PHOENIX — An Arizona congressional candidate says she was knocked unconscious and sexually assaulted this summer when repairing campaign signs overnight.
Bernadette Greene-Placentia told investigators that two men raped her, and she kicked her feet up at one point to try to fight back. She said she felt the weight of one of her attackers on her body, and had bruises on her arms from being held down, a bump on her head and other injuries, according to police reports.
“I knew that I had been knocked out,” Greene-Placentia told the Associated Press on Wednesday.
Greene-Placentia, 52, is a Democrat who is challenging incumbent Republican Rep. Abe Hamadeh for the 8th Congressional District seat representing parts of metro Phoenix that are reliably red. She said she told her husband and campaign staff about the mid-August attack in Sun City days after it happened. The Phoenix New Times first reported on it Wednesday.
Greene-Placentia told the AP she was disgusted that two men took control of her body and she had no say in it. She said she decided to speak out publicly when she realized she was telling voters she would advocate for them when she was not advocating for herself.
“My takeaway is that I have a lot more empathy and understanding of why so many women don’t come forward,” she said. “And, and I’m hoping that I can encourage them.”
Greene-Placentia said she couldn’t recall many details of the Aug. 14 assault, including the exact location or a description of the men, though she said one wore black boots and had small feet. She told investigators one of the men used an expletive to describe her, and she believes he referenced her political party.
The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office declined to comment on its investigation of the attack.
Greene-Placentia is a former long-haul trucker and later ran a small transportation company, according to her campaign.
In a social media post supporting Democrat Pete Buttigieg’s 2020 run for the presidency, Greene-Placentia called herself a former Republican and a “never Trumper,” and said she voted Libertarian in 2016. Greene-Placentia later became more engaged in Arizona Democratic politics.
She said she often put up and repaired campaign signs overnight because it was cooler than the blistering summer days and there was less traffic.
Arizona Democratic Party treasurer Greg Freeman said he got a call from Greene-Placentia, a friend who ran his 2024 campaign for a county assessor, the morning of Aug. 17. She told him she had been sexually assaulted by two men, Freeman said, and he could tell she wasn’t ready to go to the police or share it publicly.
“Obviously she was processing it on the phone,” Freeman said. “She was just in shock. She was just horrified by what happened.”
Greene-Placentia said she wishes she had called police immediately and gone to the hospital. After the attack, she took multiple showers and washed the clothes she was wearing, police reports state.
The embarrassment and anger made it hard for her to come forward, she said. She reported the attack to police in late August.
At the opening of “The Buddhist Bug” at the Vincent Price Art Museum on Saturday, guests will see a 328-foot-long orange insect. Its body will coil around the museum’s gallery, lobby and atrium, and poke through the walls. The bug’s head, covered in a hijab, will be in one room, and its feet, which some might be tempted to tickle, will be in another.
The creature is occupied and controlled by Anida Yoeu Ali, a Cambodian-born artist who lives in Tacoma, Wash. Ali’s numerous performance-based exhibits explore her Cambodian-American identity and Buddhist and Muslim religions. The bug is her “totally humorous take on hybridity.”
As the bug, Ali doesn’t speak. She mostly stands or kneels and makes facial expressions in reaction to her surroundings and passersby. But she likes to engage with visitors, who can either touch her elaborate garment, talk to her, take pictures of her or simply observe her.
Artist Anida Yoeu Ali’s exhibit, “Anida Yoeu Ali: The Buddhist Bug,” features a 328-foot-long performance installation at the Vincent Price Art Museum in Monterey Park.
(Ariana Drehsler / For The Times)
“I get a lot of people who ask for a photo or they’ll ask for a hug,” says Ali. “There’s so many stories that get whispered into my ear. A lot happens when you can hold someone’s attention with just your eyes. There’s a vulnerability that happens when you make eye-to-eye contact without any words involved.”
Ali likes to use expansive spaces and incorporate fabrics and textiles, whether it’s a red, sequin-covered chador or a tubular-looking worm made out of polyester, Lycra and spandex. Such things make the petite artist feel “taller and larger than life.”
Ali will appear in the suit for only two hours during the show’s first and last days. But for the rest of the exhibit’s run, the museum will display the bug in its entirety, in addition to sculpture, photographs and video that document how Ali has spent the last 15 years becoming her creature alter ego.
Born in Battambang, Ali, 52, is of mixed Malay, Khmer, Thai and Cham ethnicity, and was raised Muslim in a country that’s 96% Buddhist. She and her family left Cambodia in 1979 to escape the genocide committed by the brutal Khmer Rouge regime and settled in Chicago. Ali studied at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the Art Institute of Chicago. She’s currently a senior artist-in-residence at the University of Washington Bothell.
Director of the Vincent Price Art Museum Steven Wong and Executive Director Sonia Mak of Asian Arts Initiative.
(Ariana Drehsler / For The Times)
Ali conceived one of her best-known performance-based works, “The Red Chador,” in 2014 after relocating to Cambodia for a few years. She wanted to address the rise of Islamophobia in the wake of major events happening at the time, including France’s ban on facial coverings (the country had already banned the hijab years prior) and the terrorist attacks on the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. Ali also wanted to confront the politicization of Muslim women’s dress and contradict the “imagery of Muslim women as joyless and depressed.”
“It was an opportunity to put on a chador, but one of my choosing and one of my designs,” Ali says. “It was to also honor the Muslim women in my background. My mother, grandmother, aunties and cousins all covered and did so joyfully. That was never an issue for them.”
Ali wore the red sequin chador in 15 cities, including at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris in 2015, where, during a 12-hour performance, she threatened to chop off 99 baguettes. The installation was meant to challenge Muslim stereotypes while making a subversive nod to the bread as a famous French symbol. “The Red Chador” also made a stop earlier this year at the W. Keith and Janet Kellogg University Art Gallery at Cal Poly Pomona.
“The Buddhist Bug” was created in 2011, a few years before “The Red Chador,” and inspired by the pervasiveness of the saffron-colored robes worn by monks in Cambodia. The piece not only drew on the color orange but was also influenced by a collapsible play tunnel she received as a gift after giving birth to her first child.
A photo titled “Into Dreamland, The Buddhist Bug, 2015,” (photographed by Masahiro Sugano), and featured at the Vincent Price Art Museum as part of the exhibit, “Anida Yoeu Ali: The Buddhist Bug.”
(Ariana Drehsler / For The Times)
Ali wears a hijab while in the suit and uses a second person, usually a model or intern, to provide the bug’s feet — though she insists that those are the “bug’s feet.” It’s a fun, childlike interpretation of the complexities of coming from two cultures and religions.
“I wanted to do something that was tapping into my diasporic identity or what I call the ‘diasporic dilemma,’” says Ali. “This notion of going back and forth and constantly feeling like you’re not enough in one country or one culture. The bug is the result of that. You look at it and it’s a big orange creature. But for me it’s more of a tunnel structure that can double as a bridge, an entity that can connect two points or two locations. That’s the poetic part of the project.”
Sonia Mak, who co-curated the exhibit at VPAM with museum director Steve Wong, invited Ali to show in L.A. after catching one of her performances at the Seattle Asian Art Museum in 2024.
Photographs in the installation — some taken by Ali’s husband, Masahiro Sugano — capture Ali dressed as the bug in cities all over the world. Some are placed on a sculpture resembling the Rub el Hizb, an Islamic star shaped like an octagram. The rest are mounted on the walls and show the bug in places like Battambang and the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, at a restaurant, in a classroom, on a boat and a bridge.
In one image, Ali rides in a bicycle carriage. In others she stands outside a mosque while kids play with the bug’s feet and sits in an abandoned movie theater, her tail wrapped around the seats. (Angelina Jolie, whose adopted son Maddox is from Cambodia, was recently photographed visiting these cinemas and is reportedly renovating the theaters.)
Ali envisions someday performing as the bug in the desert in the Middle East and maybe building a children’s public playground as a “fun manifestation” of the project.
“I come from a country with an awful, violent history,” she says. “I have a unique set of identities and perspectives that aren’t easily explainable, which is why I make art. I want people to think about how weird and strange the bug looks, but I want them to feel happy looking at the orange. I love it when the grotesque and the beautiful sit side by side. It makes for some magical artistic moments.”
‘Anida Yoeu Ali: The Buddhist Bug’
Where: Vincent Price Art Museum, East Los Angeles College, 1301 Avenida Cesar Chavez, Monterey Park When: Sept. 26 to May 22, see website for times Cost: free Info:vpam.org.
While Maryland has not compiled a winning conference record since 2010, UCLA will face one of the most refined pure passers in the Big Ten when the Bruins and Terrapins face off Saturday at SECU Stadium in College Park, Md. If the Bruins prevail, Bob Chesney will be the first UCLA head coach to start his tenure 4-0 since Henry Russell “Red” Sanders in 1949.
Maryland signal-caller Malik Washington is the fourth consecutive returning starting quarterback the Bruins have faced, with five left on the schedule, and his play could pose problems for the UCLA defense.
“You can’t leave any stones unturned because he can make all the throws, and he’s got the ability to extend plays with his feet or make plays with his feet,” Hitschler said.
While Washington tied for third in the conference last season in interceptions with nine, the signal-caller set school records for freshman completions and passing yards, throwing for 2,963 yards and 17 touchdowns.
With new Maryland offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Clint Trickett at the helm, the Terrapins’ quarterback has taken a leap in Year 2 running the offense.
Through three games, Washington has thrown for 892 yards and six touchdowns with no turnovers.
UCLA defenders bring down San Diego State running back Lucky Sutton at Rose Bowl on Sept. 12.
(Ronaldo Bolanos/Los Angeles Times)
“He’s an entirely different quarterback right now,” Chesney said. “He’s an exciting-to-watch player, and he’s got some legit dudes out at receiver right now that are phenomenal. The offensive line is stout. They’ve been playing together for a little while. There’s a lot of things that they do to protect him, and he has a chance to deliver footballs. He’s getting hit sometimes, and just flicking this ball out there. He has a giant arm, and he’s as accurate as can be.”
Washington has benefited from a revamped receiver group after Maryland ranked among the national leaders in drops last season. Maryland coach Mike Locksley added Chris Durr Jr. and Na’eem Abdul-Rahim Gladding, who have become Washington’s top targets.
“Na’eem can play inside, he can play outside. He’s got the ability to separate,” said Hitschler, who faced Gladding when he played for Old Dominion last season against James Madison. “He’s got the ability to run, great routes, get in and out of breaks, and he’s got great hands. And now he’s making plays in the return game too.”
Hitschler’s secondary will be challenged by Washington, who led the conference in pass attempts last season with 473 and leads the Big Ten thus far with 116.
Maryland’s reliance on the passing game could pose problems for a secondary that was picked apart by Purdue quarterback Ryan Browne last week and is still without free safety Tao Johnson.
“There’s obviously plays you would love to have back, obstacles that you overcame and throughout the game they improved and started to figure it out,” Hitschler said of the UCLA defense. “But at the same time, we can’t put ourselves behind the eight ball in moments and we have to execute at a higher level. This game’s fun because you have the opportunity to lose every week. If it was easy, it wouldn’t be fun.”
Offensively, the Bruins have the chance to build off their most productive game yet, scoring 52 points and accumulating 645 yards against the Boilermakers. But, UCLA will have to work to protect senior quarterback Nico Iamaleava, who was hit often and battled multiple injuries against Purdue.
Maryland edge rushers Zahir Mathis and Sidney Stewart combined for 13 sacks last season. And though Mathis was ruled because of an injury, the Terrapins can turn to five-star edge Zion Elee, the highest ranked recruiting prospect in program history.
Given Iamaleava’s fearlessness with his legs and the Terrapins’ effective pass rush, it may be difficult to keep the signal-caller on his feet.
It’s an exciting time for Southern California coaster fans. Universal Studios Hollywood is on the verge of officially openingFast & Furious: Hollywood Drift, and Knott’s Berry Farm this summer unveiled the refurbished Montezooma: The Forbidden Fortress. Now Six Flags’ Magic Mountain is getting in on the coaster action.
Coming in 2027 to the Valencia park will be Thrill Glider, a first of its kind thrill ride designed by coaster manufacturer Vekoma exclusively for Magic Mountain.
Magic Mountain in a release describes Thrill Glider as introducing a new coaster category, one that combines a motorbike-like seating arrangement with suspended coaster technologies. Riders will board what the park is referring to “hoverbikes,” essentially bike vehicles designed to simulate a flying sensation by being suspended from the track. Riders will be seated in a prone, face-forward position that will hang from the track above.
Concept art for Thrill Glider, which will boast bike-like vehicles and a sci-fi backstory.
(Six Flags Magic Mountain)
The ride will feature 20 different coaster elements and is slated to last 80 seconds. Speeds will reach 50 mph, and the coaster will boast five inversions that will take guests upside down. The various inversions will include a barrel roll, a zero-g roll and an overbanked stall turn, hinting at a heavily twisted track that will create drifts and swinging. There will be at least 12 moments, Six Flags promises, in which riders will experience airtime lifts.
“It is the latest milestone in Six Flags Magic Mountain’s renaissance and a reflection of the park’s enduring role as an industry innovator,” said Brian Oerding, park president of Six Flags Magic Mountain in a release.
The ride will come with a heavy sci-fi-inspired narrative. The story: The ride is a new technology from a fictional inventor, Rebecca Silva, who will introduce guests in the waiting area to what is described as a “Futurist Pavilion.” Throughout the queue, riders will encounter “holographic presentations and scientific exhibits,” culminating in the discovery of a new energy source, detailed by illuminated blue energy lines, that will power the ride.
The goal, says Six Flags, is to provide an optimistic view of the future, albeit with many sudden dives and weightless moments. The ride will feature multiple launches, reach a height of 107 feet and traverse 3,380 feet of track, which is more than a half mile.
Concept art of Magic Mountain’s new Thrill Glider, which will reach a top height of 104 feet.
(Six Flags Magic Mountain)
A specific opening window has not been detailed, but the ride is currently under construction. It will be located on the former site of the Golden Bear Theatre and will overlook the recently refurbished kiddie area, Looney Tunes Land.
Thrill Glider is arriving at a moment when Six Flags has been garnering national attention. Magic Mountain’s X2 remains shut down while state safety officials continue an investigation involving the attraction.
The ride, first opened in 2002 as X, has been the subject of controversy and at least one high-profile lawsuit stemming from a 22-year-old man’s death. Six Flags bills the ride as “a right of passage for the ultimate daredevil” that goes up to 76 mph. A CNN report recently took a look at other, more recent injuries allegedly stemming from the attraction.
