Local News Roundup – Nov. 18, 2008

Here are some of the stories around Southern California we are watching and covering in The Channel 4 Newsroom:

SYLMAR RESIDENTS RETURN TO FACE DEVASTATION

Residents of the Oakridge Mobile Home Park in Sylmar are back in the park today...some to salvage what they can...others to survey the destruction.  Residents whose homes survived were allowed in first...then those whose homes were destroyed.  More than 500 homes were wiped out by the wind-whipped Sayre Fire over the weekend in Sylmar...most of them in the Oakridge Mobile Park.

AUTHORITIES: MONTECITO 'TEA FIRE' STARTED BY ACCIDENT.

Santa Barbara County Sheriff's and Fire Departments announced late this afternoon that the devastating Tea Fire that raged through Montecito and Santa Barbara last week...was started by accident.  The blaze apparently erupted 13 hours after a group of young adults apparently thought they had put out a bonfire in the Tea Garden area of Montecito.  An anonymous tipster led authorities to the discovery.  Two dozen people were injured...including a couple still hospitalized with critical burns they suffered while trying to escape the fire. NBCLosAngeles.com

JURY SELECTION UNDERWAY IN MYSPACE SUICIDE CASE

Jury selection starts in Los Angeles federal court Tuesday morning in the nation's first criminal case of cyber-bullying. The complicated story has all the elements of a TV drama. It started two years ago when Megan Meier, 13, hanged herself at home in Dardenne Prairie Missouri. Investigators learned she had been taunted online by Lori Drew, the 49-year-old mother of a teenage rival. Drew is not charged for Megan's death. Instead, the charges include conspiracy and illegally accessing computers. The charges were filed in Los Angeles because Fox Interactive, which owns MySpace, is based in Beverly Hills. (Examiner.com)

LA CITY COUNCILOR PAYING FOR RAPE KIT PROCESSING

The Los Angeles Police Department will receive $250,000 from the office of City Councilman Jack Weiss to pay for DNA evidence from rape kits to be analyzed by an outside firm. The funds are in addition to the $250,000 approved last month by the Los Angeles City Council to outsource the testing of DNA evidence. The LAPD has a backlog of 6,862 rape kits. Another 176 unanalyzed kits are part of cases being pursued by detectives. (LAist.com)

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