Subject: Police

• Gentlemen, Start Your SUV Engines...

  IT TURNS OUT THE FOLLOWING ITEM IS BASED ON A HOAX THAT BEGAN IN NEW JERSEY. SEE THIS. SO SPEED AWAY, SOUTH COUNTY DRIVERS! This just made the rounds in the OC Weekly e-mail-ery, not that all of us have lead foots here. Just most of us. Consider yourselves warned: California Highway Patrol will launch a 30-day speeding ticket frenzy in South Orange County starting January 25, 2006. The state estimates that 22 million dollars will be generated in speeding tickets. 3 million will go to pay Calif

  January 17, 2006

• California Police Secrecy Takes a Hit

  Is the public entitled to know who has been granted police powers in California? Or are cops entitled to, as they claim, near-national-security-level secrecy about such basic information as their names and what department employs them? These were the type of questions the California Supreme Court recently debated thanks to a fight between the Los Angeles Times and police departments and their lobbying groups. Using the state’s public-records act, the Times asked California’s Commission o

  September 5, 2007

• Cop Cruiser Filmed Plowing Over Man Below OC Weekly World HQ

  Perhaps in an effort to decrease inmate overcrowding, a Santa Ana police cruiser accelerated in a restaurant parking lot and ran over a fleeing suspect across the street from OC Weekly's world headquarters late Tuesday night. Police officials tell reporters that they are conducting an investigation into themselves, specifically to determine why one of their own would run over a 19-year-old Latino criminal suspect in a busy Santa Ana Norm's restaurant parking lot. A video that appears on Celebr

  September 13, 2007

• SanTana Cruises into the Past

  News this afternoon that the SanTana police department will shut down most of northbound Bristol Street until tomorrow morning to stem off car cruising is about as breaking as that the city is mostly Mexican. The city has unsuccessfully battled cruisers on Bristol for almost 20 years. In 1989, the city council officially banned cruising at the behest of Police Chief Paul Walters, but enforcing that ordinance failed so spectacularly that in 1993, 12 other police agencies helped SanTana black-and-

  March 23, 2008

• And Now There Are Two

  Five months after indicted Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona resigned to prepare for his corruption trial, the county's board of supervisors (BOS) today narrowed the prospective replacement list from nine candidates to just two: Santa Ana Police Chief Paul Walters and ex-Los Angeles County Sheriff's Chief Sandra Hutchens. Acting Sheriff Jack Anderson will turn over California's second largest police department to Walters or Hutchens in mid-June after the BOS considers background checks and then

  June 3, 2008

• And The Sheriff is. . .

  Sandra Hutchens! The Orange County Board of Supervisors earlier this morning appointed the retired LA County Sheriff's Department division chief to replace Mike Carona as Orange County Sheriff. The vote was 3-2 in favor of Hutchens. Supervisors Chris Norby and Bill Campbell supported Santa Ana Police Chief Paul Walters. Patricia Bates, John Moorlach and Janet Nguyen voted for Hutchens. More new-sheriff stuff to come on this very blog. Stay tuned!

  June 10, 2008

• Good Cop, Bad Cop

  November 9, 2000

• Welcome to Orange County, Now Go Home

  March 15, 2001

• Fit to Be Hog-Tied

  July 12, 2001

• Dirty Marky

  June 26, 2003

• Mike Carona Showed Newport Beach Police Who Is Boss!

  "I, uh, also want you to know that not only isn't he getting his sheriff's badge, there won't be a mother fucker from the Orange County Sheriff's Department that'll be there. So I called all of the command staff together and I said, 'Well, you know, I can't tell people what to do on their own time, but I'm telling all you guys cause I pay you and you're at will. If any of you show up to that thing, you're done.'" --Then-Sheriff Mike Carona, who says the Bible governs his daily actions, caught o

  November 12, 2008

• In Anaheim, Sticks And Stones Can Kill You

  Auto Theft Advisory CommitteeFlanagan received an award last year for recovering the most stolen cars in the county. **Update: Julian Alexander's family has released a statement expressing their disappointment over the DA's decision not press charges against Kevin Fagan. "The shooting represents an egregious act of excessive and unnecessary force, and the impact of this tragedy has devastated and irreparably harmed his wife and young daughter...," the statement reads. If an innocent man waves a

  March 17, 2009

• Santa Ana, Police Feted for Getting Their War On

  Parked on Civic Center?If you're scooting past Santa Ana police headquarters Thursday afternoon and notice a large contingency of uniformed members of the Armed Services, worry not. That portion of Downtown Santa Ana has not been declared a war zone. Yet.Nor is it a green zone signifying safety from threats real or imagined. Nope, it's just part of the Department of Defense's honoring of the City of Santa Ana and its police department Thursday for helping to make it easier to wage war or protect

  April 14, 2009

• At Frank Santos' Garden Grove Family Barbecue, the Police Brought the Pepper Spray and Handcuffs

  June 5, 2008

• The Weekly's Head Count of the 48 New Faces Who Want to Be Your Next Sheriff

  May 15, 2008

• How Robert Zilliott's alcohol-monitoring anklet led to a painful run-in with Laguna Beach cops

  February 14, 2008

• Anthrax Schmanthrax

  November 1, 2001

• The Force Is With Him

  November 28, 2002

• Thanks for the Work!

  An open letter to District Attorney Tony Rackauckas, Sheriff Mike Carona, and the police chiefs and mayors of every Orange County city except Laguna Niguel

  April 5, 2007

• Inside the Kill Zone

  Eyewitnesses contradict official version of Surf City shooting

  March 15, 2007

• 'We Love Hunting Wetbacks'

  Costa Mesa Latino alleges Bizarre beatdown by OC Sheriffs Deputies

  February 22, 2007

• Cop Out

  August 17, 2000

• Training Day

  Police admit they planted a gun at Huntington Beach crime scene

  November 9, 2006

• Hey, You!

  Titanic Injustice

  November 2, 2006

• "This Is Unacceptable Behavior"

  April 27, 2006

• Razin' La Raza

  January 19, 2006

• REQUIEM FOR A DREAMGIRL

  December 1, 2005

• Apples and Oranges

  Pringle to convention protesters: Bring it on

  September 23, 2004

• The Year of the Gun

  January 8, 2004

• Reefer Badness

  November 20, 2003

• The Thin Boo Line!

  Orange Countys 31 scariest cops!

  November 6, 2003

• Have Badge, Will Skate

  May 8, 2003

• Show of Farce

  February 13, 2003

• Cop Magnet

  February 14, 2002

• Anaheim Spooks

  September 20, 2001

• Internal Combustion

  August 30, 2001

• Rave Off

  August 23, 2001

• Whistleblower Blues

  March 23, 2000

• Testilying

  June 3, 1999

• Message in a Baton

  April 29, 1999

• OC Deputies Outraged That DA Attacked Their Honesty; Demand Top Resignation!

  Something rare happened on Friday, April 17--and it wasn't just that the Orange County Register was pretending it had broken news about a trial it's reporters hadn't attended. On that date in 6 B.C., so I'm told, the sun, Jupiter, Saturn and our moon were aligned. I won't pretend to know what astrological activities were in place yesterday, but something bizarre happened here on Earth: usually in lockstep, Orange County law enforcement bitterly split ranks.Specifically, the Orange County Distric

  April 18, 2009

• Court Rules Santa Ana Illegally Issued Tickets From Red-Light Cameras

  ​To read the ruling of Orange County Superior Court Commissioner Kenneth Schwartz, the city of Santa Ana has been issuing tickets off red-light cameras illegally since their 2003 debut, but according to the court's website police officers continued writing citations after Schwartz's ruling was filed on Aug. 5.Schwartz found David Murray and Lori Ann Alecnavicius not guilty of violating Vehicle Code section 21453(a)--failing to stop at a red signal light--at the intersections of Bristol Street

  August 18, 2009

• Crime Time: Nekkid Folks, Robber Baby, Strip-Club Stabbers, Loaded Brownie and a Flaming Bag of Poo

  Courtesy of Orange Police Department and Orange County Sheriff's DepartmentWe call this collage "Robberies, Solved and Unsolved." Top left: a man hands a teller a note demanding cash at Chase Bank in Orange. Top right: Booking photo of Adam J. Bennett, 20, of Santa Ana, who is suspected of robbing $700 from a Mission Viejo Wells Fargo on July 27. Bottom left and right: Surveillance photos from armed robbery that occurred around 9:30 p.m. Aug. 7 at the Orange Olive Mini Market in Orange. ​It'

  August 18, 2009

• Crime Time: Methed Mom, Nitrous Oxide, a Full Moon, a Gutted Black Cat and a Skateboarding Giant Ax Carrier

  It's our weekly Weekly roundup of Orange County police calls--with suspect mugs!TUESDAY, JULY 7Courtesy of Cypress Police DepartmentAlison Le Anne EbertAt Least She Left the TV On Officers responding to an anonymous, 4:45 a.m. report of child abuse in a home in the 8500 block of La Homa Street in Cypress discovered two girls, ages 9 and 11, who had been left alone overnight amid knee-high trash piles, toilets overflowing with human feces, frozen bugs inside a refrigerator and unfrozen bugs and m

  July 14, 2009

• An Investigation Into a SF Cop Killing Leads to a Chicago Professor Who Helped Launch Obama's Career

  September 17, 2009

• UPDATED: LA Deputy Who OC Deputies Tried to Protect From DUI Test Gets 6 Months for '08 Crash

  UPDATED WITH SENTENCING CLARIFICATION . . . A deputy driving a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department Chevrolet sports utility vehicle (but not necessarily this one) was convicted of DUI today.​The Orange County District Attorney's Office originally announced the sentence for Robert Andrew Moran--the 43-year-old Buena Park resident and veteran Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy who drove a department SUV while under the influence last year and plowed into another car, injuring two pe

  October 2, 2009

• Crime Time: F-Bombers, Tiki Takers, Beatles Fans, Creepy Molesters and Tawny Kitaen on the Loose

  FACES OF TAWNY Actress, ex-Anaheim Angel wife, car hood buffer, supposedly reformed druggie and all-around hot mess Tawny Kitaen is shown on a February 2004 Weekly sex issue cover (left); in a booking photo from her April 2002 assault on then husband Chuck Finley in Newport Beach (top right); and writhing in the famous Whitesnake video of 1987. See her latest brush with the law under Saturday, Sept. 26.​It's the Weekly's weekly round-up of local police calls--now with more Tawny Kitaen arrests

  September 29, 2009

• Taco Bell Crime of the Week!

  Great candidate for the Smoking Gun's mugshot roundup...​What is most disturbing about this story: that Chattanooga has a Taco Bell, the stupidity of the crime, or that police officers are so badly paid they have to visit a Taco Bell for their Mexican grub? Anyway, the story:A man accused of trying to rob a local Taco Bell tried to make a run for the border but ended up in jail, according to the Chattanooga Police Department.In an email to the Channel 3 Eyewitness Newsroom, Dustin Bell was "ca

  September 27, 2009

• Crime Time: Double the Fun Starring [Alleged] Skeevy Teachers, Fake Cop Robbers and Ryan Seacrest's Strange Stalker

  It's the Weekly's weekly round-up of local police calls--actually the Weekly's TWO weekly round-up as an attempt is made to make up for lost vacation time.Left courtesy of E! Entertainment, right courtesy of Orange Police DepartmentRyan Seacrest (left) gets paid another visit from his No. 1 Army special forces fan, Chidi Benjamin Uzomah Jr.​SEACREST OUT, UZOMAH BACK IN Remember Chidi Benjamin Uzomah Jr., the 25-year-old Lakewood resident who pleaded guilty last month in Orange County Superior

  November 4, 2009

• Authorities Trumpet Largest Orange County Curfew Sweep

  ​About 300 officers from 20 law enforcement agencies made sweeps through various Orange County communities last night and early today and swooped up 67 kids in violation of city curfew laws, the District Attorney's office announced. Curfews begin at 10 or 11 p.m., depending on the city, and last until 5 a.m. the following day. During those hours, minors can't be out in public unless they are accompanied by a parent or guardian, working or taking part in an 

  November 13, 2009