A former LA priest suspected of child abuse left the LA archdiocese for a job with the LAUSD. Plus, we take a look at the now-shuttered church-run treatment center for troubled priests, we find out why SoCal farmers are turning away from avocados for a less water-dependent crop, A Martinez hosts a panel about brain injury and contact sports, plus much more.
Former priest suspected of child abuse left LA archdiocese for LAUSD
More accusations of child sexual abuse are coming out of the files from the Catholic Diocese of Los Angeles. One former Catholic priest who was accused of extensive sexual misconduct with minors went on to work at L.A. Unified School District.
Joseph Pina left the church to work a community organizer for the LAUSD where he tried to rally support for the building of new schools. LAUSD has said he did not have direct contact with children in the district, but did meet with families in the community.
LAUSD schools superintendent John Deasy told the LA Times that Pina did not work directly with children and didn't know if the district was aware of Pina's past before they hired him.
Church officials had labeled Pina "a serious risk for acting out" after he told them about an attraction to an eighth grade girl. It's the latest in a series of sexual abuse scandals plaguing the Catholic church here in LA. Priests at parishes across the city are dealing with how to talk to their congregations about the recent scandals.
Reporter Hailey Branson-Potts from the LA Times visited the Cathedral of the Our Lady of the Angeles in Downtown LA on Sunday. She joins the show with an update.
Diocese sent several troubled priests to New Mexico treatment center
For decades, many of the Catholic priests accused of molestation across the country were sent to The Servants of Paraclete treatment center in the small New Mexico town, Jemez Springs. In 1947, Father Gerald Fitzgerald opened the Servants of the Paracletes to deal with and isolate troubled priests.
The Servants of the Paracletes closed eighteen years ago, but what happened there over the course of nearly 50 years reveals much about how the Catholic church has responded to claims of sexual abuse.
For more on this, we're joined by Tom Roberts of the National Catholic Reporter.
Long-term effects of traumatic brain injury
Sports related injuries, especially concussions, are being talked about more and more. Dizziness, nausea, confusion; many of us can recognize the immediate symptoms of a concussion, but how much do we really know about the long term effects of a traumatic brain injury? That's the topic of a recent roundtable discussion at KPCC's Crawford Family Forum.
Take Two host A Martinez spoke with former NFL wide receiver Billy Davis and LAUSD medical advisor Dr. Jerry Bornstein about the risks to the pros and to kids just starting out on their favorite playing fields.
Hollywood Monday: Period casting, IMFDB and more
A poor factory worker in "Les Miserables" with perfectly coiffed hair, a hard-drinking CIA agent in "Argo" with the pecs of a body-builder, and Abe Lincoln. With a pierced ear?
The hole in Daniel Day Lewis's ear is just one of little incongruities in a recent crop of Hollywood films that otherwise go to great lengths to be spot-on when depicting the period they're set in.
Rebecca Keegan writes in the LA Times about the difficulty of matching seemingly perfect Hollywood stars to roles that sometimes call for imperfection.
Plus, most people have heard of the Internet Movie Database, or IMDB. But what about the IMFDB, the Internet Movie Firearms Database?
Tech industry to meet with Congress on immigration reform
Last week, President Obama and a bipartisan group of Senators presented a framework for comprehensive immigration reform. Much of the conversation has revolved around creating a path to citizenship for those here illegally, or a guest worker program for unskilled laborers.
But in his Las Vegas speech last week, the president directly cited the importance of highly-skilled immigration to the tech sector.
Tomorrow, a group of Silicon Valley executives will travel to Washington to work with members of congress on addressing the needs of tech companies in immigration reform. Emily Lam is the point person for the group, and is Senior Director of Federal Issues for the Silicon Valley Leadership Group.
Fontana school district arms with semi-automatic rifles
For weeks, Americans of all sorts have been embroiled in a national debate about gun control. But in Sacramento last week, a group of Republican state lawmakers introduced legislation that would allow school districts to use education funds for training school staff on gun use. And now, a school district in the Southern California city of Fontana is already arming its police with semiautomatic rifles. Reporter Chris Richard has the story.
Trying to forestall another massacre like the December shooting rampage at Sandy Hook, school police in the Southern California city of Fontana have armed themselves with semi-automatic rifles.
The weapons are similar to military assault rifles. Officers will keep the guns in safes on campus. School police Chief Billy Green says he's simply giving his officers what they may need one day.
"If I did not take this action now and if there was a tragic event at one of our school sites, the questions you would be asking me now would likely be along the lines of, 'Why didn't you plan to defend our kids from something like this happening?'" he said.
Green says ordinary pistols aren't a match for the weapons used in recent shootings. He says the new rifles will allow his officers to fire more accurately, from farther away, and the bullets will pierce body armor.
Some other school districts have quietly purchased similar guns for emergency use. Fontana's policy is unique in that officers will take their Colt Model 6940s to work every day, storing them in safes on campus during their shifts.
"A gun in the safe at police headquarters does little good to a school 20 miles during the event of an active shooter," Green said.
But Fontana parent Amanda Rude fears the same weapons that are so readily available to officers could fall into the wrong hands. Her 10-year-old son is scared, and Rude stopped by school district headquarters Monday to file a formal complaint.
"Their learning environment, then, has to be effected, if you're nervous about these things being on your campus," she said. She gave a little laugh, the shocked laugh of someone who's appalled at what she's saying. "A 10-year-old should not have to worry about, getting, you know, shot down."
At dismissal time at Fontana High School across the street from district headquarters, students questioned the need for more guns. Sixteen-year-old sophomore Adan Lopez says some of his textbooks are worn out, tagged with gang graffiti and missing pages.
"They're good with the guns they have right now," he said. "You know, like, my opinion is we need, like, pencils! We don't have enough pencils, we don't have enough sharpeners, paper!"
People who study trends in school safety say that as frightening as events like the Sandy Hook attack are, they need to be understood within a broader context. National Center for Education Statistics figures show on-campus violent crime has fallen steadily since 1993. Buying the guns didn't come before the school board because it was a small expenditure. But school Trustee Leticia Garcia worries that the easy availability of overwhelming force could preclude a measured response and spin violence out of control.
"We're talking about some, in some cases kids that make really poor choices, that could bring plastic toy weapons to school, that look very real," she said. "That could possibly get them ... hurt."
Ron Astor, a professor at the University of Southern California's School of Social Work and Rossier School of Education, questions Fontana officials' focus on an armed intruder. He suggests they take a closer look at the data, like the yearly California School Climate Survey.
"If you look at these surveys of what kids are saying, they're kind of the rumbling before the earthquake," he said.
Last year, roughly 6 percent of Fontana's seventh, ninth and 11th graders reported bringing a gun to school. More than a quarter said they'd seen another student with a weapon, and one in 10 said they'd been threatened.
Those survey results match what kids are reporting throughout the state. California State Sacramento psychology professor Stephen Brock, a nationally recognized expert on preparing for school emergencies, says the best way to respond is better communication.
"Unless you're gonna make schools into a prison, well, you know what, even if you do make schools into a prison, you're not going to prevent all acts of violence," he said. "We need to strike a balance between physical and psychological safety."
USC's Ron Astor favors a community-based policing response. "Talk to any of these police officers. They're going to tell you getting to know people in a relationship way is far more powerful than having another assault weapon," he said.
Fontana School Board President Gus Hawthorn acknowledges the odds are low anybody will attack his kids.
"That's not a guarantee," he said. "And I'm committed to keeping those weapons in a place where officers can get to them if there ever was a tragedy like that and we hope there never will be, that we would be able to stop it with those firearms."
School trustee Leticia Garcia has called for a conversation about preventing violence, beginning with a public hearing next week on whether to keep the new guns.
Have California's stem-cell research efforts been worth the $3 billion price tag?
Nearly a decade ago, voters here approved Proposition 71, the California Stem Cell Research and Cures Initiative. The initiative made conducting stem cell research legal and authorized the sale of bonds to generate $3 billion for stem cell research and research.
But now, most of that money has been spent and there are concerns about how the agency is being run. For more on this we're joined by David Jensen, a former reporter who's spent years covering the agency. He now runs a blog called the California Stem Cell Report.
Skeletal remains found in parking lot confirmed as King Richard III's
King Richard III never got a funeral fit for a king. The 15th century British monarch died in combat, defending his crown from an uprising. His remains were hastily buried and soon they were lost to ages.
RELATED: The search for Richard III’s skeleton
Now archeologists say they've found the missing monarch, buried below a parking lot in Leicester, England. The researchers used DNA from Richard III's living descendants to confirm the find. Joining us with more is KPCC's Patt Morrison.
US farmers turning from water-demanding avocados to new crops
By the time the Ravens sealed their Super Bowl win over the 49ers, Americans consumed around 79 million pounds of avocados. Until recently, most of those avocados were coming from San Diego County, the nation's top producing region. Now, U.S. demand is being filled by Mexico and Chile.
What has driven area farmers to ditch the avocado? The fruit is just way too thirsty. To talk about the difficulty in growing avocados here, we're joined by Rua Petty, a farmer from Fallbrook, Ca.
'My Brother's Book': Maurice Sendak's posthumous tribute to his brother Jack
Sendak's posthumous title, "My Brother's Book," comes 50 years after the publication of "Where the Wild Things Are," and is a dark and interesting final chapter for the widely celebrated author.
Take Two will talk to Patrick Rodgers, curator of the Maurice Sendak Collection at the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia.