Ramos with Attorney General Jerry Brown

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Posted by Administrator – September 26, 2010 at 10:48 AM

Today’s article by Joe Nelson of the Sun is almost amusing to those of us who have been close to San Bernardino County’s “biggest corruption scandal in the county’s history.” Joe has finally figured out what we have been telling him for a year or so now. Yes, D-Day is nearing and it ain’t gonna be pretty.

The local media has not missed a beat in the years-long corruption scandal. There has been nary a day without a headline or two referencing some aspect of the ongoing investigation, arrests, and prosecution.

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Legal expert: Prosecutors facing tough road ahead
Joe Nelson, Staff Writer
Posted: 09/25/2010 09:18:46 PM PDT

As state and local prosecutors prepare to re-try a Rancho Cucamonga councilman and repair their criminal case against a former assistant assessor in two major corruption cases, a top legal expert sees serious challenges ahead for prosecutors.

Councilman Rex Gutierrez’s first trial ended in a hung jury on June 30, largely because jurors didn’t believe the prosecution’s key witness, a former San Bernardino County Assessor’s Office executive who is cooperating with investigators as part of a plea bargain.

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D.A.’s Office executive accused of taking funds
Mike Cruz, Staff Writer
Posted: 09/25/2010 09:19:47 PM PDT

A supervisor who worked with crime victims’ services in the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office has been charged with seven felony counts related to the misappropriation of $1,100 worth of public funds.

State prosecutors filed the charges against Vickie Marie Wagner, a supervising victim advocate, on Sept. 7 in a criminal complaint in San Bernardino Superior Court, according to court records.

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Adams

12:07 AM PDT on Sunday, September 26, 2010

By ALICIA ROBINSON
The Press-Enterprise

An ethics complaint alleging Riverside Councilman Steve Adams interfered in police promotions was rejected without a hearing because it wasn’t filed within the required time.

Mayor Ron Loveridge and Councilman Andy Melendrez, acting on the advice of City Attorney Greg Priamos, sent a letter last week to the heads of two community groups who filed the complaint to tell them it was untimely.

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11:18 PM PDT on Saturday, September 25, 2010

By JULISSA McKINNON
The Press-Enterprise

PDFs: View travel and expense forms from Menifee’s mayor and council members
Councilman John Denver | Mayor Wallace Edgerton | Councilwoman Darcy Kuenzi | Councilman Scott Mann | Councilman Fred Twyman

Some Menifee City Council members are calling for tighter controls over travel expenses after being publicly criticized for poor record-keeping and high spending on trips.

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James Rufus Koren, Staff Writer
Posted: 09/25/2010 07:00:17 PM PDT

Kamala Harris, the Democratic candidate for state attorney general, touted her experience in linking education and crime prevention during a town hall meeting in San Bernardino on Saturday afternoon.

Harris’ comments and audience questions alike focused mostly on the work she’s done as San Francisco’s district attorney to keep first-time offenders from going back to prison.

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Administrator’s Note: You can always tell which candidate the newspaper favors by the photo expression.

LOS ANGELES TIMES / USC POLL

Boxer leads Fiorina 51%-43% in Senate race, survey finds. Both Republicans are hampered by voters’ negative impressions of them, poll says.

Whitman, Brown, Boxer, Fiorina

Whitman has given a record $119 million to her campaign but is losing popularity. Brown leads among women and Latinos; but younger voters are only narrowly in his corner. Boxer led 44% to 35% when voters were asked who best understood them. Fiorina’s biggest headwind may be her opposition to President Obama. (Lucy Nicholson, Reuters; Robert Gauthier, Los Angeles Times; Justin Sullivan, Getty Images; Justin Sullivan; Pool Photo)

By Cathleen Decker, Los Angeles Times
September 26, 2010|9:43 a.m.

Democrat Jerry Brown has moved into a narrow lead over Republican Meg Whitman in their fractious contest for governor, while his party colleague Barbara Boxer has opened a wider margin over GOP nominee Carly Fiorina in the race for U.S. Senate, a new Los Angeles Times/USC poll has found.

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By Peter Hecht
phecht@sacbee.com
Published: Sunday, Sep. 26, 2010 – 12:00 am | Page 1A
Last Modified: Sunday, Sep. 26, 2010 – 10:52 am

California voters are leaning toward making the Golden State the first state in the nation to legalize marijuana for recreational use.

In a new Field Poll of likely voters for the Nov. 2 election, the Proposition 19 marijuana initiative leads by a 49 percent to 42 percent margin.

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Capitol and California

By Peter Hecht
phecht@sacbee.com
Published: Saturday, Sep. 25, 2010 – 12:00 am | Page 3A

The state Board of Equalization, which last year famously declared that legalizing marijuana could generate $1.4 billion in new tax revenues for California state coffers, has an updated analysis out for Proposition 19, the November ballot measure to legalize marijuana for recreational use.

This time, the BOE says it is clueless on what legal weed can bring in.

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Debra J. Saunders
San Francisco Chronicle
Sunday, September 26, 2010

I don’t understand why San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris wants to be California’s next attorney general. Then again, it’s hard to understand why she even ran for D.A. – other than because she has a yen for elective office.

She hasn’t been an aggressive prosecutor. She hasn’t been a competent administrator. She seems more interested in advancing liberal causes than putting bad guys behind bars.

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By Steven Harmon
Contra Costa Times
Posted: 09/25/2010 10:57:32 PM PDT
Updated: 09/25/2010 10:59:02 PM PDT

SACRAMENTO — For Meg Whitman and Jerry Brown, the upcoming two-week spate of four debates is largely an irritant, an inconvenient departure from the campaign that mostly offers potential for pitfalls and pratfalls.

With both gubernatorial candidates in a flat-footed tie in the polls, their first face-to-face confrontation, Tuesday at UC Davis, could be seen as a chance for one to break away from the other. But it is unlikely, some political analysts say, because neither will want to leave the comfort zone of the message they’ve maintained on the campaign trail thus far.

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Loretta Sanchez told Univision that “the Vietnamese” are trying to steal her seat. | AP Photo Close

By JAMES HOHMANN | 9/25/10 8:58 PM EDT

GARDEN GROVE, Calif.—Rep. Loretta Sanchez wanted to fire up her Latino base when she told Univision, in Spanish, that “the Vietnamese” are trying to steal her seat.

Instead, the vulnerable Democrat created a backlash that could undercut gains she’s made during a 14-year courtship of Little Saigon and gave her Vietnamese opponent, Republican Van Tran, a much-needed opening to galvanize an ethnic base that’s splintered away from his party in recent years.

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Published: Sept. 24, 2010
Updated: Sept. 26, 2010 12:12 a.m.

By TONY SAAVEDRA
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Presidents of the smallest California State University campuses earned as much as $353,000 in 2009, including one whose enrollment is barely larger than an Orange County high school.

An analysis by the Orange County Register of CSU schools with less than 10,000 students showed that when it comes to presidents’ pay in the 23-campus system, size doesn’t matter.

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