Author: Shelby Grad

Sewage-strewn beaches often appear after Southern California is
pummeled by storms, with those near river mouths hit especially hard.
The rain and wind pull debris and garbage into riverbeds that
eventually spit everything out into the ocean.

Last week’s powerful storms have left their mark on Seal Beach.



Seal Beach
received refuse that had traveled along the 75-mile-long San Gabriel
River, which begins in the Angeles National Forest, runs through the
Santa Fe Flood Control Basin and empties into the Pacific Ocean. Over
in Long Beach, the sand was also awash in rubbish, courtesy of the Los
Angeles River that flows through the San Fernando Valley and Santa
Susana Mountains.



"Unfortunately it’s just the way things are,
living in an urban place like this," said Seal Beach lifeguard
supervisor Tim Senneff. "We get a lot of trash any time it rains, but
especially with back-to-back storms."



The city’s Department of
Public Works is expected to begin clearing the garbage this week, with
lifeguards responding over the weekend to immediate needs, such as
removing the carcasses of animals that had washed ashore.

Read the full story here.

— Corina Knoll

Photo: Last week’s storms left Southern California beaches littered with trash. "It’s
gross…the water was really murky," said Kelsey Widman, background,
who braved the piles of refuse to catch some choice waves at Seal
Beach. Credit: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times 

The man accused of deliberately setting the deadly 2003 firestorm in San Bernardino that destroyed 1,000 homes will face the death penalty if convicted.

Rickie Lee Fowler, 28, who has been in state prison
since 2003 for burglary, was charged in October with five counts of murder as well as arson and aggravated
arson. 

“A decision to seek the death penalty in a case is never an easy
one. In fact, it’s the most difficult one we make as prosecutors. We never take
that responsibility lightly," San Bernardino District Atty. Michael Ramos said in a statement last week. "As in all matters, we look very closely at the
facts of each case and make a determination based on the factors of aggravation
and mitigation as provided by law.”

The 91,000-acre wildfire broke out Oct. 25, 2003, at Old Waterman
Canyon Road and California 18 in the San Bernardino Mountains. It
quickly raced through the forest and brush, forcing the evacuation of
more than 30 communities and 80,000 people. Six men died of heart
attacks, and investigators said five of those deaths were directly
related to the stress of the fire.

On Christmas Day of that year,
a huge mudslide caused by intense rain swept through a church camp in
Waterman Canyon, killing 14 people.

No motive for the arson has been
disclosed.

— Shelby Grad

More breaking news in L.A. Now:

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?

Rains turn some L.A. beaches into trash dumps

Woman who lies down in Riverside traffic is killed

This might not be the best day to hit the beach.

The National Weather Service issued a high-surf advisory for California beaches, which could see up to 8-foot waves and serious rip currents today.

"Dangerous swimming conditions are expected," the service said in a statement.

On Saturday, Newport Beach lifeguards found a surfer dead. They pulled 38-year-old Gregory Gladstone’s body from the water
near 14th Street and West Oceanfront in Newport Beach after surfers discovered his surfboard floating in the water.

Today will be partly cloudy with highs expected in the 60s. Monday will bring a 20% chance of rain, and Tuesday will bring a 70% chance.

— Shelby Grad

A school district in Riverside County has pulled the Merriam-Webster’s 10th edition dictionary from school shelves because it includes the term "oral sex."

The Menifee Union School District took the action last week after a parent complained about the dictionary.

The Press-Enterprise reported that some parents are angry about the move and want the dictionaries returned to classrooms.

"It’s just not age-appropriate," said school spokeswoman Betti Cadmus told the newspaper. "It’s hard to sit and read the dictionary, but we’ll be looking to find other things of a graphic nature."

The school board will decide later whether to return the dictionaries to the classrooms. One board member told the Press-Enterprise that there are probably more objectionable terms in the dictionary.

— Shelby Grad

L.A. County transit officials are forecasting the largest operating
deficit in their history, prompting them to consider cuts to bus and
rail service as well as fare increases.

The shortfall, caused by cuts in state funding as well as an 8% decline
in ridership over the last year, could be more bad news for L.A.
riders, who have long complained about crowded buses and limited
services.

"The issue is coming to a head, that they’re a quarter-billion dollars
short on operating. . . . Your usual options are to cut service or
raise fares," said Bart Reed, executive director of the nonprofit
Transit Coalition, which monitors service at the Metropolitan
Transportation Authority and other agencies. "It’s a really hideous
situation. Riders are going to feel the pain."

The MTA says it is unlikely there will be major cuts to its ambitious
rail expansion projects because most of that money comes from grants
and dedicated funding sources, including the half-cent-on-the-dollar
sales tax that voters approved in 2008. Read the full story here.

-Ari B. Bloomekatz

Photo: This bus is packed, but MTA ridership overall is down. There are no firm proposals for service cuts yet.
Credit: Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times

After a week of rain, Southern California will have a clear, sunny and crisp weekend.

The National Weather Service forecast sunny conditions with highs in the low 60s today. Similar conditions are expected Sunday. Clouds will move in Monday, with a 50% chance of rain Tuesday.

Sunny skies are forecast to return by Thursday.

One of the biggest beneficiaries of the storms were local ski resorts, which got huge amounts of snow. Big Bear and other San Bernardino County spots received nearly 5 feet of snow since Sunday. Mountain High and Wrightwood got 4 feet and Mt. Baldy (elevation 8,600 feet) saw 7 feet.

— Shelby Grad

Photo: People watching jets come and go at Los Angeles International Airport on Friday are treated to a colorful show in the sky. Credit: Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times

The L.A. County Sheriff’s Department was investigating a triple homicide in Lawndale this afternoon.

The bodies of two men and a woman were discovered inside an apartment on Larch Avenue about 2:25 p.m., a sheriff’s official said.

Homicide detectives were on the scene trying to determine what happened. Officials don’t know how long the victims were dead, and it’s unclear how they were discovered.

The victims’ names have not been released, and officials are not disclosing how they were killed.

–Richard Winton

A judge has rejected director Roman Polanski’s bid to be sentenced in absentia in a three-decade-old child-sex case.

Judge Peter Espinoza ruled that Polanski, 76, will have to come back Los Angeles to be sentenced.

"I have made it clear he needs to surrender," the judge said.

Polanski’s attorneys said they would appeal.

The famed film director is under house arrest in Switzerland, where he is waiting to learn whether the Swiss government will extradite him to the U.S. to face sentencing for having sex with a 13-year-old girl.

Polanski received some support this week from his victim.

In papers filed in Superior Court on Thursday, Samantha Geimer’s lawyer accused
the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office of violating state
victims’ rights statutes by not consulting Geimer before seeking
extradition.

In the filing, attorney Lawrence Silver wrote
that Marsy’s Law — a 2008 statute passed by ballot initiative — gives
crime victims the right "to reasonably confer with the prosecuting
agency, upon request, regarding … the determination whether to
extradite the defendant."



The attorney said he wrote to
prosecutors in July and made clear that Geimer wanted to meet with them
and that she planned to "exercise every right that she may have under
the Victims’ Bill of Rights." Two months later, Polanski was arrested
in Zurich on a three-decade-old arrest warrant, and prosecutors
subsequently submitted a formal extradition request. A Swiss court has
yet to decide the matter.



Hours after the documents were filed, the district attorney’s office fired back with its own filing.



Deputy
Dist. Atty. David Walgren wrote that over the last year, Geimer and her
attorney ignored repeated offers to discuss the case. The filing
included copies of 11 e-mails that Walgren sent to Silver — five of
which contained offers to talk about the case.



"Despite multiple
invitations to meet and confer, Mr. Silver has never once responded to
these entreaties," Walgren wrote. He suggested the victims’ rights
statute was being twisted to benefit Polanski.



Marsy’s Law
"was intended to protect the rights of victims. It was not intended to
be vicariously used by a defendant to avoid prosecution," Walgren
wrote.

Geimer was 13 at the time of the crime and is now a
wife and mother living in Hawaii. She has never changed her account of
being raped and sodomized by Polanski during a photo shoot at Jack
Nicholson’s house in 1977, but her stance toward Polanski changed in
the years after she and the director settled a civil suit brought
against him for sexual assault and other claims.

Under the terms of the
1993 confidential agreement, he agreed to pay her at least $500,000.

— Harriet Ryan