Law Enforcement

Superior Court judge reported missing, LAPD says
Los Angeles police Monday night were looking for a 71-year-old Superior Court judge who has been reported missing. Linda Kay Lefkowitz, a judge at the Santa Monica courthouse, was last seen about 8:30 a.m. Monday at her home in the 200 block of Tranquillo Road in Pacific Palisades as she prepared to head to work, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.
Los Angeles Times

Suspect in brutal bus stop attack may be serial rapist
A suspected serial rapist was arrested Monday morning after he allegedly brutally beat a woman at a bus stop in South Los Angeles. It happened just before 1 a.m. at West Manchester Avenue and South Normandie Avenue, according to police. A sergeant who was in the area saw the assault taking place behind the bus stop, according to LAPD Sgt. Rudy Lopez. He jumped out of his car and went after the man, who was on top of the victim, beating her against the concrete.
KTLA

Needed officer privacy legislation stymied in Sacramento
After the home addresses of more than a dozen LAPD members were posted anonymously on the Internet, Assemblyman Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles) introduced in the California Legislature a bill actively supported by the League. AB 2299 lets counties establish programs to redact the names of police officers, judges and other public safety officials from real estate records to protect their residences from those who may wish to do them harm.
LAPPL Blog

New appointee announced to civilian panel that oversees LAPD
Andrea Sheridan Ordin, a longtime Los Angeles-area attorney, has been appointed to a civilian panel that oversees the Los Angeles Police Department. Ordin's appointment to the Police Commission was announced Monday by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's office. She served on the commission from 2005 to 2010. Ordin was a member of the Christopher Commission, a panel headed by former Secretary of State Warren Christopher that studied the LAPD and recommended changes in the wake of the 1991 beating of Rodney King.
Los Angeles Times

Old L.A. police bulletins show city's history from a different angle
In a 1920s brick fortress near the gritty corner of York Boulevard and Figueroa Street in Highland Park, the intertwined history of Los Angeles and its police force is slowly being recovered from fragile documents that were never meant to be saved. A few steps from the bullet-riddled patrol cars from the 1997 North Hollywood bank shootout and relics of the Symbionese Liberation Army on display at the former station, Los Angeles Police Museum volunteer Joan Renner, under guidance from the Getty Museum, is painstakingly archiving half a century of bulletins that provide snapshots of the LAPD starting in 1907.
Los Angeles Times

City Government

Credit rating agencies like L.A.'s cost-cutting
Steps taken by Los Angeles to reduce its pension costs and overall spending resulted in the city receiving high ratings from the top three credit rating agencies in the country, City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana said Monday. "All three rating agencies affirmed the city's highest short-term ratings," Santana said in a memo to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and City Council members.
Los Angeles Daily News

L.A. Fire Department's data expert steps down after less than 3 months
A nationally recognized data expert brought in by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to restore confidence in the Fire Department's emergency response times is leaving after less than three months on the job. Jeffrey Godown, who was installed as interim director of statistical analysis in March amid a ballooning controversy over the accuracy of the department's performance data, is leaving Tuesday to take a job at UC San Francisco.
Los Angeles Times

Life and limbs: L.A. trees so overgrown, fire trucks can't get down some city streets
Delays in the city's tree trimming schedule has resulted in trees so overgrown that fire engines and other large emergency vehicles are unable to drive down some streets to respond to calls, officials said Monday. The Bureau of Street Services told the Board of Public Works the current schedule is to trim trees every 40 years. That has resulted in the tree branches hanging so low in some areas that emergency vehicles need to drive in the middle of streets or find other access routes to respond.
Los Angeles Daily News

State Budget

California public employees win concessions in new budget
The budget California's Democratic- controlled Legislature sent to Governor Jerry Brown last week granted concessions to public employee unions even as talks continue on cutting programs for the poor. Democrats removed language that would have authorized the governor to order unpaid days off, known as furloughs, if unions balked at a proposed one-year, 5 percent payroll reduction.
Bloomberg

Immigration

Immigration reprieve means thousands of new workers in California
As thousands of young illegal immigrants consider openly applying for work permits under a new Obama administration directive, they dream of jobs they could never find in the shadows. An estimated 350,000 children and young adult immigrants in California and more than 1 million nationwide could qualify for protection from deportation and temporary work permits through the new federal relief initiative announced Friday, according to the Migration Policy Institute.
Contra Costa Times