Law Enforcement

Man on motorcycle shot and killed in Westlake
Police were searching for a gunman Wednesday afternoon after a man on a motorcycle was shot in killed in Westlake, authorities said. The motorcyclist was near the corner of Wilshire Boulevard and South Burlington Avenue when he was shot about 1:15 p.m., said LAPD Det. John Motto of the Rampart Division. It is unknown whether the assailant was on foot or fired from a vehicle. The victim, who was pronounced dead at the scene, appears to be a Latino in his 40s, but police have not identified him, Motto said.
Los Angeles Times

Former Hollywood exec loses second bid to go after police union
For a second time, Hollywood executive turned banking executive Brian Mulligan has failed to persuade a judge that he was unfairly attacked by the Los Angeles police union. A federal judge this week threw out a lawsuit Mulligan brought against Eric Rose, a media consultant for the L.A. Police Protective League, which represents rank and file LAPD officers. In January, the former Deutsche Bank executive had a similar suit against police union officials tossed out as well.
Los Angeles Times

LA confidential: The world's most storied police force opens up its photography archive - and the result is worthy of Hollywood
The photograph shows three men in suits and a fourth in a long coat, standing by a car at the side of a dirt road on a flat plain paneled with fields. Power lines stretch to the grey horizon. The men could be property developers, surveying the site of a new out-of-town supermarket, but for a single detail: one of them has curled his hand into the shape of a pistol, and he is pointing it at his companions. The picture, taken in 1963, comes from the archive of the Los Angeles Police Department. The three men in suits are cops, there to recreate the climax of the Onion Field kidnappings, one of the more notorious cases in the history of the LAPD – a police force that, in its 145-year history, has seen more notorious cases than any other. The fourth man is Jimmy Lee Smith, one of the suspects.
History News Network

Smart Phones

California of two minds on warrantless searches of cellphones
California is of two minds when it comes to warrantless searches of a suspect's cellphone. There also appears to be little consensus at the Supreme Court. At oral arguments Tuesday, justices appeared wary of granting police unlimited authority to search cellphones seized from suspects without a warrant. But no agreement emerged over what narrower rule could provide authorities enough leeway to deal with rapidly advancing mobile technology that can be used for criminal activity.
Wall Street Journal

Prisons

Researchers blast U.S. prison policies
The United States incarcerates too many people, a new National Research Council report concludes. Adding more evidence to a growing debate, the elite scientific panel noted with alarm that "the U.S. penal population of 2.2 million adults is by far the largest in the world." Nearly one out of every 100 U.S. adults is in prison or jail, a rate five to 10 times higher than that in Western Europe and other democracies.
Sacramento Bee

Prisoner Release

State corrections officials acknowledge some prisoners are being released early to reduce overcrowding
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation officials have acknowledged that some low-level, nonviolent prisoners are being released early under a federal court order to reduce the inmate population. “For many of those offenders, this just means that the sentence date, the release date, is changed by a matter of days. These are people who were going to be under that supervision, anyway. It's just that their dates were changed by a few days in these cases. That's what's happened,” Jeffrey Callison, the press secretary for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said.
CBS LA

Workers Comp

California's workers compensation benefits among lowest
California workers who suffer permanent, job-related injuries and illnesses are entitled to workers compensation payments that are among the lowest in the nation, an exhaustive state-by-state comparison reveals. The voluminous report on state (and Canadian province) workers compensation benefits was issued Wednesday by the Massachusetts-based Workers Compensation Research Institute and the International Association of Industrial Accident Boards and Commissions.
Sacramento Bee

Child Abuse

Child abuse deaths down in Los Angeles County
Los Angeles County saw fewer deaths from child abuse in 2012 than at any time in the last quarter-century, a trend that coincided with a surge in the reporting of suspected child abuse or neglect, according to a report issued Wednesday. "One can conclude that the number of referrals is not indicative of a bigger problem, but indicative of more awareness and better opportunity to help children, protect them and keep them safe," Inter-Agency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect Director Deanne Tilton-Durfee said.
Los Angeles Daily News

City Government

Sterling furor presents test of L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti's leadership
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti stepped into the national media glare at a galvanizing moment for the city: Donald Sterling's remarks about blacks had just earned him a lifetime NBA banishment, just as his Los Angeles Clippers were competing in the playoffs. The scene, before two dozen TV cameras on the steps of City Hall, offered a rare high-profile moment for a mayor who has spent much of his first 10 months in office stressing nuts-and-bolts city services. Flanked by NBA stars, Garcetti made the case for L.A. as a center of diversity, channeling the public's anger over remarks the NBA determined to be Sterling's and its relief over the league commissioner's stiff penalty.
Los Angeles Times

Los Angeles looks to combat illegal dumping
A broad plan to clear the city's alleys of couches and mattresses that have been illegally dumped is being studied, but it comes with a hefty price tag. The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday asked for a detailed tracking and workload monitoring report from the Bureau of Sanitation, as Mayor Eric Garcetti's proposal to add $5 million to cleanup programs is debated. Councilman Gil Cedillo last year began a pilot program in his district where the alleys were regularly patrolled and emptied of the miscellany of junk dumped there illegally.
Los Angeles Daily News

DWP shuts Magnolia Boulevard in Valley Village for repairs
A portion of Magnolia Boulevard in Valley Village will be closed Saturday for the Department of Water and Power to complete work on replacing a 100-year-old trunk line in the street. DWP officials said the street will be closed from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. between Coldwater Canyon Avenue and Whitsett Avenue. The project is part of a continuing upgrade of the DWP's water system and designed to improve reliability and flexibility of the system.
Los Angeles Daily News