One innocent person dead at the hands of an officer is bad enough. Now there could be two. 5-year veteran of the Inglewood Police Department Brian Ragan is on leave for the second time in 10 weeks after he shot and killed a man who allegedly was pointing a gun at him. Ragan was responding to a family disturbance call, knocked on the door and, according to police, Kevin Wicks, a postal worker was holding......

A lot of us grew up with The Golden Girls, from their unprecedented success on NBC's Saturday night sitcom lineup to the now-ubiquitous Lifetime reruns. It was a show that probably shouldn't have been a hit--four elderly women sharing a home in Miami in the mid-1980s--but thanks to its incredibly sharp (and still funny) dialogue and the talents of its four leading ladies, the show has earned its place as a pop culture icon. One......

Olga Rutterschmidt, 75, second from left and Helen Golay, 77, background at the Criminal Courts building in downtown Los Angeles on Tuesday, July 15, 2008. Rutterschmidt moments later received the same sentence..(AP Photo/Genaro Molina, Pool) They befriended homeless men, gave them life insurance policies for two years, killed them by running over them, claimed their deaths as hit and runs and collected on the insurance. Nearly $3 million was collected between the two men......

View Larger Map The LAPD has released a break down of events that occurred last night in Hollywood that occurred around 8:45 p.m. where two pedestrians were killed during a short police pursuit. Here, in their own words, is their version of what happened accompanied by a handy LAist map: "A West Traffic Division Officer was in the area of Highland Avenue near Camrose Avenue when he observed a 2005 Honda Civic travelling on the......

Two years ago the community joined City Council President Eric Garcetti on the Great Hollywood Walkabout conducted by Deborah Murphy who then made recommendations which included reclassifying Hollywood Boulevard to include a pedestrian priority classification. Then and today, Hollywood Boulevard is still classified and engineered as a Major Highway. This morning, a vehicle involved in killing two pedestrians on the boulevard last night still sat in the middle of the street. The two victims were......

Shortly before 9:00 p.m., an LAPD West Traffic Division officer attempted to pull over a car for reckless driving on Hollywood Blvd. The suspect did not stop, prompting a short pursuit before hitting two pedestrians between Wilcox and Cahuenga and then crashing the vehicle. Both pedestrians, a male and a female between the ages of 35 and 40, were pronounced dead at the scene and the driver of the vehicle was treated for wounds and......

A crash between a vehicle and a semi this morning on the eastbound 210 Freeway has left one man dead at the scene, reports the Los Angeles Fire Department. It happened at around 8:00 a.m. when the vehicle somehow ended up under the semi near Lowell Steet. A SigAlert has been issued. Yesterday, four people died in a single-car accident on the 10 Freeway.......

26-year-old skateboarder and photographer Lee Grivas was found dead in his apartment by a neighbor in Hollywood on July 1. There were no signs of physical trauma and it appears to be from a heroin overdose. Applegate and Grivas dated on and off but his drug problem was a factor that often split them up. Right now, there is no official cause of death and is currently being ruled as an accident or suicide pending......

Last year in May, Edith Isabel Rodriguez died at Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital. Her death became national headlines because Rodriguez was dying (literally throwing up blood on the floor) in the waiting room as nurses and other hospital staff continued to ignore her as they walked by. Rodriguez's husband, Jose Prado, and another person in the waiting room called 911 explaining that she was in need of help. But dispatchers refused saying she......

"He definately knew how to make everyone laugh," wrote a friend of Staff Sgt. Du Hai Tran on an LA Times comment board. Tran, 30, of Reseda was killed Friday by a roadside bomb in Baqubah, Iraq. He is the 501st soldier from California (24th from Los Angeles) to be lost due to the war.......

Traffic diverted to Griffith Park at Hyperion/Fountain. Taken at 2:04 p.m. by LAist reader and friend, Lisa Borodkin Shortly before noon, a crash on the 2000 block of Hyperion Avenue between a postal truck and car resulted in the death of a postal worker. The female employee, between the ages of 25 and 30, was thrown from the truck before the vehicle landed on her, according to Los Angeles Fire Department spokesperson d'Lisa Davies.......

George Carlin once said that "anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac." Obviously, George lived here in LA. Almost his entire professional career was based here in the city of dreams, where he made his come true while influencing, inspiring, irritating, and entertaining so many different lives. People passed his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at the corner of Vine and Selma and......

Photos of George Carlin via his MySpace profile Comedian George Carlin died of heart failure at 5:55 p.m. today at Saint John's Hospital in Santa Monica. It was announced a few hours later, shortly before 9 p.m., by his publicist. He was admitted into the hospital for chest pains earlier in the afternoon. In honor of the comic genius who made millions laugh, loved words and called bullshit when it was needed during his......

Photo by WTL photos via Flickr As temperatures easily reach over 100 in some parts of the region, it is affecting those who are vulnerable. An 90-year-old woman driving in San Bernardino County died when she stepped out of her car to search for her husband who left the car for unknown reasons. They were found 50 yards from their car and the 116 degree heat killed Virgil Sanders and the husband had 2nd......

Convicted murderer Susan Atkins has earned a dubious honor: She has been the longest incarcerated woman in California history*, having logged 37 of her 59 years as an inmate following her conviction in the famous 1969 "Manson Murders." Now, Atkins is pleading for an early compassionate release by State corrections officials because she faces another kind of life sentence--the impending end of her own. Although specific medical details have not been made public, Atkins is......

Some report that 11 people were murdered over the weekend, some report 12. Whichever the number, it is greater than the normal homicide rate in Los Angeles County, an unfortunate two or three per day. At least nine of the deaths occurred within Los Angeles: four in South LA, four in the Valley and one in Northeast LA. Authorities suspect several were gang related. Photo by guamafro via Flickr......

(AP Photo/Jose Fidelino Vera Hernandez) Police say that 28-year-old Juan Campos, allegedly of Brownsville, Texas, was apparently drunk and fell asleep when he crashed into a bicycle race near Matamoros, Mexico, which is near the U.S. border. At least one person was killed and 14 were injured. The 24-kilometer race, which took place on Sunday, had only started 15-minutes prior to the incident. (h/t Streetsblog LA)......

This past Friday, a cyclist was riding on Santa Anita Avenue in El Monte, only to die under the wheels of a Foothill Transit Bus. The incident received a small amount of coverage in the LA Times and the San Gabriel ValleyTribune, just enough bad coverage to cause a few members of the cycling community to give a collective WTF? The LA Times quoted El Monte Police Lt. States as saying "He (the cyclist)......

Shortly before 8:00 a.m. this morning, a car traveling in the Laurel Canyon area south of Mulholland Drive came off the road and landed upside down killing one person and injuring four. It started around the 8900 block of Crescent Drive, but the car landed near Duncamp Place. Two patients were listed in critical condition and one young male was said to be not seriously hurt. Initial reports from the Los Angeles Fire Department said......

Photo of bike-inspired graffiti at Angels Gate Pool by Marshall Astor - Food Pornographer via Flickr Yesterday in El Monte, a man riding his bicycle was struck and killed by Foothill Transit bus. The LA Times explains:The cyclist was riding across Santa Anita Avenue near Ramon Boulevard about 9:15 a.m. when he was hit by the bus, said Lt. Michelle States of the El Monte Police Department. He was not in the crosswalk and......

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 state report (.pdf) to be presented today says that "as many as 24,000 deaths annually in California are linked to chronic exposure to fine particulate pollution," according to the LA Times. That's more than triple the figures announced by the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) when they asked Governor Schwarzenegger and President Bush to declare a state of emergency regarding the 5400 environmental/pollution related deaths a year. With the alarming amount of deaths,......

Photo by Daniella Zalcman via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr Maybe actor Dennis Farina was taking his former role as an L&O detective too seriously when he packed his suitcase and headed to LAX this morning. Authorities arrested Farina on charges of carrying a concealed weapon when a .22 caliber handgun was found in his carryon. Homicide detectives are working on the case of an infant found dead inside a Lancaster home......

A scuffle between a group of teens that apparently knew each other left one 14-year-old shot and killed. The incident happened last night around 8:30 p.m. near the intersection of Van Nuys and Glen Oaks Boulevards in the Valley neighborhood of Pacoima. "Witnesses said the fight looked almost over when shots were fired. The young boys dispersed, and a 14-year-old victim was left laying on the ground with a gunshot wound," reported ABC7. Police do......

Photo of unrelated Disneyland Hotel balcony by clouddinner via flickr. A man leaped to his death from a 14th-floor balcony at the Disneyland Hotel this morning. "He went out on the balcony and intentionally leapt,'' said Anaheim police Sgt. Rick Martinez, all but confirming the apparent suicide of a businessman in his 30's or 40's, around 11 a.m. outside the the Disneyland Hotel's Wonder Tower. ( -- OC Register). An investigation is ongoing and......

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......

Photo by hinducow via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr Over 300,000 troops returning from campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan are suffering from some sort of mental illness, including PTSD. Over half admit they are not seeking medical treatment. "Trainwreck"? More like "how many college students can we fuck in the ass?" The answer is pretty much all of them: Sallie Mae, the largest student loan company in the United States, says the......

This one is a little hard to wrap your mind around. A taxi driver transporting two women to the Ramona Gardens housing project in East LA ended up in a situation when he stopped to drop them off. Daily News explains: According to a preliminary investigation, the women had taken a cab ride to the Ramona Gardens housing project in the city of Los Angeles, where the taxi stopped at a building, [LAPD Sgt. Lee......

An estimated 6,000 people are Downtown this morning for the procession and memorial services for Los Angeles Firefighter Brent Lovrien, who was killed in the line of duty last week in Westchester near LAX. Firefighters, likely representing almost every agency from around the state, have come to Los Angeles to show their support. It is being aired live on KTLA and on their website. Also airing online is KNBC, KCBS/KCAL and KABC. For those not......

View Larger Map Yesterday evening, an explosion rocked a home a 1108 E. 32nd St., injuring one man. It was caused by a "bug bomb." No, it's not terrorism, it really is something to get bugs. This one just got out of control. This morning around 6:45 a.m., at 1258 W. 58th St. 1 story single family home caught on fire with two people trapped inside. Only on person survived. According to KCBS, it was......