Author: Matt Lait

A man who claimed to be the brother of former Mexican president Vicente Fox and took money from Beverly Hills investors for bogus business opportunities pleaded guilty Tuesday to grand theft, securities fraud and tax evasion, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.

Alfredo Trujillo Fox, 67, was sentenced to seven years in state prison for the crimes and ordered to pay $460,000 to seven victims. He was also ordered to pay $117,000 to the state franchise tax board.

Fox was arrested in January at the end of an investigation launched in June 2008 by the district attorney’s office. He was charged with 15 counts of grand theft, 15 counts of unqualified sales of securities, 15 counts of misrepresentation in sales of securities and two counts of tax evasion, and was facing a maximum of 27 years in prison.

As part of his plea deal, all but two counts each of grand theft and fraudulent sales of securities and one count of tax evasion were dropped.

According to his victims, Fox lured investors by boasting of lofty connections and displaying signs of his own wealth, driving fancy cars and dining at high-end restaurants. They said he promised unrealistically high returns for tens of thousands of dollars in investments, saying his money was held up by Homeland Security or because of the Patriot Act.

More than 20 years ago, Fox was sentenced to 10 years in prison in Arizona after investors there and in Florida said he defrauded them, claiming to be a well-connected lawyer. He served six years of that sentence before he was released on parole, according to Arizona prison records.

 

— Victoria Kim

Blanket strip searches of incoming jail inmates are constitutional and necessary to prevent the smuggling of contraband into detention centers, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

The decision by a full 11-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals replaces a smaller panel’s ruling in 2008 that strip searches are so dehumanizing that they violate a person’s constitutional rights if conducted without good reason to suspect that the individual is carrying drugs or weapons.

The ruling undermined one of several civil rights violations that antiwar protester Mary Bull and eight others alleged in their class-action lawsuit against the city and county of San Francisco. The protesters alleged they were mistreated by authorities when arrested during a November 2002 demonstration.

“This is not a final defeat at all. It opens the case to move forward,” attorney Mark E. Merin said of Tuesday’s fractured ruling, noting that the arrestees’ complaint was headed for trial by jury in federal district court.

Writing for the majority, Judge Sandra S. Ikuta, an appointee of President George W. Bush, said the court had found the strip-search policy “reasonable under the 4h Amendment.” She pointed out that the searches had produced hundreds of caches of drugs, money, shanks, knives and other items that can pose risk to jail personnel and other inmates.

Four separate opinions were filed by the 11 judges, including a dissent written by Judge Sidney R. Thomas and joined by three fellow appointees of President Clinton.

Thomas had written the 2008 ruling against strip searches without probable cause, saying that “the intrusiveness of body-cavity searches cannot be overstated.”

In his dissent, Thomas recounted that Bull had been arrested at a peaceful protest, slammed to a concrete floor during booking, stripped and subjected to a body-cavity search, then left naked in a cell for 11 hours. She was subjected to a second strip search before being released without charges.

— Carol J. Williams

Inglewood Mayor Roosevelt Dorn abruptly resigned his elected post Sunday evening, hours before he pleaded guilty this morning to a misdemeanor just as his trial on public corruption charges was expected to begin, a district attorney’s spokeswoman said.

Dorn, a former Superior Court judge, was fined $1,000 and placed on two years of probation as part of a plea agreement with prosecutors, said Shiara Davila-Morales. As part of the sentence, Dorn, 74, is prohibited from holding public office.

Dorn, a three-term mayor and ordained clergyman, faced embezzlement charges in connection with his borrowing of $500,000 from a city-funded low-interest loan program originally intended to help Inglewood administrators afford to live in the city. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor conflict of interest charge, Davila-Morales said.

Dorn borrowed the money in November 2004, five months after he voted with the 3-2 council majority to extend the program to elected officials. He received a 30-year loan with a variable interest rate of 2.39%, far less than the market rate.

He allegedly used the funds to pay off the mortgage on his Inglewood home and put the rest in his bank account. He repaid the loan in October 2006.

[Updated at 2:11 p.m.: The headline on an earlier version of this post said Dorn resigned after pleading guilty. He resigned before entering his plea.]

— Jack Leonard

More breaking news in L.A. Now:

Detectives seek public’s help in solving Lawndale triple-slaying

State Supreme Court OKs ‘John Doe’ warrants based on crime-scene DNA

California Supreme Court throws out pension charges against 5 ex-retirement board members in San Diego

California state prison changes take effect today

Zsa Zsa Gabor’s husband wants to be governor; California residents want to cut services

Vans, small trucks deliver supplies to snowed-in Big Bear

New rainstorm headed to Southern California

Crews work to clear closed roads to Big Bear of snow and ice

School district gets heat for banning dictionary over ‘oral sex’ definition. What do you think?

A 17-year-old girl killed last July, allegedly by a transient parolee, had bite marks to her face and ear and had injuries all over her body showing she violently struggled with her attacker, a coroner’s official testified this morning.

Jeffrey Gutstadt, a medical examiner for L.A. County, testified Monday at the preliminary hearing of 50-year-old Charles Samuel, who is accused of kidnapping and murdering Lily Burk. Burk left her Los Feliz home on July 24 on an errand for her mother and never returned. Prosecutors allege Samuel killed the girl after failed attempts to get her to withdraw cash with a credit card.

[Updated at 3 p.m.: Samuel was ordered to stand trial this afternoon for the murder of Burk and other felony counts, including kidnapping, robbery and carjacking.

Judge David S. Wesley found there was “sufficient cause” to believe Samuel is guilty of the crimes, and ordered him to return to court in February for arraignment. The judge denied a motion by Samuel’s attorney to dismiss the case.]

Gutstadt said most of the injuries occurred while Burk was still alive. She was killed by an incision to the right side of her neck, possibly caused by a broken bottle, which would have caused her to lose consciousness within minutes, the examiner testified.

A forensic print specialist for the Los Angeles Police Department testified later in the morning that broken shards of green-colored glass, possibly from a Pellegrino water bottle, were found in the black Volvo where Burk’s body was found. No fingerprints were found on the glass, she testified during cross examination by Samuel’s attorney, Albert DeBlanc Jr.

Gutstadt also testified that more of the wounds were on the left side of the girl’s body. On Friday, prosecutors presented video surveillance images and suggested Samuel drove Burk’s black Volvo. Burk’s body was later found on the passenger side of the vehicle.

The examiner also testified that Burk had sustained abrasions and contusions to her scalp, possibly indicating that her head had been hit against the car’s dashboard or struck from above with an object.

Burk’s mother, Deborah Drooz, clutched onto a handkerchief and quietly sobbed, her body shaking, as the coroner’s official testified. The girl’s father left the courtroom before the testimony began.

Judge David Wesley is expected to rule today on whether there is enough evidence to try Samuel, who had walked out from a residential drug-treatment facility on the day of the killing, in Burk’s murder. Samuel is also accused of committing the murder in the course of a kidnapping, robbery and carjacking, making him eligible for the death penalty.

The hearing is expected to resume this afternoon.

— Victoria Kim

Photo: Times file

Three people were killed and four wounded overnight in half a dozen shootings across Los Angeles County, authorities said.

The violence began in Van Nuys about 9:25 p.m. Saturday when an unidentified man was wounded in a drive-by shooting in the 15800 block of Vanowen Street, a Los Angeles police spokeswoman said. The victim was transported to a hospital, where he was listed in stable condition, Officer April Harding said.

About an hour later, Harding said, a gunman fatally shot an unidentified man in 11200 block of Califa Street in North Hollywood. She said she had no information about a possible motive for the shooting.

Shortly after midnight, Dontae Cotton, 28, was fatally shot outside his home in the Harvard Park neighborhood of South L.A. Police said a car stopped in the street and a gunman got out and confronted Cotton as he was walking from his parked car to his home in the 1600 block of West 60th Place. Detectives believe the shooting was gang-related, Harding said.

Another man was wounded in Boyle Heights as he left a party about 12:20 a.m. Harding said an SUV pulled up in front of the victim in the 3100 block of Winter Street, and several shots were fired before the vehicle sped off. The victim was reported in stable condition at a hospital, she said. Detectives believe the suspects are gang members, she said.

Minutes later, two men were shot in Pomona as they stood in the 1000 block of East Phillips Boulevard after they were involved in a noninjury traffic collision. The victims, both Pomona residents in their early 20s, were exchanging information with another driver in the accident when four men in a white Honda Accord drove westbound on Phillips and opened fire, said Pomona Police Sgt. Jaime Gutierrez. One victim was shot in the right arm, the other in the left leg.

Gutierrez asked anyone with information about the shooting to call (909) 620-2085.

Another shooting occurred in the unincorporated South L.A. neighborhood of Athens. A man was killed in the 1100 block of West 126th Street about 1:36 a.m., a sheriff’s spokeswoman said. A coroner’s official identified the victim as 19-year-old Marquise Ortiz of Los Angeles.

— Jack Leonard