Free Republic

PORTLAND, Ore.—U.S. Attorney Billy J. Williams announced today that seven people have been arrested and face federal charges for their roles in weekend riots at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland.According to court documents, since May 26, 2020, protests in downtown Portland have regularly been followed by nightly criminal activity including assaults on law enforcement officers, destruction of property, looting, arson, and vandalism.Rowan Olsen, 19, of Portland, is charged with disorderly conduct, creating a hazard on federal property, and failing to obey a lawful order; Shant Singh Ahuja, 28, of Oceanside, California, is charged with destruction of...

   LOS ANGELES – A West Hills man was arrested this morning on federal charges alleging he started a fire that caused substantial damage to the Sake House by Hikari in Santa Monica on May 31.         Micah Tillmon, 19, was arrested without incident this morning by special agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and officers with the Santa Monica Police Department. Tillmon is expected to make his initial court appearance this afternoon in United States District Court in downtown Los Angeles.         Tillmon was arrested pursuant to a criminal complaint filed on June 25 and unsealed after his arrest....

A raging fire tore through the church at Mission San Gabriel Arcángel early Saturday, July 11, destroying almost all of the 215-year-old building that is an icon in the small Los Angeles County town.

A fire broke out at the San Gabriel Mission early Saturday and burned the roof and much of the church’s interior, officials said. Authorities have not determined what caused the blaze at the 249-year-old church on 428 S. Mission Drive. The San Gabriel Fire Department received a call about the fire at around 4:30 a.m. and arrived at the scene to find flames through the roof, Capt. Antonio Negrete told KTLA. The crews called for additional units after about 5 minutes, Negrete said. Some 50 firefighters responded to the location, and they struggled as parts of the roof began to...

A fire broke out at the San Gabriel Mission and completely burned the church’s roof early Saturday, officials said. Authorities have not said what may have caused the blaze at the 249-year-old church on 428 S. Mission Drive. Video recorded before daylight shows dark smoke rising from the flames. Officials did no report any injuries. The church, founded in 1771, was the fourth of 21 missions established by the priest Junipero Serra, according to the Los Angeles Times.

At least 21 people including 17 sailors and four civilians were hospitalized with minor injuries on Sunday following a massive fire and explosion on board a Navy ship at Naval Base San Diego that sent billowing plumes of smoke and ash into the sky. 'Seventeen Sailors and four civilians are being treated for non-life threatening injuries at a local hospital,' the US Navy told CNN in a statement. Fire and rescue crews are on the scene responding to the three-alarm fire on the amphibious assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6) (snip). About 200 sailors and officers were on board...

An explosion erupted as a roaring blaze was reported on a military assault ship at Naval Base San Diego Sunday morning, according to authorities. Plumes of smoke arose from USS Bonhomme Richard as firefighters battled the three-alarm blaze on the 3400 block on Senn St. The vessel is an amphibious assault ship homeported in San Diego, according to Krishna Jackson of Naval Base San Diego. The ship had undergone a regular maintenance cycle before the fire was reported, Jackson said. Crew members typically are aboard the ship on weekends, but there are fewer than on weekdays. Several sailors are being...

California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday ordered a halt to indoor activities at certain businesses statewide as cases of coronavirus surge in the country’s most populous state. Newsom, a Democrat, announced during a press briefing that all bars across the state must close up shop and that restaurants, wineries, tasting rooms, family entertainment centers, zoos, museums and card rooms must suspend indoor activities. The governor also announced that all gyms, places of worship, malls, personal care services, barbershops, salons, and non-critical offices in counties on the state’s “monitoring list” had to shut down under the new order. The order affects...

More than 400 sailors are working to put out the massive fire that continues to rage aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard in San Diego and Navy officials are unclear how long the blaze might continue to burn. The fire has brought down the amphibious assault ship's forward mast and caused other damage to the ship's superstructure that rises above its flight deck. "There is a tremendous amount of heat underneath and that's where it's -- it's flashing up -- also forward, closer to the bow again there's a heat source and we're trying to get to that as well," Rear...

The Los Angeles Teachers Union says its schools can’t open in the fall unless charter schools are closed and the police are defunded.These are the Marxist loons teaching your kids. Oh, and they want more money.83% of teachers voted to not reopen in the fall.But they still expect to get paid.Just the News reported: United Teachers Los Angeles, a 35,000-strong union in the Los Angeles Unified School District, made those demands in a policy paper it released this week. The organization called on local authorities to “keep school campuses closed when the semester begins on Aug. 18.”The union outlined numerous major provisions it says...

The recent surges in U.S. coronavirus cases can be traced to two key factors -- crowds of protesters and proximity to the U.S.-Mexico border, Dr. Scott Atlas, a senior fellow at The Hoover Institution, said Saturday night. Most of the cases in the Southwest -- California, Arizona and Texas -- are occuring in counties closest to the U.S.-Mexico border, Atlas told anchor Jon Scott during an appearance on on "Fox Report Weekend." "When you look in the southern counties of California, Arizona and the bordering counties of Texas -- with the Mexico border -- these are where most of these...

(Search showed nothing) It's fun to be a mob leader until the mob turns on you, as Nancy Pelosi is finding out. A socialist challenger is gunning for her San Francisco district and got #PelosiMustGo to trend on Twitter all day Sunday. Trending on Twitter is a big deal when you're trying to influence the Left's low-information voters. Pelosi's opponent, Shahid Buttar, is a left-wing activist, lawyer, DJ and poet. Among other impressive things, Buttar boasts about his trips to Burning Man, his "socially conscious music" and "outdoor poetry" jams. Buttar finished second in the primary and represents Pelosi's first...

Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered every county in California to close indoor restaurants, movie theaters and wineries Monday as the state combats a surge in coronavirus cases. He also ordered bars to cease all operations, indoor and outdoor, throughout the state. Newsom had previously directed 30 counties on the state’s “watch list” due to surging outbreaks to close business operations in those sectors. But Newsom said the order will now extend to all 58 California counties. Newsom’s statewide closure order applies to a host of other indoor spaces: zoos, museums, cardrooms and family entertainment centers. Those establishments are still allowed to...

Dear San Franciscan, You are invited to join Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi for a telephone town hall for San Franciscans today, Monday, July 13, 2020 at 5:00 p.m. Congresswoman Pelosi will discuss justice in policing, justice in the ongoing response to the Coronavirus pandemic, and environmental justice. To join this town hall, please call in to (833) 261-6164. You are invited to submit questions for Congresswoman Pelosi. We hope to hear from you! Please feel free to forward this information to your family and friends. To learn more about these efforts, express your views, or sign up for email updates, please...

ESPN reporter Adrian Wojnarowski sent an email reading "F—k you" to the office of Senator Josh Hawley (R., Mo.) on Friday in response to the senator's criticism of Chinese influence in the NBA. The note came in response to Hawley's open letter to the National Basketball Association condemning its new policy on players’ jerseys, and Wojnarowski apologized later on Friday after Hawley publicized the email. The new policy allows players to wear messages in response to recent police brutality cases that prompted protests across the nation, but does not allow players to select messages criticizing human rights violations in China....

The first black person to serve as district attorney for Los Angeles has criticized Black Lives Matter activists for showing up at her house in the middle of the night, leading her husband to pull a gun on them. Jackie Lacey, who was elected in December 2012, was asked in an interview on Saturday about the March 2 incident. She was also questioned about moves to defund the police, her record in policing the police, and how it feels to have Black Lives Matter now campaigning to get rid of her in the November election.

If we’re looking for an example of heartlessness from the political class, there are few better examples than California Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez’s Twitter response to moderate-income freelance workers who lost their jobs because of her law restricting companies from using contract labor. Even during the coronavirus stay-at-home orders, where a suspension of the law would help desperate people make ends meet working at home and enable contract drivers to provide much-needed home deliveries, Gonzalez largely doubled down on her support for the law. After Vox Media announced in December its layoff of two hundred mostly California-based writers for its SB...

Two Clovis restaurants were cited recently for allowing customers to eat inside, a violation of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s orders to slow the spread of COVID-19. Fresno County is among the counties affected by the state of California’s crackdown due to the rising numbers of positive cases. House of JuJu and Luna’s Pizzeria & Italian Restaurant each received misdemeanor citations from the California Department of Beverage Control on Friday. The ABC is part of multi-agency strike team the governor assembled to enforce the dining rules.

SACRAMENTO, California — Crossroads Community Church Senior Pastor Jim Clark wants to keep his 1,500 parishioners safe during the coronavirus pandemic but he’s drawing the line at a new California ban on singing or chanting at religious services. “I said enough’s enough,” Clark said. “We will be singing and praising the Lord. … We don’t chant, but if we did chant, we’d be chanting too.” The California ban was one of a number of restrictions on indoor businesses and gatherings put in place last week by Gov. Gavin Newsom amid fast-rising virus cases and hospitalizations. It’s unclear if any similar...

FRESNO, Calif. — U.S. District Judge Dale A. Drozd sentenced a Turlock man today to two years and three months in prison to be followed by three years of supervised release for purposefully striking a Stanislaus County Sheriff’s helicopter with the beam of a powerful laser, U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced.In March 2018, Roger Shane John, 34, pleaded guilty. According to court documents, on the evening of Oct. 22, 2017, John struck a Stanislaus County Sheriff’s helicopter, Air 101, five to six times with a powerful green laser, causing visual interference of both the pilot and tactical flight...