Deputy district attorney Damon Mosler, chief of the narcotics division points out guns and drugs seized during at a news conference held in San Diego today.(AP Photo/Denis Poroy) SDSU may as well stand for Sold Drugs to Some Undercover after 18 students were arrested today on drug charges. Nearly 100 people -- including 75 students -- have been stung in Operation Sudden Fall, a five-month DEA investigation on the San Diego campus.Agents were involved......

Photo by _ROXANNE_ via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr The former manager of a WeHo marijuana dispensary was sentenced today to 5 years probation for "maintaining drug-related premises" on North La Brea known as the Yellow House. Tonya Mae Schaefer of Alhambra also received her sentence today; the 43-year-old will now serve 25 to life for the murder and abandonment of her newborn baby in 2006. It's a not guilty plea for......

Photo by _ROXANNE_ via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr After heisting a rental car that was just about to be rented out, a woman led police on a wild three-county tour of SoCal which ended with her being put out by a spike strip. The chase began in Anaheim and ended near Camp Pendleton. A pot bust took place late last night in a gated community in El Monte, netting cops 1,000......

Just like a certain marijuana ATM that was introduced to the world via Los Angeles last month, USC began their medicinal vending machine program this week in the dorms. No, it won't have any smokable green, but it will carry over-the-counter drugs and condoms. While most students quoted in a Daily Trojan article about the new service are excited about the program, they found someone unhappy with one aspect of it. Ana Hernandez, a freshman......

Photo © Copyright 2008 by Jonathan Alcorn (Sundogg) via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr One of the gunmen involved in yesterday's Glassell Park shootout has been identified as a member of the Avenues gang. Daniel Ivan Leon was killed by police following his participation in a fatal drive-by shooting that claimed one life. Ok, so there wasn't anyone jumping onto the 110 Freeway today, but there was a police pursuit on the......

One year ago, Los Angeles County received the distinction of being number one in the nation for the amount of medical marijuana dispensaries in the country, with close to 50 in operation. Recently, picking up your prescribed pot got theoretically easier with the launching of the world's first marijuana vending machines here in the City of Angels, which is causing international waves from objectors who cast doubt on the therapeutic validity of the Schedule 1......

Slide your money in the slot, press the right alphanumeric combo, and down drops a treat for you to reach in and grab. That's vending machine magic in a nutshell. But LA's got some new vending machines that are raising some eyebrows, and possibly violating some international treaties. They are the newly installed marijuana vending machines that are operating out of at least three of the city's medical marijuana dispensaries, and the International Narcotics Control......

There's something similar about Weeds on Showtime and today's marijuana bust in the Santa Clarita Valley. If you watch the TV show and know the SCV, you know that it is filmed there (opening credits are very much the neighborhood of unincorporated Stevenson Ranch). And now today, via the Santa Clarita Sheriff's Station's Blog/RSS feed (see, SCV can be hip too), we find that "detectives discovered a substantial indoor marijuana grow estimated to contain more......

Fire: La Salle Avenue Elementary School sustained damage today, but no injuries were reported, due to a fire on the second floor this afternoon. Rain: A small tornado did indeed land on shore last night in Ventura County which is probably what led the NWS to issue last night's tornado warning for LA. It was an "empty air station hangar at the Naval Base Ventura County at Point Mugu" that took the hit, losing its......

Increasingly free of gang violence, it may be getting safer to walk the streets of Watts, the Daily News reports. Homicides in the area have dropped from 24 in 2006 to just 11 last year and many residents are pinning hopes for further neighborhood revitalization on economic opportunities. Hey Magic Johnson, that's your cue! A man died last night after sliding down an escalator at the Hollywood Highland shopping pit of hell today. Apparently......

Just because the federal government can legally rob a medical marijuana dispensary in Los Angeles, it doesn't mean you can too. On Friday, in two separate incidents in the Valley, a dispensary on Cahuenga Boulevard in North Hollywood and Golden State Collective, 10369 Balboa Blvd., in Granada Hills, both got robbed in takeovers. On Sunday, the Granada Hills robbers were caught, according to the Daily News:During the heist, one shot was fired, ricocheting off......

On Sunday, 60 Minutes updated their story from September on California Proposition 215 and Medical Marijuana in a 12-minute news report, saying the law became victim to the the law of unintended consequences.For one thing, the federal government still views marijuana, medical or otherwise, as illegal and has been cracking down on dispensaries that sell it. For another, it's clear there are legions of people buying medical marijuana for the sole purpose of getting high.......

This morning the Daily News is reporting that the FBI is looking for "Arcesio Escobar, a 49-year-old laundry cleaner worker" who is the alleged supplier of the drugs that caused a 15 year old girl's lethal overdose this summer. Jennifer Elias, from New York, was found dead in a converted garage in North Hollywood "with only a jacket on, about 2 p.m. on June 27." Although her official cause of death remains uncertain, it is......

LAFD responded to a fire in the 3200 block of Dos Palos Drive in Studio City Sunday morning. The blaze was confined to the patio of the residence but upon entering the home, firefighters saw what appeared to be weed. LAPD followed up and confiscated 382 marijuana plants -- approx. 48 pounds -- growing in the garage. 37-year-old Eric Porter of Studio City was later arrested and booked on suspicion of felony cultivation of marijuana,......

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......

We scored this tasty blend from Dealer McDope the other day, for $55 an 8th. Super Silver Haze was the first prize winner at the High Tims Cannabis Cup in 1997, 1998 and 1999. It's a superb plant well known for bringing joy to the masses. Pre-Smoke Examination: The nugs are huge. My whole 8th was that nug in the picture. It's smell is pungent and very strong. It smells close to skunk with......

Welcome to the all fire, all the time edition of Extra Extra! The weather is not expected to abate until tomorrow, and fire fighters are still days away from containing major blazes. The New York Times is liveblogging the fires; they are reporting that over 500,000 people have been forced to evacuate so far (although other reports are estimating up to one million people have had to flee their homes). The Daily News is......

Consolation Prize of a Lifetime - Al Gore is a man of peace and gets the homepage of Apple.com all to himself -- should we expect the iAl to come out by the holidays? The Catalina Island Avalon city employee who beheaded a deer and left it in a soccer net is definitely not getting any peace prize. There was another suspicious package today left around City Hall, forcing street closures and the evacuation......

A bit of happy news for our sister site over in Texas: the Austin Chronicle just named Austinist Best Local "Fun" News Site. Yay for the Ist-iverse! The correct term is babes, sir: "Point Break Live!" -- yes that's right, as in the classic 1991 Patrick Swayze-Keanu Reeves film -- is coming to a stage near you! NBC is leaving its longtime home in Burbank for the greener pastures of Universal City, or Campo......

No sex in the champagne room. No crying in baseball. No place like home. No alcoholic beverages served after the 7th inning. Add another to the list: No smoking in multi-unit, multi-story residences in Belmont, California. That’s right, when the law takes effect it will be illegal to smoke cigarettes in your home if you share common floors or ceilings with other units. John Locke would be fuckin pissed. Located between San Jose and......

According to an MSNBC online poll participated by over 16,000 people, Texas Congressman Ron Paul won the GOP Michigan debate in a landslide. Sister-station, CNBC, who hosted the debate also had an online poll but they, like Pajamas Media, took it down when they saw that the most conservative congressman in office was winning by such a wide margin. When asked who they thought was standing out from the pack, Paul, who favors the......

We bought this from a dude's Toyota trunk in a dollar store parking lot for $50 an 8th. Trainwreck is a toker's favorite, with its unique flavor and powerful high who can blame them? This sativa blend is rumored to have originated out of Humboldt, CA. Pre-Smoke Examination: The nugs come in all sizes, from the pictured above, to little pebble sized nugs no bigger than a US dime. The buds are fresh, and......

This week marked one of the proudest moments in recent Canadian history. Well, not really...but pretty darn close... On Monday the Canadian dollar traded at $1.0091! That translates to about 99.12 Canadian cents to the American dollar, the highest rate the currency had traded at in over 30 years! The “loon” has been steadily increasing over the last month up from its typical rate of around $0.80-$0.85 Canadian cents to one American dollar. The......

A Venice-based organization has ended their efforts to bring NFL running back Ricky Williams to Los Angeles. The group, known as Wii'd, likes to get high and play Madden 2007 on days that end in "y." Williams, who was a college standout at Texas, has a strained relationship with the NFL due to his close relationship with Mary Jane. He recently applied to the league for reinstatement. That caused people in Denver to put......

Feeling lucky punk? Well, are ya? LAist hopes you are: Win a pair of VIP passes to LA Weekly's Detour Festival on October 6 and a pair of tickets for The Crystal Method at The Roxy next Tuesday. Good luck! Prosecutors plan to refile charges against Phil Spector. Jeez, what's a murderer brutha gotta do to walk free? Britney Spears "dined" at Acapulco in Burbank last night and the paparazzo’s freaked. It's like they'd......

It's better than winning the lottery. LAist is running three contests right now: a pair of tickets for Bright Eyes with the LA Philharmonic for this Saturday, a pair of VIP passes to LA Weekly's Detour Festival on October 6 and a pair of tickets for next The Crystal Method at The Roxy next tuesday. Speaking of Detour, the line-ups and stages were announced today Hopefully, citizens won't get cheated as much anymore: the......

The LA Weekly has been struggling to placate its staff ever since the alt-weekly's publisher, Village Voice Media was swallowed up by not-so-alternative New Times Newspapers nearly two years ago (New Times adopted the VVM name, but not necessarily the flavor). If you haven't witnessed the shift in ideology and coverage in the pages of the Weekly yet, a drastic dip in content quantity -- if not quality -- seems imminent, as the New......

With such a groundswell of support for Ron Paul, why isn't the GOP embracing the most conservative congressman on the hill? According to this video, seen on Capitol Annex, Paul delegates who arrived on time at an event in Texas were not allowed to vote. Why wouldn't the GOP be interested in a candidate who could get a lot of Democrats to vote "this one time only" for a man who wants to get......

Happy first weekend of September - and happy Labor Day weekend, too, for our American cities! Let's take a look at what's been happening around the Ist-a-verse. The deaths of two firefighters shook Bostonist this week. Boston's firefighters bent over backwards all week long - first, they fought flames pouring from the Boston Tea Party museum, and then a restaurant fire killed two and injured many more. Their efforts make everything else - like Tom......

Hand it to Todd Marinovich to get chased by an OC cop for skateboarding and later arrested when the officer "discovered a small amount of methamphetamine, a metal spoon and a hypodermic needle" on the former number one draft choice's person. And leave it to the former QB to also get tagged for resisting arrest, proving that old #13 still crumbles when blitzed. This is the sixth time the USC Trojan, who led his team......