Recently in Los Angeles Department of Coroner Category

A summary of some items we've been covering over the weekend:

1. EL MONTE -- Homicide detectives are investigating the mysterious death of a man whose body was found on the property of an office building Sunday.
2. ROSEMEAD -- The man who died in a fiery crash at the end of a police chase Saturday was driving an SUV that belonged to a woman found shot to death at her Gardena business.
3. LA PUENTE -- A man allegedly shot and wounded two of his roommates during an argument at their house Saturday.
4. SOUTH EL MONTE -- Officials have released the name of a man found who was fatally shot in his car last week.
5. NORWALK -- A man was shot and wounded in the parking lot of a convenience store Sunday.
6. SONORA -- The Montrose Search and Rescue Team rescued a 34-year-old man Sunday after he spent two nights at the bottom of an abandoned mine shaft.

This story from Pico Rivera comes via the wire services. I'll post an update later:

The L-A County coroner's office plans perform an autopsy on the body of a man
who was found in the driver's seat of a parked car in an un-incorporated area
near Pico Rivera. The body was discovered at Rooks Road and Peck
Roads last night. A parking citation had been left on the car.

*Here's what KCBS/KCAL is reporting:

Employees at a nearby truck repair shop said the car -- a 1980s four-door Lincoln -- had been parked there all day, and, at some point, someone placed a parking ticket on the vehicle's door.

A worker said firefighters who responded couldn't believe that someone had issued the citation without noticing the deceased man.

 

    The death of retired Pasadena Police Lt. David Richter has highlighted the need for responsible journalism in a time when tabloid reporting and the sentiments of bloggers are confused with news.

    Richter's abandoned car was found by a water-filled pit in Irwindale last January. Police assumed the retired lieutenant had either taken his own life or simply walked away from his financial troubles.

    The later discovery of Richter's corpse and a firearm under a nearby overpass seems to corroborate the theory that Richter took his own life. But then there's the conspiracy theorists, and admittedly the case possesses all the potential of a Law and Order episode.

    Thursday, I read an article by Andre Coleman of the Pasadena Weekly. Buried on page 13, the article uses an unnamed source and anonymous letter to create speculation amongst readers. After a short recap of the facts, Coleman delves into a lengthy digress about an anonymous letter sent to members of the Pasadena City Council.  The letter alleges everything from police malfeasance to racism.

    Coleman's sublimation of this anonymous letter leads to another anonymous source:

"According to an earlier conversation with one coroner's office employee who did not wish to be named, among the factors that may have led authorities to reopen the case (the case was never closed) was that a gun found near Richter's body appeared to have been fired four times, and one bullet remained in the weapon."

    Keeping in mind that they are a tabloid, I find it alarming that the Pasadena Weekly published this story. Had someone in the coroner's office made the statement, a statement that Los Angeles County Coroner Assistant Chief Ed Winter doubts the legitimacy of, I would have written it off as conjecture, rather than present it as news. How would someone in the coroner's office know this information? According to Winter, homicide detectives would have taken the weapon and run ballistics on it, not the coroners office. While the article spends ample time on anonymous sources, it fails to mention Richter's financial possible motives for Richter to commit suicide.

    Prior to writing my article on Richter, I searched for reliable information, unfortunately reliable sources of information weren't permitted to comment.

    Friday I spoke with a psychic who claims the spirit of David Richter awakens her every morning seeking justice for his murder.

    Monday morning I listened to a voice-mail from an anonymous caller who presented himself as law enforcement by using the word "we" often in his rant. I listened to the message several times in an ill-fated attempt to extract meaningful insight.

"You'll never find out what happened, because that's what happens to us good cops when we make promises we can't keep."

What promises? Promises to financial institutions involving adjustable rate mortgages?

    After racking my brain for three days I had an epiphany: there probably isn't any credible information indicating Richter's death was anything but a suicide.

    Let's face it, Richter was a retired cop and retired cops kill themselves. By the age of 55 Richter had spent his entire adult life in law enforcement, and didn't have a spouse or children.

    Police who survive years of service, only to take their own lives after retirement is not a new concept. My own grandfather retired after 30 years as a Philadelphia homicide detective, and spent the next ten years drinking himself to death.

    Sure, it's possible that Richter caught a bullet during an old-west-style shootout with a crooked cop. However, it's far more likely that Richter was lamenting his career, his impending financial doom, and a Christmas without not only kin but comrade, last holiday season when he died.

    Regardless of what happened to Richter, it's important that journalists remember their role: to report the news not create it. That's why I take it as a compliment when bloggers like Aaron Proctor recognize me with a "ham and egger" award for "stealing" a story. So long as the Associated Press continues to recognize the difference between news coverage and misleading narratives, there just might be hope for the media and the role it should play in our society.

After two days of intensive reporting Brian Day is set to report several new revelations that have emerged from his investigation into the slaying of Glenn Patrick Rose.

Among those revelations, Rose had been Tasered prior to an officer involved shooting that led to his death. Additionally he had been convicted of participating in at least two police pursuits in 2001 and 2002.

On Tuesday morning, Rose was shot to death by deputies from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and officers from the California Highway Patrol. The shooting occurred after Rose led officers on a high speed pursuit from Walnut through West Covina.

Rose, a woman who was riding in the car with him, and the officers ended up in a Covina alleyway near First and Puente avenues in Covina.

Once there, officers said Rose attempted to steal another car before attempting to run them down.

As many as 15 shots were fired and Rose was killed.

Here's the new information:

• Rose was Tasered before he was shot, according to an autopsy performed by the Los Angeles County Department of Coroner.
• Rose had a criminal record in Los Angeles County that included convictions for fleeing officers in 2001 and 2002. His record also included convictions for grand theft and driving a vehicle without the owner's consent.
• An attorney hired by Rose's family to possibly file a wrongful death lawsuit against the county told Day in an interview Friday he was unaware of convictions, but believes it bolsters his case; as Rose was never charged with violent crimes stemming from previous pursuits.
• Rose's family and friends as well as the attorney told also told reporter Day that Rose, who previously had a substance abuse problem, had turned his life around and was attending a 12-step program.
• Rose's girlfriend Sarah Rebecca Morales remains in custody for her role in the pursuit. She is being held in lieu of $50,000 bail.

Much of this continues to be debated in a Topix forum that's been pretty heated.

As a sample, here's an anonymous comment from a person identified as a friend of both Rose and Morales:

 I knew Sarah and Patrick very well. I was in sober living with Patrick and knew Sarah from her job at Alpha Omega. She was and is a sweet young lady. It is so sad to see what the drugs and alcohol do to us and how we turn into a totally different person once we are on them. I am in recovery and have been sober for four years. I know the strugles of staying clean and sober. I relapsed many times befor I got the four years I have today. The one thing that AA tell us is,(If we do not stop doing the drugs and drinking and work the Spiritual Program put befor us, that we are doomed to Jails, Institutions or Death. It is just really sad and ashame that Patrick had to draw the death card, because when he was sober he was a very good person and helped many.) I have seen so many guys that I care about and that have been through the sober living that I went through and managed go back to prison and institutions that it really hurts. But, Sarah and all of the men that have had to go to jail or back to prison are the lucky ones, because they can resume there lives once they have served there time,

What a week.

Violence erupted on our freeways. Crooks took pot shots at police officers and the cops shot back. Someone executed an Arcadia man inside his parents' home. The Department of Coroner attempted to sort out the details surrounding the strange death of a Pico Rivera man found dead in a Ford sedan the morning after his wedding.

Two kindly grandfathers working as car salesmen in East Los Angeles were herded into a back room and blasted. Twenty minutes later, and a block or so away, two other guys were killed in a drive-by.

Oh, and the parents of Moe the chimp encountered a purse snatcher Sunday at a Target store in West Covina.

On Wednesday afternoon, St. James and LaDonna Davis held a press conference at attorney Gloria Allred's office in a Wilshire Boulevard highrise overlooking the Hollywood Hills to discuss the incident.

"How could she do this to me?" St. James said. "I keep asking myself 'why, why, why do I have such bad luck?'"

This is news.

As proof, TMZ.com was streaming live and KTLA, KABC, KCBS, KCAL and KTTV all sent their heaviest hitters.

There's a huge file of stories about Moe the chimp in the newspaper's morgue dating back a decade or so. Most have pictures. The saddest shows St. James Davis wailing as his "son" is carted away from the family's West Covina home in September 1999.

The most recent mention comes from 2005. Chimps attacked and mauled St. James on the grounds of Moe's new home, the Animal Haven Ranch in Caliente.

As a result of the attack and 60 surgeries, St. James' face is disfigured and he is confined to a wheelchair. He could only sit and watch Sunday as LaDonna's purse was taken from their shopping cart. On Wednesday, 15 of my colleagues were there to chronicle this latest twist of the Davises.

After all, who doesn't like monkeys or stories about monkeys? (Yes I know Moe's a chimp — but in a generic sense he's a monkey.)

Monkeys are funny. It's in their genes. Every time I think about the chain-smoking Mr. Teeny, Krusty the Clown's sidekick on "The Simpsons," I smile. I put Ronald Reagan right up there in the pantheon of presidents, but who can remember a single movie of his other than "Bedtime for Bonzo"?

I must admit, I stifled a grin when I saw how much attention the Davises' case got.

In that context, who can blame Allred for using the chimp to make chumps of the local media?

"They are on a fixed income and are still coping with the life-changing consequence of the attack by the chimps," Allred said. "LaDonna spends her days caring for St. James, feeding him, bathing him, helping him in and out of his wheelchair and taking him to doctors."

For most of us, a purse snatching winds up with the police taking a report, and the bank and credit card companies taking their sweet time to return your lost plastic.

Don't forget the line at the DMV taking a century or so to navigate just to get a paper license and a new picture.

I know. My wife, Rosie, and I lived this once. When our son Matthew was born at San Gabriel Valley Medical Center, he had to spend the first week of his life in the neonatal ward in an induced coma.

It's one of those secure and supposedly clean wards of the hospital. Everyone has to scrub down. Purses and other personal items need to be left on a table away from the sick babies.

One Sunday when we were visiting the little guy, someone walked off with Rosie's purse. I think we called in a report to the police.

Eventually the wallet came back, with a note that said, "sorry." But the plastic and the money was gone. I guess someone needed it more than we did.

And that was that.

Maybe we would have scored it all back if Matt had been born a monkey.

Arraignment for Isaac Campbell, 32, accused of killing his girlfriend Liya "Jessie" Lu, ,31,  then stuffing her body in a trash can filled with kitty litter was postponed again Tuesday, officials said.

Apparently the Los Angeles Department of Coroner is having a difficult time determining the cause of Lu's death, and therefore Campbell cannot be arraigned, according to officials who spoke to Pasadena Star-News reporter Fred Ortega at the Alhambra courthouse. The arraignment was continued until the end of next month, officials said.

Students at PCC, where Lu was a nursing student have been folowing the case via the PCC Courier, which carried this report by Franco Sui Yuan:

One time PCC student Isaac Campbell, suspected in slaying former PCC student Liya Jessie Lu, will make a new appearance on court, after his arraignment was postponed today at the Alhambra Courthouse.

Superior Court Judge Carlos Uranga postponed the arraignment to May 6 due to the tardiness in receiving the Coroner’s report.

The report contains the information of Lu’s cause of death.

“We still don’t have a copy of the [Coroner’s] report,” said Deputy District Attorney and Prosecutor Steve Ipson. “Hopefully it will be available soon.”

Campbell spent several weeks on the lam in connection with the Aug. 11 disappearance and death of Lu before he was captured in Minneapolis in September.

Lu had been reported missing on Aug. 11 after she was dropped off at Campbell's apartment in San Gabriel, authorities said. Her car, a Mazda Miata, was also reported missing.

The car was recovered in the same Arcadia back yard where Lu's body was found, according to a friend of the homeowner who asked to remain anonymous.

Just prior to Campbell's capture, detectives held a news conference asking for assistance locating him. Among the information released at the news conference were details that indicated Lu's body was covered with kitty litter after being stuffed in a 90-gallon plastic trash can.

That information combined with several Internet posts on this blog and Usenet newsgroups helped lead investigators to Campbell, Sheriff's homicide Lt. Gil Carrillo said.

Apparently transients were living in a van off and on for several months, according to preliminary reports. John Doe, discovered Wednesday, may have died before Memorial Day, which was the last time anybody took a look inside the vehicle.