Los Angeles, 1999. Officer Dave Brown (two-time Academy Award(R) nominee Woody Harrelson) is a Vietnam vet and a Rampart Precinct cop, dedicated to doing “the people’s dirty work” and asserting his own code of justice, often blurring the lines between right and wrong to maintain his action-hero state of mind. When he gets caught on tape beating a suspect, he finds himself in a personal and emotional downward spiral as the consequences of his past sins and his refusal to change his ways in light of a department-wide corruption scandal seal his fate. Brown internalizes his fear, anguish and paranoia as his world, complete with two ex-wives who are sisters, two daughters, an aging mentor dispensing bad advice, investigators galore, and a series of seemingly random women, starts making less and less sense. In the end, what is left is a human being stripped of all his pretense, machismo, chauvinism, arrogance, sexism, homophobia, racism, aggression, misanthropy; but is it enough to redeem him as a man?

RAMPART will open for a one week run in New York and Los Angeles on November 23rd.

The “Geezer Bandit”, reported to be an elderly bank robber who is surprisingly light on his feet, may actually be a younger man in a mask. Take a look at the latest security footage of the geezer above, and a mask called “The Elder” by SPFX Masks below. See a resemblance? The Feds do- they’re looking into a costume shop in the San Luis Obispo area that sells the mask. This outlaw hero to geriatric criminals everywhere may just be an act, and his 3,000 facebook fans are sure to be disappointed.

(the mask)

(previous robbery)

“Guess where I’m at??? It never ends”

That’s what @Lamudercop tweeted in the early morning on October 11th. Sal La Barbera, according to his google and twitter profiles, is a supervisor for the Criminal Gang/Homicide Division. Hes been with LAPD for 30 years, 24 of those with CGHD and is the current Squad Leader of FBI/LAPD SOS ll Homicide Task Force. A New York transplant, he’s also provided consulting to writers and film makers throughout Hollywood and appears on television regularly.

Everyone knows the life of a murder cop is tough, and no one expects them to be cuddly, but I’m baffled as to why he would tweet a picture of a recently deceased person lying on the street and not show even a shred of compassion for the person or their family. On the job, cynicism is to be expected, but the world of social media changes things as it becomes public.

From reading the twitter timeline, the picture is of the corpse of a murder victim somewhere near 106th and Wilmington. When I saw the picture and the caption La Barbera wrote, the first thing that came into my mind was “fuck the police”. Actually, “FUCK DA MUTHA FUCKING POLICE!!!” is probably more accurate.

It’s one thing for media to ignore a death in a poor neighborhood and spend 30 minutes on the Michael Jackson trial, they’re idiotic like that and we don’t pay their salaries. But when an officer, no less a supervisor with 30 years on the force uses twitter to make light of someone’s tragedy, it makes me angry. It’s not just the coldness, it’s the double standard. You would never see a cop post shit like that on the Seal Beach massacre because people would be all over them and someone would get fired, reassigned, or reprimanded within days.

Social media is a two way street and can be a powerful thing when used correctly. The detective can tweet all the pics of food, friends and the things on the job he sees as he pleases, but in my opinion this crosses the line. It’s disrespectful to the community he’s supposed to be “protecting and serving”. I’m pretty sure that Sal or someone over at the LAPD is going see this and possibly take some sort of action against me. Maybe I’ll end up as one of his tweets. Who knows, but you can be sure I’ll tweet that shit right back. And that’s the power of social media.

UPDATE 10/11/11: Pressure from the City Attorney’s office has caused RAND to remove the study from their website.

The RAND corporation, a non-partisan rightwing think tank, has released a study today which shows that crime shot up over 60% in the three block radius around shuttered pot shops. From today’s Daily News story:

RAND Corp. studied crime reports over the 10 days before and after June 7, 2010, when the city shuttered hundreds of pot shops. The Santa Monica-based think tank found that crime shot up 60 percent within three blocks of closed dispensaries as compared to those where dispensaries were allowed to remain open. “There’s the common wisdom that dispensaries are crime magnets,” said Mireille Jacobson, the study’s lead author and a senior economist at RAND. “And this flies in the face of that.”

“If medical marijuana dispensaries are causing crime, then there should be a drop in crime when they close,” Jacobson said. “Individual dispensaries may attract crime or create a neighborhood nuisance, but we found no evidence that medical marijuana dispensaries in general cause crime to rise.”

The City Attorney’s office had a characteristically nonsensical reply:

“(Dispensaries) are a center for crime,” said Detective Robert Holcomb of LAPD’s Narcotics Enforcement Detail in the San Fernando Valley.

“Look at it from a criminal standpoint: Here is a location that you know contains narcotics, money so what better location to rob?”

By that logic, pharmacies and banks should be shut down immediately, as clearly they are magnets for crime! Also, we should definitely allow criminals to dictate what type of businesses are allowed to operate in our city, and not patients, caregivers and doctors.

With the news of the Rembrandt sketch (pictured above) heist in Marina Del Rey, we decided to look back into LA’s long history of art theft and pick out some of the biggest and most interesting art crimes in Los Angeles in recent years. The FBI estimates that art theft is a $6-billion-a-year industry, and it’s growing fast. Less than 5% of all works stolen are eventually returned to their owners…

Update: Rembrandt found outside Encino Church.

West L.A. Warhols Stolen

In September 2009, noted art collector Richard L. Weisman had 11 Warhols stolen from the walls of his dining room. The works were large portraits of celebrity athletes such as O.J. Simpson, and were commissioned by Weisman in the 1970s. The total value of the heist is up to $11m dollars, and to date police have no significant leads other than a maroon van that may have been spotted in the neighborhood.

Cooperman Art Theft hoax 1999
It started as one of LA’s biggest art thefts, and ended in the conviction of the alleged victim for insurance fraud. In July 1999, Los Angeles ophthalmologist Steven G. Cooperman was convicted of insurance fraud for arranging the theft of two paintings, a Picasso and a Monet, from his home in an attempt to collect $17.5 million in insurance. The hoax shocked the art world, and Cooperman was sentenced to three years in prison.

The Butler Did It, But for Whom?

A topsy-turvy case of divorce, infidelity, faked art, and oil(s), the case of Roy Donnell is worthy of a film or HBO mini-series. The Swedish butler of Bel Air resident oil tycoon Howard Keck was found to have replaced several million-dollar works of art with enlarged photographs, admitted selling the works in Sweden, and yet was acquitted of the crime of stealing and selling the valuable works of art. How? His defense claimed that he was acting as an agent for Keck’s wife, Elizabeth, who was in the middle of a protracted divorce from her husband. Elizabeth Keck denied all charges, and later filed a civil suit against her former butler.

Multi Million Dollar Encino Collection Heist

In August of 2008, art thieves entered an unlocked door in an Encino home and absconded with 12 million-dollar+ works, including Marc Chagall’s “Les Paysans,” Diego Rivera’s “Mexican Peasant,” and Arshile Gorky’s “Cubist Still Life.” The works have not turned up yet, and the LAPD is still on the hunt for any clues.

Two big items in the LA Times yesterday about Boston transplants in Los Angeles. First was the news about Boston’s Whitey Bulger:

Legendary Boston crime boss James “Whitey” Bulger, who has been on the run for more than a decade, was arrested Wednesday in Santa Monica, multiple law enforcement sources told The Times. Bulger, 81, has been the subject of several books and was the inspiration for “The Departed,” a 2006 Martin Scorsese film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon and Jack Nicholson.

Bulger fled Boston in late 1994 as federal agents were about to arrest him in connection with 21 killings, racketeering and other crimes that spanned the early 1970s to the mid-1980s. He was arrested by the FBI inside a building without incident, according to the sources, who asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak on the matter. The details surrounding his arrest were unclear Wednesday night.

Next was this nugget about Frank McCourt, who apparently plans to hold the Dodgers hostage once he’s rubbed out as an owner by Major League Baseball Capo di Tutti Capo Bud Selig:

Dodgers owner vows to retain the stadium and related assets even if he loses the team because of financial problems. McCourt’s vow to retain Dodger Stadium and related assets even if he loses the team caught the attention of at least one prospective buyer. Mark Cuban, owner of the NBA champion Dallas Mavericks, said the Dodgers appeared to be “such a mess” financially.

It was also revealed that the Dodgers’ charity was primarily a vehicle to make the McCourts look good, and Frank had to pay back $100,000 that the California Attorney General found was improperly used to promote his wife and her luxurious travel schedule rather then the needs of the people the charity was supposed to have helped.

OK, so McCourt hasn’t actually killed anyone (although the family of Brian Stowe holds him liable for his beating and subsequent coma), just the spirit of a city’s beloved team.

Ruling today that the overcrowded conditions in California’s prisons violate the constitution’s “cruel and unusual punishment”, the US Supreme Court ordered the release of at least 30,000 prisoners in the system. From the NY Times:

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing for the majority in a 5-to-4 decision that broke along ideological lines, described a prison system that failed to deliver minimal care to prisoners with serious medical and mental health problems and produced “needless suffering and death.”

The majority opinion included photographs of inmates crowded into open gymnasium-style rooms and what Justice Kennedy described as “telephone-booth-sized cages without toilets” used to house suicidal inmates. Suicide rates in the state’s prisons, Justice Kennedy wrote, have been 80 percent higher than the national average. A lower court in the case said it was “an uncontested fact” that “an inmate in one of California’s prisons needlessly dies every six or seven days due to constitutional deficiencies.”

There are currently about 28,500 people in California prisons for non-violent drug offenses, according to the California Department of Corrections. Just sayin’.

Photos courtesy TalkRadioNews

The Wikileaks cables keep coming, and we’ve pored over them to find the most interesting news related to Los Angeles. Having gone through many cables, the most pressing issues we face, as far as the diplomatic community is concerned, seems to be that we are a growing haven for international organized crime. The majority of the cables related to LA are with regards to US relations with Latin America, although most of those weren’t particularly interesting or newsworthy to residents of our city. We tried to pick out the most interesting 5 that have been released so far and have included links to the original cables as well as a key grab from each cable. Let us know what you’ve found in the comments.

1. Bulgarian Crime Lords Operating in Los Angeles
Key excerpt: U.S.-based investigations of transnational crime groups have dismantled significant drug trafficking organizations run by Bulgarian nationals in LOS ANGELES and Tampa. These groups imported multi-kilo quantities of cocaine and multi-thousand doses of ecstasy into the United States. They had drug connections through Amsterdam and some financial backing of an Israeli national. While most members of these groups were convicted and imprisoned in the U.S., three who were charged in California and Florida are still wanted international fugitives who may have returned to Bulgaria to exploit the country’s current policy of not extraditing its citizens. The three fugitives are IVAYLO ANGELOV PETKOV (Bulgarian citizen born 18 May 1965), IVAN DOBREV (Bulgarian citizen born 25 May 1959), and STEFAN TZVETANOV STOYANOV (Bulgarian citizen born 9 January 1966).

2. Were 9/11 Backups in LA on September 10th?
Key excerpt: THE MEN THEN FLEW TO LOS ANGELES, CA ON 24 AUGUST 2001 ABOARD AMERICAN AIRLINES (AA) FLIGHT #143. THEY CHECKED INTO ONE ROOM IN A HOTEL NEAR THE LOS ANGELES AIRPORT WITH A CHECKOUT DATE OF 10 SEPTEMBER 2001. THEY PAID FOR THE ROOM USING CASH AND, DURING THE LAST FEW DAYS OF THEIR STAY, REQUESTED THAT THEIR ROOM NOT BE CLEANED. HOTEL CLEANING STAFF GREW SUSPICIOUS OF THE MEN BECAUSE THEY NOTICED PILOT TYPE UNIFORMS, SEVERAL LAPTOPS, AND SEVERAL CARDBOARD BOXES ADDRESSED TO SYRIA, JERUSALEM, AFGHANISTAN, AND JORDAN IN THE ROOM ON PREVIOUS CLEANING VISITS. THE MEN HAD A SMASHED CELLULAR PHONE IN THE ROOM AND A CELLULAR PHONE ATTACHED BY WIRE TO A COMPUTER. THE ROOM ALSO CONTAINED PIN FEED COMPUTER PAPER PRINT OUTS WITH HEADERS LISTING PILOT NAMES, AIRLINES, FLIGHT NUMBERS, AND FLIGHT TIMES.

ACCORDING TO AA RECORDS, THE MEN SCHEDULED RETURN FLIGHTS FOR 10 SEPTEMBER 2001 ABOARD AA FLIGHT #144 FROM LOS ANGELES, CA TO WASHINGTON, D.C., BUT FAILED TO BOARD. THE SAME PLANE USED FOR AA FLIGHT #144 ON 10 SEPTEMBER 2001 WAS USED FOR AA FLIGHT #77 ON 11 SEPTEMBER 2001. AA FLIGHT #77 WAS HIJACKED ON ROUTE THE NEXT DAY AND CRASHED IN TO THE PENTAGON.

BA RECORDS INDICATE THAT THE MEN BOARDED BA FLIGHT #268 ON 10 SEPTEMBER 2001 FROM LOS ANGELES, CA TO LONDON, ENGLAND. THE MEN RETURNED TO QATAR ON BA FLIGHT #125 FROM LONDON, ENGLAND TO DOHA, QATAR ON 13 SEPTEMBER 2001.

3. Israel– Promised Land for Organized Crime?
Key excerpt: In March 2009, Post received information from law enforcement authorities that convicted criminal and member of the Abergil organization, Mordechai Yair Hasin, along with his pregnant wife and child, was intending to flee Israel for LOS ANGELES on valid tourist visas. Hasin’s visa was revoked based on his conviction, as were his family’s visas after they were determined to be intending immigrants. As in the Hasin case, Post is using every available tool to limit OC travel to the United States, but such efforts are not always successful. In June 2008, Post issued Adam Abitbul a valid tourist visa. Abitbul had no prior criminal convictions, and carried no visa ineligibilities. Several months later, Post received information from the LOS ANGELES Police Department (LAPD) that he had traveled to the United States to carry out a hit. Abitbul returned to Israel prematurely for his father’s funeral, at which time Post revoked his visa. (Post can only revoke the visas of Israeli citizens while in country.) In a similar case, in October 2008 Post issued Moshe Bar Muha a tourist visa; he claimed to be traveling for medical treatment. Post subsequently received information from the LAPD that Bar Muha is in fact the brother of Itzik Bar Muha of the Jerusalem Gang (see above) and a convicted criminal.

4. Hamburg Vs. Scientology
Key excerpt: Caberta asserted that Scientology in Germany has received orders from the LOS ANGELES headquarters to “conquer” Europe. She contends that the new Berlin headquarters have been set up for this “campaign.” She continually stressed that she views Scientology not as a religious organization, but as a “political extremist” one. According to Caberta, the Hamburg Scientologists as well as most of the Scientology members in Germany are only “small fish” and the organization’s strategic planning is conducted in the United States. Caberta showed Pol/Econ Officer and Specialist a booklet she had received early November that appeared to be published by Hamburg’s mayor. The booklet contained the mayor’s photograph and signature, yet was actually a publication from Scientology’s “The Way to Happiness Foundation.” Caberta contended that Scientology regularly used misleading methods to fool individuals into joining and said that such booklets had been distributed to other German cities. For someone unfamiliar with Scientology publications, the booklet looked very much like information brochures from the City of Hamburg.

5. Elderly Angeleño Smuggled out of Iran
Key Excerpt: On January, 7, Embassy Bern alerted posts in the region that American citizen Hossein Ghanbarzadeh Vahedi, DPOB xx/xx/1933 was trying to escape from Iran and could possibly surface in Iraq. Vahedi, a dentist from LOS ANGELES, instead appeared at the Ankara Consular Section around noon on January 9, 2009. Although visibly shaken,Vahedi said he had no major physical problems, but he did break down a few times when explaining his ordeal. He told Conoff that he had enough medication and declined local medical attention preferring to wait until he was back in the United States.
¶3. (SBU) Vahedi has been a resident, then citizen of the United States since the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Aside from this trip, he has only returned to Iran once about ten years ago and did not encounter any problems on that visit. At his wife’s urging to visit his parents’ gravesite in Iran, he traveled to Tehran in early May 2008 where he spent four weeks with family and friends without incident. However, after clearing customs at Tehran airport on June 6, he heard his name called on the public address system with instructions to report to a separate office. At this office, GOI authorities confiscated his passport and told him he would not be leaving Iran. When Vahedi pressed as to the reason, he was dismissed with instructions to follow-up at the Islamic Revolution Court.

This lengthy blog post with tons of source links and conjecture about past and present police gangs, keys off of a KTLA5 report on the “3000 Boys”, a clique within the LA Sheriff’s Department composed of Central Jail officers. According to the post,

the “3,000 Boys” are a group of tattooed thugs from Los Angeles who spend a lot of time in jail, share cryptic hand signs, have a cultivated sensitivity to being “dissed,” routinely beat up people at parties and instigate fights in bars — but don’t you dare call them a “gang.”

While law enforcement officials will concede that the group engages in “gang-like activity,” they refuse to designate the group itself as a gang. This may have something to do with the fact that this little knot of miscreants is composed of LA County Sheriff’s Deputies employed at the Men’s Central Jail.

For years, inmates have complained about “horrific” conditions in the 3000 Block of the Men’s Central Jail, particularly the routine abuses carried out by the violent clique of guards called the 3,000 Boys. Those protests were consistently dismissed as ACLU grievance-mongering — until members of that officially sanctioned prison gang assaulted a fellow members of the sanctified guild of official coercion during a Christmas party at L.A.’s Quiet Cannon banquet hall last December.

The 3000 Boys get special tattoos, commit acts of violence as a group, and have special code words, language and symbols known only to themselves. That, and the evidence presented by KTLA and the post referenced above, sure does make the distinction between cop clique and gang hard to make– except that only one is paid for by your tax dollars.

The boards will show the composite images of the pair, and ask for any information the public may have. The company issued a statement explaining why they wanted to help: “We, at Lamar Advertising of Los Angeles, are honored to assist the Stow family and the LAPD, as well as the Dodger and Giant organizations, in the capture and arrest of the suspects in the Attempted Murder of Brian Stow on Opening Day. It is our hope that our contribution will help put an end to this tragedy and start the healing process.”

Reuters has a report on a bizarre scam being operated by a Chinese man in El Monte. He raked in something like $120,000 telling immigrants that they could get citizenship by joining a special unit of the Army that he commanded. He even paraded them around in uniform (if anyone has pictures of this, please send them our way). Here is an excerpt from the article:

A Chinese man was arrested on Tuesday for creating a fake U.S. Army unit and selling immigrants on the idea that joining the squad was a path to citizenship, authorities said.

Yupeng Deng, 51, allegedly gave his “recruits” military uniforms, had them parade in a Los Angeles suburb and took them to the decommissioned USS Midway aircraft carrier, which is a museum in San Diego.

Deng charged more than 100 fellow Chinese nationals a fee of between $300 and $450 to join the fake Army unit, according to the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office.

He called his bogus squad the U.S. Army/Military Special Forces Reserve unit, or MSFR for short, and he gave himself the lofty title of “supreme commander,” prosecutors said.

Aside from telling recruits that belonging to the unit was a path to U.S. citizenship, Deng also urged them to pay him cash for higher military rank, according to prosecutors.