Zach Behrens

A house fire claimed the life of an elderly man early this morning in Brentwood. The fire, which was first reported at 3:38 a.m. at 12026 Benmore Terrace, was knocked down in 28 minutes after "an aggressive and well coordinated fight on the blaze," described LA Fire Department Spokesman Brian Humphrey. Once out, firefighters began to search the 3,234 sq. foot two story residence where they found the man who was declared dead on...

Locke High School in South LA has been shut down after a 16-year-old male student was shot and wounded shortly before 8 a.m. Police set up a perimeter around the school, located at 325 East 111th Street near Watts, as they search for a suspect who they believe is a 17-year-old male. The victim was taken to the hospital with serious injuries. Police believe the incident is gang related....

A few have wrote in asking what the heck that was about. Don't worry, there's no need to grab your nuclear fallout suit, it was just in celebration of home opening day at Dodger Stadium, according to the Los Angeles Fire Department in an alert. They play the San Francisco Giants. Go Blue!...

A gas station chain primarily serving truck fleets has been sued by California for violating underground fuel storage laws for years. "TravelCenters of America has knowingly and repeatedly disregarded California's underground fuel storage laws for years," Attorney General Brown said in a statement today. "This has put the Inland Empire's scarce groundwater supplies at serious risk of contamination." Brown's legal complaint in the suit include the company's failing to manage hazardous waste containers and...

Tom Andrews/LAist A 2-year-old toddler was killed Saturday afternoon when he was struck by a Yukon GMC truck in the parking lot of a car wash in the Koreatown area. Luis Rojas and his 24-year-old brother were standing near their car when Rojas ran around the passenger side of the car to the back when he was hit by the 2003 Yukon. He was transported to the hospital by where he died shortly after...

Before she goes off to Sacramento to work under Schwarzenegger later this month, City Controller Laura Chick today released another scathing audit (.pdf) bringing to light another major city inefficiency. “There is no way that the City of Los Angeles can keep up with serving the needs of the people when it takes an average of 135 days (4 ½ months) and a minimum of a dozen steps to hire one person, and that’s...

The two most contested local battles on the May 19th ballot will be over City Attorney and the seat for Council District 5, which roams from the Westside to the Valley. In the latest reporting period for campaign contributions and expenses, which ended April 4th, the money races are neck and neck, found the LA Times. Just separated by a handful of votes in the March primary, District 5 Candidates David T. Vahedi and...

Photographer honeybeejen submitted this photo to our LAist Featured Photo pool on Flickr earlier this week asking "What the heck happened here??" It was taken in Claremont, but we sought out the advice of George Gonzalez, Los Angeles' Chief Forester. "It is not a common occurrence, but I have seen it in abandoned date orchards," Gonzalez explained in an e-mail. "It's difficult to say why this happened just based on a photo." So the...

Play with the numbers on the real image here | Image via GOOD Magazine The description of American urban city streets printed in GOOD Magazine pretty much sums up Los Angeles: Throughout the 20th century most of the human beings designing our streets were traffic engineers. For the most part, they viewed the city from behind a windshield and saw the street as a problem to be solved for automobiles. The result is the...

We're still looking at a slight chance of showers until midnight. After that, expect partly cloudy skies and some wind throughout the weekend. Day time highs will range from the 60s to low 70s along the coasts and into the valleys, according to the National Weather Service. And because Palm Springs will be crazy with The White Party all weekend long, here's what's going on there: slight chances of rain mixed in with thunderstorms...

So far, so good? Or maybe not? New Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Ramon Cortines has entered into his job at a tough time while facing a $718 million budget deficit--that's a bigger red number than the city of Los Angeles. Cortines was once the interim superintendent back in 2000 and he drafted up plans he is only getting to implement this time around: "Its central office would be lean; decisions would be...

It's been a tough few weeks in Los Angeles. There's been too many incidents, alcohol related or not, involving cars and pedestrians. And it just so happens that the LAPD will be setting up a sobriety checkpoint tonight just West of the Staples Center and LA Live on Olympic Blvd. at Blaine Street from 7:00 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. In the last three months, a higher than normal amount of traffic collisions have occurred...