Law Enforcement

Crime alerts for Valley Glen and 11 other L.A. neighborhoods
Crime reports are up significantly for the latest week in 12 L.A. neighborhoods, according to an analysis of LAPD data by the Los Angeles Times' Crime L.A. database. Eight neighborhoods reported a significant increase in violent crime. Hollywood Hills West was the most unusual, recording five reports compared with a weekly average of 0.4 over the last three months. Valley Glen topped the list of four neighborhoods with property crime alerts.
Los Angeles Times

LAPD officers hailed for saving baby's life in Sun Valley
A woman screaming. That's all Officer Leroy Alley and Sgt. Roland Fogel knew as they headed to a house in Sun Valley this week. What they found when they arrived explained the screaming: A woman raced up to them holding a blue, nearly lifeless child in her arms. Los Angeles police released new details Friday of how two officers saved the life of a 1-year-old girl who had fallen into a toilet while playing.
Los Angeles Daily News

Organized crime ring could be responsible for cargo thefts in San Fernando Valley
Millions of dollars worth of cargo has been stolen throughout Los Angeles County, prompting the Los Angeles Police Department to ask for the community's help in what it believes is a major organized theft ring. The cargo thefts have been reported over the last year and have included baby furniture, toys, electronics, beer, pharmaceuticals and copper. "These guys are just terrorizing Los Angeles County by stealing all these big rigs with valuable freight," said Detective Marc Zavala.
Los Angeles Daily News

Northridge shooting leaves four dead
Two men and two women were found shot to death outside what looked to be an illegal boarding house in Northridge before dawn Sunday in what police said appeared to be targeted killings. Officers said they responded to an early morning 911 call from someone who reportedly heard screams, shouts and then gunfire in the 17400 block of Devonshire Street, said LAPD Capt. William Hayes of the department's elite Robbery-Homicide Division.
Los Angeles Daily News

Sheriff's deputy struck by vehicle is in critical condition
A Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy is in critical condition after being struck by a vehicle Saturday morning near the Gold Line tracks in East Los Angeles, sheriff's officials said. Deputy Rudy Juarez, 50, of the sheriff's Transit Services Bureau is being treated for severe head injuries and broken bones in an intensive-care unit at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center, sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said Saturday afternoon. Juarez was unconscious but breathing on his own.
Los Angeles Times

LAPD officers fatally shoot a knife-wielding man in Van Nuys
Los Angeles police shot and killed a man in Van Nuys on Saturday night after he allegedly held a woman at knifepoint. The shooting took place near the intersection of Saticoy Street and Tobias Avenue in the San Fernando Valley around 8 p.m. after officers responded to a 911 call about an assault with a deadly weapon, according to sources familiar with the investigation. When the officers arrived, sources said, the suspect was holding a knife to a woman's throat.
Los Angeles Times

Man found shot to death in Westlake neighborhood
A man was found shot to death in front of a house near downtown Los Angeles early Sunday, police said. Police responding to a 911 call about 1 a.m. discovered the victim outside the house in the 800 block of Beacon Avenue in the Westlake area, police said. He was pronounced dead at the scene. No other information was available about the victim, police said. The investigation is continuing.
Los Angeles Times

Police seek gunman in car-to-car shooting on Hollywood Freeway in North Hollywood
A gunman in a white sedan who wounded a woman in a car-to-car shooting on the Hollywood (170) Freeway in North Hollywood was at large Saturday. A motive for the shooting in southbound lanes between Roscoe Boulevard and Sherman Way about 7:10 p.m. Friday was unknown, police said. The 20-something woman who was wounded was driving a white Nissan Sentra, with her boyfriend, father and infant child in the car, when a white, newer-model four-door, with tinted windows, pulled alongside and a gunman in the back seat opened fire with a semiautomatic pistol, wounding her in the neck, according to police and broadcast reports.
City News Service

Survey: One in 7 of state's nighttime drivers under the influence of drugs
Sometimes, they come through DUI checkpoints smoking a joint. "They'll say, I've got a medical card," said Los Angeles County Sheriff's deputy Sgt. Philip Brooks, of the drivers who get stopped. "And we'll say, that doesn't matter. Smoke that at home and don't drive." While they don't all come through checkpoints smoking marijuana, an increased number of motorists are getting caught driving drugged. It's happening at DUI checkpoints on curved roads through Malibu's canyons and it's happening across the state.
Los Angeles Daily News

City Government

With pension initiative dead, unions focus on spring elections
The decision by former Mayor Richard Riordan last week to suspend his pension reform campaign continued to resonate at City Hall as a city union took one last blast at the former mayor. SEIU Local 721, one of the city's major employee unions, divulged one of its anti-Riordan campaign strategies last week when it said more than 10,000 people who signed the Riordan petition later asked to have their names withdrawn. To no one's surprise, a number of those people were city workers.
Los Angeles Daily News

Once on fast track, L.A. fire chief faces tough scrutiny
The City Council, frustrated by the department's slow response times and inability to turn produce accurate data, has summoned Brian Cummings to appear Tuesday. A wave of outside investigations have found major flaws in the department's performance data following an admission in March that fire officials for years had released flawed figures that overstated how fast rescuers arrived at emergencies. A department task force put the blame on unqualified staff and outdated computer systems, problems also cited in audits by the city controller and others.
Los Angeles Times

Tree damage from storms underlines Los Angeles' lack of maintenance
Damage from downed trees in this week's storm is bringing new attention to the city's financial problems and its inability to respond to residents' complaints. After more than half an inch of rain fell in the Los Angeles area, city crews were answering reports of scores of uprooted trees across the city, creating massive workloads for city crews and frustration for residents. Among them was a 50-foot-tall tree that crashed down in a Mission Hills neighborhood early Friday morning, narrowly missing some houses and blocking the street.
Los Angeles Daily News