“He raped me, and he choked me. And while he was choking me, I lost consciousness. And I thought I died. I did not consent to any sexual activity,” Lonna Drewes told reporters at a press conference at the office of her lawyers in Beverly Hills.

Drewes said Swalwell, whom she met through mutual friends, “spoke repeatedly about his ability to make connections” to help with her software company. Drewes said she was also considering a run for Beverly Hills City Council at the time. 

In a statement posted online, an attorney for Swalwell said he “categorically and unequivocally denies each and every allegation of sexual misconduct and assault that has been leveled against him.”

“These accusations are false, fabricated and deeply offensive — a calculated and transparent political hit job designed to destroy the reputation of a man who has spent nearly twenty years in public service,” attorney Sara Azari wrote.

Asked if Swalwell thought the women were lying about corroborating evidence such as medical records that they had provided to reporters, Azari wrote, “We haven’t seen documents.”

A week ago, Swalwell was one of three leading Democratic contenders for governor, but his support quickly collapsed soon after the San Francisco Chronicle reported last Friday that an unnamed former staff member said Swalwell solicited oral sex from her while she was working for him and twice sexually assaulted her when she was too drunk to consent. 

CNN later Friday published the same woman’s account, as well as those of three other women, one of whom said he kissed and touched her inappropriately and two of whom alleged he sent unsolicited messages. 

Swalwell suspended his gubernatorial campaign Sunday night and officially resigned from Congress Tuesday. Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday proclaimed a special election to serve the remainder of Swalwell’s term on Aug. 18. That person would serve through December; several candidates are already running in a June 2 primary election to replace him next January.

Drewes said she met Swalwell three times in total in 2018 and did not see him again after the third time, when the alleged assault took place. She provided reporters a photo that her attorneys said showed one of their meetings, during an opening of a Beverly Hills restaurant. The restaurant opened in late April 2018, according to news reports.

One of her attorneys, Lisa Bloom, said she would be filing a complaint with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office later Tuesday, which will include text messages between the two, journal entries in which Drews said she recorded the incident at the time and information about people whom she told about the alleged assault. Drewes also told reporters she sought therapy afterward at a center for assault survivors in Connecticut. 

This has been updated with a statement from Swalwell’s attorney.

The post Woman alleges violent sexual assault by Eric Swalwell: ‘He raped me’ appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Attorney Patrick Kolasinski said federal prosecutors have told him that Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez is not under arrest, raising questions about why he was the target of an enforcement action. No one under that name from El Salvador is in ICE detention, according to the agency’s online detainee locator. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has not responded to inquiries about Kolasinki’s statements.

Tuesday’s encounter was among a string of shootings during the Trump administration’s aggressive push to detain and deport immigrants in the country illegally, about which questions have been raised with federal immigration officials.

DHS has said ICE agents fired defensive shots at Mendoza when he tried to drive into them after he was pulled over on Tuesday. Officials said they were conducting an enforcement stop targeting Mendoza, 36, in Patterson, a city about 75 miles (120 kilometers) southeast of San Francisco. They described him as a suspected gang member wanted in El Salvador for questioning in connection to a murder.

Kolasinski told reporters that Mendoza was having difficulty speaking because he was shot in the jaw, but that he said he was never a member of a gang. Kolasinski said previously that his client has been stopped for minor traffic infractions but has no criminal record in the U.S. and is not the subject of an arrest warrant in El Salvador, where he was acquitted of murder.

Kolasinski said that the FBI was leading the investigation of the shooting and that ICE was not currently involved in Mendoza’s case. The Department of Justice referred inquiries to the FBI, which said it couldn’t comment on an active investigation.

Kolasinski said that agents fired on Mendoza while the car was stopped and he drove away to flee the gunfire. “He fled in a panic because he was being fired on,” Kolasinski said. “He was not trying to hurt anyone … he was just scared he was going to die.”

According to a Oct. 25, 2019 court document from a judge in El Salvador, Mendoza, who was 29 at the time, was acquitted after being accused of murder and ordered immediately released. The document lists 10 others who were convicted of various crimes from aggravated robbery to murder, and mentions at least one of them was a member of the 18th Street Gang. But there is no mention of Mendoza belonging to a gang or being accused of carrying out gang activity in the document.

In the California ICE shooting, dashcam footage obtained by KCRA-TV shows three officers standing around a vehicle stopped on the side of a road. One of the officers appears to be touching the driver-side window when the car begins to back up and turn, hitting a vehicle behind it. At least two of the agents have weapons drawn, pointing at the car. The driver then pulls forward toward where the men are standing and turns sharply, driving over the roadway median.

The video has no sound and it’s unclear when the shots were fired or if words were said.

Mendoza’s fiancée was able to speak with him Wednesday before a surgery and again Thursday morning, Kolasinski said.

Kolasinski said Mendoza, a dual citizen of El Salvador and Mexico, came to the U.S. in 2019 but he said he did not know his legal status nor how he arrived to the country.

The attorney said his client works as a laborer to repair fire damage. He has a 2-year-old daughter and is engaged to a U.S. citizen, he said.

The post An attorney for a man shot by ICE in California says his client denies being a gang member appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

The chase began shortly after 2 p.m. Wednesday at an unspecified location in the Riverside metropolitan area and traversed both the Pomona (60) Freeway and Interstate 15, according to published reports.

the motorist was believed to be armed when sheriff’s deputies tried to stop him

A California Highway Patrol Inland Division spokesperson told City News Service the motorist was believed to be armed when sheriff’s deputies tried to stop him, but no other details were immediately available, including the initial reason for the pursuit.

Over the course of an hour, the suspect attempted to evade patrol deputies, eventually exiting I-15 onto Bellegrave Avenue and heading eastbound. As the vehicle approached Wineville Avenue, a Riverside County Sheriff’s Department SUV deployed a “grappler bumper” device, composed of nylon and other materials, pushing the unit under the white four-door sedan and causing the driver to lose control.

Images captured by ABC7 indicated the car plowed through a retaining wall protecting the side of a single-story house, causing major damage to the vehicle and ending the chase.

No one in the house was hurt.

CHP officers were initially requested to assist with K-9 units, but they were later canceled, according to the agency.

Deputies deployed around the vehicle, establishing a close perimeter, relying on an armored vehicle for protection in the ensuing standoff.

As of 4 p.m., there was no word on the condition of the suspect.

No deputies were injured.

The post RivCo Sheriff’s Chase Ends In Crash, Standoff With Suspect appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Deputies responded to the 45000 block of Castile Canyon Road around 11:40 p.m. Saturday to a report of a person who had been shot, according to the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.

Responding deputies found Frankie Ortega of San Jacinto suffering from apparent gunshot wounds and he was pronounced dead at the scene. The sheriff’s Central Homicide Unit assumed the investigation.

As of Sunday afternoon no arrests had been made, as investigators were still working to identify the suspect or suspects involved. Anyone with additional information about the case was encouraged to contact Investigator Gonzales at 951-955-2777 or Investigator Siaw at 951-791-3400.

The post Man Killed In San Jacinto Shooting, Suspect At Large appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Audrey Carroll, 30, and Zachary Page, 32, entered their pleas in federal court Monday. Tina Lai, 41, entered her plea in court a few days earlier. Their attorneys did not immediately respond to emailed requests for comment.

The fourth person, Dante Anthony-Gaffield, 24, will enter his plea Jan. 20.

The suspects, all from the Los Angeles area, were arrested Dec. 12 in the Mojave Desert east of Los Angeles as they were rehearsing their plot, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said last month. Officials said they made the arrests before the suspects assembled a functional explosive device.

Essayli said Carroll created a detailed plan to bomb five or more business locations owned by two companies across Southern California on New Year’s Eve described as “Amazon-type” logistical centers. He did not identify the alleged targets.

A grand jury indicted the four on multiple counts of providing and attempting to provide material support to terrorists and possession of unregistered firearms. Carroll and Page were also indicted on one count of conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction.

Officials said they are members of an offshoot of an anti-capitalist and anti-government group dubbed the Turtle Island Liberation Front. The group calls for decolonization, tribal sovereignty and “the working class to rise up and fight back against capitalism,” according to the criminal complaint.

They also are members of what one of the defendants characterized as a “radical” faction of the group that communicated using a chat called “Order of the Black Lotus,” according to the indictment.

The term “Turtle Island” is used by some Indigenous peoples to describe North America in a way that reflects its existence outside of the colonial boundaries put in place by the U.S. and Canada. It comes from Indigenous creation stories where the continent was formed on the back of a giant turtle.

Two of the group’s members also had discussed plans for future attacks targeting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and vehicles with pipe bombs, according to the criminal complaint.

Photos included in the court documents show the desert campsite where they were arrested with what investigators said were bomb-making materials strewn across plastic folding tables.

Trial for Carroll, Page, and Lai is scheduled to begin Feb. 17. Anthony-Gaffield’s trial will be scheduled once he enters his plea.

If convicted, Carroll and Page could face a maximum sentence of life in federal prison, and Anthony-Gaffield and Lai could face a maximum sentence of 25 years in federal prison.

The post Suspects plead not guilty in Southern California bombing plot appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Kenny Shun Yu Wu, 36, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder and special circumstance allegations of lying in wait and taking multiple lives in the same crime for the 2022 deaths of 31-year-old Yaying “YaYa” Wu of Palm Desert and 30-year-old Jesus Sanchez of Cathedral City.

“This case is about Kenny’s state of mind,” defense attorney John Dolan told jurors in his opening statement Monday at the Larson Justice Center in Indio. “It’s an awful and ugly situation.”

Dolan recounted how his client had been distressed to the point of a psychological collapse over YaYa’s ongoing relationship with Sanchez in 2022.

The extramarital affair was uncovered in the winter of that year, and Wu initially tried to forgive his spouse’s behavior, but it left him scarred and emotionally damaged, in need of professional help, Dolan said.

The affair did not stop, leading to a rift that Wu attempted to heal, continually hoping that his wife would abandon her connection to Sanchez and remain in the defendant’s life, according to the defense.

Wu had long conversations with relatives, seeking to resolve the conflict. Dolan said YaYa’s own father tried to help, speaking with the defendant for more than two hours via telephone, listening to the defendant plead for YaYa’s fidelity.

Testimony from Wu’s preliminary hearing in October 2022 indicated that he had physically assaulted the woman on more than one occasion, stemming from her communications with Sanchez.

YaYa’s mother, Xue Jia, believed her daughter was in danger, having heard Wu express a desire “to kill them,” a sheriff’s deputy testified during the hearing.

When Wu discovered that YaYa intended to meet Sanchez at the Spring Hill Suites on Highway 111 in Palm Desert on the morning of July 15, 2022, he went there, waiting for the victims and then confronting them in the parking lot, according to investigators.

“The rage just exploded,” Dolan said.

Prosecutors allege Wu pulled a knife and stabbed YaYa and Sanchez multiple times, killing them. The defendant did not attempt to flee afterward and was arrested at the scene without incident.

Deputy District Attorney Samantha Paixao gave a brief opening statement, telling jurors that the case is not complicated.

“We are here for his choices, his decisions,” she said.

Testimony is expected to last several weeks.

Wu, who is being held without bail at the Benoit Detention Center, has no documented prior felony convictions in Riverside County.

The post Despair Over Wife’s Extramarital Affair Led To Palm Desert Killings: Defense Attorney appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

With a wind speed of up to 80 mph, the brief tornado traveled for about one-third of a mile in Boyle Heights, a neighborhood on L.A.’s Eastside, just after 10 a.m. Thursday. It was classified as an EF-0 on the Enhanced Fujita scale, the weakest kind of tornado, in which three-second gusts can be between 65 mph to 85 mph.

The tornado first damaged a home on Lee Street, damaging the roof and allowing rainwater to leak inside. The tornado then hit a strip mall on the northeast corner of Whittier Boulevard and South Lorena Street, breaking some windows and tree branches, bending a utility pole and destroying several business signs, the weather service said in a statement.

Finally, just north of the shopping plaza off of Lorena Street, damage could be seen on the roofs of some homes and metal chain link fences. Nearby residents described how “the storm roared and the house was shaking” when the twister spun through.

The tornado ended at 10:12 a.m. on Thursday.

The damage report was the latest to illustrate the power of the Christmas Eve-Christmas Day Pineapple Express storm, which brought record amounts of rain to a wide swath of Southern California for the two-day holiday period.

On Friday night, a large boulder fell from a mountainside and rolled onto Highway 18 west of Big Bear Lake; two cars were then involved in a vehicle collision. Five people were reported injured, including two children; all injuries were minor, but four people were sent to a nearby hospital, the San Bernardino County Fire Department said.

At Mammoth Mountain, two ski patrollers suffered significant injuries Friday morning when a slide hit as they performed “avalanche mitigation work.” One patroller sustained serious injuries and was transported out of the area for further care; the second patroller may have suffered broken bones.

Mammoth Mountain was to remain closed on Saturday. On its Facebook page, the ski resort said the closure was “to allow mountain operations and patrol teams time to mitigate storm-related hazards across the entire mountain.”

Authorities reported on Friday reported another possible storm-related death — the fourth reported in California in recent days.

A deceased man was found in a partially submerged vehicle Friday morning in the Lancaster area, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said.

Earlier storm related deaths involved a motorist who drove into floodwaters in Redding; a woman who was knocked off a rock by a large wave at a beach in Mendocino County; and a man struck by a falling tree in San Diego.

Some of the worst damage hit the San Gabriel Mountains, where a debris flow — a fast-moving flow of mud and rocks — rammed into homes and left cars buried in debris in Wrightwood, a town which sits on the border of L.A. and San Bernardino counties. In the mountainous community of Lytle Creek in San Bernardino County, a bridge connecting parts of the town was seen during the storm covered with water and was possibly destroyed.

Gov. Gavin Newsom has declared emergencies in Los Angeles, San Diego, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Shasta counties.

The fact that tornadoes can occur in California may come as a surprise, but they do happen. They’re nowhere near the scale of what can happen in the Midwest — where they can be a mile or two wide and can last for hours — but they’re not unheard of California.

There were at least three tornadoes that occurred in California during the last rainy season. A tornado lasting for about five minutes touched down a year ago in the city of Scotts Valley in Santa Cruz County, injuring three people. With wind speeds that peaked at 90 mph, that tornado overturned vehicles, damaged street signs downed trees and power poles, and stripped trees of branches.

In February, a tornado, with winds of up to 85 mph, tore roofs off mobile homes in Oxnard and ripped power cables to the ground. A tornado in March uprooted trees in Pico Rivera, with wind gusts of up to 85 mph sending some crashing into vehicles and homes.

In 2023, a tornado that hit Montebello was the strongest to hit L.A. County in 40 years, bringing winds of 110 mph. It left 17 buildings damaged and 11 structures red-tagged, and was 50 yards wide. One person was injured. That tornado was classified as an EF-1 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale.

The previous time a tornado with a strength of EF-1 or greater hit L.A. County was back in 1983, when an even-stronger EF-2 tornado tore through a residential area of South Central Los Angeles. That tornado injured 25, mostly from flying glass, and destroyed 37 homes and severely damaged more than 100 others.

The post Yes, that was a tornado in Los Angeles on Christmas appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.