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.......

Photo by _ gianni's_ photography _ AKA *Prime Imagery* via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr In part to honor the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr and in part to "increase the peace" a 40-hour moratorium on violence goes into effect for the City of Los Angeles starting at 6:01 p.m. tonight. Do your part! Because "You can't fire me...I QUIT!" lacks that certain je-ne-sais-quoi, perhaps? An employee in......

Photo by Try Hank via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr The "severely decomposed" body of an infant has been found in Santa Ana. An area resident saw a dog playing with something unusual, which turned out to be the baby, whose body has been taken to the Orange County coroner's office for an autopsy. Police may now be ruling yesterday's 101 freeway death a suicide, reports the Daily News. Initial reports intimated......

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......

...there will be no bubble after all. The bubble in question was to be a giant bubble encasing show-elephant Tai as part of Santa Ana's Discovery Science Center's upcoming "Bubblefest" event. Due to overwhelming public objection, artist Fan Yang will not get the chance to set a world record for the largest bubble blown that holds a large animal--and really, how often do those opportunities come along? (One may wonder how someone practices for such......

Stunts come in all shapes and sizes, but the one planned for next week at the Santa Ana Zoo is absolutely elephantine--at least for one pachyderm named Tai. According to cbs2.com: "Artist Fan Yang plans to briefly envelop the elephant in a giant soapy bubble at the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana on Tuesday as part of the center's annual Bubblefest." Admittedly a strange stunt--and one that will "set a world record for the......

God, sometimes we love Orange County. It's such a parody of itself at times, which we admire. Especially when it comes to brilliance like the following found over at Laughing Squid. You see, the city of Santa Ana (oy) wants to help parents determine, via the graphic above, whether or not their child is a rat bastard tagger. The city of Santa Ana's site explains their accusatory and unfair image, along with the final word......

Arthur Paul Carmona, 26, an advocate for people wrongly accused of crimes who was wrongly accused himself and incarcerated for 2 1/2 years as a teenager in Orange County was killed this weekend. His name became widely known when he was arrested when he was 16 and convicted of robbing two juice bars in Irvine and Costa Mesa:His mother mustered support for her son and political and community outrage followed over police tactics that led......

Reports of Bigfoot were sweeping across America by the late '50s, but what Charles Wetzel encountered on Saturday, November 1st, 1958 was unlike anything reported in the press. He was cruising in his 1952 Buick Super near Riverside, lending an ear to KFI Radio of Los Angeles, when he had to slow his car further to avoid water that had spilled across the road from the Santa Ana River. Suddenly, the radio began to crackle......

Will it be pouring buckets tonight? If you aren't already planning on holing up with some popcorn and Netflix picks, you may want to get out and get your art & culture on. Let us help! ART ART LA 2008 is billed as "the only art fair in Los Angeles exclusively dedicated to contemporary art" and runs through tomorrow at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium. This year's event "features 64 prominent international and Los Angeles-based......

Photo by Fire Monkey Fish via flickr. Forget medical marijuana storefronts, the feds have found a new kind of place to storm into -- museums. Today, four Southern California museums, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Bowers Museum of Cultural Art in Santa Ana, the Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena and the Mingei International Museum in San Diego, were raided in an attempt to bust an "alleged illegal smuggling of Southeast Asian......

Two incidents that took place yesterday in parts of Orange County turned deadly and claimed two lives and injured others. The first incident took place Friday afternoon in Garden Grove, when a man described as "an Asian male in his early 20s, was found lying in a pool of blood in the middle of the street," an apparent victim of a stabbing reports CBS2.com. Officials found the body at Cork Street and Hazard Avenue, and......

So far this weekend in the Southland there have been several major freeway accidents that led to injuries, deaths, arrests, and shutdowns. In the early hours of Saturday in Diamond Bar, a driver going the wrong way in his pickup truck on the transition road from the eastbound 60 Freeway to the northbound 57 Freeway collided with a minivan, killing its driver. As KNBC.com reports: "The wrong-way driver, who is believed to have been intoxicated,......

Jeffrey Lawrence Weaver was sentenced today to 40 years to life in prison for the killing of a man whose remains were left to rot in a Van Nuys storage unit. Weaver is one of two men convicted in this case. Today the "judge said he would recommend that Weaver never be released on parole" because of the extreme nature of the killing. The couple found this weekend dead of an apparent murder-suicide have been......

Vitals details in the killings of two South LA residents who were found shot to death in their 11th Ave apartment remain unknown. The LAPD was notified late Monday afternoon of gunshots heard, and soon after discovered the bodies of Shelton Sumerall, 32, and Monica Youngblood, 23, both of whom suffered fatal shots to their heads. The motive and a shooting suspect have not been determined. A Van Nuys man was stabbed yesterday when he......

A suspected drunk driver brough his Sunday to a crashing conclusion when he led officers on a chase from Santa Ana to Glendale late last night. The PIT maneuver was employed on the Colorado Street offramp of the 5 North to bring things to a halt. Kids, don't go spiking Santa's milk tonight with rum; we don't want the cops chasing any reindeer-led sleighs! The LA Times chimes in with their thoughts today on the......

The robbery spree of an OC couple in their twenties came to an end this week after a purse-snatching and pepper-spraying incident at a Wal-Mart. The two are also suspected of a robbery in Santa Ana, and were taken into custody after police stormed their Surf Cove home. Yesterday in Pomona Superior Court, the three white men accused of attempted murder, assault, and hate crime against a black man in Claremont last year were convicted......

During the go-go, greed is good ‘80s, Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous and host Robin Leach became the symbol of American opulence. It was hard not to aspire for 'champagne wishes and caviar dreams.' Of course these days, there are countless shows featuring the upper crust flaunting their wealth. And like a car wreck, we wretch at the sight of such blatant materialism while secretly keeping our eyes glued to the TV set. So......

As soon as we arrived at the Obey sale on Saturday in Santa Ana I told my friend, "fuck this, I'm out." The line was longer than anything I'd seen outside Magic Mountain. All you could see were high school and college-aged kids in hoodies and tapered jeans messaging their friends and they were probably saying the same thing I was saying, "fuck this." But my friend was determined. She had Christmas shopping to......

The LA Times is reporting this morning that "the big waves predicted for Southern California beaches failed to materialize Tuesday afternoon." Photographer Jonathan Alcorn, an LAist Featured Photos contributer on Flickr, shot these large waves yesterday in El Segundo at El Porto. These surfers seem to be riding waves in that 7-12 ft. range the Times predicted yesterday morning. Hrmmmmm? Yes, throughout the region waves were not as high as many hoped to be,......

While you were sleeping: There's nothing wrong with the ganj in California, as long as you've got a scrip to use. So decided the 4th District Court of Appeals in the case of a 22-year-old who had a quarter of weed confiscated in a traffic stop by LAPD, despite having a prescription for marijuana as treatment for severe back pain. Now, how exactly will LAPD go about "returning" weed to rightful owner 2.5 years......

"Human activity" is what the LA Times is reporting is the cause of the fires. That's arson if it wasn't an accident. The most destructive fire in Malibu in nearly 15 years raced through parched canyons Saturday, consuming 49 homes and forcing the evacuation of thousands of residents. The so-called Corral fire burned 4,700 acres before the fierce Santa Ana winds died down, allowing firefighters to make a stand. By evening, the blaze, which......

Black Friday has come and gone but there's one more killer sale that you shouldn't miss - the Obey Sale. For the last few years we have been lucky enough to learn about the sale, this year held in a warehouse The OC, and today we are very happy to share the dates with you. When: Friday, December 7th from 9a - 7p & Saturday, December 8th from 9a - 5p Where: 3500 West......

Every Friday, LAist is taking you on a trip down to Orange County to uncover the unique dining experiences that await adventurous eaters willing to explore beyond the county line. Here in LA, we are blessed with embarrassing riches when it comes to Latin American food. Just about every country is represented by at least a couple of places that truly embody the cuisine and spirit of the local culture. Venezuela is no different.......

If you have been thirsty lately and don't know why, perhaps it was the news that the Metropolitan Water District is about to cut water to Southern California agriculture by 30 percent. As a result, your bill could rise of 10 percent. It may be time to move into the ocean. "Nasty," Aggravating" and "Snotty" are words usually meant for our beloved President from critics near and far. Well, if Bush was the Santa......

We felt it slightly in the Valley and according to the USGS, a 4.7 Earthquake east of Santa Ana hit at 10:29 a.m.Lake Elsinore, CA - 13 km (8 miles) WNW (298 degrees) Lakeland Village, CA - 15 km (9 miles) NW (314 degrees) Portola Hills, CA - 16 km (10 miles) ENE (70 degrees) Corona, CA - 18 km (11 miles) SSE (148 degrees) Los Angeles Civic Center, CA - 80 km (50 miles)......

These are the last days of summer. At least that's what they say on the news and in the marketplace. But here in Southern California, it only gets hotter as the days grow shorter. (At least the pools won't close just yet). But -- Holy Dallas Raines -- early this morning, with temps stuck in the mid-70s, we've got thunder and lightning! Unfortunately, the electricity in the air has no bearing on California's energy supply,......

We know lots of people are heading out of town for a jumpstart on the Labor Day holiday. But if you’re sticking around -- maybe check out one of LAist’s theatre picks this week: 365 Days/365 Plays: Week 42 The staging of Suzan-Lori Parks’s massive experiment of writing a play a day continues this week in the hands of the Angry Bubble Productions. Audience members will be taken in 20 at a time for......

More congestion insanity: the L.A. City Council has just approved a rethink in planning rules to allow more downtown developments. Tom Hanks, his wife Rita Wilson and Nia Vardalos have filed suit in Los Angeles alleging they weren't paid their full percentage "share of net profits" for the hit "My Big Fat Greek Wedding." 10 individuals and businesses face federal charges of accidentally starting large wildfires. Officials at Angel Stadium have pledged to work......

Sometimes the emails that we get from our readers tell the stories way better than we ever could. We had just read the sad news over at LA Observed that filmmaker, writer, and blogger Theresa Duncan had committed suicide, when we got this email: Tony, I'm a long time fan of your blog and LAist. I'm also a huge fan of Theresa Duncan's blog, Wit of the Staircase. LAist did an interview with her awhile......