PLACERVILLE — Employees at Apple stores must be paid for time they spend waiting for managers or security guards to search their bags to make sure they’re not stealing anything, the California Supreme Court ruled Thursday. What’s more, the justices said their class-action ruling is retroactive, covering all Apple California...
California Man Free After DNA Site Leads to New Arrest in Murder
California authorities used recently developed DNA techniques to free one man and implicate another for only the second time in the United States, officials said Thursday. Ricky Davis, who spent about 15 years in prison after being wrongfully convicted in the slaying of his housemate, was exonerated after authorities used...
Walters: Vocational Ed Makes a Comeback
Somewhere along the way, California’s public schools became enamored with the notion that all students will — or at least should — acquire degrees from four-year colleges. Local school districts often adopted college-prep-for-all policies and in doing so denigrated and often eliminated what was once called vocational education — classes...
NTSB Releases Details in 2 Crashes Involving Tesla Autopilot
SAN FRANCISCO — An Apple engineer who died when his Tesla Model X slammed into a concrete barrier had previously complained about the SUV malfunctioning on that same stretch of Silicon Valley freeway. His complaints were detailed in a trove of documents released Tuesday by federal investigators in two Tesla...
Thousands of Pot Plants Seized in Riverside County Raids
AGUANGA — Riverside County authorities seized thousands of marijuana plants and hundreds of pounds of processed pot this week while serving search warrants at suspected illegal cultivation sites. On Tuesday, deputies and other authorities serving warrants in the Aguanga area eradicated more than 9,900 plants and collected 411 pounds of...
Death Toll in Camp Fire Likely Includes 50 More People
PARADISE — Doctors and other experts say at least 50 more people, many of them elderly or ill, likely died as a result of the 2018 wildfire that devastated the town of Paradise, California, but were not counted in the official death toll, an investigation by the Chico Enterprise-Record found. Authorities have...
Will This Be the Year California Tackles Its Waste Crisis?
Even the special interests that helped kill a California Senate bill aimed at reforming beverage bottle recycling say the state needs to fix its broken system. And one lawmaker who voted no on the bill says he might just introduce his own. Authored by Democratic state Sen. Bob Wieckowski of Fremont, the Beverage...
What Happens If California Takes Over PG&E?
Calling the bankruptcy of California’s largest investor-owned utility a “godsend,” Gov. Gavin Newsom has threatened a public takeover of Pacific Gas & Electric unless it can transform into a provider of affordable, reliable, clean and — above all — safe energy. That means no more ferocious wildfires sparked by PG&E...
Walters: Housing Construction Drops Are Wake-up Call
Gavin Newsom came into the governorship a year ago having made many promises to accomplish great things, or as he put it, “big hairy, audacious goals.” Perhaps the most audacious was to solve California’s ever-growing shortage of housing by building 3.5 million more units by 2025. Specifically, he pledged in...
Nearly 200 Evacuees to Leave Coronavirus Quarantine in US
RIVERSIDE — Nearly 200 evacuees prepared Tuesday to end their two-week quarantine at a Southern California military base where they have been living since flying out of China during a deadly viral outbreak. None of those who flew into March Air Reserve Base have tested positive for the novel coronavirus,...