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| Suspicious fires ignite major California freeway shut down by arson last year |
| 2024-08-27 |
| [JustTheNews] The Los Angeles Fire Department estimates that 80% of fires downtown and 54% citywide that it responds to are caused by homeless individuals and all riverbed fires (The Center Square) - A series of fires with “potentially suspicious starts” disrupted traffic on a busy California freeway near where an enormous fire shut down that same freeway for days last year. The Los Angeles Fire Department said there were several fires near one small section of the I-10 freeway between the ocean and downtown Los Angeles, and, according to KTLA, called the fires “suspicious” without outright calling them arson. Last year, items stored under the same freeway burned so hot the freeway — which connects Los Angeles’ job centers to its far-flung housing — was shut down for eight days. California Gov. Gavin Newsom blamed arson for that fire and issued a surveillance photograph of a person of interest, but no announcement was ever made on whether or not the culprit was caught or the results of the final investigation. City of Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass’s office did not respond to a request for information on the 2023 case by the time of publication. The Los Angeles Fire Department estimates that 80% of fires downtown and 54% citywide that it responds to are caused by homeless individuals. Beach town police issue ultimatum to homeless people on boardwalk: ‘Might be a catch-22’ [FoxNews] Long Beach, California, makes move after Gov Gavin Newsom told officials to take down encampments. Long Beach, California, will begin fining and potentially arresting homeless people to combat its most "problematic" encampments, city officials said. The decision comes after the Supreme Court ruled, 6-3, that cities can ban people from sleeping and camping in public places and arrest them – even in the absence of public shelters – overturning lower court rulings that deemed the practice cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment if the person had nowhere else to sleep. Following the highest court's June decision, Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a directive ordering state officials to take down homeless encampments. Earlier this month, Newsom took to the streets to clean garbage left by homeless encampments. Now, Long Beach is the latest municipality to announce its intention to follow that order. City officials said they plan to target encampments that pose a public threat or block access to libraries, beaches and parks, according to the memo. It will also identify encampments where people have repeatedly declined to accept offers for shelter. Public works teams for the city have responded to 3,200 encampments in the last year, according to the memo. But city officials did not disclose the cost of citations or the amount of jail time those who ignore citations could face. On Thursday, Los Angeles sanitation workers followed suit at Dockweiler State Beach, according to the California Globe, ignoring County Supervisors' public opposition to the order. California legal experts interviewed by Fox News Digital are hopeful but were unconvinced that the new executive order will make a difference. "The idea [that] they're going to jail people for being homeless is laughable," criminal attorney David Wohl said. "In L.A. county where those jails are located, I've had clients sentenced on felony cases to 120 days in jail, and they are released the next day." "The crowding in L.A. county jails is so increased that no one will be jailed for homelessness," he continued. Moreover, he said, "[W]hen those fines aren't paid, what are you going to do?" Civil rights attorney Leo Terrell questioned Newsom's motive in issuing the executive order. "I’m old enough to remember that Gavin Newsom had a plan to deal with homelessness; that was in 2008," he told Fox News Digital. "Why now? Is it [because it's an] election year?" Terrell also recalled Newsom's invitation to California for the world's homeless population in 2021, when he pledged to house and feed them all, according to the Colorado Springs Gazette. |
| Posted by:Skidmark |