws addressing marriage into conflict and that the state Legislature needs time to address those issues.
The lawyers also argue that the high court's ruling should be placed on hold until after the November elections, when California voters will decide whether to amend the state Constitution to ban the unions.
The Supreme Court said no to a similar request last week. Full story: AP via LADN.
Turns out that "new shower curtain smell" is actually a noxious brew of toxic chemicals that can harm your liver, damage your central nervous system, affect your breathing and even interfere with fertility. (And you thought the shower scene from "Psycho" was scary.) Tami Abdollah has the alarming details in her story here.
The charreada, or Mexican-style rodeo, is a home-grown event that gives Mexican Americans a flavor of home. With with events like bull tail-pulling and tripping up horses by roping their front feet (as shown at a Sacramento rodeo in the photo at right) more states are banning the amateur sport, according to a story in today's New York Times:
It always begins at noon in a dusty arena, with brisk salutes on the brims of glittering sombreros and mustachioed horsemen in three-piece suits.
Let others have their golf and their swimming holes. Here in the Central Valley of California, and in Winnemucca, Nev., and Joliet, Ill., a growing number of middle-class Mexican Americans spend lazy summer afternoons at the charreada — part rodeo, part fiesta and one of Mexico’s most revered sporting events, dating to the 17th century.
“We don’t live and then go to the charreada,” said Marcos Franco, a 51-year-old flooring contractor from Tracy, Calif., who is the United States representative for the Federación Mexicana de Charrería. “We live for the charreada.”
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But now the charreada, which is strictly amateur, is facing its biggest challenge. After criticism from animal rights and anti-rodeo activists, eight states over the last decade have cracked down on several events, most notably horse tripping, a centuries-old tradition that involves roping and snaring the front legs of a running mare and that can cause serious injury. As a result, no charros in the federation practice horse tripping.
