I wonder which of these “AK-47 assault rifles” Whitey had.
I also wonder how “sawed-off” that shotgun was.
Archive for the ‘California Über Alles’ Category
Noted for the record.
Friday, June 24th, 2011Legal update, and other random notes, for June 23, 2011.
Thursday, June 23rd, 2011After 16 years, James “Whitey” Bulger has been arrested in California. Boston Globe coverage. If you go to the front page, the Globe has a quite extensive package, including some of their previous Bulger coverage. Boston Herald coverage. Ditto on the Herald having an extensive package, including commentary by Howie Carr. LAT coverage, but don’t bother. It doesn’t add much.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with the story, Bulger was the leading crime boss in Boston for many years; he built his empire largely through a corrupt relationship with the local FBI office, which covered for his criminal activities because he served as an informant for them. (Bulger’s work as an informant generally involved either providing misleading information, or using the FBI to eliminate his competition and other folks he wanted to get out of his way.)
There are two excellent books on the Bulger case: The Brothers Bulger: How They Terrorized and Corrupted Boston for a Quarter Century
One of the first cases I mentioned here at WCD was the Sedona sweat lodge incident. I am mildly pleased to report that James Ray has been convicted of three counts of negligent homicide. Unfortunately, he was not convicted of the more serious manslaughter charges he was facing, but he could still get 30 years on the negligent homicide charges.
Due to being busy and on the road, I’ve been somewhat neglecting “Spider Man: Turn Off the Dark”. From what I hear, the revised version (which is now open, and getting “official” reviews) is actually a vast improvement over the original. (The NYT review is linked from the article I’m about to link; I’m not posting the link here because I’ve used up my free articles for the month on this one.) Anyway, Patrick Healy and Kevin Flynn have an interesting article in today’s NYT on where, exactly, that $75 million went.
At this point, “Spider Man” is bringing in $1.2 million to $1.3 million a week, per the NYT. However, the show’s operating costs are…somewhere between $1 million and $1.2 million per week. And the show owes roughly $100,000 a week on the construction loan they took out to renovate the theater. (I’m not clear if that’s included in operating costs, or is a separate line item.)
Edited to add: By way of Jimbo:
Meanwhile, you have to dig down to the Bulger page on the “America’s Most Wanted” web site to find any mention of the capture. This seems odd, given the number of times John Walsh ran stories about Bulger, but perhaps they’re holding off until they determine if an “AMW” tip was behind the capture.
Edited to add 2: The LAT coverage on their “LA Now” blog is a vast improvement over the initial LAT story I linked, and is being constantly updated. Kudos to the “LA Now” blog team.
Obit watch: June 3, 2011.
Friday, June 3rd, 2011I’m really sorry, but I don’t have a damn thing to say about Jack Kevorkian. Not even snark.
I also can’t say much about James Arness. I want to say I’m a little too young for “Gunsmoke”, but it ran until 1975, when I would have been 10. I can’t understand why I don’t have any memories of it. It may have been something my family didn’t watch, but if so, I don’t recall why.
Elmer “Geronimo” Pratt has also died, and that’s kind of an interesting story. Pratt was a Black Panther leader who was convicted of murder in 1972. His conviction was overturned in 1997; the judge ruled that the prosecutors at Pratt’s murder trial had hidden evidence that could have pointed to Pratt’s innocence. (“Pratt maintained that the FBI knew he was innocent because the agency had him under surveillance in Oakland when the slaying was committed in Santa Monica.”) Pratt later settled a lawsuit over his conviction for $4.5 million.
Finally, by way of Popehat: Joel Rosenberg, author and firearms rights advocate, died yesterday. Condolences to his family.
Quirks.
Wednesday, June 1st, 2011Bruce Malkenhorst was convicted of misuse of public funds last week.
Keep those numbers in mind.
Mr. Malkenhorst was the city administrator for the corrupt city government of Vernon, California, a city government so corrupt that the state legislature is trying to disincorporate the city.
However, Mr. Malkenhorst, as city administrator, is not an elected official.
Why does that matter?
Mr. Malkenhorst, as a non-elected official, gets to keep his retirement pension. California law only allows for the revocation of pensions for elected officials.
Did I say “retirement pension”? I meant, “his $500,000 a year retirement pension“.
He pays about $100,000 in fines and restitution, gets three years of probation, and still comes out $400,000 ahead just in the first year.
Nice work if you can get it.
Random notes: April 4, 2011.
Monday, April 4th, 2011Should the Chowchilla school bus kidnappers be paroled?
Sagra Italian Restaurant damaged by fire. The SDC ate there, and, well…we wish the owners the best, even if we can’t say we were wild about the restaurant.
I intended to blog this a few days ago: the latest APD suspension is for 90 days. In this case, the officer in question “was rude to a citizen and initially gave misleading statements to investigators”.
Oh, sure, you laugh at me for picking the Cubs to win it all. But I’ll point out that the Cubs have actually won a game this year, unlike certain other teams (cough cough Houston cough cough) I could name.
Even more police professionalism.
Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011We’re just jam-packed today, aren’t we?
The LA County Sheriff’s Office is planning to fire six deputies, all of whom worked on the third floor of the men’s jail.
According to the LAT‘s reporting, the six deputies in question “allegedly were part of a clique that had certain gang-like characteristics, including three-finger hand signs, representing the third floor”.
But, hey, is esprit de corps a crime? Or even a termination offense?
No. But beating up your fellow jail employees at the Christmas party is.
Six on two, guys? Really?
L’update Bell.
Wednesday, March 16th, 2011As noted previously, the mayor and much of the city council of Bell lost the recall election.
Ah, but there’s a catch: the city of Bell is losing their shirts on this deal, but they’re looking for audiophiles who need high quality cassette tapes. has to certify the election results. Under ordinary circumstances, that would be a non-issue. But a judge has ordered three of the current city council members to stay at least 100 yards from City Hall, as well as ordering them not to conduct city business. So there’s nobody available to do the certification. The answer: special emergency legislation.
And what of Robert “Ratso” Rizzo? The latest news from his hearing on conflict of interest charges is that, as city administrator, he hired an engineering firm owned by Dennis Tarango to do various environmental studies. Tarango was also the city’s planning director. And, even better, Tarango and Ratso were business partners in a horse-racing venture.
Somebody’s going to get a great true crime book out of this.
Edited to add: Wow. Just wow. Google Books, making it possible to hattip references from the early 1980’s.
Today’s War on Drugs update.
Thursday, March 10th, 2011This is shaping up to be a major scandal, and I’m frankly shocked that I haven’t heard about it until now.
Local coverage from the SFChron. Curiously to me, the SFChron is not giving this story major play; I had to click several levels deep in their website to find it. On the other hand, this next story was front page news in the SFChron, even though it happened clear across the country:
This wouldn’t ordinarily be big news. But one of the people arrested was Felicia Pearson, who played “Snoop” on The Wire.
Damn shame.
Random notes: March 3, 2011.
Thursday, March 3rd, 2011I went to the fights last night, and a case of chronic traumatic encephalopathy broke out.
Sirhan Sirhan has been turned down for parole for the 13th time. What’s interesting about this article is that it focuses almost as much on Sirhan’s lawyer, William F. Pepper, and Pepper’s previous efforts:
This gives me an excuse to plug Hampton Sides’ excellent (and Edgar-nominated) book Hellhound on His Trail: The Electrifying Account of the Largest Manhunt In American History
I’m not going to say it deserves the Edgar; I haven’t read any of the other nominated books (I did pick up The Killer of Little Shepherds: A True Crime Story and the Birth of Forensic Science
This is not a strategy I had considered for driving up page views, but good for the Austin Bulldog.
Edited to add: This is the closest thing I’ve found to a discussion of food items at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo this year. No photos. I’d apologize, but I don’t want a photo of the “Pulled Pork Sundae”, which frankly sounds disgusting.
For you see I’m on the legal beat…
Wednesday, March 2nd, 2011I love a good heist. But it has to be a good one; that is, there has to be an element of panache to it, not just a random smash and grab. Something like this:
From a second LAT article about the heist:
I’ve previously mentioned Where the Money Is: True Tales from the Bank Robbery Capital of the World
Right decision. Westboro is still a bunch of jackasses.
This decision got a lot of press yesterday. I’m kind of hoping one of my legal readers can explain why:
I’m confused because I’ve always understood “dying words” to be an exception to the hearsay rule. (Wikipedia is not a lawyer. Wikipedia is not your lawyer. Neither am I. Contents may settle in shipping.) What exactly does this decision change?
Crime watch.
Friday, February 18th, 2011Eric Delacruz and his buddy Fernando Romero were convicted of the murder of Sonia Rios Risken yesterday. Why is this noteworthy? Well, when the LAT article begins
That kind of makes you take notice. At the time of her death, Risken was being investigated by the FBI in the death of her second husband, who was killed while visiting Risken’s relatives in the Philippines.
And then Risken herself was capped; Delacruz was her grandnephew, and apparently expected to inherit Risken’s estate.
By way of Balko, we learn that Charles Stobaugh has been convicted in the murder of his wife, Kathy Stobaugh. Ms. Stobaugh disappeared the day before her divorce became final in 2004. I can’t work up the indignation of Balko over this: “despite no body, no physical evidence of a crime, and no proof the alleged victim is actually dead.” All of these things are true, but a murder conviction without a body is not unheard of (see Anne Marie Fahey). In addition:
Further:
Yeah, the evidence is circumstantial. But, to quote Thoreau, “Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk.”
In other news, the LAPD apparently has a lead in the 2002 murder of two men in Studio City.
If the $75,000 reward being proposed in this case isn’t enough, surely the chance to see it dramatized on Law and Order: Los Angeles is an additional incentive.
Speaking of Ponzi schemes, we neglected to note the alleged Amish Ponzi scheme yesterday, so let’s fix that now. (This also gives us a chance to tell our favorite Amish joke: “What sounds like this: Clip clop clip clop clip clop clip clop BANG! Clip clop clip clop clip clop clip clop…” “An Amish drive-by.”)
And, finally, it was anarchists who burned down the Texas Governor’s Mansion in 2008. At least, that’s what the Texas DPS is saying now. Hey, at least it wasn’t nihilists. We would post a Crimestoppers!, but the DPS claims to know who at least three out of four of the anarchists are. So we’ll ask some questions instead:
- Who told the Statesman that auto-play on videos was a good idea?
- The fire took place nearly two years ago. Why is this evidence just now being presented? Did it take them two years to go through all the video from the area? Or to do the video enhancement?
- What evidence is there connecting the Jeep to the arson? “Someone sitting in the back seat can be seen taking two photos of the house with a flash. McCraw characterized that as ‘obviously pre-ops surveillance’ but would not elaborate.” That sounds kind of hand-wavy to me.
- What kind of half-assed security lets someone walk up to a building and throw a Molotov cocktail? (Hattip: Lawrence.)
Random notes: February 8, 2011.
Tuesday, February 8th, 2011There are a couple of interesting things in the NYT this morning.
J. Paul Getty III passed away over the weekend. That’s a name (like Koo Stark, he said, tipping his hat in Lawrence’s direction) I hadn’t thought of in years. Getty was most famous as the victim of a kidnapping “by Italian gangsters” during which his ear was cut off. I knew he was something of a party animal, but I was unaware of his 1981 stroke (apparently the result of an overdose). I was also unaware that Balthazar Getty was his son.
Meanwhile, Los Angeles (and specifically LACMA) are trying to figure out how to maintain the Watts Towers, and how to get more tourists to a part of town that’s most famous for riots.
And the NYT has made their move:
Yes, this is a real review.
The fallout from the NYT decision should be interesting. The pin has been pulled from Mr. Grenade. He is no longer Ben Brantley’s friend. On the other hand, Charles McNulty in the LAT has Brantley’s back:
And it looks like Peter Marks in the WP is standing with Brantley and McNulty:
Charles Willeford
In other news, the WP has discovered (reporter with a database!) that people in “Washington’s safest, most well-to-do neighborhoods” have registered more guns than people in “poorer, crime-plagued areas of the city”. I may have more to say on this later, time permitting.
Edited to add: I was in a hurry to finish that last post and hadn’t got to the Statesman yet, unfortunately. I previously noted the fires at several Austin restaurants, including the Green Muse Cafe. (There was also a recent fire at Habana, which I didn’t note for reasons that escape me at the moment.)
Anyway, APD made an arrest:
Bad boys, bad boys…
Thursday, January 27th, 2011…what you gonna do, what you gonna do when your city government runs out of money because corrupt city officials have been pillaging the treasury, and the city decides to disband the police department and outsource to the L.A. County Sherrif’s Department?
(Okay, so I need to work on the scansion a bit.)
Edited to add this bulletin from Captain Obvious:
We are amused.
Monday, January 24th, 2011By this story in the LAT about the arrest of rapper “40 Glocc” (sp?).
Specifically, we are amused by:
- the name “40 Glocc” (which, Lawrence points out, is both distinctive and not subject to trademark infringement suits).
- Mr. “Glocc”‘s arrest (his real name appears to be Lawrence White) on weapons charges.
- the fact that he was arrested carrying a 9mm handgun and not a .40 S&W. The LAT does not specify if it was, at least, a Glock.
Baby, if you ever wondered…
Thursday, January 13th, 2011…what Robert “Ratso” Rizzo, former city administrator for the city of Bell, now under indictment, was doing, the answer is:
He’s working as a parking lot attendant at the “International Surfing Museum” in Huntington Beach.
I think I speak for many of my readers when I say: there’s an “International Surfing Museum”?
Edited to add 1/14: Well, that was quick. Rizzo is no longer working at the International Surfing Museum.