ICE agents have reportedly claimed to be police officers to gain consent to enter a person’s home – a tactic that is viewed as unethical, but within the powers granted to the officers. Civil rights groups supported Kalra’s bill, looking to stymie the Trump administration’s promise to use any and all available tools to deport undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes. Many groups fear Trump will expand deportations to include all undocumented immigrants, their families and relatives.   read more

The California Department of Justice (DOJ) suggests that in order to make sense of the information in the wiretap report, its elaborate, multi-page tables “should be read in conjunction with one another to evaluate the impact intercepts have on public safety.” Good luck with that. The department released the report as a locked PDF, a file format that reduces the ability to analyze the data in alternative formats. No copying and pasting into an Excel spreadsheet.   read more

Two-thirds of the suspect medical providers claimed an extreme number of procedures a day, including one who billed for 1,000 services a day on 97 separate days. The average is 24. His personal record was 1,658 in one day. That's one service every 17.4 seconds, assuming an 8-hour workday. Two dentists averaged 500 services a day and 229 averaged 76 a day. One dentist averaged 862 services per day.   read more

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) wanted $125 million from the county to help pay for a $600-million expansion. Board member Michael Lynton was CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment and a frequent associate of L.A. County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas. The supervisor asked for and received a $25,000 contribution for a SuperPac he founded and later voted in favor of giving LACMA the money. The story does not allege a quid pro quo. That would be wrong and illegal.   read more

Myrna Arias of Bakersfield sued her employer (pdf) in Kern County Superior Court, claiming she was fired two weeks after turning off a company-required GPS app that tracked her movements during off-hours. Arias likened the app to a parolee's ankle bracelet, called it illegal and asked for $500,000 compensation.   read more

The association took a neutral stance on Senate Bill 128, which would make it legal for doctors to prescribe lethal medication to terminally-ill patients. The bill, mirrored on Oregon’s law, establishes procedures for requesting aid-in-dying drugs and provides immunity from civil or criminal liability to those who assist terminal patients in good faith.   read more

The Los Angeles Times did a quick database check at the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) and found Plains had three times the number of infractions per mile of pipeline than the national average. They were fifth on a list of 1,700 pipeline operators in the total number of infractions. Reporters counted 175 infractions in multiple states since 2006, including pipeline corrosion, operator error and pump failure.   read more

The Legislative Analyst projected the state would clean up collecting capital gains taxes from wealthier individuals. That’s been the story so far in 2015, and they are sticking to it. “We are clearly on the upward slope of the state’s revenue roller coaster,” the Analyst warned, without explicitly saying some folks might lose their lunch or suffer heart palpitations on the way down. "No one can reliably predict many of the key variables that affect California finances."   read more

The Santa Barbara Independent said the Coast Guard cited Plains All American Pipeline (PAAP) of Texas as estimating that 21,000 gallons of oil gushed out of its broken 24-inch pipeline onshore, flowed into a culvert, made its way to a storm drain and dumped out in the ocean. But the company said on its website late into the evening that “at this time, the amount of released oil is unknown.”   read more

Although the minimum wage was $1.60 an hour in 1968, that would be the equivalent of $9.25 today. Workers have lost ground on wages even as productivity has skyrocketed. If the minimum wage were pegged to overall income growth in the American economy, the minimum wage would be $21.16 an hour.   read more

Although serious childhood trauma is generally recognized as being widespread in our culture and a severe detriment to student achievement, K-12 teachers receive little if any training in college or on the job on how to recognize and deal with it in the classroom. That might change soon. The lawsuit seeks judicial recognition that complex trauma prevents students from receiving meaningful access to education, a basic constitutional right, and cannot be ignored.   read more

Salmon is another story. California’s Department of Fish and Wildlife (DFW) is directing a massive effort to truck tankloads of baby salmon from fisheries to the San Francisco Bay to help save the fishing industry, keep the species alive and put a Band-Aid on the food chain. State and federal wildlife agencies told AP it was the largest fish-lift ever. 30 million salmon.   read more

“I'm a little disappointed industry did not represent themselves,” committee member Dr. Bryce Mays said, according to the Los Angeles Times. “I think they may have data critical to our thinking in terms of reaching a decision, and they chose not to.” They probably didn't want to hear panel member Dr. Irving Nachamkin say, “We have heard enough data to say these devices are not safe using current conditions.”   read more

Halpern’s complaint, filed in San Francisco Superior Court against the S.F.-based company, claims he was the “inventor of the idea, concept, coding, design, appearance, application and prototype” of what eventually became Uber. The suit alleges misappropriation of trade secrets and breach of contract.   read more

Exports of water were already low. The Sheet reported that they were around 60,000-70,000 acre-feet each of the last couple years, compared to an average of 337,000 a year since 1970. L.A.’s sordid history with Owens Valley, in Inyo County, was famously fictionalized in the 1974 movie “Chinatown.” Owens Lake went dry in a decade. Farmers, ranchers and residents were devastated and the area has been wracked by dust storms and drought ever since.   read more

The department's action was triggered by an SEC complaint filed against the operator of more than 135 schools in 39 states, with enrollment of 57,000, just days before. The SEC charged that ITT “engaged in a fraudulent scheme and course of business and made various false and misleading statements and omissions to defraud ITT's investors by concealing the extraordinary failure of two off-balance-sheet student loan programs, and the looming effect of that failure on ITT's financial condition.”   read more

The students claimed a “classic bait-and-switch” by administrators, who promised a master’s program that includes two years of teaching experience and very little debt while learning from an “inspiring faculty.” That is not what they got, they say. “We became devalued pawns in the University’s administrative games,” they wrote in a group letter. “We feel betrayed, exhausted, disrespected and cheated."   read more