Lindsay William-Ross

Freddy Leyva, the 22-year-old Job Corps student accused of fatally stabbing a beloved program adviser, is being charged with murder.

Learning how to preserve, jam, and can produce, along with other foodcrafting skills like cheesemaking, are helping turn home cooks into artisans. Since knowing is half the battle, it helps to have a little professional savvy.

You can hike close to it, ogle it from a neighboring peak, or see it in countless movies and television shows, but the average person can't actually touch the Hollywood Sign.Unless you are about to get really lucky...

The Daily Meal released a behemoth list today, naming their picks for the 60 (Plus) Coolest People in Food & Drink. Los Angeles is well-represented, between chefs and food personalities who call the City of Angels home, and a few whose empires extend to our fair city.

The Los Angeles Lakers trade deadline was today, and they've wrangled out a deal to trade Luke Walton and Derek Fisher, but not Pau Gasol, who was the subject of much trade rumor speculation in recent days.

A woman in her 40s reportedly used a chainsaw to take her own life this week inside her home. The body was found at about 12:40 a.m. Thursday by her sister, according to City News Service.

Dwayne Alexander, a program adviser at the Job Corps facility in Hollywood, died Wednesday afternoon after being stabbed multiple times in his office on campus. The suspect, a 22-year-old student who others say had been acting strangely lately, is in custody for the killing.

Things worked out well for the inaugural Los Angeles Food & Wine festival last fall, so the event is coming back again in '12, but a little earlier.

This Sunday, Wolfpack Hustle (yep, the crew whose cyclists raced a JetBlue airplane from Burbank to Long Beach during Carmageddon last year and won) is putting on their Marathon Crash Race, which takes advantage of the closed-off city streets and uses the Los Angeles Marathon course for car-free racing.

It's been a brief period of uncertainty and quiet over at the Music Box, after an abrupt shut-down in January that found the current operators evicted. Now comes word that the venue is born again as The Fonda Theatre, and Goldenvoice will be its exclusive promoter and operator.

In today's Extra, Extra we've got some klassy kompetition for the Kardashians on E!, a tour of literary Los Angeles, a review of the Guns N' Roses show at the House of Blues, and more news of the day. Plus: Keep up with us on Facebook, and follow us on Twitter: @LAist @LAistFood @LAistSports.

An official report form the Los Angeles County Office of Independent Review issued today explores the failings in the handling of the death of Mitrice Richardson, a 24-year-old woman whose remains were found a year after she had been released from custody by the L.A. County Sheriff's Department's Lost Hills/Malibu station.