Christopher Dorner supporters organize on Facebook

Several days after Christopher Dorner's death ended his standoff with authorities, some sympathizers have been expressing support for him online and on the street.

Dorner -- accused of the slayings of four people -- has gained some
supporters on the Web who have read his alleged manifesto and believe
its claims that he was unfairly fired by the Los Angeles Police
Department and was a victim of
racism.

Dozens of protesters gathered outside LAPD headquarters in downtown L.A. on Saturday afternoon in an event they said was organized through a
Facebook page called “I support Christopher Jordan Dorner.” The post announcing the protest advised attendees to “keep it PEACEFUL” and
to bring recording equipment.

PHOTOS: Manhunt for ex-LAPD officer

The Facebook page states: “This is not a page about supporting the
killing of innocent people. It’s supporting fighting back against
corrupt cops and bringing to light what they do.”

Those gathered Saturday said they were protesting police corruption and the
way the massive manhunt for Dorner was conducted. Authorities said
Dorner appears to have died from a self-inflected gunshot wound after a
shootout with police in Big Bear on Tuesday, ending a deadly rampage
that stretched across Southern California.

Protesters also said they were appalled by police officers' mistakenly shooting
at passengers in two separate trucks in Torrance, wrongly believing
Dorner might be in the vehicles. One woman was shot in the back and is
still recovering.

FULL COVERAGE: Sweeping manhunt for ex-cop

The protesters emphasized that they did not condone the killings of which Dorner is accused.

Michael Nam, 30, stood at the corner of 1st and Main Streets with a
sign, painted by his girlfriend, showing a tombstone and the words “RIP
Habeas Corpus.” The tombstone was engulfed in flames.

Nam, of Lomita, said he was disturbed by the burning of a mountain
cabin near Big Bear where Dorner barricaded himself with a high-powered
sniper rifle, smoke bombs and a cache of ammo. The blaze started shortly
after police fired "pyrotechnic" tear gas into the cabin; the canisters
are known as "burners" because the intense heat they emit often causes a
fire.

WHO THEY WERE: Victims in the Dorner case

But authorities have maintained that the fire was not intentionally set. 

Dorner, whose charred body was found in the cabin, appears to have died of a single gunshot wound to the head, authorities said.

“How the police handled this -– they were the judge, the jury and the
executioner,” Nam said. “As an American citizen, you have the right to a
trial and due process by law.”

TIMELINE: Manhunt for ex-LAPD officer

Nam, a former Marine and a current member of the Army National Guard,
said he has combat experience from deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan.

He said he has been in situations in which a combatant has been
barricaded and successfully waited until the person surrendered,
eventually getting “tired and coming out on their own.”

Nam said it was “pretty obvious” police wanted Dorner dead. “What I
saw was a complete disregard for the Bill of Rights,” Nam said.

San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon, during a news conference
Friday, defended the tactics used by his agency in the shootout at the
mountain cabin, which left one of his deputies dead and another
seriously wounded.

“The bottom line is the deputy sheriffs of this department, and the
law enforcement officers from the surrounding area, did an outstanding
job,” he said. “They ran into the line of fire.”

As the protesters stood Saturday, drivers passing by honked, waved
and gave thumbs up. A handful of officers watched from police
headquarters across the street.

Nam said he spoke to the officers before the protest began about what
the protesters should do to keep the event peaceful. He said the
officers were respectful.

The protesters marched around the block, circling an intersection
near the department headquarters. They chanted, “LAPD, you are guilty.”

Signs expressed anger at police and support for Dorner.

“If you’re not enraged, you’re not paying attention,” one sign read.

“Why couldn’t we hear his side?”

“Clear his name! Christopher Dorner”

Liliana Alaniz, 40, came with her family -– her mother, sister,
nieces and daughters -– from Long Beach to join the protest, which she
said was her first.

“I really, really believe he was innocent in the firing case,” Alaniz said of Dorner.

Alaniz held a sign that read, “Trying to clear your name.”

Her daughter, Andrea Tovar, said Dorner “has his supporters.”

“Murder is never right, but neither is the law when it’s unjust,”
said Tovar, 18. She said police need to know they “can’t get away with
everything.”

ALSO:

Ex-mayor who gambled away $1 billion to pay restitution

Riverside officer wounded in Dorner manhunt is identified

Dorner probably died of self-inflicted gunshot, officials say

-- Hailey Branson-Potts

twitter.com/haileybranson

Photo: Protesters outside LAPD headquarters on Saturday. Credit: Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times

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Karzai to Forbid His Forces to Request Foreign Airstrikes

KABUL, Afghanistan — President Hamid Karzai said Saturday that he would issue a decree forbidding his military forces from turning to NATO or American forces to conduct airstrikes, and he condemned the use of torture on detainees by his security forces.

He made his comments in a speech at the Afghan National Military Academy in Kabul. It was the first time he had dwelt at such length and with such passion on human rights.

His proposed ban on Afghan troops from calling in airstrikes came after a joint Afghan-NATO attack last week in Kunar Province, in eastern Afghanistan, that killed four women, one man and five children, all of them civilians, according to local officials.

Mr. Karzai said Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., the commander of the international coalition forces fighting the Taliban and other insurgents in Afghanistan, told him that the airstrike had been requested by the National Directorate of Security, the country’s intelligence service. The attack took place in the Shigal district, an area where two known Taliban commanders were visiting family members, Afghan officials have said.

“Our N.D.S. in their own country calls foreigners to assist them and bombard four or five Al Qaeda or Taliban,” Mr. Karzai said.

“It is very regrettable to hear this,” he added. “You are representing Afghan pride. How do you call for an airstrike from foreigners on your people?”

Civilian casualties in the war on the Taliban has long vexed Mr. Karzai and has been a major point of contention with American and NATO troops. New rules instituted by commanders from the International Security Assistance Force have minimized the loss of life, and the coalition has all but stopped air attacks on populated areas and on homes. The result has been a dramatic drop in civilian casualties caused by foreign forces.

Nevertheless, Afghan troops, who lack their own air support, still turn to foreign forces for help during pitched battles with the Taliban and other insurgents. It was not clear whether there would be exceptions to Mr. Karzai’s decree, but he was clearly dismayed that his own forces would be employing the very techniques he had worked so hard to persuade the West to abandon.

In an unusual move, the Afghan president also publicly acknowledged that torture was a problem in Afghan detention centers and pledged to halt it. In the past, the government has largely deflected charges of torture raised by human rights organizations, contending that any abuse was the work of a few bad actors.

But after a United Nations report released in January detailed abuses or torture at a number of detention sites around the country, Mr. Karzai took a closer and more independent look at the complaints.

He appointed a delegation to investigate the report’s validity, and when the inquiry confirmed many of the allegations, he ordered the security ministries to implement the team’s recommendations. He reiterated that order on Saturday. The recommendations include prosecuting perpetrators of torture, giving detainees access to defense lawyers, providing medical treatment for detainees who are ill or have been beaten, and videotaping all interrogations.

“Not only have foreigners tormented and punished Afghans, but our people have been terrorized and punished by our own sons too,” Mr. Karzai said. “The U.N. report showed that even after 10 years, our people are tortured and mistreated in prisons.”

The United Nations’ human rights office here emphasized the importance of Mr. Karzai’s attention to the issue.

“It is encouraging that the president appears to be personally taking the issue of human rights of all Afghans seriously,” said Georgette Gagnon, the office’s director of human rights. She added that the government should act immediately on the delegation’s recommendations. “We urge them to do so without delay,” she said.

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Oscar Party Idea: Make Sheila G. Main's Truffles

02/16/2013 at 06:30 PM EST

Andrew Purcell; Inset: Courtesy Sheila G. Main

Oscar night is just around the corner so start prepping your viewing party menu now! Take inspiration from any of the films nominated or replicate what Sheila G. Main, the creator of the Original Brownie Brittle snack, will serve at studio head Harvey Weinstein's Oscar party!

Brownie Truffles

Makes 22 to 24 truffles

• 6 oz. semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 2 oz. unsweetened chocolate, chopped
• 8 tbsp. unsalted butter, cut into quarters
• 3 large eggs
• 1 ¼ cups sugar
• 2 tsp. vanilla
• ½ tsp. salt
• 1 cup flour
• 2 tbsp. unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1–2 tbsp. Grand Marnier
• 1 oz. (2 tbsp.) champagne

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Grease an 8x8-in. baking pan. In a bowl, melt chocolates and butter in microwave on high for 2 minutes. Stir until smooth. Let cool.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, sugar, vanilla and salt. Stir in the chocolate mixture. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour and cocoa powder. Stir it into the chocolate mixture. Do not over mix. Pour batter into pre-pared pan. Bake for 25 minutes. (Brownies will be slightly underbaked.) Let cool.

3. Cut brownies into pieces and mix in food processor, along with Grand Marnier and champagne until creamy. Chill for at least 1 hour. Use an ice cream scoop to make truffles. Roll into balls, then roll in sanding sugar or a coating of your choice.

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UN warns risk of hepatitis E in S. Sudan grows

GENEVA (AP) — The United Nations says an outbreak of hepatitis E has killed 111 refugees in camps in South Sudan since July, and has become endemic in the region.

U.N. refugee agency spokesman Adrian Edwards says the influx of people to the camps from neighboring Sudan is believed to be one of the factors in the rapid spread of the contagious, life-threatening inflammatory viral disease of the liver.

Edwards said Friday that the camps have been hit by 6,017 cases of hepatitis E, which is spread through contaminated food and water.

He says the largest number of cases and suspected cases is in the Yusuf Batil camp in Upper Nile state, which houses 37,229 refugees fleeing fighting between rebels and the Sudanese government.

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Soledad re-brands itself as the 'Gateway to the Pinnacles'

SOLEDAD, Calif. — For decades the slogans have sought to entice motorists who pull off Highway 101 in this Salinas Valley farm town — usually for gas or a cup of coffee — to stay and visit a while.

"It's Happening in Soledad," declares a billboard that looms over the asphalt artery.

"Soledad: Feel the Momentum" urge the stone markers planted at the town's highway exits.

Now city officials think they have seized on an idea to provide the economic boost the community desperately needs: "Gateway to the Pinnacles."

"This is our chance," Mayor Fred Ledesma said recently, "and it's never going to pass this way again."

The Pinnacles' volcanic spires and talus caves are located five miles east of here, in the Gabilan Mountains. A release site for endangered California condors and a haven for rock climbers, the landscape also hosts a stunning wildflower season, 400 species of bees and more than a dozen types of bats.

A national monument since 1908, the area last month was elevated to national park status thanks to lobbying by federal, state, county and local officials throughout the region.

The change likely will benefit many communities, because national parks bring tourism. And tourism brings dollars.

Hollister, for example, sits 30 miles north of the park's eastern entrance — and Pinnacle's only campground.

But Soledad, whose only association for many people is the state prison here, perhaps has the most to gain.

At the urging of Ledesma and Adela Gonzalez, Soledad's city manager, the City Council in December hired a San Jose public relations firm to help re-brand the town. They set aside $150,000 for new river rock monuments touting Soledad's gateway status (it sits outside the park's west entrance). And officials snapped up nine Web domain names, among them: gatewaytopinnacles.com, gatewaytopinnaclesnationalpark.com and so on.

"It's been a month since the bill was signed, and we have not stopped jumping up and down," Gonzalez said. "We've been screaming it off the rooftops."

Incorporated in 1921, the town of 17,000 residents (prisoners not included) is named for the 18th century Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad. It served as a backdrop for John Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men." Ledesma readily recites the opening line: "A few miles south of Soledad, the Salinas River drops in close to the hillside bank and runs deep and green."

While life here has been driven largely by agriculture — Ledesma and Gonzalez both are children of farmworkers — the economic boom of the late 1990s took the town by storm. Housing development soared; Soledad got its first and only shopping center. By the mid-2000s, this was among the fastest growing California communities of its size.

Then everything came to a halt. "Clearly we need a more thriving sales tax base," Gonzalez said.

The "gateway" designation may help provide it.

For example, a dozen well-regarded Monterey County wineries happen to sit within five miles of Soledad. Ledesma said that Carmel's mayor recently told him that the town would point tourists Soledad's way for winery tours and park visits.

Still, Gonzalez said, Soledad's success will turn on the foresight of its entrepreneurs — who could seize the chance to rent out bikes or rock climbing gear to park-goers, launch van tours, improve lodging opportunities or expand dining options.

It won't be easy.

Andrea Nield, director of Cal State Monterey Bay's small business development center, said the farming community is "used to things being the way they've been forever." The center still serves businesses there, but its small Soledad office recently was shuttered for lack of walk-ins.

Most retailers near downtown, a stretch of Front Street that parallels the highway, cater to farmworkers and their families: There are bakeries, discount stores and small Mexican restaurants that offer authentic seafood dishes as well as caldo de res and costillas. Sunday and Monday store closures, Gonzalez said, will need to be a thing of the past for tourism to thrive.

Some merchants are enthusiastic about the opportunity.

Sergio Gastelum, 44, opened El Camaron Mexican Grill with his brother seven months ago. The Mazatlan native, who has been in Soledad 14 years, recently leased an adjoining banquet room that would be perfect for tour groups. If the park designation "brings new people, new tourists, new customers to Soledad," said Gastelum, "it will benefit everyone."

At the official unveiling of the national park sign, held Monday on the east side, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar said Pinnacles was now on par with the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone as being among the "iconic places of the United States of America."

"There will be a whole lot more people coming to this area," he told the crowd gathered in winter afternoon light.

Sitting in his office shortly before the event, Ledesma was philosophical, sharing a John F. Kennedy quote he'd come across that morning.

"There are risks and costs to a program of action," he recounted, "but they are far less than the long-range risks and costs of comfortable inaction."

Then he paused. "That's us right now."

lee.romney@latimes.com

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Venezuela Releases First Pictures of Chávez

CARACAS, Venezuela — Amid a heated national debate over the state of the health of President Hugo Chávez, the Venezuelan government on Friday released photographs of him for the first time since his cancer surgery in Cuba more than nine weeks ago.

Officials also provided a rare glimpse into the sequestered world of the convalescing leader, saying he has difficulty breathing and speaking but writes notes to aides while making all government decisions. Sometimes, there is music in his hospital room and it is like a party, one official said.

The four photographs released by the government show Mr. Chávez lying in bed and smiling, with two of his daughters, Rosa Virginia and María Gabriela, on either side.

Jorge Arreaza, the minister of science and technology, who is married to María Gabriela, said the pictures were taken Thursday. In three of the them, Mr. Chávez is holding a copy of what Mr. Arreaza said was Thursday’s edition of the Cuban newspaper Granma.

“There he is with his family, always attentive to the people of Venezuela, always attentive and in charge of his functions, working tirelessly,” Mr. Arreaza said.

The Venezuelan information minister, Ernesto Villegas, said that doctors had controlled a severe lung infection, but added that the president was breathing with a “tracheal tube,” making speech difficult.

In the photographs, Mr. Chávez wore what appeared to be a white and blue jacket, which covered his throat. No tube was visible.

Mr. Chávez, 58, has had four cancer operations in Cuba since June 2011. The latest was on Dec. 11. But in contrast to his previous absences from the country, Mr. Chávez has remained out of sight and has not even telephoned a government television program, which he often did before. That has led to widespread speculation about the severity of his illness, especially after he could not return from Cuba in time to be sworn in for the start of his new term on Jan. 10.

Government officials have repeatedly insisted that Mr. Chávez is continuing to run the government from his hospital bed in Havana, but the political opposition has long challenged that assertion, questioning how he could manage the country but be too sick to communicate with the public directly.

As Mr. Chávez’s absence has dragged on, the opposition has consistently demanded that the government provide proof that he is well enough to lead the nation. Some have even questioned whether he was still alive.

On Friday, an opposition leader, Henrique Capriles, posted on Twitter: “A few days ago, the liars said they talked with the Pdt., now they say he can’t talk! They make fun of their own people.”

Mr. Arreaza said later in a television interview that Mr. Chávez “does not have his characteristic voice” and sometimes writes notes when meeting with aides.

“He has difficulty expressing himself verbally,” Mr. Arreaza said. “Nevertheless, he makes himself understood. We are with him. You have to pay attention, and he perfectly communicates his decisions.”

Mr. Arreaza said in Spanish that Mr. Chávez was undergoing “palliative treatments,” which he described as strong and hard. He did not say what those treatments were but did say that Mr. Chávez had undergone the same treatments previously in the course of his illness. He has had both chemotherapy and radiation since his cancer was diagnosed.

In its Spanish definition, the word “palliative” refers especially to treatments used to relieve pain or slow the progress of an incurable disease. Mr. Villegas, the information minister, described Mr. Chávez on Friday as being in “delicate circumstances.”

Mr. Arreaza said that Mr. Chávez was keeping his spirits up. “There are days in which the commander practically has a party there in his room,” he said, “with his music from his beloved plains and with jokes and laughter.”

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Next-generation PlayStation 4 controller leaks

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Molly Sims: I Nursed a Little Vampire!

Mom & Babies
Celebrity Baby Blog

02/15/2013 at 01:00 PM ET

Following the birth of her baby boy, Molly Sims was ready to sink her teeth into breastfeeding.

The only problem? Her son Brooks Alan had beaten her to it.

“Early on in the hospital, they really want you to breastfeed, so I’m trying everything,” the model mama, 39, shared during a Wednesday appearance on Anderson Live.

“And I’m like, ‘Gosh, this really, really hurts.’ And they’re like, ‘Oh, we know.’”

Determined to find the root of the pain, Sims went searching in her newborn’s mouth — and was shocked at her discovery.

“I’m like, ‘Is there any way a baby could be born with a tooth?’” she recalls. “And they went, ‘Oh sweetie, I know you’re a model, but … babies aren’t born with teeth!’”

She continues: “Come to find out, my baby was born with a tooth!”

Courtesy ANDERSON LIVE

Despite countless attempts to successfully nurse — “I did nipple shields, nipple guards, supplemental nursing system, it was horrible,” the new mom says — Sims eventually decided to call it quits.

“He was literally like a vampire on me for three months — it was unbelievable,” she says with a laugh. “Cut to I’m not breastfeeding and I’m proud of it.”

Now Brooks, 7 months, has moved on to other milestones — including crawling — and is already taking after his dad, Scott Stuber.

“He has the hairline of my husband. It’s like an Eddie Munster kind of hairline. It’s not so attractive, but [he'll] end up growing into it,” Sims says.

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States' choices set up national health experiment

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama's health care overhaul is unfolding as a national experiment with American consumers as the guinea pigs: Who will do a better job getting uninsured people covered, the states or the feds?

The nation is about evenly split between states that decided by Friday's deadline they want a say in running new insurance markets and states that are defaulting to federal control because they don't want to participate in "Obamacare." That choice was left to state governments under the law: Establish the market or Washington will.

With some exceptions, states led by Democrats opted to set up their own markets, called exchanges, and Republican-led states declined.

Only months from the official launch, exchanges are supposed to make the mind-boggling task of buying health insurance more like shopping on Amazon.com or Travelocity. Millions of people who don't have employer coverage will flock to the new markets. Middle-class consumers will be able to buy private insurance, with government help to pay the premiums in most cases. Low-income people will be steered to safety net programs like Medicaid.

"It's an experiment between the feds and the states, and among the states themselves," said Robert Krughoff, president of Consumers' Checkbook, a nonprofit ratings group that has devised an online tool used by many federal workers to pick their health plans. Krughoff is skeptical that either the feds or the states have solved the technological challenge of making the purchase of health insurance as easy as selecting a travel-and-hotel package.

Whether or not the bugs get worked out, consumers will be able to start signing up Oct. 1 for coverage that takes effect Jan. 1. That's also when two other major provisions of the law kick in: the mandate that almost all Americans carry health insurance, and the rule that says insurers can no longer turn away people in poor health.

Barring last-minute switches that may not be revealed until next week, 23 states plus Washington, D.C., have opted to run their own markets or partner with the Obama administration to do so.

Twenty-six states are defaulting to the feds. But in several of those, Republican governors are trying to carve out some kind of role by negotiating with federal Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. Utah's status is unclear. It received initial federal approval to run its own market, but appears to be reconsidering.

"It's healthy for the states to have various choices," said Ben Nelson, CEO of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. "And there's no barrier to taking somebody else's ideas and making them work in your situation." A former U.S. senator from Nebraska, Nelson was one of several conservative Democrats who provided crucial votes to pass the overhaul.

States setting up their own exchanges are already taking different paths. Some will operate their markets much like major employers run their health plans, as "active purchasers" offering a limited choice of insurance carriers to drive better bargains. Others will open their markets to all insurers that meet basic standards, and let consumers decide.

Obama's Affordable Care Act remains politically divisive, but state insurance exchanges enjoy broad public support. Setting up a new market was central to former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's health care overhaul as governor of Massachusetts. There, it's known as the Health Connector.

A recent AP poll found that Americans prefer to have states run the new markets by 63 percent to 32 percent. Among conservatives the margin was nearly 4-1 in favor of state control. But with some exceptions, including Idaho, Nevada and New Mexico, Republican-led states are maintaining a hands-off posture, meaning the federal government will step in.

"There is a sense of irony that it's the more conservative states" yielding to federal control, said Sandy Praeger, the Republican insurance commissioner in Kansas, a state declining to run its own exchange. First, she said, the law's opponents "put their money on the Supreme Court, then on the election. Now that it's a reality, we may see some movement."

They're not budging in Austin. "Texas is not interested in being a subcontractor to Obamacare," said Lucy Nashed, spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Perry, who remains opposed to mandates in the law.

In Kansas, Praeger supported a state-run exchange, but lost the political struggle to Gov. Sam Brownback. She says Kansans will be closely watching what happens in neighboring Colorado, where the state will run the market. She doubts that consumers in her state would relish dealing with a call center on the other side of the country. The federal exchange may have some local window-dressing but it's expected to function as a national program.

Christine Ferguson, director of the Rhode Island Health Benefits Exchange, says she expects to see a big shift to state control in the next few years. "Many of the states have just run out of time for a variety of reasons," said Ferguson. "I'd be surprised if in the longer run every state didn't want to have its own approach."

In some ways, the federal government has a head start on the states. It already operates the Medicare Plan Finder for health insurance and prescription plans that serve seniors, and the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program. Both have many of the features of the new insurance markets.

Administration officials are keeping mum about what the new federal exchange will look like, except that it will open on time and people in all 50 states will have the coverage they're entitled to by law.

Joel Ario, who oversaw planning for the health exchanges in the Obama administration, says "there's a rich dialogue going on" as to what the online shopping experience should look like. "To create a website like Amazon is a very complicated exercise," said Ario, now a consultant with Manatt Health Solutions.

He thinks consumers should be able to get one dollar figure for each plan that totals up all their expected costs for the year, including premiums, deductibles and copayments. Otherwise, scrolling through pages of insurance jargon online will be a sure turn-off.

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Action on L.A.'s parking ticket problem is overdue

Parking tickets are a big deal in Los Angeles. For years, the city has been jacking up fines, which slams many low-income renters and young people who live in tightly packed neighborhoods where they have to fight over street parking.

Most politicians don't want to talk about it because parking fines are a big part of the city's revenue. Those tickets bring in $150 million a year. When the city runs into money problems — as it always does — it's the easiest thing in the world to raise fines instead of running afoul of unions, developers and political donors.

For the sixth time in seven years, the City Council voted last year to jack up parking fines by $5. The latest hike boosted the penalty for a street sweeping citation to $73.

That's a heavy price to pay, and it's $30 more than what violators pay for the same offense in neighboring cities, such as Torrance and El Segundo. In neighborhoods like Koreatown and Pico Union, which were built before garages and carports were needed, there is nowhere to park for blocks and blocks when the yellow dirt-sucking trucks lumber by.

In this campaign season, it seemed important to get mayoral candidates on the record about parking tickets, specifically about one issue that is even more aggravating than getting a ticket: appealing one.

Out there in the city, there are thousands of people for whom appealing a ticket is akin to trying to get out of Siberia.

Lucky for us, this is something the city can actually do something about. The contract is up for the private company, Xerox State and Local Solutions, now running the Parking Violations Bureau. Department of Transportation staff has recommended a five-year extension for Xerox, which had been operating on five-year contract that cost the city $86 million.

When I asked the mayoral candidates at a forum last week about Xerox's work, their responses were somewhat mushy.

City Councilman Eric Garcetti "will review the DOT contract recommendation when it comes to council," a spokesman said in an email. After which, Garcetti will "clearly take a position by voting yes or no."

City Controller Wendy Greuel, City Councilwoman Jan Perry and Emanuel Pleitez, a former tech exec, took similarly strong positions, saying they will closely review the contract when it comes to them.

Only Kevin James, a former prosecutor, promised to oppose the contract extension, saying, "I would vote against it."

Here's the issue with Xerox in a nutshell: Since Xerox took over, a group of people in the city says the company has been trying to keep more parking revenue by stonewalling attempts to fight tickets.

Jeff Galfer, an actor who lives in Atwater Village, filed a class-action lawsuit in January, claiming Xerox doesn't really consider their cases but just sends form letters stating that their appeals have been rejected. Then, when motorists try to appeal to the Department of Transportation, Xerox slaps them with late payment fees and penalties.

Galfer's case started with a $68 parking ticket in 2011. He paid, but he's mad.

The city's data on tickets seem to back up Galfer's claim that Xerox is rejecting too many appeals. Last year, the city dismissed thousands of tickets after Xerox had rejected the drivers' appeal — vindicating the small percentage of intrepid souls who managed to bring their case to City Hall.

City transportation spokesman Jonathan Hui said the dismissals are evidence that the city gives citizens a fair chance to beat their tickets.

Xerox would not comment on the litigation, but spokesman Chris Gilligan said that the company has been "successfully providing parking services to drivers and communities for 30 years, including our work in L.A."

Galfer, who started an online petition with hundreds of signatures against the parking bureau, finds both the city's and Xerox's statements hilarious. "I haven't talked to one person who got out of a ticket, ever," he said.

City staff has backed renewing Xerox's contract, saying in a report that the company provides "excellent services," although it has had "occasional challenges they had to work through."

The report did not specify what "occasional challenges" it was referring to, but perhaps the staff meant that flap concerning the "Gold Card Desk" awhile back. That was the program that let City Hall insiders and their friends get expedited review of their tickets.

James, who shows no campaign contributions from Xerox on the city website, says the gold card matter was reason alone to drop Xerox.

"As far as I'm concerned [their] willingness to let that happen should end their contract," he said.

Greuel has received $4,750 in political donations from Xerox, its employees or its predecessor company since 2002, according to a Times analysis. Perry took in $2,000 since 2003; Garcetti and Pleitez have nothing from Xerox listed on the site.

Greuel said she has been tough on the company. As city controller, she issued three harsh audits that uncovered, among other problems, $440,000 the city paid for processing tickets that were voided. "I was critical" of the company, she said, adding that political contributions don't "have an influence on me."

Her focus was on the company's failure to squeeze money out of scofflaws, not on how hard it is to appeal a ticket.

Later, Greuel called back and said she had directed her staff to start an audit of the bureau's appeal process. Greuel said she was not comfortable going forward with the contract "without looking at all the concerns."

The problems with the process are just part of a bigger picture in which no one in power seems to want to talk about how expensive our tickets have gotten.

Times are tough. But really, enough is enough.

gale.holland@latimes.com

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