Unusual News
Woman Gets Ticket for Driving Distracted with Google Glass
California’s Vehicle Code 27602 prohibits a person from driving a motor vehicle “if a television receiver, a video monitor, or a television or video screen, or any other similar means of visually displaying a television broadcast or video signal . . . is operating and is located in the motor vehicle at a point forward of the back of the driver’s seat, or is operating and the monitor, screen, or display is visible to the driver while driving the motor vehicle.” read more
Judge Invokes 1848 Treaty to Block Public Access to Billionaire’s Beach
A judge said the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo trumped the California Coastal Act last week and officially ended a century of access to Martins Beach in Half Moon Bay, which is now owned by venture capitalist billionaire Vinod Khosla. Mark Massara, an attorney for the nonprofit Surfrider Foundation, told the Los Angeles Times, “Every single landowner on the coast is going to rush to see if they’re part of an ancient land grant so they can try to get a get-out-of-jail-free card.” read more
Cuts in Phys Ed Take Toll: Only One-Third of California Students Are Fit
A new study which found that only around one-third of students in fifth, seventh and ninth grades were physically fit. Only 37% of ninth-graders scored in the “Healthy Fitness Zone” for all six areas, and they were the fit ones. Only 32% of seventh-graders and 26% of fifth-graders were in the zone. read more
Sea Serpents Invade California—So, Where Are the Earthquakes?
The presence of oarfish on the beach in San Diego County’s Oceanside and floating dead in the water near Catalina Island jolted people who wondered weather global warming or some other human affront to nature was flushing the rarely seen eel-like creatures from their normal home, deep beneath the waves. In Japan there is an enduring belief that the “Messenger from the Sea God’s Palace” shows up before an earthquake. read more
Yellow Fever Mosquitoes Turning up Around California
The mosquito was first detected in the Fresno-area cities of Madera and Clovis in June, It was found again in August in San Mateo County. The Associated Press reported that the mosquitoes have been trapped at more than 100 locations in Clovis. Its presence does not pose an immediate threat—the mosquito has been found, not yellow fever—but public health officials are concerned that the bug could be problematic if it gains a foothold in the state.
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“Birther” Superior Court Judge in San Diego Banished to Traffic Court
Kreep was reassigned September 9 to a court that handles traffic disputes and small claims after repeated complaints from attorneys who boycotted his courtroom over his general conduct. He is best known for challenging the citizenship of President Barack Obama and the legitimacy of his administration, read more
Officials Scorned Employee Who Warned of Jobless-Benefits Computer Problems
When officials at the Employment Development Department received an e-mail from an employee warning that the new computer system for processing unemployment checks was not usable, one of them responded, “Who is this guy?” The guy is Adolfo Jimenez, the Buena Park service center employee was blasting off dire warnings about the $188-million system's flaws as it rolled out on Labor Day, headed toward a meltdown that would cost 300,000 Californians their unemployment checks. read more
Despite Neighbor Objections, Coastal Commission Lets Romney Build McMansion on La Jolla Beach
The neighbor argued that the Romneys incorrectly exaggerated the size of their lot by 50%, to 18,000 square feet, by improperly including too much of the beach (out to the median high-tide marker) in computing how much home could legally be built. He also claimed the Romneys had privatized a public-access walkway and had a seawall that wasn’t up to snuff. read more
Hospital Can’t Explain How Patient Who Died in Stairwell Went Undetected for 17 Days
Spalding was the subject of an intensive search inside and outside the hospital after she disappeared in mid-September, but the stairwell where she was found is rarely used for anything except as a fire escape and was apparently overlooked. Preliminary speculation is that she wandered away from her fifth floor room in a haze from medication and couldn’t get back through the self-locked, alarm-equipped door. read more
L.A. County Sheriff’s Department Dogs only Bite Blacks and Hispanics
A recently released report (pdf) by the Police Assessment Resource Center found that dogs caused more injuries than the combined use of batons, tear gas, guns and other weapons. It also found that the dogs wreaked more havoc in low-income minority neighborhoods serviced by five stations over the past nine years than 21 other agencies and stations combined. read more
Court Rules It’s Not Stealing If You Don’t Plan to Keep It
The appellate court said the jury was incorrectly led to believe that taking the phone for any length of time legally constituted theft, and that was wrong. “Taking a phone for temporary use is far more akin to joyriding or taking a bicycle with intent to return it the next day, which do not constitute theft,” the judge wrote. read more
FBI Arrests Alleged Underground Drug Website Operator in San Francisco Library
It was a go-to destination for heroin, ecstasy, marijuana, fireworks, erotica, hacking assistance, forged documents and more. In 2011, not long after the website launched, U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-New York) described it as “a certifiable one-stop shop for illegal drugs that represents the most brazen attempt to peddle drugs online that we have ever seen. It's more brazen than anything else by light years.” read more
Man Convicted of Marijuana-Related Crime because His Money Smelled Like Pot
Bush, who represented himself in the two-day trial, claimed the money came from his mother . . . his life savings . . . or maybe his Mexican ATM business—Paul Payne at the Santa Rose Press Democrat wrote that the story seemed to change—but didn’t have an explanation for the pot smell that officers said could be detected across the road. But there were no discernible quantities of marijuana larger than the nearly microscopic. read more
Familiar Marijuana Legalization Initiative Cleared for Signature Gathering
The proposal has sort of been around for a while. California NORML noted its presence in December 2011 when doing a roundup of five marijuana initiatives vying for signatures to get on the November 2012 ballot. It was described as “a sweeping measure by the late Jack Herer that has circulated but failed to qualify in repeated attempts over twenty years.” read more
Retailer Sues West Hollywood over First-Ever Ban on Fur Sales
Lawyers for Mayfair House, a boutique that sports fur-lined parkas for $1,800 and other clothes and accessories, filed a five-count complaint in federal court, according to the Los Angeles Times, that argues the West Hollywood law violates both the state and U.S. Constitutions. The ordinance prohibits stores in the city from selling, trading, distributing, importing or exporting any fur product. read more
L.A. Schools’ iPad Giveaway Lasts a Week before Students Hack the Computers
Around 300 high schoolers at three of the schools given the first batch of iPads a week ago took them home and wasted little time figuring out how to bypass security measures meant to keep them off of social media and away from restricted websites. Enterprising students deleted their student profiles, freeing their computers from the district network, and alerted their friends that Facebook, Pandora, Twitter and all that good stuff was theirs for the typing. read more