Category Archives: California

Marijuana, abortion, climate crisis: what was down the ballot in the midterm

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The ‘green wave’ expanded to Maryland with voters opting for recreational cannabis while California voted to enshrine abortion

Voters across the US weighed in on a variety of ballot measures during the US midterms on Tuesday, passing judgement on everything from recreational drugs to abortion rights, to sports betting and the climate crisis.

Multiple states voted on whether or not to legalize recreational marijuana, part of a growing “green wave” that has already seen many relax their laws on cannabis use.

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California woman describes harrowing shark attack: ‘I saw it clamp my leg’

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The 50-year-old, who survived the encounter, is being treated for the wounds to her upper right thigh

A California woman has given her first interviews about surviving a shark attack while swimming off the coast of San Diego.

Lyn Jutronich, 50, said she was resting in the water during her morning ocean swim when something rammed her hard out of the water.

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Paul Pelosi released from San Francisco hospital after hammer attack

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Husband of House speaker Nancy Pelosi underwent successful surgery for a fractured skull and other injuries after assault

Paul Pelosi, the husband of House speaker Nancy Pelosi, has been released from the San Francisco hospital six days after being attacked by a man wielding a hammer in the couple’s home.

The House speaker said in a statement on Thursday: “Paul remains under doctors’ care as he continues to progress on a long recovery process and convalescence. He is now home.”

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Paul Pelosi attack suspect told police he was on a ‘suicide mission’ and had list of targets

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David DePape appeared in San Francisco court where he pleaded not guilty to charges including attempted murder

The man accused of breaking into Nancy Pelosi’s home and attacking her husband with a hammer made his first courtroom appearance on Tuesday, where he pleaded not guilty to charges including attempted murder.

David DePape was arraigned in San Francisco, where he is also charged with assault with a deadly weapon, burglary, elder abuse and threatening a public official. He appeared with his arm in a sling due to a dislocated shoulder, his public defender said.

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Paul Pelosi attack suspect charged with attempted kidnapping and assault

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Suspect who faces state and federal charges told police he wanted to hold Nancy Pelosi hostage and ‘break her kneecaps’

The man accused of attacking Paul Pelosi, the husband of the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, told police he wanted to hold the congresswoman hostage and “break her kneecaps”, authorities in California said on Monday afternoon.

David DePape, 42, confronted a sleeping Paul Pelosi in the couple’s San Francisco townhouse bedroom shortly before 2.30am last Friday morning, according to a federal affidavit filed in court on Monday.

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Eight-year-old boy becomes youngest person to ascend Yosemite’s El Capitan

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Sam Adventure Baker went up the cliff with his father, but some climbers say method known as ‘jugging’ is not true climbing

An eight-year-old boy has become the youngest person to ascend the terrifying sheer rock wall of El Capitan in America’s Yosemite national park, his father said in a Facebook post.

Sam Adventure Baker has been going up the huge cliff with his father since Tuesday. The duo are part of a four-person team, where one person climbs ahead and sets the ropes for others to follow. Nights are spent sleeping on the rock face.

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‘Bone-appetite’: San Francisco’s latest trendy restaurant caters to canines

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Dogue, run by a trained chef, has garnered outrage for the high cost of pampering pups but pet parents have been supportive

San Francisco is a foodie heaven with plenty of Michelin-starred restaurants. And San Franciscans love dogs. So it might come as no surprise that an entrepreneur has decided to combine the two passions, creating what’s believed to be the first restaurant exclusively for man’s best friend.

Dogue, which rhymes with “vogue”, opened last month in the city’s trendy Mission District.

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Sixth set of human remains found in vanishing Lake Mead

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A second world war-era boat, half emerged B-29 plane and five other bodies have so far been found in the receding waters

Yet another set of human remains was pulled from the shallows of Lake Mead this week, marking the sixth time this year the receding water levels uncovered bodies from the past.

The National Park Service confirmed on Wednesday that a human bone discovered by a diver directed a park dive team to an area where the skeletal remains were found.

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Elon Musk makes splashy visit to Twitter headquarters carrying sink

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Tesla CEO changes his profile to ‘Chief Twit’ as Friday deadline to finalize his takeover deal nears

Elon Musk paid a visit to Twitter’s headquarters ahead of an end-of-week deadline to close his deal to buy the company, posting a video of himself in the company’s San Francisco lobby carrying a sink.

“Entering Twitter HQ - let that sink in!” he tweeted on Wednesday.

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Harvey Weinstein accuser testifies she wanted to ‘destroy’ herself after assault

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The woman alleges the producer raped her in 2013 and is the first of eight witnesses providing testimony during the trial

A woman who accused Harvey Weinstein of raping her in 2013 testified on Tuesday that the attack left her wanting to “destroy” herself.

The woman, a model and actor living and working in Rome who was in Los Angeles at the time for a film festival, is the first of eight Weinstein accusers set to testify in a courtroom in Los Angeles where the 70-year-old movie mogul is on trial on multiple counts of rape and sexual assault.

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California sheriff’s office stops Black drivers five times more often than white people, data shows

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A new report says sheriffs’ patrols spend more time conducting racially biased stops than they do responding to calls for help

Black drivers in California’s capital are nearly five times more likely than white motorists to get pulled over by sheriffs for traffic violations, according to a new report on racial profiling across the state.

Records from the county sheriff’s departments of Los Angeles, San Diego, Sacramento and Riverside show that Black Californians were disproportionately stopped across those regions in 2019, especially for minor infractions.

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Mystery car buried in Silicon Valley mansion garden fully excavated

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Authorities said no body was found, after cadaver dogs had made “slight” notifications of possible human remains

Crews fully excavated a car that police said was buried in the backyard of a northern California mansion 30 years ago and found no human remains, authorities said Monday.

The convertible Mercedes Benz filled with bags of unused concrete was discovered last week by landscapers in the affluent town of Atherton in Silicon Valley. Cadaver dogs brought to the scene made “slight” notifications of possible human remains on three separate occasions, police said in a statement.

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Los Angeles leaders condemn Kanye West as antisemitic incidents rattle city

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Karen Bass, LA mayoral hopeful, told Adidas to sever ties with the rapper while talent agency CAA reportedly dropped him as a client

Kanye West is facing a growing backlash among Los Angeles’ political and Hollywood leaders following several antisemitic incidents in the city that came after the artist made bigoted comments about Jewish people.

On Monday Karen Bass, the congresswoman and LA mayoral hopeful, called for Adidas to cut ties with West, referencing an incident over the weekend in which protesters on a freeway overpass were photographed giving Nazi salutes with banners referencing antisemitic comments made by West. In addition, Los Angeles police are investigating a recent distribution around the city of fliers spreading antisemitic conspiracy theories.

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Police investigate car buried in yard of Silicon Valley home in 1990s

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Car was discovered Thursday morning by landscapers in affluent town of Atherton with unused bags of concrete inside it

Police are investigating why someone buried a car in the yard of a multimillion-dollar northern California home in the 1990s – and left unused bags of concrete inside.

The car was discovered on Thursday morning by landscapers in the affluent town of Atherton in Silicon Valley, police said in a news release.

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US doctor removes 23 contact lenses stuck in eye like ‘stack of pancakes’

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The patient, who had been avoiding visits to her eye doctor due to Covid, complained about feeling something foreign in her eye

A California eye doctor has said an elderly patient who came in complaining of blurry vision ended up having 23 disposable contact lenses in her eye.

“To this day, she herself does not understand how it took place,” Dr Katerina Kurteeva, a Newport Beach ophthalmologist, told a local TV news channel. “She’s still baffled by it all.”

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Kristin Smart: classmate found guilty of murdering California woman missing since 1996

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Paul Flores found guilty of first-degree murder as prosecutors claim he killed 19-year-old during attempted rape

The last man seen with Kristin Smart was convicted on Tuesday of killing the college freshman, who vanished from a California campus 25 years ago.

Jurors unanimously found Paul Flores guilty of first-degree murder, the San Luis Obispo Tribune reported. Flores was one of Smart’s college classmates at the time.

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Police make arrest in suspected Stockton serial killer case

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‘We are sure we stopped another killing,’ Stockton police chief says

A man suspected of killing six men and wounding a woman in a series of shootings in northern California was arrested before dawn on Saturday as he drove through the streets of Stockton, armed with a handgun and possibly searching for another victim, police said.

Investigators began watching the suspect after receiving tips and stopped him in a car at about 2am in the Central Valley city where five of the shootings took place, the police chief, Stanley McFadden, said at a news conference.

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A California measure would tax the rich to fund electric vehicles. Why is the governor against it?

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Proposition 30 would raise up to $5bn annually to help buy zero-emission cars, trucks and buses; Newsom calls it a ‘Trojan horse’

Two years ago, California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, issued an executive order banning the sale of new gas-powered vehicles by 2035.

This year, he’s opposing a ballot measure to fund the transition to electric vehicles – siding with Republicans and against fellow Democrats, environmental groups, firefighters and labor unions.

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Nury Martinez resigns from LA city council after racist remarks leaked

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The former city council president faced intense pressure to step down, including from Joe Biden

The embattled former president of the LA city council stepped down from the board , days after a recording surfaced documenting her and two other Latino council members using racist language to mock colleagues and constituents while they planned to protect Latino political strength in council districts.

Nury Martinez announced her resignation in a statement on Wednesday, hours after the state attorney general announced an investigation into possible criminal charges involving the meeting where she made the remarks.

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Maverick the 2,560lb pumpkin triumphs in ‘Super Bowl’ of gourd fests

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Rhinoceros-size Minnesota native wins big in California and will compete once more before being retired to stud

Growers from across the country descended on the California coast carrying with them some of the world’s most gargantuan pumpkins.

The giant pumpkin weigh-off, held annually ahead of Half Moon Bay’s pumpkin festival just south of San Francisco, is considered by competitors to be a Super Bowl of sorts in the unique sport, and the behemoths entered this year – some weighing as much as an average rhinoceros – did not disappoint.

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