Author: Jill Jones

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s all-expenses-paid vacation to South Africa last July, provided by the group Academy of Achievement, was valued at $17,346 — topping the list of gifts he received in 2009, city records show.

During his trip to the Los Angeles-themed Guadalajara International Book Fair in November, Villaraigosa also came home with three art pieces, cuff links and a $75 bottle of tequila courtesy of Mexican dignitaries.

A list of gifts the mayor received in 2009, as well as his major assets and other economic interests, was released Tuesday by the city Ethics Commission along with those for other city elected officials. Under state law, elected officials have to file a statement of their financial interests every year.

City Atty. Carmen Trutanich also had a pretty good year. He collected $32,000 in rent in 2009 for his $2.3-million home in the Naples section of Long Beach. The city attorney, who lives in Harbor City, also received cigars and a humidor as gifts, along with a few neckties.

The records also show Controller Wendy Greuel owns an interest in a building supply company worth $600,000. City Council President Eric Garcetti collected about $300,000 from his financial stake in a Beverly Hills beauty salon.  And Councilman Richard Alarcon reported receiving a $100 suite ticket to the Dodgers’ Oct. 7 playoff game against the St. Louis Cardinals.

Villaraigosa reported receiving more than $2,300 in gifts, including a $65 pair of cuff links from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a $50 tie from former Assembly Speaker Willie Brown.
The mayor also received $23,319 in “travel payments, advances and reimbursements,’’ which included travel for public policy speeches he gave to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and the U.S. Hispanic Leadership Institute.

The nine-day trip to Africa was for an Academy of Achievement event that assembled graduate students from around the world to meet with "the greatest thinkers and achievers of the age," according to the group’s website.

Villaraigosa was accompanied by Lu Parker, a KTLA-TV Channel 5 reporter the mayor is dating.
The free travel expenses, however, did not include the cost of sending the mayor’s Los Angeles Police Department security detail. According to KTLA reporter Eric Spillman, the city picked up that $12,800 tab.

— Phil Willon in L.A. City Hall

A federal jury in San Francisco ruled Friday against an insurgent union fighting the giant Service Employees International Union for representation of tens of thousands of healthcare workers throughout California.

The civil case is the latest chapter in the nasty battle pitting the breakaway National Union of Healthcare Workers against the SEIU, one of the nation’s largest unions.

The rival group split off from the SEIU in January 2009 amid a bitter jurisdictional dispute. The SEIU filed suit in federal court, accusing the breakaway unit and its leaders of sabotage, theft, vandalism and other offenses. The NUHW and its leader, Sal Rosselli, denied any wrongdoing.

The SEIU originally sought some $25 million in damages. Testimony in the case lasted almost two weeks in U.S. District Court in San Francisco.

The federal jury, while finding in SEIU’s favor, awarded a much smaller amount, though how much the NUHW is required to pay remained in dispute. The SEIU said the rival union and its officers, including Rosselli, are liable for more than $1.5 million in damages. The NUHW said the amount owed was $737,850.

The SEIU hailed the verdict in a case that exposed “a scheme to undermine the well-being of union members.”

The NUHW called the lawsuit part of a “smear campaign” and said it planned to appeal.

The rival union said the case cost the SEIU $10 million in legal fees. Steve Trossman, an SEIU spokesman, called the figure “totally fabricated,” adding that the legal fees were probably less than $5 million.

The NUHW has been mounting an aggressive effort to unseat the SEIU as collective bargaining representative for healthcare workers at hospitals, clinics, nursing homes and other sites throughout the state. The bitter battle has split union ranks nationwide.

— Patrick J. McDonnell

A motorist was sentenced in a Santa Ana court Friday to four years in prison for killing a pedestrian while texting on a cellphone.

Martin Bert Kuehl, 42, of Costa Mesa was convicted in January of vehicular manslaughter in the death of Martha Ovalle early Aug. 29, 2008.
Ovalle, 32, a nanny, was struck by Kuehl’s SUV as she was crossing the street near Dover and Westcliff drives in Newport Beach.

Orange County prosecutors said Kuehl was texting while driving. He stopped at a light, failed to notice when it turned green, then lurched forward when the driver of the car behind him honked.

Prosecutors said he told Newport Beach police that he didn’t see Ovalle in the crosswalk before hitting her, despite having an unobstructed view.

— Jill Leovy

Three bronze markers have been pried off the graves of U.S. military veterans at Pacific Crest Cemetery in Redondo Beach, authorities said Friday.

Police sought the public’s help in catching the thief or thieves who apparently broke into the gated cemetery  Thursday evening. An employee discovered the crime Friday and reported it to police.

The names on the 12-by-18-inch markers were not released.

Redondo Beach Police Sgt. Rody Contreras said that the cemetery, located near the South Bay Galleria, is fenced and its gates locked at night but that occasionally trespassers hop a fence near the railroad tracks.

Metal theft has plagued Southern California in recent years, mushrooming as prices for bronze and copper have soared.

Police asked anyone with information on the theft to call the Redondo Beach detective bureau at (310) 379-2477, Ext. 2714.

— Jill Leovy

A teenage boy from west Texas filed a lawsuit Thursday alleging that a priest in the diocese under incoming Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez sexually assaulted him repeatedly and that Gomez should have known the priest was an abuser.

The complaint filed in the small town of Rocksprings is the first allegation of clergy abuse of a minor to have occurred during Gomez’s tenure and made known to the San Antonio Archdiocese leader, who was just named by the Vatican to succeed Cardinal Roger M. Mahony as Los Angeles prelate.

The suit alleges that Father John M. Fiala assaulted the teenager in 2007 and 2008, including forcing him to perform sex acts at gunpoint.

Edwards County sheriff’s officials brought the reported abuse to the attention of the church hierarchy in 2008, the lawsuit said.

A spokesman for the San Antonio Archdiocese, Deacon Pat Rodgers, said in a statement that the Sheriff’s Department had advised church leadership of an investigation into Fiala but on grounds of “interference in the custody of a minor,” not sexual abuse.

A source with knowledge of the case said Fiala came to the attention of law enforcement when the boy’s grandmother, who had legal custody, reported that the priest had taken the boy on overnight trips without permission.

Gomez suspended Fiala from ministerial functions in the fall of 2008, when the archdiocese agreed to cooperate with the investigation, Rodgers said. Fiala was also removed from appointments as pastoral administrator for the three missions and parishes he served.

The archbishop, who is expected to assume his Los Angeles duties in May ahead of his takeover from Mahony next year, instructed Father Martin Leopold to inform parish communities of the “investigation into Father Fiala’s activities,” Rodgers’ statement said. Leopold has been identified by Bexar County law enforcement authorities as the archdiocese’s “point man” on clergy sexual abuse issues.

Gomez has been criticized by victims’ advocates for doing what they consider too little to address three other instances of alleged sexual misconduct by priests in the archdiocese. But all occurred decades ago, long before Gomez’s tenure, and beyond the statute of limitations for bringing civil charges against the alleged perpetrators.

The teenager’s San Antonio attorney, Tom Rhodes, told the Associated Press that the boy’s family was unaware of the alleged sexual abuse until the boy attempted suicide.

— Carol J. Williams

Photo: Incoming L.A. Archbishop Jose Gomez. Photo: Al Seib/Los Angeles Times.

Authorities Tuesday identified two employees of a Compton auto shop who were shot dead after a group of men tried to rob the store.

The bodies of Vance Donnell Dean, 40, of Long Beach and Lejon David Robins, 40, of Huntington Beach were discovered by deputies responding to a burglary-in-progress call just before 8 p.m. Monday at Custom City Auto in the 300 block of North Long Beach Boulevard, authorities said.

Another employee, an adult male, was wounded but is expected to live, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Benjamin Grubb said.

When deputies arrived, they saw a green van matching a description of the suspects’ vehicle driving away. Deputies pulled the van over a few blocks away at Ward Avenue and Compton Boulevard and, after a brief foot pursuit, arrested the six men.

One, however, became unresponsive in the back of a patrol car and was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead of an apparent heart attack. The coroner’s office would not give his name, pending notification of next of kin.

— Tony Barboza and Corina Knoll

A Westminster police detective and a corrections officer were charged Tuesday in the alleged rape and kidnapping of a 25-year-old restaurant worker in Ontario.

Westminster Police Det. Anthony Nicholas Orban, 30, was arrested Saturday on suspicion of kidnapping the woman at Ontario Mills Mall and raping her at gunpoint. Corrections Officer Jeff Thomas Jelinek, 30, from the Chino Institution for Men, was arrested on suspicion of carjacking and is being as an accessory to the crime.

In a 14-page felony complaint filed Tuesday by the San Bernardino County district attorney’s office, Orban is charged with kidnapping, rape, forced oral copulation, penetration with a foreign object, forced sodomy and making criminal threats.

Jelinek is charged with kidnapping, rape and being an accessory after the fact. While Jelinek did not rape the woman he was charged because his actions aided the crime, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Debbie Ploghaus.

“What makes it so heinous is the fact that [Orban] is a police officer and his job is to protect people and this is what he’s doing,” Ploghaus said. “They are both law enforcement officers.”

According to Ontario police, the woman was walking to her car in the parking lot of Ontario Mills Mall about 5 p.m. Saturday when she was confronted by the men. Orban allegedly got in her car, pointed a gun at her and forced her to drive away while Jelinek stood by and watched, police said.

Orban then allegedly ordered the woman to drive to a commercial complex in Fontana, where he raped her. About two hours after she was kidnapped, the woman was able to get out of the car and run to a business to call police, Ploghaus said.

Authorities connected Orban to the incident because he left his service weapon in the woman’s car after he fled and was picked up by Jelinek, police said.

Orban has been with the Westminster Police Department for five years and is assigned to criminal investigations. Jelinek has worked for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation since 2006. Both men are being held at the West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga and have been placed on paid administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation. If convicted, each faces a sentence of 25 years to life in prison on the rape charge.

Both men are expected to be arraigned Wednesday at the Rancho Cucamonga courthouse. Prosecutors have asked that bail for both be raised from $1 million to $2 million.

“We believe they’re a danger,” Ploghaus said. “Both of them are a danger to society.”

— Paloma Esquivel in Orange County

The body of a 60-year-old man who had been arrested on a domestic violence charge was found hanging from a telephone cord inside his jail cell at the Burbank Police Department, authorities said Tuesday.

John Flores was taken into custody Saturday at 1:20 a.m. after allegedly assaulting his wife. He was also charged with assaulting an officer and resisting arrest, Burbank Police Sgt. Robert Quesada said in a statement.

Flores was placed in a cell about two hours later.
The following day about 4:50 p.m., a police jailer noticed Flores hanging from a cord. He was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics.

The Burbank Police Department is investigating the incident. No other information was given.

— Corina Knoll

A 28-year-old stuntwoman was killed Tuesday in Studio City after she fell off her motorcycle and was hit by another vehicle, authorities said.

April Erin Stirton was riding her motorcycle west on the 101 Freeway near the Laurel Canyon Boulevard exit about 7:40 a.m. when she attempted to pass a tow truck ahead of her in the same lane, Lt. Cheryl MacWillie of the Los Angeles County coroner’s office said.

Stirton lost control, fell off her bike and was struck by the back wheels of the tow truck, California Highway Patrol Officer Jose Nunez said. Her motorcycle then skidded two lanes over and became lodged under the rear wheels of another truck.

Stirton, a resident of North Hollywood, had been traveling at 55 mph. She was pronounced dead at the scene. No other injuries were reported.

According to her online resume, Stirton had appeared as an acrobat in live shows and performed stunts on television shows, including “True Blood” and “CSI.”

— Corina Knoll

A Los Angeles County health inspector has been placed on leave while officials and police investigate allegations that he was caught on tape sexually assaulting a Pomona business owner during an inspection last month.

Magdy Tawadros, an environmental health specialist with the county’s Department of Public Health, is accused of groping a 45-year-old business owner at her doughnut shop March 24, according to a claim the woman filed against the county April 1.

The victim, who asked not to be identified, claims Tawadros assaulted her several times in a storage room while her husband was picking up their two children. She resisted, despite fears the inspector would give her shop a bad grade, according to the claim.

“It wasn’t anything that was wanted or desired,” said the woman’s lawyer, Timothy McDonough.

A security camera in the storage room recorded the assaults, and the victim supplied a copy of the footage to the county with her claim, McDonough said.

Tawadros gave the shop a 91% approval rating after the inspection, records show.

The inspector was placed on unpaid leave Monday based on a “preliminary, internal investigation,” according to a statement released by public health officials Tuesday.
“If the allegations are proved to be correct, we will take swift and decisive action,” the statement said.

Tawadros was licensed by the state last July and has worked for the county for about six months, McDonough said.

The victim reported the incident to Pomona police March 29, and they were still investigating Tuesday, said Sgt. Horace Blehr.

[Updated, 9:25 p.m.: Tawadros is 50 years old. Pomona police said late Tuesday that criminal charges are expected.]

— Molly Hennessy-Fiske

Authorities continued to search Tuesday for witnesses to a Malibu crash in which a 26-year-old driver struck and killed a 13-year-old girl on Pacific Coast Highway.

Emily Rose Shane had just left a friend’s home about 5 p.m. Saturday and was walking north on the right side of Pacific Coast Highway near Kanan Dume Road when she was struck by a blue Mitsubishi Lancer, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said. The vehicle then ran into an electric pole and turned over.

Sina Khankhanian of Winnetka was detained at the scene and later booked for murder at the Malibu-Lost Hills sheriff’s station. Authorities determined that Khankhanian may have deliberately crashed his vehicle. They do not believe he intended to hit Emily Rose.

Anyone who saw the vehicle before the crash or saw the collision is asked to call the Sheriff’s Department homicide bureau at (323) 890-5500.

— Corina Knoll

A state appeals court panel Tuesday ordered two murder charges reinstated against a trucker whose out-of-control big rig killed a Palmdale man and his 12-year-old daughter last year in La Cañada Flintridge.

The three-justice panel from the 2nd District Court of Appeal overturned Pasadena Superior Court Judge Lisa Lench’s ruling dismissing the second-degree murder counts against Marcos Barbosa Costa. The panel found Lench erred in her decision to grant a motion by Costa’s attorney to dismiss the charges.

Costa was driving a car hauler on April 1, 2009, when his brakes failed on the steep Angeles Crest Highway descent into La Cañada Flintridge. The big rig hit a small red Ford, killing Angel Posca and his daughter Angelina instantly, then collided with several other vehicles before smashing into a bookstore and a nail salon.

Despite being warned about “the condition of his brakes, the nature of the steep, winding road ahead and the fact many drivers would be on the road at the time, Costa decided to drive his 25-ton, 18-wheel truck into La Cañada. His brakes continued to put out more and more streams of smoke, yet he decided to drive past two turnouts while the brakes were barely working, ultimately driving onto Foothill Boulevard and killing Angel and his daughter,” wrote Presiding Justice Tricia A. Bigelow on behalf of the panel.

Costa, 44, of Everett, Mass. was indicted in June on multiple counts, including two of second-degree murder.
In October, however, Lench dismissed the murder charges at the request of the defense. She agreed there was insufficient evidence to show Costa intended to kill the victims. Prosecutors appealed.

In her ruling, Bigelow noted that there was sufficient evidence “for assuming the possibility that Costa decided to continue to drive his truck down Angeles Crest Highway with an actual awareness of the great risk of harm his actions created, resulting in the deaths of two people.”

— Richard Winton

Photo: L.A. Times file

Two people were killed and a third was injured Monday night during a robbery at a Compton tire shop, authorities said.

Deputies from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department responded shortly before 10 p.m.. to a burglary-in-progress call at Custom City Auto on North Long Beach Boulevard, said sheriff’s Sgt. Ulysses Cruz.

Officers found three people shot at the scene. Two were dead and the one survivor was taken to a hospital.

Three suspects were taken into custody shortly after the shooting and were being questioned, Cruz said.

No other details were immediately available.

— Joel Rubin

Four people were injured Monday evening in Long Beach in a possible gang shooting, police said.

At least one gunman walked up to the group outside an apartment complex in the 200 block of West Burnett Street about 5:20 p.m. and opened fire, said Nancy Pratt of the Long Beach Police Department.

A 19-year-old man shot in the torso was taken to a hospital, where he was listed in stable condition. Two teenage girls and a 22-year-old woman suffered non-life-threatening wounds, Pratt said.

No suspects were in custody Monday night as police investigated “the possibility that it may have been gang-related,” Pratt said.

Anyone with information should contact Long Beach detectives at (562) 570-7370.

[Updated 11 p.m.: Since January 2007, there have been 22 homicides within one mile of Monday’s multiple-injury shooting, according to data collected for The Times’ interactive Homicide Report.]

— Joel Rubin

Map locates the 200 block of West Burnett Street in Long Beach and shows locations of homicides in a one mile radius of shooting scene. Source: Homicide Report.

Farmers in a string of Mexican villages close to the epicenter of Sunday’s magnitude 7.2 earthquake were confronting widespread damage to their homes, schools and churches Monday.

The temblor ripped giant, jagged fissures in the earth’s surface throughout the rural area, situated about 25 miles southeast of Mexicali. Walls and roofs of many homes and other structures were badly cracked. Water, sewage and power services were not working, and the two-lane road connecting the area to Mexicali was impassable at several places where the earthquake had torn the pavement apart.

The quake also pushed up water from beneath the earth’s surface, leaving the area a flooded, muddy mess. Many homes and schools were rendered mud bogs, while the landscape took on the look of a checkerboard with huge pools of water separated by dry patches.

Jorge Alcaraz, 54, lives in Moreno Valley but was visiting family in Nayarit, the village of his childhood. Surveying his brother’s home, which was all but destroyed by the quake, Alcaraz shook his head at the power of the quake as compared with others the area has experienced.

“This is different, “ he said. “This is very, very different.”

Each village is home to several hundred families, who work the surrounding wheat and onion fields. Afraid of aftershocks, many people planned to sleep in their frontyards or in small tent encampments.

The villagers were among the thousands of Mexicans who flocked to an emergency distribution site in the area, where soldiers handed out food rations, water and blankets.

Paula Camacho, 20 and eight months pregnant, and her sister Rosa, 26, received some food and a blanket but did not arrive in time for the limited water supplies. They said they were planning to sleep in a car.

“We now have food. I think my baby will be OK,” Camacho said.

— Tony Perry in Mexicali

A former cast member of ABC’s “Desperate Housewives” is suing the show’s creator and producer, Marc Cherry, alleging that he physically assaulted her, then killed off her character from the series in retaliation after she reported the assault to the network.

Nicollette Sheridan, who played Edie Britt until her character was written off the series in early 2009, alleged in the suit filed Monday in Los Angeles County Superior Court that Cherry was dismissive and demeaning to her during the filming of the show.

In September 2008, Cherry “took her aside and forcefully hit her with his hand across her face and head” during rehearsal after she asked him a question about the script, the suit alleged.
The subsequent decision to kill Sheridan’s character and fire her from the show despite her character’s popularity was retaliation for her reporting Cherry’s assault to ABC, she alleges in the lawsuit.

Sheridan said she suffered damages of more than $20 million. The suit also named ABC and Touchstone Television Productions as defendants.

Sheridan alleged in the suit that Cherry was abusive and hostile toward other actors and writers on the show. After one of the lead actresses on the show spoke to ABC executives, Cherry told Sheridan, “I hope Teri Hatcher gets hit by a car and dies,” the suit alleges.

"While we have yet to see the actual complaint, we
investigated similar claims made by Ms. Sheridan last year and found them to be
without merit," an ABC Studios spokeswoman said. Cherry did not immediately return requests for comment late Monday.

— Victoria Kim

A woman was killed and a man wounded in a shooting Friday in Hawthorne, authorities said.

The gunfire was reported at 5:02 p.m. in the 4900 block of West 117th Street near Inglewood Avenue, said Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Guillermina Saldana.

The woman was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

Saldana said she had no update on the man’s condition or any other details about the shooting.

–Hector Becerra

The son of a former assistant Orange County sheriff and two other men who sought to have their sexual assault convictions and requirements to register as sex offenders overturned have lost their appeal.

“Understandable disappointment” is how attorney Dennis Fischer said he felt on learning that he and his fellow attorneys lost before the 4th District Court of Appeal in the case involving Gregory Haidl and two of his friends. He said they would have to weigh their next legal step.

In a 56-page opinion written by Associate Justice Richard Aronson, Presiding Justice David G. Sills and Associate Justice Raymond Ikola, the 2005 conviction of Haidl (the son of former Assistant Sheriff Don Haidl), Kyle Nachreiner and Keith Spann was upheld.

The panel also rejected the trio’s request that they do not have to register as sex offenders for the rest of their lives.

The three, as teenagers, were convicted in the videotaped sexual assault of an apparently unconscious 16-year-old girl at the elder Haidl’s Newport Beach home.

The Daily Pilot has full details on the ruling.

— Joseph Serna in Orange County

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s appointees at the Department of Water and Power on Wednesday evening rejected the City Council’s proposal for a 4.5% electric rate hike, opting for a larger increase that was more in line with the amount Villaraigosa had sought for his renewable energy proposal.

 After taking a 45-minute break, the DWP board voted unanimously for an increase of 0.7 cents per kilowatt hour, which would translate into a 5.7% rate hike for residents and businesses, according to a high-level utility executive.

The City Council was planning its own 8:45 p.m. meeting to respond to the DWP’s decision.

Councilwoman Jan Perry warned the DWP board that she was willing to reject a larger increase. She accused Raman Raj, the DWP’s acting general manager, of setting in motion “an Armageddon scenario’’ by threatening to withhold $73 million from the city’s struggling budget.

“I’d be more than comfortable voting no on the entire package," Perry said. “My environmental credentials are fine, so I’m not worried about it.”

[Updated, 9:25 p.m.:On a 13-0 vote Wednesday night, the City Council voted to veto the DWP board’s latest rate hike proposal, sending it back to the utility for more work.

The vote came less than an hour after the board approved a larger increase.]

— David Zahniser at DWP headquarters

Photo: Councilman Paul Krekorian called the DWP board’s actions "outrageous." Credit: Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times.

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power’s acting general manager Wednesday urged the utility’s board to reject the City Council’s proposed rate hike, saying it would not protect the agency’s finances.

Raman Raj, who is running the DWP while General Manager S. David Freeman is on vacation, said the board should also refuse to send $73 million to the city’s struggling general fund.

Raj said the DWP needed the increase to last longer than three months, which is the current plan backed by the council.

If the board agrees with Raj in a vote expected Wednesday evening, it would set up a protracted fight over rates in the middle of a budget crisis — one where 4,000 city jobs are already at risk.

Chief Deputy Mayor Jay Carson, who sat in the audience as Raj spoke, would not say whether Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa agreed with the recommendation.

Raj made his remarks after several business leaders said they would need to lay off workers or move out of the city if the mayor’s planned increases go into effect.

— David Zahniser at DWP headquarters