STOCKTON, Calif. — A serial killer may have ambushed five men in central California separately in recent months, shooting them to death alone in the dark, and police are baffled as to why the victims were targeted.
None of the men were robbed or beaten before their killings — which all took place within a radius of a few square miles — and none appear to have known each other, Stockton Police Officer Joseph Silva said Monday. The shootings also do not seem to be related to gangs or drugs, either.
Stockton police on Friday announced an $85,000 reward for information leading to an arrest in the slayings, which date back to July 8. Authorities also released a grainy still image of a “person of interest,” dressed all in black and wearing a black cap, who appeared in videos from several of the crime scenes.
The latest killing occurred shortly before 2 a.m. Tuesday, when a 54-year-old man was shot in a residential area just north of downtown.
None of the shootings have been captured by video cameras and no firearms have been recovered.
“We don’t have any video of anybody holding any gun or actually committing a crime,” Silva said in a phone interview Monday.
Still, the available footage, as well as ballistics evidence, link the five killings, he said. All five men were shot by a handgun, though it’s not yet clear if it was the same gun used in each crime.
“It definitely meets the definition of a serial killer,” Silva said. “What makes this different is the shooter is just looking for an opportunity and unfortunately our victims were alone in a dark area.”
There may even be multiple people involved in the violence. “To be honest, we just don’t know,” he said. “This person or people who are out doing this, they are definitely very bold and brazen.”
Police said the victims were each walking alone or in a parked car when they were killed in the evening or early morning in the city of 320,000 residents about 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of the state capital, Sacramento.
The ages of the victims range from 21 to 54; four of the men were Hispanic and one was white.
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This story has been corrected to say that Stockton police announced an $85,000 reward for information leading to an arrest in the slayings on Friday, not Sunday.
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Grizzly Flats had stood in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada in California since 1851. Lumber was the economic backbone of the region for decades. But it took only 15 minutes one night last August for nea of the town to be destroyed, engulfed by the Caldor Fire that had roared out of the Eldorado National Forest.
The fire would burn for two months, scorching more than 200,000 acres and costing $271 million to extinguish.
It started as a small plume of smoke about four miles south of Grizzly Flats at 7 p.m. on August 14th, 2021. Since the fire was on federal land the U.S. Forest Service was in charge, responsible for calling in firefighters and resources. A 60 Minutes investigation discovered that problems started right away: maps were out of date, firefighters had trouble locating the fire. As she was listening to her police scanner, resident Candance Tyler said her heart sank.
“They’re sending them down Caldor Road. Well, it’s been washed out for three years,” Tyler told correspondent Bill Whitaker. “How are you going to get a tanker down there? Have you seen the washout? It’s huge. It would take a month of Sundays to fill that hole in or cut a new road.”
Scorched forest from the Caldor Fire
Keeping national forests healthy—including maintaining roads—is a central part of the Forest Service’s mandate. But 60 Minutes found many roads in the Eldorado Forest were impassable—blocked by downed trees and deep ruts. When the Caldor Fire broke out, fire engines had to backtrack, a costly two-hour delay.
Retired fire captain Grant Ingram was also listening to his scanner. Ingram fought fires for 35 years for BOTH the U.S. Forest Service and for Cal Fire, California’s state firefighting agency. Ingram investigated the initial spread of the fire for the local fire district and he told us he believes the U.S. Forest Service management team bears much of the blame.
“The leadership failed to give the team on the ground what they needed to do to put that fire out in a timely manner,” Ingram told Whitaker.
“You flat out say it’s a failure of leadership?” Whitaker asked.
“Absolutely,” Ingram said. “They failed to understand where the fire was going to go. Then they failed to bring in enough equipment and resources to mitigate that fire. And then, they failed to protect the community of Grizzly Flats when they knew it was headed that way.”
Ingram said one of the most consequential decisions came in the early hours of August 15, when the fire was still small. At 1:43 a.m., just hours into the fire, the Forest Service shut down operations for the night.
“Will be pulling everyone off the line for accountability” reads the dispatch log, a minute-by-minute account of the fire that 60 Minutes obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. The Forest Service said it was unsafe to continue and it wanted to reassess.
“When I worked for other agencies, we typically fought fires at night. That was the best time to do it,” Ingram told Whitaker.
“But yet this Forest Service incident commander was ordering people to stop,” Whitaker said. “Turn back, go home.”
“Right. I couldn’t believe it at first,” Ingram said. “Firefighting is dangerous but you don’t call 9-1-1 when you’re a firefighter. You are there as 9-1-1.”
The order to pull out didn’t sit well with state and local firefighters who’d raced in to help the Forest Service. A number of them told 60 Minutes that they believed that night was their best chance to contain the fire. They also said they were trained to fight wildfires 24/7 until the fire is out. No one would go on camera for fear of losing their jobs, so 60 Minutes agreed to conceal this firefighter’s identity.
“So when you heard the incident commander say he was pulling out, and other equipment, fire engines and bulldozers left with him, what did you think?” Whitaker asked the firefighter.
“What in the world’s going on here? I mean, like what the hell? We have a fire. You have to suppress the fire. It—it’s just that simple,” the firefighter said. “I think everybody on that hill that night figured that if we didn’t get ahead of this thing that night, we were going to be in trouble.”
The Forest Service knew it too. Their own fire model for August 15, also obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, showed Grizzly Flats in the middle of the area almost certain to burn—an 80-100% chance—if the fire wasn’t put out. Yet that same day, the Forest Service dismissed some half-dozen state Cal Fire engines and crews, letting most of them go before their replacements arrived. Ingram told 60 Minutes that breaks every rule of firefighting.
“It made no sense to me. And it—it should never have happened,” Ingram said.
On the second day, August 15, the fire engulfed 200 acres. On August 16, 700 acres. That night, the winds in the canyon whipped the flames into a frenzy and Caldor exploded, consuming 11,000 acres.
Flames jumped from treetop to treetop, picking up speed. The Eldorado National Forest was so dense with dead trees and parched underbrush, it was like a pyre waiting for a match.
“Now everything’s on fire. It’s all raining down on this community,” Ingram recounted. He told Whitaker it was sitting in front of a blow torch.
The U.S. Forest Service says its resources were stretched thin. The Dixie Fire, which would become the second-largest in California history, was burning ferociously nearby. But Ingram told 60 Minutes there were regional crews available. And he pointed to the dispatch log that showed 12 extra fire engines being called up as the flames were tearing into Grizzly Flats. But it was too late.
“All of a sudden all these fire engines start showing up,” Ingram said, “and it’s like, well, where were they two days ago? Why weren’t they in the neighborhood of Grizzly Flats prior to this fire even getting there?”
“The Forest Service won’t answer our questions,” Ingram continued.
Several miles south of Grizzly Flats at the Leoni Meadows campsite, retired Sacramento Deputy Fire Chief Lloyd Ogan told Whitaker the flames were 30 feet above the treetops that night, hissing and crackling. Ogan said he knew then the Caldor Fire was out of control.
“The thing I struggle with is why would any resources get released on a fire that is in an obviously high-risk location in a high-risk environment? I have not heard what I would term as an acceptable answer to that question yet. I haven’t heard any answer to that question yet,” Ogan said.
In all the wreckage of Caldor, Leoni Meadows stands out—an island of green in a charred, desolate wasteland. The fire skirted the camp thanks to a massive fuel break—or buffer zone—the camp had built. Ogan pointed out where they’d thinned trees and cleared the combustible underbrush. When Caldor hit, there was little material left to feed it. The fire slowed and changed direction.
Ogan showed 60 Minutes the Forest Service land next to the camp that had not been cleared. There, everything burned.
“There was no management on the Forest Service side. And that’s the result,” Ogan said.
“It’s kind of mind-blowing to see all that devastation there and it gets to the property line of the camp, where the land was managed, and this all survived. It’s all green,” Whitaker told Ogan. “Could this have been replicated around Grizzly Flats?”
“Yes. Absolutely,” Ogan said. “That’s what the Trestle Project was all about, was to do exactly this. And had that been done, there’s a high probability Grizzly Flats wouldn’t have burned.”
The Trestle Project was launched by the Forest Service nine years ago, when its own research warned Grizzly Flats could be incinerated if wildfire ignited the overgrown Eldorado Forest. The agency promised to clean up thousands of acres, starting with 970 acres on the town’s southeast flank, where fire would likely hit first. Almost a decade later, only a fraction of the work was done. The Caldor Fire wiped out Grizzly Flats exactly as the Forest Service had predicted.
Residents aren’t the only ones who have tried to get answers from the Forest Service. 60 Minutes asked the federal agency repeatedly for documents, a comment, and to have the taxpayer-funded service explain what happened in Grizzly Flats.
Last week, the Forest Service emailed us that it plans to dramatically increase the scale of forest health projects like the Trestle Project and has launched a 10-year plan, starting with communities at immediate threat.
The 10-year plan is no solace for the residents of Grizzly Flats who told 60 Minutes that any trust they had in the Forest Service has been shattered.
“A 40-acre fire,” resident Candance Tyler said, “you can’t put that out in a canyon? And don’t get me wrong, I lived here my whole life. I know that’s a steep treacherous canyon, but you’re still telling me that you don’t have the ability and the equipment to put it out? They didn’t do nothing. In our opinion, they did nothing to put this fire out.”
Last year, Caldor was one of three devastating fires in the region that started on federal land and burned more than a million acres.
The California gold-rush town of Grizzly Flats was founded in 1851. People came for the gold but stayed for the trees. Lumber from lush forests supported Sierra Nevada foothill towns for decades. Then, one August night in 2021, the Caldor Fire roared out of the Eldorado National Forest and in less than 15 minutes, Grizzly Flats was gone. Today, the community’s anger is still raw. Many residents blame the U.S. Forest Service for letting a few-acre blaze morph into a monstrous wildfire. In our months-long investigation, we found evidence of mismanagement by the Forest Service and critics who say its outdated tactics and overgrown lands have led to millions of acres and foothill towns burning needlessly. We went to Grizzly Flats to see for ourselves what happened that August night when a wall of fire ripped through town.
Candance Tyler: I took a couple pictures of my house knowing that that would be the last time I ever saw it.
Bill Whitaker: You knew that?
Candance Tyler: Yeah, I mean, when you got hot embers raining down on ya and your friends and family’s houses are exploding and you’re listening to it; and there ain’t nothing between here and them to stop it, you know your fate.
Candance Tyler’s world went up in flames on August 17, when the Caldor Fire tore out of the Eldorado National Forest and burned the family ranch to the ground.
Bill Whitaker: So where was your house?
Candance Tyler: So right here would have been our bedroom. And then over here, this would have been walking into our dining room.
Candance Tyler shows correspondent Bill Whitaker around the ruins left by the Caldor Fire
The Tylers have lived on this hilltop for five generations. Today, their homestead is a charred hellscape. Blackened trees stand like sentinels over a shadow world. For more than a year, the Tylers and their two children have lived in a trailer.
More than 600 homes—nearly all of Grizzly Flats—were destroyed in minutes. The Caldor Fire would burn for two months, scorching more than 200,000 acres and costing $271 million to extinguish.
Bill Whitaker: When it first started, did you have confidence that the Forest Service would handle it? Would put it out?
Candance Tyler: Absolutely. A hundred percent. A 40-acre fire, you can’t put that out in a canyon? And don’t get me wrong, I lived here my whole life. I know that’s a steep treacherous canyon, but you’re still telling me that you don’t have the ability and the equipment to put it out? They didn’t do nothing. In our opinion, they did nothing to put this fire out.
Caldor started as a small plume of smoke about four miles south of Grizzly Flats. It was August 14, 7 p.m. This was federal land so the U.S. Forest Service was in charge, responsible for calling in firefighters and resources. We discovered that problems started right away: maps were out of date, firefighters had trouble finding the fire. As she was listening to her police scanner, Candance Tyler told us her heart sank.
Candance Tyler: They’re sending them down Caldor Road. Well, it’s been washed out for three years. How are you gonna get a tanker down there? Have you seen the washout? It’s—it’s huge. It would take a month of Sundays to fill that hole in or cut a new road.
We went to see what Tyler was talking about. Keeping national forests healthy—including maintaining roads—is a big part of the Forest Service’s mandate. But we found many roads in the Eldorado Forest were impassable—blocked by downed trees and deep ruts. when Caldor broke out, fire engines had to backtrack, a costly two- hour delay.
Grant Ingram: I can’t believe that it was even happening. It was like watching a slow-motion disaster.
Grant Ingram
Grant Ingram also was listening to his scanner. A retired fire captain with 35 years experience, Ingram fought fires for the U.S. Forest Service and for Cal Fire, California’s state agency. Ingram investigated the initial spread of the fire for the local fire district. He believes the U.S. Forest Service management team bears much of the blame.
Grant Ingram: The leadership failed to give the team on the ground what they needed to do to put that fire out in a timely manner.
Bill Whitaker: You flat out say it’s a failure of leadership?
Grant Ingram: Absolutely. They failed to understand where the fire was gonna go. Then they failed to bring in enough equipment and resources to mitigate that fire. And then, they failed to protect the community of Grizzly Flats when they knew it was headed that way.
Ingram told us one of the most consequential decisions came in the early hours of August 15, when the fire was still small. At 1:43 a.m.—just hours into the fire—the Forest Service shut down operations for the night. “Will be pulling everyone off the line for accountability” reads the dispatch log, a minute-by-minute account of the fire that we obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The Forest Service told us conditions were unsafe and it wanted to reassess.
Grant Ingram: When I worked for other agencies, we typically fought fires at night. That was the best time to do it.
Bill Whitaker: But yet this Forest Service incident commander was ordering people to stop.
Grant Ingram: Yes.
Bill Whitaker: Turn back, go home.
Grant Ingram: Right. I couldn’t believe it at first. Firefighting is dangerous but you don’t call 9-1-1 when you’re a firefighter. You are there as 9-1-1.
The remains of a forest burned by the Caldor Fire
The order to pull out didn’t sit well with state and local firefighters who’d raced in to help the Forest Service. A number of them told us that night was their best chance to contain the fire. They also told us they’re trained to fight wildfires 24/7 until the fire is out. None would go on camera for fear of losing their jobs, so we agreed to conceal this firefighter’s identity.
Bill Whitaker: So when you heard the incident commander say he was pulling out, and other equipment, fire engines and bulldozers left with him, what did you think?
FIREFIGHTER: What in the world’s going on here? I mean, like what the hell? We have a fire. You have to suppress the fire. It—it’s just that simple.
Bill Whitaker: Did you know that this had the potential to turn into this?
FIREFIGHTER: Absolutely. Yeah, I think everybody on that hill that night figured that if we didn’t get ahead of this thing that night, we were gonna be in trouble.
The Forest Service knew it too. In their own fire model for August 15, also obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, the area almost certain to burn if nothing was done was marked in red. In the middle of the bulls eye? 600 homes in Grizzly Flats. Yet that same day, the Forest Service dismissed some half dozen Cal Fire engines and crews, letting most of them go before their replacements arrived. Ingram told us that breaks every rule of firefighting.
Bill Whitaker: The decision to release the Cal Fire firefighters early, even as this fire is growing, that just didn’t make any sense to you?
Grant Ingram: It made no sense to me. And it—it should never have happened.
Retired fire captain Grant Ingram now owns a fire-mapping business. He showed us why he was alarmed.
Bill Whitaker: So this is where it started and it went all the way up here to Grizzly Flat?
Grant Ingram: Yes.
On the second day, August 15, the fire engulfed 200 acres. On August 16, 700 acres. That night, the winds in the canyon whipped the flames into a frenzy, consuming 11,000 acres.
Flames jumped from treetop to treetop, picking up speed. The Eldorado Forest was so dense with dead trees and parched underbrush, it was like a pyre just waiting for a match.
Grant Ingram: Now everything’s on fire. It’s all raining down on this community. They’re sitting in front of a blow torch and they can’t get out of the way.
Lloyd Ogan talks with correspondent Bill Whitaker
Lloyd Ogan: We saw the glow coming up…
From half a mile away, retired deputy fire chief Lloyd Ogan could see that blow torch, smell it, feel it.
Lloyd Ogan: We stood on the deck, right where you and I are standing. And you could feel this whole deck was just rumbling.
Bill Whitaker: From a fire that was a ridge over?
Lloyd Ogan: Yeah, it was just rumbling. And that noise was literally like a freight train coming.
We met Ogan at Leoni Meadows, a campsite south of Grizzly Flats. He told us the flames were 30 feet above the treetops that night, hissing and crackling. Ogan said he knew then the Caldor Fire was out of control.
Lloyd Ogan: The thing I struggle with is why would any resources get released on a fire that is in a obviously high-risk location in a high-risk environment? I have not heard what I would term as an acceptable answer to that question yet. I haven’t heard any answer to that question yet.
The Forest Service says its resources were stretched thin. The Dixie Fire, which would become the second largest in California history, was burning savagely nearby. But retired fire captain Grant Ingram told us there were regional crews available. And he pointed to the dispatch log that showed 12 extra fire engines being called up as the flames were tearing into Grizzly Flats. But it was too late.
Grant Ingram: All of a sudden all these fire engines start showing up and it’s like, well, where were they two days ago? Why weren’t they in the neighborhood of Grizzly Flats prior to this fire even getting there?
Bill Whitaker: Why weren’t they?
Grant Ingram: I don’t know. The Forest Service won’t answer our questions.
Leoni Meadows
In all the wreckage of Caldor, Leoni Meadows stands out—an island of green in a desolate wasteland. The fire skirted the camp thanks to a massive fuel break—or buffer zone—the camp had cut. Retired deputy fire chief Lloyd Ogan pointed out where they had thinned the trees and cleared the combustible underbrush. When Caldor hit, there was little left to feed it.
The area in Leoni Meadows where the camp cut a buffer zone
The fire slowed and changed direction. Then Ogan showed us the U.S. Forest Service land next to the camp that had not been cleared. There, everything burned.
U.S. Forest Service land next to Leoni Meadows
Lloyd Ogan: There was no management on the Forest Service side. And that’s the result.
Bill Whitaker: It’s kind of mind-blowing to see all that devastation there and it gets to the property line of the camp, where the land was managed, and this all survived. It’s all green.
Lloyd Ogan: Yep.
Bill Whitaker: Could this have been replicated around Grizzly Flats?
Lloyd Ogan: Yes. Absolutely. That’s what the Trestle Project was all about, was to do exactly this. And had that been done, there’s a high probability Grizzly Flats wouldn’t have burned.
Bill Whitaker: Would not have burned?
Lloyd Ogan: Yep.
The Trestle Project was launched by the Forest Service nine years ago, when its own research warned Grizzly Flats could be incinerated if wildfire ignited the overgrown Eldorado Forest. The agency promised to clean up thousands of acres, starting with 970 acres on the town’s southeast flank, where the fire would likely hit first. Almost a decade later, only a fraction of the work was done. And the Caldor Fire wiped out Grizzly Flats exactly as the Forest Service had predicted.
Bill Whitaker: Why didn’t they do this? It was part of their project.
Lloyd Ogan: That’s the million-dollar question I think, is why wasn’t it done?
Residents aren’t the only ones who have tried to get answers from the Forest Service. We asked repeatedly for documents, a comment, to have the taxpayer-funded service tell us what happened here.
Last week, the Forest Service emailed us that it plans to dramatically increase the scale of forest health projects like the Trestle Project and has launched a 10-year plan, starting with communities at immediate risk.
But that’s no solace for the residents of Grizzly Flats who told us any trust they had in the Forest Service has been shattered. Last year, Caldor was one of three devastating fires in the region that started on federal land and burned more than a million acres. Candance Tyler fears unless the Forest Service follows through on their promises, more towns like Grizzly Flats will go up in flames.
Bill Whitaker: The Forest Service has said they did all they could. They threw all the resources they had at the fire. You laugh?
Candance Tyler: I laugh. Are you kidding me? Your maps say, we’re gonna burn. Your models show, we’re gonna burn. But you’re not worried about it? Oh, you don’t have the resources? That’s a joke.
Produced by Heather Abbott. Associate producer, LaCrai Mitchell. Edited by Michael Mongulla.
Rewards totaling $85,000 have been offered for information leading to an arrest in five fatal shootings since July in Stockton, California, that investigators believe are related
STOCKTON, Calif. — Rewards totaling $85,000 have been offered for information leading to an arrest in five fatal shootings since July in Stockton, California, that investigators believe are related, police said.
After reviewing surveillance footage, detectives have located an unidentified “person of interest” in the killings, Stockton Police Chief Stanley McFadden wrote on the department’s Facebook page Saturday. Police released a grainy still image of a person filmed from behind, dressed all in black and wearing a black cap.
The latest killing occurred shortly before 2 a.m. Tuesday, when a 54-year-old man was shot in a residential area just north of downtown, McFadden said.
Police said he was the fifth man fatally shot since July 8 within a radius of a few square miles. Detectives believe all five homicides are related “based on our investigation and the reports we are receiving,” McFadden said.
Police said the victims were each walking alone when they were killed in the evening or early morning in the city of 320,000 residents about 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of the state capital, Sacramento.
The ages of the victims range from 21 to 54; four of the men were Hispanic and one was white, McFadden said.
“We are committed to protecting our community and solving these cases utilizing all the resources at our disposal including YOU. We need YOUR help!!!! If anyone, has information regarding these investigations, call us immediately. Please remember our victims have grieving family members who need resolution. If you know something, say something,” the chief wrote on Facebook.
The city of Stockton put up a $75,000 reward, and Stockton Crime Stoppers offered an additional $10,000.
One in four of all tomatoes on the planet are grown in the state of California. With temperatures increasing across the country, California tomato farmers are now experiencing significant loss in their crop yields. CBS Bay Area’s Elizabeth Cook has the story.
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The process is officially called “natural organic reduction,” and involves “fostering gentle transformation into a nutrient-dense soil, which can then be returned to families or donated to conservation land,” the release explained.
Natural organic reduction is less harmful to the environment than the other two legal options (cremation and burial), according to the release. Burial can allow chemicals to leek into the soil, and cremation requires the burning of fossil fuels and releases carbon dioxide.
The law will not go into effect until January 2027, according to the text of the bill. The law stipulates the Cemetery and Funeral Bureau, a subdivision of the Department of Consumer Affairs, will develop regulations for facilities performing the process.
In the release, Garcia called natural organic reduction “an alternative method of final disposition that won’t contribute emissions into our atmosphere and will actually capture CO2 in our soil and trees.”
“If more people participate in organic reduction and tree-planting, we can help with California’s carbon footprint,” she said. “This bill has been in the works for the last three years, and I am very happy that it was signed into law. I look forward to continuing my legacy to fight for clean air by using my reduced remains to plant a tree.”
Recompose, a company which has been offering natural organic reduction services since 2020, also lauded the law in the release.
“Recompose is thrilled that the options for nature-based death care in California have expanded,” said the company’s CEO and founder Katrina Spade in the release. “Natural organic reduction is safe and sustainable, allowing our bodies to return to the land after we die.”
According to Recompose’s website, natural organic reduction works much like composting your vegetable scraps does. The body is placed in a vessel along with wood chips, alfalfa, and straw. Over a month, microbes work to break the body down into a cubic yard of soil, which can then be used in a loved one’s garden, or anywhere else.
Washington became the first state to legalize so-called “human composting” in 2019. Lawmakers similarly cited the ecological benefits of reduction over burial and cremation.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday signed a bill limiting conservatorships that grant legal guardianship over individuals, a move that comes after Britney Spears’ conservatorship case garnered national attention amid her attempts to regain control over her finances and livelihood.
The new law, authored by Democratic Assemblymember Brian Maienschein, will require that judges document all alternatives to a conservatorship before granting one. It aligns with similar legislation adopted in other states, following a push from advocates. In a statement, Newsom, a Democrat, said the state is committed to protecting the rights of Californians with disabilities.
People deemed to be unable to make certain life decisions for themselves can be placed into legal conservatorships in which a court-appointed conservator is given control over their finances and other critical aspects of their life, sometimes without their consent. They most often involve people with developmental or intellectual disabilities or those with age-related issues like dementia.
Advocacy groups contend that people like Spears, who was under a conservatorship for nearly 14 years, can become trapped in a system that removes their civil rights and the ability to advocate for themselves.
“This measure is an important step to empower Californians with disabilities to get needed support in caring for themselves and their finances, while maintaining control over their lives to the greatest extent possible,” Newsom wrote in a signing statement, calling the new law a “transformative reform to protect self-determination for all Californians.”
Spears, the pop singer and Mississippi native who has publicly struggled with her mental health, ended up at the center of a widespread #FreeBritney campaign aimed at regranting the pop singer authority over her medical, personal and financial decisions. She alleged she became a victim of misconduct at the hands of her father, James Spears, who was her conservator.
Fans and advocates rallied online and in person to bring attention to Spears’ situation. Documentaries by The New York Times and Netflix on the effects of Spears’ conservatorship brought renewed spotlight to the case and the conservatorship process more broadly. She was a 26-year-old new mother who had several public mental health struggles during the height of her career in 2008, when her father sought the conservatorship, at first on a temporary basis.
A Los Angeles judge ended Spears’ conservatorship last year, a win followed by legislative proposals to protect the rights of conservatees and efforts to make it more difficult for people to end up in one.
Maienschein, who represents parts of San Diego, thanked the governor in a statement, noting the importance of ensuring the autonomy of people with disabilities.
The new law will give potential conservatees preference for selecting a conservator and make it easier to end probate conservatorships.
Disability rights organization Disability Voices United referred to news of Newsom’s decision as historic.
“This law affirms that conservatorships should be rare and the last resort,” the group wrote. “The default should be that people with disabilities retain their rights and get support when they need it. ”
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Sophie Austin is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Sophie Austin on Twitter.
California is attempting to stymie abortion prosecutions in other states by making it illegal for Silicon Valley giants and other businesses based in the Golden State to hand over the personal information of abortion-seekers to out-of-state authorities.
A new law signed Tuesday by Gov. Gavin Newsom forbids California-based businesses from giving up geolocation data, search histories and other personal information in response to out-of-state search warrants, unless those warrants are accompanied by a statement that the evidence sought isn’t connected to an abortion investigation.
The prohibition also bars companies in the state from complying with out-of-state law enforcement requests related to abortion, including subpoenas and wiretaps.
It’s the latest example of how California is using its status as a powerful state, with jurisdiction over the world’s most powerful tech companies, to influence policy at a national scale.
“California is setting a national privacy standard,” said Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, an architect of the bill, in a statement Tuesday. According to a release by California Attorney General Rob Bonta, the law went into effect immediately upon signing.
Bauer-Kahan’s law, AB 1242, bars California-based companies, including Google, Meta, Uber and others, from producing records about a person if the companies know “or should know” that the warrant they’re responding to is related to an abortion probe. CNN has reached out to the companies for comment.
The new law prohibits abortion-related search warrants in the first place, and requires all out-of-state search warrants to attest that they are not abortion-related.
But in directly undercutting the anti-abortion laws of other states, California’s new law could put businesses in the difficult position of having to pick sides — and face potential legal penalties no matter what they choose.
Companies that violate AB 1242 could face prosecution by the California attorney general. But if they comply with AB 1242, they could also face legal action in states that have restricted abortion for failing to comply with legal process.
“Anti-choice sheriffs and bounty hunters are going to be highly motivated to do anything they can to get this data,” said Adam Schwartz, a senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group that supports the California law.
In the event of a conflict between state laws, Schwartz said courts first look to whether a state has jurisdiction over a company and then, if it does, they fall back on a procedural tool known as “choice of law” to determine which law should apply.
A state with only some employees of a company, or that is home to users of an electronic service, isn’t likely to satisfy the jurisdictional test, Schwartz said. Even if it did, he added, it would likely fail in the choice of law because the California law is tailored to govern businesses that are incorporated in California or that have their “principal executive offices” in California.
Still, he acknowledged there will likely be many court battles ahead.
“We are going to see more of this situation where a business is facing, at one time, legal process from an anti-choice state commanding it to disclose abortion-related data, and a blocking statute from a pro-choice state forbidding it from disclosing that same data,” Schwartz said. “This is an important new area, this contest between anti-choice legal process and pro-choice blocking statutes, and it is a matter that could work its way up the courts to the highest court.”
In the meantime, tech companies could find themselves between a rock and a hard place, according to tech trade group Chamber of Progress.
“Red states and blue states are at war over abortion, and online platforms are caught in the crossfire,” Chamber of Progress CEO Adam Kovacevich said in a statement to CNN. “California’s new law could potentially have a big impact on protecting reproductive privacy — but first it will create a challenging conflict between state laws.”
LOS ANGELES — The Southern California teenager killed this week alongside her father in a shootout with law enforcement was with him a day earlier when he fatally shot her mother, police said Thursday.
Savannah Graziano, 15, was in the back of her father’s pickup truck when he gunned down her mother, Tracy Martinez, on Monday, according to Fontana police. Witnesses and two videos — one from a bystander and another from a doorbell — show she stayed still as her mother screamed.
“She’s just sitting in the backseat,” Sgt. Christian Surgent said in a phone interview Thursday.
Authorities had previously said the teen was somewhere else during her mother’s killing and was later abducted by her father, Anthony Graziano. But the two videos obtained Wednesday showed her inside the truck between 30 and 60 seconds before the gunfire began, police said.
Witnesses did not report seeing Savannah get out of the vehicle, Surgent said, as Martinez tried to escape and Graziano — her estranged husband — jumped out wielding a handgun.
Graziano, 45, shot Martinez multiple times and also turned and fired on a nearby car. No one else was hurt.
Martinez was able to identify her killer as Graziano before she died, Surgent said, but never mentioned her daughter being there. Neither video showed the shooting.
Savannah and her father were both killed a day later after a long chase along an desert interstate east of Los Angeles in Hesperia — about 35 miles (56.33 kilometers) north of the homicide scene. Rifle shots were fired at the pursuing officers from Graziano’s pickup truck, which became disabled after driving off the highway. The shooter put several rounds through a patrol car’s windshield and later disabled a second pursuing vehicle, authorities said.
Graziano died in the truck while Savannah, wearing tactical gear and a helmet, was fatally shot as she ran toward deputies amid a hail of gunfire. Authorities are investigating whether she was shot by deputies, her father, or both.
The California Department of Justice is reviewing the teen’s death under a state law requiring the agency to investigate police shootings involving the death of unarmed civilians. Meanwhile, detectives in Fontana still have not determined a motive for the slaying.
Investigators later searched the family’s Fontana home — which Graziano and his daughter moved out of weeks prior — and Graziano’s storage unit. Inside the storage pod they found numerous AR-15-style rifles, handguns, thousands of rounds of ammunition, smoke grenades and other tactical gear, Surgent said.
The firearms were legally owned by Graziano, who was not or probation or parole. Savannah’s younger brother told investigators that the siblings grew up around guns.
Authorities have said they have police video showing the freeway shootout but have not made that public, nor did they release the two videos showing Savannah in the pickup truck just before her mother was killed.
Authorities say two rock climbers, including a former NFL player, were found dead near a Southern California peak after rescue crews responded to reports of injuries
IDYLLWILD, Calif. — Two rock climbers were found dead near a Southern California peak after rescue crews responded to reports of injuries, authorities said.
Rescuers were called around 12:30 p.m. Wednesday to Tahquitz Rock near Idyllwild following a distress call, the Cal Fire/Riverside County Fire Department said on Twitter.
A team managed to climb into the steep, remote area and found both unidentified climbers dead at the scene, the department said.
They were identified Thursday as Chelsea Walsh, 33, and Gavin Escobar, 31.
A small amount of rain fell in the area earlier in the day, but officials didn’t immediately say if weather was a factor in the deaths.
Escobar was a Long Beach firefighter who was hired in February, the department said.
Escobar previously had been a tight end, playing for the Dallas Cowboy in a backup role from 2013 to 2016. He then had brief stints with the Kansas City Chiefs, Baltimore Ravens, Cleveland Browns and Miami Dolphins, ending his career in 2019 with the now-defunct Alliance of American Football.
Tahquitz Rock, with its steep granite cliffs, is a popular destination for climbers.
Two climbers from Los Angeles fell 200 feet (60 meters) to their deaths on the rock in 2000, according to the Los Angeles Times.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office on Thursday filed murder charges against a father and son in connection to the fatal shooting of musical artist PnB Rock.
Freddie Trone, who is being sought by police, along with his minor son were each charged with murder, conspiracy to commit robbery and second-degree robbery, according to a release from the DA’s office. A woman was charged with accessory after the fact.
The minor appeared in juvenile court Thursday and is set to return for a preliminary hearing on October 19. The woman is expected to be arraigned Thursday afternoon.
Trone is considered armed and dangerous, police said, and anyone who sees him should immediately call 911, according to a LAPD news release.
On Tuesday, LAPD arrested a 32-year-old woman and young man under 18 years old who police “believed to be involved” in the rapper’s death, according to the release.
LAPD did not have information on the young man or woman’s relationship to Trone.
The fatal shooting of PnB Rock took place September 12 while the rapper and his girlfriend were eating at Roscoe’s House of Chicken ‘N Waffles on West Manchester Avenue, according to LAPD Chief Michel Moore. The chief identified the rapper by his real name, Rakim Allen.
“[Allen] was brutally attacked by an individual who, apparently, we believe… came to the location after a social media posting of the artist and the woman accompanying him,” Moore said.
Moore said a picture of the pair’s meal had been posted on Instagram, with the location tagged. He said a Black man attacked the rapper at the restaurant, demanding his property. PnB Rock “had an extensive amount of jewelry and other valuables,” Moore said.
Between 2016 and 2019, PnB Rock had eight songs on the Billboard Hot 100, four of which were in 2019.
The rapper’s latest song, “Luv Me Again,” was released on September 2.
LOS ANGELES — Coolio, the rapper who was among hip-hop’s biggest names of the 1990s with hits including “Gangsta’s Paradise” and “Fantastic Voyage,” died Wednesday at age 59, his manager said.
Coolio died at the Los Angeles home of a friend, longtime manager Jarez Posey told The Associated Press. The cause was not immediately clear.
Coolio won a Grammy for best solo rap performance for “Gangsta’s Paradise,” the 1995 hit from the soundtrack of the Michelle Pfeiffer film “Dangerous Minds” that sampled Stevie Wonder’s 1976 song “Pastime Paradise” and was played constantly on MTV.
The Grammy, and the height of his popularity, came in 1996, amid a fierce feud between the hip-hop communities of the two coasts, which would take the lives of Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. soon after.
Coolio managed to stay mostly above the conflict.
“I’d like to claim this Grammy on behalf of the whole hip-hop nation, West Coast, East Coast, and worldwide, united we stand, divided we fall,” he said from the stage as he accepted the award.
Born Artis Leon Ivey Jr., in Monessen, Pennsylvania south of Pittsburgh, Coolio moved to Compton, California. He spent some time as a teen in Northern California, where his mother sent him because she felt the city was too dangerous.
He said in interviews that he started rapping at 15 and knew by 18 it was what he wanted to do with his life, but would go to community college and work as a volunteer firefighter and in airport security before devoting himself full-time to the hip-hop scene.
His career took off with the 1994 release of his debut album on Tommy Boy Records, “It Takes a Thief.” It’s opening track, “Fantastic Voyage,” would reach No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100.
A year later, “Gangsta’s Paradise” would become a No. 1 single, with its dark opening lyrics:
“As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I take a look at my life and realize there’s not much left, ‘cause I’ve been blastin’ and laughin’ so long, that even my mama thinks that my mind is gone.”
Social media lit up with reactions to the unexpected death.
“This is sad news,” Ice Cube said on Twitter. “I witness first hand this man’s grind to the top of the industry. Rest In Peace, @Coolio.”
“Weird Al” Yankovic tweeted “RIP Coolio” along with a picture of the two men hugging.
Coolio had said in an interview at the time it was released that he wasn’t cool with Yankovic’s 1996 “Gangsta’s Paradise” parody, “Amish Paradise.” But the two later made peace.
The rapper would never again have a song nearly as big as “Gangsta’s Paradise,” but had subsequent hits with 1996’s “1, 2, 3, 4 (Sumpin’ New)” (1996), and 1997’s “C U When U Get There.”
His career album sales totaled 4.8 million, with 978 million on-demand streams of his songs, according to Luminate. He would be nominated for six Grammys overall.
And with his distinctive persona he would become a cultural staple, acting occasionally, starring in a reality show about parenting called “Coolio’s Rules,” providing a voice for an episode of the animated show “Gravity Falls” and providing the theme music for the Nickelodeon sitcom “Kenan & Kel.”
He had occasional legal troubles, including a 1998 conviction in Stuttgart, Germany, where an boutique shop owner said he punched her when she tried to stop him from taking merchandise without paying. He was sentenced to six months probation and fined $30,000.
He was married to Josefa Salinas from 1996 to 2000. They had four children together.
OAKLAND, Calif. — At least six adults were wounded in a shooting at a school campus in Oakland on Wednesday, with at least some of the victims found inside the school, authorities said.
The shooting took place around 12:45 p.m. at Rudsdale Newcomer High School, authorities said. The school serves recent immigrants ages 16-21 who have fled violence and instability in their home countries, according to the school’s website. It is one of four adjacent schools located on a block in east Oakland.
Officials have not said whether any of the victims might be students age 18 or older.
“The victims were affiliated with the school, and we are determining the affiliation at this time,” Oakland Assistant Police Chief Darren Allison said, although he declined to say whether any students or teachers were involved.
Allison said police were seeking at least one suspect but did not have anyone in custody.
Three of the wounded were taken to Highland Hospital in Oakland, while the other three were taken to Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley. Allison said three people remained hospitalized Wednesday evening, two of them with life-threatening injuries, while one person had been released and two others were expected to be released soon.
John Sasaki, a spokesperson for Oakland Unified School District, said in a statement that district officials “do not have any information beyond what Oakland Police are reporting.” He said counselors were being made available for students and he could not say whether the schools at the site would be open Thursday.
Television footage showed dozens of police cars and yellow tape on the street outside the school and students leaving nearby campuses.
City Council Member Treva Reid said investigators told her the shooting may be tied to rising “group and gang violence.”
James Jackson, chief executive of Alameda Health System, also noted an increase in violence.
“We’ve seen almost a doubling of the violent crimes victims that we’re seeing here at our facility (Highland Hospital). So something has changed,” Jackson said.
City Council Member Loren Taylor, who was outside the school, declined to confirm any details about the incident, telling KTVU-TV, “Guns were on our school campuses where our babies were supposed to be protected.”
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This story has been corrected to show that The Associated Press, quoting Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, erroneously identified the location of the shooting. It was at Rudsdale Newcomer High School, not Sojourner Truth Independent Study school.
Six people were injured in a Wednesday shooting at an East Oakland, California, school campus, authorities told CNN.
All six victims had apparent gunshot wounds, Oakland Police Lt. Casey Johnson told reporters at the scene. Three of the victims were transported to Highland Hospital and were in critical condition, Chief Administrative Officer Mark Brown told CNN affiliate KGO. Hospital spokesperson Eleanor Ajala could not provide any details on those victims’ ages or injuries.
The other three victims were taken to Eden Medical Center, said a hospital spokesperson who also could not share the victims’ ages or conditions.
No suspect was in custody Wednesday afternoon, police spokesperson Paul Chambers told CNN. Officers were preparing to conduct a “methodical” search of the school looking for additional evidence, Chambers said. Authorities do not yet know if the shooting was a random incident or targeted among people who knew each other, Chambers said.
The Oakland Unified School District said in a Wednesday statement there was an incident at “the King Estate campus on Fontaine Street, which houses the co-located Rudsdale Continuation and Newcomer high schools, BayTech Charter School, and the headquarters of Sojourner Truth Independent Study.”
“The campus is near Oakland Academy of Knowledge (OAK), but it is important to note the incident was NOT at OAK, nor did it have anything to do with that elementary school,” the statement said.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) was also responding to the scene, the agency said Wednesday afternoon.
LOS ANGELES — A Southern California man who was accused of killing his estranged wife and abducting their 15-year-old daughter had been living with the teenager out of his pickup truck and hotels for weeks before the violence, authorities said Wednesday.
Anthony John Graziano and his daughter, Savannah Graziano, were killed Tuesday in a shootout with law enforcement on a highway in the high desert after a 45-mile (72-kilometer) chase. The girl, wearing a tactical helmet and vest, ran toward deputies amid a hail of gunfire. Authorities are investigating whether she was shot by deputies or her father, or both.
While many questions remain regarding Tuesday’s gunbattle, police in Fontana — where Graziano’s wife, 45-year-old Tracy Martinez, was killed Monday — offered some details about the family’s life before the bloodshed erupted this week.
Graziano, 45, had moved out of the family’s home a month or two before the mother’s killing, as the couple went through a divorce, Fontana Sgt. Christian Surgent told The Associated Press. Savannah Graziano left with her father, while her younger brother stayed with their mother.
Police issued an Amber Alert after Martinez’s killing, saying Savannah Graziano had been abducted by her father. Now, detectives are trying to determine whether or not she was coerced into leaving Fontana.
“Did she go willingly?” Surgent said. “Or was she actually abducted? We haven’t been able to prove that just yet.”
Fontana police had not received any reports of domestic violence at the home before the slaying, Surgent said, and child services had not been involved with the family. Neither parent was on probation or parole at the time and investigators believe Savannah was being home-schooled while she lived with her father, whom police said liked to camp out in the desert and mountains in his pickup truck.
On Monday, witnesses saw Martinez walking in Fontana when Graziano picked her up in his truck. Surgent said it was not clear whether she was forced into the vehicle or got in on her own.
“And immediately that’s when they started arguing and yelling and domestic violence was occurring,” he said.
Martinez got out of the truck — potentially to escape — and Graziano opened fire on her with a handgun, striking her multiple times, Surgent said. The shooting on the street near an elementary school during morning drop-off forced students and parents to duck for cover.
Graziano fled the scene and drove to get Savannah, who had been somewhere else at the time — likely wherever they had been staying that day, Surgent said. The son was at the family’s home at the time and was not involved.
The next day, a 911 caller reported seeing the suspect’s Nissan Frontier around Barstow, nearly 70 miles (112 kilometers) north of Fontana.
San Bernardino County sheriff’s deputies located the pickup truck and chased it on the highway for around 45 miles (70 kilometers) to Hesperia. Throughout the pursuit, Graziano — and possibly his daughter as well — was “constantly shooting back at the deputies” with a rifle through the truck’s rear window, San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus said Tuesday during a news conference.
A firefight in Hesperia ensued, with dozens of bullets flying. Savannah ran toward deputies — who did not realize it was her — in the chaos and went down amid the gunfire. She was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead shortly before noon.
Her father was found in the driver’s seat and pronounced dead at the scene.
The Sheriff’s Department declined to release any additional information Wednesday.
In Fontana, mourners contributed flowers, balloons and candles to a small memorial.
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Associated Press News Researcher Jennifer Farrar in New York contributed.
