Witness says victim of deputies' shooting did not pose threat

An 18-year-old woman who witnessed an officer-involved shooting of a Culver City man has told investigators that the victim was standing with his hands on his head when deputies shot and killed him.

Her account contradicts Los Angeles County deputies' statement that they fired only after Jose de la Trinidad, an unarmed 36-year-old father of two, seemed to reach for his waistband.

The witness told The Times she watched the Nov. 10 shooting — and the events that led up to it — from her bedroom window. She has been interviewed twice by sheriff's investigators, telling them that De la Trinidad complied with the deputies' orders to stop running and raised his hands to surrender. She contends that two deputies opened fire seconds later, seemingly without provocation.

"I know what I saw," said Estefani, who asked that her last name not be used out of fear of being harassed by media outlets. "His hands were on his head when they started shooting."

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department maintains that the deputies opened fire only after De la Trinidad appeared to reach for his waist, where he could have been concealing a weapon. Authorities did not comment on Estefani's account other than to say it would be included in the final report on the shooting.

Estefani, who lives directly across the street from where the shooting occurred, said that just after 10:20 p.m. Nov. 10, the sound of a car screeching to a stop jerked her attention away from music she was downloading at her small desk.

She turned to the bedroom window and pulled back her dark green curtains.

Then, she said, she saw an unarmed man, a handful of sheriff's deputies and, suddenly, the shooting that remains vivid in her mind.

Two sheriff's deputies had attempted to pull over De la Trinidad and his brother for speeding as they were leaving a family quinceañera. De la Trinidad's brother was driving the car and fled for a few blocks before the car came to a sudden stop in the 1900 block of East 122nd Street in Willowbrook, a residential neighborhood tucked just off the 105 Freeway.

According to the deputies' account, De la Trinidad jumped out of the passenger seat.

His brother, 39-year-old Francisco de la Trinidad, took off again in the car. One of the four deputies on the scene gave chase in his cruiser, leaving Jose de la Trinidad on the sidewalk and three deputies standing in the street with their weapons drawn.

The deputies said Jose de la Trinidad then appeared to reach for his waistband, prompting two of them to fire multiple shots into the unarmed man. He died at the scene.

Unknown to the deputies at the time, Estefani sat perched in her bedroom window, directly overlooking the shooting.

Estefani said De la Trinidad did jump out of the car after it came to a sudden stop. After he ran toward the deputies a few feet, they ordered him to stop and turn around — which he did immediately, she said.

Seconds later, the deputies opened fire, she said.

Estefani said that, frozen in shock, she did not count the number of shots fired by the deputies.

"As soon as I saw him hit the floor, I couldn't look up any longer," Estefani said. "Then I ran downstairs and started to cry."

She was still crying half an hour later when two sheriff's deputies canvassing the area for witnesses came to her door, Estefani said.

The deputies, she said, repeatedly asked her which direction De la Trinidad was facing, which she perceived as an attempt to get her to change her story.

"I told them, 'You're just trying to confuse me,' and then they stopped," she said.

Read More..

News Analysis: Sunni Leaders Gaining Clout in Mideast

Mohammed Saber/European Pressphoto Agency

A Palestinian woman in Gaza City on Tuesday walked amid the rubble left from eight days of fighting that ended in a cease-fire.

RAMALLAH, West Bank — For years, the United States and its Middle East allies were challenged by the rising might of the so-called Shiite crescent, a political and ideological alliance backed by Iran that linked regional actors deeply hostile to Israel and the West.

But uprising, wars and economics have altered the landscape of the region, paving the way for a new axis to emerge, one led by a Sunni Muslim alliance of Egypt, Qatar and Turkey. That triumvirate played a leading role in helping end the eight-day conflict between Israel and Gaza, in large part by embracing Hamas and luring it further away from the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah fold, offering diplomatic clout and promises of hefty aid.

For the United States and Israel, the shifting dynamics offer a chance to isolate a resurgent Iran, limit its access to the Arab world and make it harder for Tehran to arm its agents on Israel’s border. But the gains are also tempered, because while these Sunni leaders are willing to work with Washington, unlike the mullahs in Tehran, they also promote a radical religious-based ideology that has fueled anti-Western sentiment around the region.

Hamas — which received missiles from Iran that reached Israel’s northern cities — broke with the Iranian axis last winter, openly backing the rebellion against the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad. But its affinity with the Egypt-Qatar-Turkey axis came to fruition this fall.

“That camp has more assets that it can share than Iran — politically, diplomatically, materially,” said Robert Malley, the Middle East program director for the International Crisis Group. “The Muslim Brotherhood is their world much more so than Iran.”

The Gaza conflict helps illustrate how Middle Eastern alliances have evolved since the Islamist wave that toppled one government after another beginning in January 2011. Iran had no interest in a cease-fire, while Egypt, Qatar and Turkey did.

But it is the fight for Syria that is the defining struggle in this revived Sunni-Shiite duel. The winner gains a prized strategic crossroads.

For now, it appears that that tide is shifting against Iran, there too, and that it might well lose its main Arab partner, Syria. The Sunni-led opposition appears in recent days to have made significant inroads against the government, threatening the Assad family’s dynastic rule of 40 years and its long alliance with Iran. If Mr. Assad falls, that would render Iran and Hezbollah, which is based in Lebanon, isolated as a Shiite Muslim alliance in an ever more sectarian Middle East, no longer enjoying a special street credibility as what Damascus always tried to sell as “the beating heart of Arab resistance.”

If the shifts seem to leave the United States somewhat dazed, it is because what will emerge from all the ferment remains obscure.

Clearly the old leaders Washington relied on to enforce its will, like President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, are gone or at least eclipsed. But otherwise confusion reigns in terms of knowing how to deal with this new paradigm, one that could well create societies infused with religious ideology that Americans find difficult to accept. The new reality could be a weaker Iran, but a far more religiously conservative Middle East that is less beholden to the United States.

Already, Islamists have been empowered in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia, while Syria’s opposition is being led by Sunni insurgents, including a growing number identified as jihadists, some identified as sympathizing with Al Qaeda. Qatar, which hosts a major United States military base, also helps finance Islamists all around the region.

In Egypt, President Mohamed Morsi resigned as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood only when he became head of state, but he still remains closely linked with the movement. Turkey, the model for many of them, has kept strong relations with Washington while diminishing the authority of generals who were longstanding American allies.

“The United States is part of a landscape that has shifted so dramatically,” said Mr. Malley of the International Crisis Group. “It is caught between the displacement of the old moderate-radical divide by one that is defined by confessional and sectarian loyalty.”

The emerging Sunni axis has put not only Shiites at a disadvantage, but also the old school leaders who once allied themselves with Washington.

The old guard members in the Palestinian Authority are struggling to remain relevant at a time when their failed 20-year quest to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands makes them seem both anachronistic and obsolete.

Read More..

Play Your Wii U Anywhere — Even on a Train

Wii U on a Train

No need for a TV set. If you plug the Wii U in, you can interact entirely with the GamePad. This is on a Japanese Shinkansen, a high-speed train.

Click here to view this gallery.

[More from Mashable: Nintendo Unveils Wii Mini for the Canucks]

Nintendo’s new Wii U console may have one real advantage over the competition: portability. Since you don’t need a television to play a good portion of the Wii U titles, gaming on the road is as easy as locating a power outlet.

Rocket News 24 tested the console’s mobility by taking a Wii U on a Japanese bullet train, which has power outlets at every seat. Thanks to that — and a little iPhone tethering magic — their staff was able to play New Super Mario Brothers U and Call of Duty Black Ops 2 while riding comfortably.

[More from Mashable: Wii U Sells 400,000 Units in First Week]

Check out Rocket News 24 to see more pictures and a full recount of their experience.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Dancing with the Stars Crowns an All-Star Winner

TV Watch
Update

By Mike Fleeman

UPDATED
11/27/2012 at 11:00 PM EST

• Originally published 11/27/2012 at 10:50 PM EST

Tom Bergeron and Brooke Burke Charvet

Adam Larkey/ABC

There's a new leading lady!

The first all-female finale of Dancing with the Stars featured all-stars Shawn Johnson, Kelly Monaco and Melissa Rycroft in a fierce battle Tuesday night for the mirror ball trophy.

After taking big risks in Monday night's performance show, the stars and their pro partners – Derek Hough, Val Chmerkovskiy and Tony Dovolani – performed "instant dances."

With the competitors getting their dance-style instructions less than an hour before hitting the floor, the field was whittled down to two couples. Read on to find out who won.

After Monaco was the first eliminated, it came down to Johnson and Rycroft. And the winer was ... Rycroft!

Amid showering confetti, the reality star and Dovolani clutched the trophy. They embraced and jumped up and down.

Rycroft was the only competitor among the final three all-stars to not have won before. Dovolani had labored 14 seasons without previously winning.

Read More..

CDC: HIV spread high in young gay males

NEW YORK (AP) — Health officials say 1 in 5 new HIV infections occur in a tiny segment of the population — young men who are gay or bisexual.

The government on Tuesday released new numbers that spotlight how the spread of the AIDS virus is heavily concentrated in young males who have sex with other males. Only about a quarter of new infections in the 13-to-24 age group are from injecting drugs or heterosexual sex.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said blacks represented more than half of new infections in youths. The estimates are based on 2010 figures.

Overall, new U.S. HIV infections have held steady at around 50,000 annually. About 12,000 are in teens and young adults, and most youth with HIV haven't been tested.

___

Online:

CDC report: http://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns

Read More..

Man who set his two children ablaze pleads guilty

When asked how he pleaded to the murder of his 11-year-old daughter, Ashley, the father — his once full cheeks sunken and his skin now a pasty white against the dark green of the suicide prevention frock — was silent for a few seconds, his eyes wandering blankly as if in a daze.

He then croaked something barely audible. An interpreter repeated it loud and clear: "Guilty."

As he admitted also murdering his 10-year-old son, Alexander, Dae Kwon Yun dropped his head to his chest. Even as his attorney discussed his multiple suicide attempts in jail and as the judge spoke of the horrific crime he had committed when he doused an SUV in gasoline and set it on fire with his two children inside, the 61-year-old father refused to look up.

"It's beyond my imagination how someone can blow up their children," Superior Court Judge Stephen Marcus said, sentencing Yun on Tuesday to two consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole. "From my vantage point there is no justification."

Yun's attorneys said that although it may not be justification, there was a complex backdrop to the murder-suicide attempt six years ago — culture, mental illness, a life in shambles after his business crumbled and his marriage fell apart. He was the oldest son in a family of nine children, saddled with expectations and responsibilities, unable to admit failure, show weakness or ask for help.

"His mental state has been fragile before Day One. That's why we had a Day One," said his attorney, Casey Lilienfeld, calling the life sentence a "just" outcome.

In exchange for Yun's guilty plea, prosecutors said Tuesday that they would no longer seek the death penalty.

"This was a horrific crime with horrific results," Deputy Dist. Atty. Habib Balian said outside court. "The sentence will assure justice will be served."

A probation officer who evaluated the case wrote that for Yun, capital punishment would have been a reprieve.

"It is the belief of this officer that the death penalty would allow the defendant to avoid the punishment which is appropriate for his crimes," the officer wrote in a 2008 report made public Tuesday. "It is therefore believed the best interest of the community will be served by a sentence to state prison for as long a period of time as his natural life provides."

The Toyota Sequoia parked in a deserted alley in downtown Los Angeles erupted in flames on a Sunday afternoon in April 2006, a few weeks after the businessman shut down his T-shirt manufacturing business and his wife of 13 years filed for divorce. Shortly before the blaze, witnesses saw Yun shouting at his daughter before shoving her into the back seat of his car.

After the vehicle went up in flames — with all three inside — Yun rolled out of the SUV onto the ground with his legs aflame, a witness recalled at a preliminary hearing. Yun yelled for help, but never once gestured toward his children inside the burning vehicle, the witness said.

The children's deaths horrified Los Angeles' Korean community, a shock that was multiplied when within days of the attack, two other Korean men committed murder-suicides, one in Echo Park and another in Fontana.

According to the probation report, Yun, while he was being treated for his burns, told detectives that he had contemplated killing himself and his children for months because he was angry with his wife.

His wife and the children's mother, Sun Ok Ma, testified that he had repeatedly beaten her and threatened to kill her and burn down their home, leading to their separation and divorce. He pleaded guilty in 2004 to beating Ma, and was sentenced to two years' probation.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Bobby Grace, another prosecutor on the case, said Tuesday that the attack was "definitely premeditated," noting that Yun purchased the gasoline, picked an isolated location and parked the car up against a loading dock, making it difficult for the doors to open.

Prosecutors told the judge that Ma had been informed of the plea and sentencing, but said she did not want to make a statement.

Yun's attorneys asked that their client receive mental health treatment in prison and be kept in protective custody, saying he was suicidal and would be a target for violence from other inmates.

The man has shown "tremendous remorse" for his crime, attorney Christopher Apostal said. Yun has attempted suicide at least three times since his arrest, his attorneys said, and has been placed on the highest level of suicide watch with around-the-clock monitoring.

The judge said he would make the recommendations but declined the attorneys' request that Yun be housed in Southern California to accommodate visits from his family. Marcus said the decision was up to the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, and that the man should not receive "special treatment."

victoria.kim@latimes.com

Read More..

Egypt’s President Said to Limit Scope of Judicial Decree

Tara Todras-Whitehill for The New York Times

Egyptians at a burned-out school in Cairo on Monday before the funeral of an activist who was injured in a clash and died Sunday.

CAIRO — With public pressure mounting, President Mohamed Morsi appeared to pull back Monday from his attempt to assert an authority beyond the reach of any court. His allies in the Muslim Brotherhood canceled plans for a large demonstration in his support, signaling a chance to calm an escalating battle that has paralyzed a divided nation.

After Mr. Morsi met for hours with the judges of Egypt’s Supreme Judicial Council, his spokesman read an “explanation” on television that appeared to backtrack from a presidential decree placing Mr. Morsi’s official edicts above judicial scrutiny — even while saying the president had not actually changed a word of the statement.

Though details of the talks remained hazy, and it was not clear whether the opposition or the court would accept his position, Mr. Morsi’s gesture was another demonstration that Egyptians would no longer allow their rulers to operate above the law. But there appeared little chance that the gesture alone would be enough to quell the crisis set off by his perceived power grab.

Protesters remained camped in Tahrir Square, and the opposition was moving ahead with plans for a major demonstration on Tuesday.

The presidential spokesman, Yasser Ali, said for the first time that Mr. Morsi had sought only to assert pre-existing powers already approved by the courts under previous precedents, not to free himself from judicial oversight.

He said that the president meant all along to follow an established Egyptian legal doctrine suspending judicial scrutiny of presidential “acts of sovereignty” that work “to protect the main institutions of the state.” The judicial council had said Sunday that it could bless aspects of the decree deemed to qualify under the doctrine.

Mr. Morsi had maintained from the start that his purpose was to empower himself to prevent judges appointed by former President Hosni Mubarak from dissolving the constituent assembly, which is led by his fellow Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party. The courts have already dissolved the Islamist-led Parliament and an earlier constituent assembly, and the Supreme Constitutional Court was widely expected to rule against this one next week.

But the text of the original decree had exempted all presidential edicts from judicial review until the ratification of a constitution, not just those edicts related to the assembly or justified as “acts of sovereignty.”

Legal experts said that the spokesman’s explanations of the president’s intentions, if put into effect, would amount to a revision of the decree Mr. Morsi issued last Thursday. But lawyers said that the verbal statements alone carried little legal weight.

How the courts would apply the doctrine remained hard to predict. And Mr. Morsi’s opposition indicated it was holding out for far greater concessions, including the breakup of the whole constituent assembly.

Speaking at a news conference while Mr. Morsi was meeting with the judges, the opposition activist and intellectual Abdel Haleem Qandeil called for “a long-term battle,” declaring that withdrawal of Mr. Morsi’s new powers was only the first step toward the opposition’s goal of “the withdrawal of the legitimacy of Morsi’s presence in the presidential palace.” Completely withdrawing the edict would be “a minimum,” he said.

Khaled Ali, a human rights lawyer and former presidential candidate, pointed to the growing crowd of protesters camped out in Tahrir Square for a fourth night. “The one who did the action has to take it back,” Mr. Ali said.

Moataz Abdel Fattah, a political scientist at Cairo University, said Mr. Morsi was saving face during a strategic retreat. “He is trying to simply say, ‘I am not a new pharaoh; I am just trying to stabilize the institutions that we already have,’ ” he said. “But for the liberals, this is now their moment, and for sure they are not going to waste it, because he has given them an excellent opportunity to score.”

Read More..

132 online counterfeit sites seized in Cyber Monday blitz

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. and European authorities seized 132 domain names in a counterfeit goods crackdown linked to Cyber Monday, the online bargain day, the head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said.

ICE agents seized 101 domain names in the United States and 31 were taken over by officers in Britain, Romania, Belgium, France and Denmark and by Europol, the European Police Office, ICE Director John Morton said.

The sites, many linked to organized crime, were selling fake goods that ranged from National Football League jerseys and Nike Inc shoes to Adobe Systems Inc software, he said.

“There is much money to be made out there duping consumers and that is what is going on,” Morton said on a conference call.

Investigations are ongoing and more sites will be seized in coming days.

In the United States, 41 rights owners’ merchandise was being sold on the seized sites, Morton said.

ICE said in a statement that one U.S. arrest had been made.

The crackdown marks the third year that ICE has targeted websites selling counterfeit goods on Cyber Monday, the online shopping spree. It is the first time the agency has carried out the operation with European police.

The Cyber Monday seizures raise the total number of U.S. sites taken over to 1,630 since ICE began its anti-counterfeit campaign in June 2010.

PayPal accounts identified with the sites and holding a total of more than $ 175,000 are being targeted for seizure, the ICE statement said.

Morton put the scale of online piracy in the billions of dollars. Much of the online counterfeiting is in China and other parts of Asia, and U.S. authorities are working with China on the problem, he said.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson; Editing by Dan Grebler)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Women Sizzle in Dancing with the Stars All-Star Finale

TV Watch

By Aaron Parsley

11/26/2012 at 09:35 PM EST

From left: Shawn Johnson, Kelly Monaco and Melissa Rycroft

Craig Sjodin/ABC (3)

It's raining 10s, hallelujah!

On the final Monday night of competition for the all-star season of Dancing with the Stars, the all-female top three – Melissa Rycroft, Shawn Johnson and Kelly Monaco – took big risks during two final routines with their partners.

Each couple performed their favorite dance of the season and "super-sized freestyle," which allowed the pros – Tony Dovolani, Derek Hough and Val Chmerkovskiy – to incorporate the music and choreography of their choice with sets, additional performers and costumes to create routines to wow the judges and the voters at home.

Here's how it all played our inside the ballroom on Monday night:

Melissa and Tony dominated with two perfect 30s for a total of 60. Kelly and Val were close behind with 59 points. And Shawn and Derek remained very much in it with 57.

ROUND 1
Kelly and Val, who have not scored a 10 this season, chose the paso doble as their favorite dance. "I want to make it so technically perfect, so passionate that the judges have no choice but to give us a 10," she said before doing a routine that judge Len Goodman called their "best dance to date." But it wasn't perfect: Carrie Ann Inaba spotted a "little slip-up," an unintentional release, and knocked off half a point, leaving them just shy of 30 with 29.5.

Melissa and Tony performed their favorite dance, a samba. Bruno Tonioli called her a "deliciously irresistible Brazilian bombshell," and said, "You've grown so much as a performer. You really have blossomed." Added Len: "You captured the party flavor of the samba, great technique, great rhythm, fabulous." They earned a perfect 30.

Shawn and Derek decided to revisit their quickstep and performed their original choreography even though some of the moves were against the rules. "The standing ovation means everything to us," Shawn said, explaining their determination to entertain rather than just earn points. Though the judges said the routine was "fantastic," they also called them out for their controversial decision. "You're not allowed to break hold, which you did, you're not allowed to do lifts, which you did," Len said. "You leave me nowhere to go." Added Carrie Ann: "Points do matter ... I'm a little disappointed but I hope your risk pays off." They scored 27 our of 30.

ROUND 2
Kelly started her super-size freestyle by performing aerial work hanging from the ballroom rafters as Val played the violin. According to Bruno the routine, which they danced to "(I've Had) The Time of My Life," combined Cirque du Soleil with Dirty Dancing. "This was the perfect dance," Carrie Ann said of their 29.5-point performance. "You executed everything great, you added artistry and you told us a happy ending to a beautiful love story."

Melissa and Tony did something never done before in the finale – a contemporary routine. "We're taking a huge risk," she said of their lift-heavy dance. Carrie Ann agreed: "With great risk comes great rewards," she said, "Freestyle jackpot!" The routine left Len speechless but when he held up his 10-point paddle, he said, "I wish I had an 11." They earned another perfect 30.

Shawn and Derek performed the final dance of the night with the U.S. Women's Gymnastics team – a.k.a. The Fierce Five. "It was a medley of Derek and Shawn's greatest hits," was Len's assessment. Carrie Ann called it "sensational." Bruno said it was "the crowning glory on a fantastic night," and they got a perfect 30.

But will it be enough to make up for their unconventional quickstep? On Tuesday the couples will perform one more time for points when they pick their music and dance live on the air. And then an all-star winner will be crowned.

Read More..

Bounce houses a party hit but kids' injuries soar

CHICAGO (AP) — They may be a big hit at kids' birthday parties, but inflatable bounce houses can be dangerous, with the number of injuries soaring in recent years, a nationwide study found.

Kids often crowd into bounce houses, and jumping up and down can send other children flying into the air, too.

The numbers suggest 30 U.S. children a day are treated in emergency rooms for broken bones, sprains, cuts and concussions from bounce house accidents. Most involve children falling inside or out of the inflated playthings, and many children get hurt when they collide with other bouncing kids.

The number of children aged 17 and younger who got emergency-room treatment for bounce house injuries has climbed along with the popularity of bounce houses — from fewer than 1,000 in 1995 to nearly 11,000 in 2010. That's a 15-fold increase, and a doubling just since 2008.

"I was surprised by the number, especially by the rapid increase in the number of injuries," said lead author Dr. Gary Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio.

Amusement parks and fairs have bounce houses, and the playthings can also be rented or purchased for home use.

Smith and colleagues analyzed national surveillance data on ER treatment for nonfatal injuries linked with bounce houses, maintained by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. Their study was published online Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Only about 3 percent of children were hospitalized, mostly for broken bones.

More than one-third of the injuries were in children aged 5 and younger. The safety commission recommends against letting children younger than 6 use full-size trampolines, and Smith said barring kids that young from even smaller, home-use bounce houses would make sense.

"There is no evidence that the size or location of an inflatable bouncer affects the injury risk," he said.

Other recommendations, often listed in manufacturers' instruction pamphlets, include not overloading bounce houses with too many kids and not allowing young children to bounce with much older, heavier kids or adults, said Laura Woodburn, a spokeswoman for the National Association of Amusement Ride Safety Officials.

The study didn't include deaths, but some accidents are fatal. Separate data from the product safety commission show four bounce house deaths from 2003 to 2007, all involving children striking their heads on a hard surface.

Several nonfatal accidents occurred last year when bounce houses collapsed or were lifted by high winds.

A group that issues voluntary industry standards says bounce houses should be supervised by trained operators and recommends that bouncers be prohibited from doing flips and purposefully colliding with others, the study authors noted.

Bounce house injuries are similar to those linked with trampolines, and the American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended against using trampolines at home. Policymakers should consider whether bounce houses warrant similar precautions, the authors said.

___

Online:

Pediatrics: http://www.pediatrics.org

Trade group: http://www.naarso.com

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

Read More..