ICE agents have reportedly claimed to be police officers to gain consent to enter a person’s home – a tactic that is viewed as unethical, but within the powers granted to the officers. Civil rights groups supported Kalra’s bill, looking to stymie the Trump administration’s promise to use any and all available tools to deport undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes. Many groups fear Trump will expand deportations to include all undocumented immigrants, their families and relatives.   read more

The private medical records of 4.6 million Californians have been exposed since 2009, according to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services data analyzed by the Center for Health Reporting. But it is not only patients who are victims. Blue Shield of California confirmed on Thursday that the Social Security numbers of 18,000 doctors were released when the insurance company inadvertently included them in mandatory monthly filings with California’s Department of Managed Health Care (DMHC).   read more

The link of neonicotinoid pesticides to the decline of honeybees is not new, and because it is not new, a coalition of advocacy groups sued California’s Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) this week to do something about it. Five years of “foot-dragging,” while expanding the pesticide’s acceptable use, is a violation of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and other laws, the suit contends.   read more

Despite fierce opposition from mental health advocates, San Francisco leaders have approved a policy by which a judge can be petitioned to order mandatory treatment for the mentally ill. The policy change came as a result of the approval of a 12-year-old statute, Laura’s Law. The law was named after teenager Laura Wilcox, who was murdered in 2001 by a psychiatric patient. Nevada County, where Wilcox was murdered, was the first to adopt the program. Orange County has since signed on.   read more

The state collects basic information about water wells: where they’re drilled, how deep they go and the geological formations encountered. State agencies can look at it, and so can people with permission from the well owner and folks doing environmental cleanup studies. But researchers, the general public and other interested parties cannot. Every other Western state allows that.   read more

Bryan Stow will get around $15 million from the Dodgers, who got tagged with all his medical bills and lost earnings, and 25% of the liability. But the jury exonerated the team’s owner and declined to blame the victim. The two men who beat Stow senseless and are in prison for assault shared in the liability but probably don’t have any money.   read more

Superintendent Jose Fernandez came under fire in February for making more than $750,000 last year to run a 6,600-student school district. He received a 40-year, $910,000 loan with 2% interest from the district to buy a home, a generous pension, the right to cash out vacation days and a guaranteed 9% annual pay raise. On Tuesday the board unanimously voted to fire the former Inglewood city councilman.   read more

Real estate investors would gather on the steps of the Alameda County Courthouse for what appeared to be an open auction of foreclosed properties. It was a group of familiars who decided the system would work better if they agreed to not drive up the price by bidding against each other with a crowd of unfamiliars and an auctioneer they didn’t totally control. Instead, they would designate a single person to bid, grab the property on the cheap and hold their own private auction later.   read more

The City Council voted unanimously to amend their medical marijuana ordinance to require that dispensaries give 2% of their weed to very low-income residents and the homeless without charge. And it can’t be skunk weed. The council also expanded the number of dispensaries in the city from three to four and authorized the Planning Commission to consider what expanding to six licensed dispensaries would entail.   read more

Project members will meet with NASA officials this week to get final permission to bring the craft into its new orbit. The group will have to prove that the craft is functional and that it has a valid scientific purpose. And just as a teen’s first stop in his new car is often a fast-food joint, the reactivated satellite will be controlled from—where else?—an abandoned McDonald’s restaurant on the site of NASA’s Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California.   read more

L.A. follows about 100 municipalities across the country, including the counties of Los Angeles, San Bernardino, San Diego and Riverside, that have cited a ruling by U.S. District Judge Janice M. Stewart in an Oregon case three months ago that essentially said the detainees could not be held in jail solely for the purpose of deportation.   read more

Judge Hatter ruled in April that the National Forest Adventure Pass program improperly charges people who are on federal property―hiking, biking or otherwise recreating―but aren’t using “developed facilities and services.” The ruling applies to the Angeles, Cleveland, Los Padres and San Bernardino national forests in California.   read more

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced last week that the 3,500-acre Shiloh IV Wind Project near Rio Vista in Solano County is set to receive a five-year permit that will let it kill five golden or bald eagles without getting slapped down. In exchange, the project owners agreed to take mitigation measures to lessen the chance of that happening.   read more

Responding to what seemed to be a death blow two weeks ago when the U.S. Department of Education froze payment of the student grant and loan money that has been its life blood, Santa Ana-based Corinthian announced last week that it had reached a deal with the agency for an “orderly transition for its 107 campuses and online programs.” How orderly remains to be seen.   read more

Thousands of people lined up for hours on Friday through Sunday to flash their medical marijuana cards and gain entry to the California Heritage Market where the West Coast Collective dispensary arranged for 20 to 50 vendors to display their wares. Growers, bakeries, collectives and others were spread out at the 15,000-square-foot open-air structure.   read more

The state acknowledged that its law was outdated, but has not walked away from regulatory oversight of virtual currencies like bitcoin. The state issued an advisory in April that the government was still trying to figure out how they fit into a regulatory framework, and warned that the “crypto currencies,” “digital cash” or whatever they are called, are “high-risk,” vulnerable to cyber attacks, sometimes “associated with criminal enterprises” and have a “significant” potential for loss.   read more

While the biggest decisions will be made at the federal level, the state has a special interest in the merger of Comcast and Time Warner and some potential avenues of legal involvement. The deal is not a foregone conclusion but it’s been a long time since Washington cared much about mega-mergers and monopolies. For those who believe they see the writing on the wall, the five stages of grief have already begun and are at varying levels of progression.   read more