There's nothing particularly scathing in this letter asking for Prop 8 support, but as blogger John Remy at Mind on Fire points out, he was only sent this letter because he's on the Mormon Church's official ward roster. Let me explain what’s going on here–the Mormon Church is using its considerable organizational and monetary resources to mobilize its troops to fight for Prop 8... One of the reasons I’m making this public is because......

Submitted & Authored by Michael Zampelli It was a welcome home fiesta for Manic Hispanic on Sunday night at Alex's Bar in Long Beach, as they returned from the Western leg of their US tour and played a tight set of punk rock classics for a full house of their SoCal homies. The pit was utter chaos with bodies and liquids being tossed around like it was 1977 all over again. Los Mysteriosos, with Alex's......

Mountain Lion cubs are adorable. But beware when you pet them, their mother might lash out as one did today when a hiker on the Borrego Trail in Whiting Ranch Wilderness Park (Orange County) did just that. Luckily, today's "attack," as KNX1070 is calling it, was only a scratch. We would call it self defense as the human was the one who approached the cubs, even if with harmless intentions. The park is currently closed......

Yesterday morning, it was Encino. Last night, it was Santa Ana when a man who was told by police to leave an area got involved in a struggle with officers. He tried to grab a gun from one officer's holster when the another officer shot him dead, according to police. Several officers had minor injuries.......

At the South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, there was some damage to what looks like lighting and tables on two floors after this morning's 5.4 earthquake in Chino Hills. Flickr user, Jason Sherwin, quickly snapped photos and uploaded them to the web.......

Fans of deep-fried anything rejoice! The Orange County Fair opened its gates yesterday and will be welcoming crowds in Costa Mesa until August 3. There's tons of stuff going on there from Tuesdays through Sundays, including live performances, kids stuff, carnival games, animals, exhibits, and did we mention the food? The theme this year in the OC is "Say Cheese!" so some combination of cows, photo ops, and dairy products is sure to be in......

This upcoming weekend is probably the biggest weekend the LA Derby Dolls have had so far. In a first tournament of its kind, the best skaters from Los Angeles, San Diego and Orange County are having it out on a banked track. Not only will there be tons of games throughout Saturday and Sunday, there will be bands, food, beer and general awesomeness. What the Derby Dolls do is very special and unique to Los......

A Los Angeles county crew shovels mud from a road, in Sierra Madre, Calif. Friday, May 23, 2008. A mudslide closed two roads in the foothill community of Sierra Madre as wet and windy weather bounced through Southern California for a second day. (AP Photo/Nick Ut) After a fire ripped through the hills above Sierra Madre last month, rain caused a mudslide forcing the closure of two roads while officials urged voluntary evacuations that......

From a weekend heatwave to a rainy and snowy day in Southern California. A reader wrote in an e-mail to us "It's hailing! But it only lasted a second here in Northridge." The bigger news is that heavy rains in Orange County have caused officials to order evacuations in three canyons where mudslides occurred earlier today. After last year's wildfires, those hillsides were charred, making for easy sliding action. However, some residents have not left......

Photo by timsamoff via Flickr Thirteen hospitals statewide were fined on Wednesday by the California Department of Public Health. In total, five from the Los Angeles area were cited: Pomona Valley Medical Center, Los Angeles County Harbor-UCLA Medical Center near Torrance and Los Angeles County Olive View- UCLA Medical Center in LA County and Garden Grove Hospital and Medical Center and St. Joseph Hospital in Orange County, according to wire reports. Reasons varied from......

A grand jury report released today (.pdf) said that Orange County patrons of food institutions are hardly notified of the conditions inside the restaurant. Unlike Los Angeles County where A-B-C grades are posted in the front window, Orange County restaurants only have to display placards saying they are either "in substantial compliance" with food-safety standards, or awaiting a re-inspection, according to the OC Register. The report says that the public is "almost universally unaware" of......

State of California, Park Rangers: "'The park system we have is not set up to be an answer to social services' but exists as a recreation and vacation venue, [Roy Stearns, a state Department of Parks and Recreation spokesman,] said. He said churches and community centers would be more appropriate as sites for feeding the homeless." Interfaith Needs Network (represented by ACLU): "'We are not inciting a riot,' Siler said. 'We are simply feeding our......

When an Orange County woman asked her husband to go clean the car, he came back with some old lottery tickets. Turns out one was worth $1, another was $3 and the final ticket was $198,468. The woman had bought the tickets back in March at a Fountain Valley liquor store and forgot about them until her husband came up with them. The next time your mother, your wife, your girlfriend or whoever tells you......

After confronting a tagger in Garden Grove, a man was shot four times in the upper body, according to police. The incident took place around 10 p.m. Sunday night at the corner of Robyn Court and Trask Avenue. The victim is listed in critical condition and undergoing surgery at UCI Medical Center in Irvine. The man is expected to survive. Last year, two women in separate incidents were murdered by taggers in Whittier and San......

Photo by Rick O! via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr A shark attack off the shores of San Diego killed Dr. Dave Martin, a retired veterinarian and triathlete from Solana Beach. Martin was taking part in an early morning group swim near Fletcher Cove when the incident occured; an 8-mile section of beach remains closed. The fate of Rocky, the grizzly bear who bit and killed his trainer earlier this week, will......

Yesterday, in another timely Earth Day announcement, Governor Schwarzenegger announced California's first natural landmark in Orange County. 40,000 acres of the Irvine Ranch may be recognized with the title, but it does not mean the land is protected or open to the public. Rather, it is to help bring awareness to the land and focus on long-term public preservation. With summer coming, more people will be heading outdoors. Yes, Yosemite may be five hours away,......

Keith Millhouse, vice-chairman of the board of Metrolink speaks during a roll-out ceremony of Metrolink's cleanest locomotive, background, in LA. The locomotives, which cost nearly $2 million each, use computer technology and electronic fuel injection to reduce emissions and a shut-down feature to reduce idling. (AP Photo/Nick Ut) Just in time for Earth Day, Metrolink officials announced the arrival of a new kind of train yesterday -- one that's cleaner for the environment and......

After the odd news that broke this morning about the verboten action of snapping photos in Disneyland parking lots, more news comes out of the House of Mouse today -- in the form of transportation. Ray Bradbury may want a monorail in Los Angeles, but Disney is the only place you'll actually get some one-on-one action with it. And beginning Friday, "the first new monorail car in two decades — called the Monorail Red or......

Officials still haven't determined whether or not the Orange County Sheriff's deputy found dead in an unmarked car yesterday shot himself or was a homicide victim. BUT...Just hours before he was found, [41-year-old Gerald] Stenger was charged Wednesday morning with molesting a 12-year-old boy for two years after meeting him through Big Brothers Big Sisters of Orange County. Stenger was charged with one felony count of lewd acts on a child younger than 14 and......

An on-duty Orange County sheriff's investigator was found dead in the driver's seat of an unmarked Ford Crown Victoria in Aliso Viejo on Wednesday. The veteran investigator's body was found about 2:30 p.m. in an unmarked Ford Crown Victoria parked in the parking lot of a shopping center in the 26700 block of Aliso Creek Road near Enterprise. Blood covered the front seat. -- OC RegisterEarly news reports described a "body ... discovered ... in......

Photo by kristi.nicole via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr One week after being subdued in his cell with a taser gun and lapsing into a coma, 35-year-old Orange County inmate Jason Jesus Gomez has died, officials announced today. Gomez, who was in jail for a probation violation, stopped breathing after officers used the taser on him during a scuffle. Say cheese: LA City Council voted today to approve a contract that will put......

Click here to play with this map! Holy! See all that blue? Most likely, your street has been caught on camera. After this past summer when Google initially released a very limited Street View function in Los Angeles, a vast improvement in coverage all over Los Angeles and Orange counties was recently released. Now, did they get your street this time?......

Photo of the Vincent Thomas Bridge by Jonathan Alcom (Sundogg) via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr We've been covering the city's police force a lot lately -- and before you think those officers just sit around eating donuts all day, you should definitely check out the LA Times guide to the Best Eats on the Beats. (Think Mexican food.) In more fun food news, EaterLA gives us the breakdown of Los Angeles......

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What was just a St. Patty's Day bar fight that included a pool cue knocking one man unconscious has turned into a murder incident. As of yesterday, the Monday afternoon fight in a bar in Orange County's city of Cypress left Steven Keith Toole, 45, in critical condition and on life support. As of yesterday morning, he was pronounced dead police announced today. Police had arrested a bar regular, Richard Lee Thompson, 46, who after......

What killed a 33-year-old woman discovered packed in dry ice in the Newport Beach hotel room of a cocaine dealer this past weekend? "Everything that happened was for religious reasons," Stephen David Royds told The Orange County Register on Sunday reports the AP. Detectives found the body of Monique Felicia Trepp, 33, fully clothed and "well preserved" inside a large Rubbermaid container late Thursday after arresting a guest at the Fairmont Newport Beach for investigation......

Update, 10:31 p.m.: The jewelry thief was shot deadThe Shops in Mission Viejo became a crime scene today when at 5:30 p.m., a gunman robbed a jewelry store, taking two women hostage, according to a witness, and eventually being shot by sheriff's deputies. According to another witness, security guards chased the man through the mall to a parking structure where he was met by police where shots were fired. Other than the alleged robber, no......

Nick's, home of delicious breakfast burritos, by Rebecca~James via LAist Featured Photos Pool on Flickr Remember when we told you that Los Angeles tap water was the best tasting in the world? Turns out that our delicious H20 might have been sprinkled with delicious drugs. The AP found that a multitude of pharmaceuticals, like antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones, have been found in the drinking water supplies of at least 41 million......

Unrelated photo of Ben & Jerrys' shipment of dry ice via AmyMo's flickr. *UPDATE, Monday, March 10, 11:10 a.m.: The woman was on dry ice, apparently for 'religious reasons' and does not appear to be murdered. Full story can be found here.What killed a 33-year-old woman discovered packed in dry ice in the Newport Beach hotel room of a cocaine dealer? The few details are embarrassing sketchy at best pending CSI-style detectivery. The body......

$3.55 for unleaded. Check, albeit annoying. $3.79 for performance plus. Ugh, okay, check. $9.38 a gallon for high performance. Che-- wha???!?!?!!!? LAist Featured Photos photographer Movie Lover snapped this shot on the Westside. "While driving past a gas station in Brentwood, CA a while back, I noticed that the price had gone up. Way up." Yeah, no doubt. Let's see, April Fool's Day is next month. It's not a six upside down. This doesn't look......