southern california

Stalwart bookstores Vroman’s in Pasadena and Book Soup in West Hollywood announced new ownership on Thursday, after a two-year search for a buyer.

Longtime owner Joel Sheldon, whose family has helmed Vroman’s for more than a century, announced his retirement in 2024. At the time, Sheldon said he was looking for “someone who shares our core values and who is committed to preserving Vroman’s as a community treasure.”

Sheldon said he found that in the new owner, Robert Hoffman, who has worked on tech regulation and other public policy in Washington, D.C., for several decades, but who grew up in Southern California with his family living in the area for generations.

“After talking with Robert and his family, I knew we had found the right stewards. They understand what makes this store special, and they’re committed to preserving that legacy while moving Vroman’s forward for our customers and the Pasadena community,” Sheldon said in a statement posted Thursday to the bookstore’s website.

Hoffman was born in Pasadena and has been visiting Vroman’s since his mother brought him in when he was 5 years old, according to the Thursday announcement.

His mother, in turn, had been introduced to the store by her grandmother, Georgia Bullock, a decades-long Pasadena resident and the first woman to serve as a municipal and superior court judge in California.

Hoffman was born in Pasadena and attended UCLA. He currently heads government relations and regulatory affairs at semiconductor company Advanced Micro Devices, according to his LinkedIn page.

Book Soup, a Sunset Boulevard landmark, was founded in 1975 by Glenn Goldman, a UCLA graduate student who raised investments with his friends to establish the store. Goldman died in 2009 at age 58, and Sheldon acquired the store from Goldman’s estate that year.

A post to Book Soup’s Instagram page said Hoffman and his family are “genuinely invested in this community.”

“Same shelves, same staff, same WeHo icon. Same gratitude for you,” the bookstore said in the social media post.

Vroman’s was founded in 1894 by Adam Clark Vroman, an ex-railroad worker from Illinois who moved to California hoping the sunny weather would improve his wife’s health. His wife eventually died of tuberculosis, and a brokenhearted Vroman, a bibliophile, sold off a chunk of his vast book collection to collect capital to open the store. The Sheldon family stewarded the store after Vroman’s death in 1916.

Vroman’s catered to various clientele and communities, from traveling dignitaries to academics and leisure readers on vacation. When the federal government incarcerated Japanese Americans from the San Gabriel Valley and elsewhere in the 1940s, an activist lugged books from Vroman’s to the Manzanar camp in the Owens Valley. Science fiction author Octavia Butler, who grew up in the area, frequented the bookstore.

Vroman’s second location in Hastings Ranch was forced to close in 2024 after the company was unable to reach a new lease agreement with the property owner. The store was otherwise sustainable, but was forced to close “due to increasing occupancy expenses,” the company wrote in a social media post at the time.

Vroman’s flagship location on Colorado Boulevard remains open. However, the property itself changed hands, with Sheldon selling it to GD Realty Group for $15.5 million amid uncertainty about its future.

The bookstore has a long-term lease with the real estate group, whose chief executive, Arash Danialifar, said in a statement last year to news outlet Pasadena Now that the bookstore was a “staple of the community” and that he hoped it would remain there “for the foreseeable future.”

Torrey Pines State Natural Reserve, which includes some of the most dramatic sandstone sea cliffs and oceanfront trails in Southern California, closed Monday for utility upgrades. Reopening is scheduled for March 2027.

The closure covers cars, cyclists and walkers. The 1,750-acre Torrey Pines reserve, located north of La Jolla and south of Del Mar in San Diego County, attracts an estimated 4 million visitors yearly. Its population of Torrey pine trees is one of just two spots in the U. S. where that species is found. (The other is Channel Islands National Park’s Santa Rosa Island, where a fire in May killed much of the Torrey pine population.)

Meanwhile, next door to the natural reserve, Torrey Pines State Beach remains open. Visitors can still park at the North Beach and South Beach parking lots and walk to that 4.5-mile stretch of sand, much of it at the foot of 300-feet cliffs.

State parks officials said in a release that the improvement project includes installation of new gas, water, wastewater and communication lines, along with accessibility upgrades.

Jim Harbaugh had never lost an NFL opener as a head coach… until last Sunday.

Now, with the Las Vegas Raiders coming to town, Harbaugh is looking to keep another streak intact. With him as coach, his Chargers are 4-0 against the Silver & Black.

If Sunday’s game isn’t a must-win for the Chargers, it’s certainly a high-stakes contest on the heels of an opening flop against the Arizona Cardinals.

The Chargers did precious little right in that 26-14 defeat at SoFi Stadium, the first Week 1 loss for Harbaugh in seven openers.

The Chargers, who were favored by 9½ points, failed to generate anything close to a rhythm. The newly unveiled Mike McDaniel offense failed to get any real traction, and Justin Herbert was sacked three times.

One of the few bright spots for the Chargers was receiver Ladd McConkey, but his availability remains uncertain.

Meanwhile, the Raiders dominated the visiting Miami Dolphins, 27-13, handing Klint Kubiak a victory in his coaching debut. Granted, the Dolphins don’t show a lot of promise.

Harbaugh’s teams have swept the Raiders each of the past two seasons. In fact, the last time the Chargers lost to the Raiders was a 63-21 debacle Dec. 14, 2023, and Chargers coach Brandon Staley was fired the next day.

CALIFORNIA: Three people were charged by federal authorities in Los Angeles on Wednesday with stealing $12 million in federal and state homelessness aid to pay for real estate, luxury trips and vintage vehicles.

It was the second such arrest of people on federal fraud charges in Southern California this week, as President Donald Trump’s administration tries to emphasize a crackdown on fraud and waste in government and aid programs. On Tuesday, 12 people were charged with stealing more than $10 million in federal childcare aid.

The three defendants each worked for or ran Southern California-based nonprofit organizations, which often contracted with city, county, state or federal agencies to provide aid or money to find housing and social services for homeless people. Prosecutors allege that the defendants used funds from those contracts to pay personal expenses, accepted bribes, and billed for services that were never provided.

“Make no mistake, HUD and the Trump administration will not tolerate the theft and abuse of taxpayers in this country,” Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Scott Turner said at a news conference.

Turner used the indictments to accuse the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, which approved grants to these defendants, of being negligent with taxpayer dollars.

Taxpayer aid spent on video games, nightclubs

Two defendants, Lakiya Malone, 48, and Michael Young, 46, were arrested early Wednesday in Los Angeles. A third defendant charged with wire fraud, Donye Mitchell, 55, is considered a fugitive.

Young is the founder of Home At Last, a nonprofit that took in more than $118 million in public funds since 2019 for its stated mission of providing housing and aid to homeless people.

Federal prosecutors say Young instead created shell companies that he claimed were independent contractors but were, in fact, controlled by him. This alleged self-dealing allowed Young to be paid both at Home At Last and overbill federal and local authorities, prosecutors said. They say Young misused an estimated $7.5 million in taxpayer funds through fake contractors and vendors.

Young used the proceeds to take luxury trips to Tahiti, and used funds to open a nightclub in Inglewood called the Six Seven Five Lounge and other commercial real estate projects, prosecutors allege.

Mitchell is the CEO of Big Blue Umbrella, which was awarded more than $1.2 million from a federally supported nonprofit for housing and mental health care aid. Prosecutors say Mitchell not only misstated his organization’s ability to provide such services, but also used money from the award to pay off his credit card debts, give funds to family members, buy video games and pay legal expenses for an unrelated case.

Malone was charged with accepting more than $180,000 in bribes from another homelessness-aid nonprofit. Malone allegedly not only accepted bribes but also placed people in homeless aid programs who weren’t homeless.

Separately, federal prosecutors announced that a fourth person pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering charges for stealing at least $2 million in homeless aid. Alexander Soofer, the executive director of Abundant Blessings, admitted to working with Malone to bill federal and state authorities for homelessness aid services when there were no participants in his programs.

Big money, little documentation

Some 72,000 to 75,000 people live in shelters or encampments in Los Angeles and Los Angeles County, making it one of the largest homeless populations in the country. It has been a significant issue in Southern California for years, and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass made it a cornerstone of her 2022 election campaign.

City and county authorities spend roughly $1 billion a year trying to help the homeless population, often using LAHSA to coordinate aid. While significant funds are spent to address the issue, city and county reviews have repeatedly found that the programs lacked appropriate recordkeeping, audit trails and documentation.

Nathan Hochman, the district attorney for Los Angeles County, told reporters that the public should expect more investigations and indictments into the misuse of homeless aid funds. Hochman’s office’s investigation into Soofer and Abundant Blessings led to his indictment earlier this year.

“I can assure this is the beginning of these prosecutions and we are far, far from the end,” he said, adding that his office’s investigation had found that the only “abundant blessings” Soofer provided were to his friends and family.

Some of the Trump administration’s efforts to go after fraud and abuse of government benefit programs have faced criticism and legal challenges. In December, Vice President JD Vance, who chairs the administration’s task force on the subject, amplified a YouTube video of a popular right-wing influencer accusing childcare providers in Minnesota, many of them immigrants from Somalia, of running scams. State authorities visited the centers and found nearly all of them operating normally.

Nonetheless, the administration launched a massive immigration crackdown in Minnesota. Officials later attempted to freeze federal funds for childcare in five Democratic-led states but were halted by a lawsuit.

Jackson Renger, the star outside linebacker on Los Alamitos’ Southern Section Division 2 championship football team last season, packed his bags and boarded a flight on Aug. 14 to begin life as an Ivy Leaguer at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.

Armed with a 4.4 grade-point average and memories of winning a championship with his best friends, Renger is entering the world of college football while competing in an academic environment featuring the best of the best.

“I’ve been told football might be the easiest part,” he said. “I’m coming in to be surprised.”

The Ivy League continues to recruit players from Southern California. Former St. John Bosco quarterback Caleb Sanchez is entering his junior year at Columbia, which has 10 Southland products on its roster. St. John Bosco defensive back Dorian Franklin is committed to Harvard.

Aiding Renger are eight other players from Southern California on the Cornell roster.

“They said it will be fine and help me,” he said of the transition.

Renger visited Cornell three times last year but has done little preparation this year for what he will be facing in his balancing act of football and academics. He’s going to trust his skills and previous experiences.

“My biggest concern is the academics,” he said. “Throw on top of that football, that’s going to be a real challenge. They said you have to be on top of your stuff and can’t let either get on top of you.”

When Renger left home last month, he packed what he could, flying to New Jersey to visit family, then drove to New York with his parents before moving in on a Sunday. He had hernia surgery in July and spent six weeks recovering and still believes he should be able to contribute on the field as a freshman.

One thing he didn’t bring to Cornell was a warm jacket for snow. He didn’t trust the stores in Orange County.

“That’s what I’m thinking,” he said. “They’re going to sell me something useless.”

So he’ll trust the stores in New York or maybe receive recommendations from teammates once the snow comes.

He’s going off to college to explore and test himself on and off the field. That’s what Ivy Leaguers do.

“Cornell is such a unique and big school,” he said. “I’m not sure what I want to do. I want to try different things when I’m there.”

Football has taught him the most important lesson for anyone who plays sports — never quit.

“This is a whole new challenge. I’ll put my head down and try,” he said.

Friends are welcome to send mittens, ski caps and hot soup when the snow comes. Football begins on Sept. 19. The Southern California natives are sure to shake hands after games and discuss happenings back home while never forgetting that “Winter is Coming.”

The breath of a dragon won’t save them but a warm coat will.

A look at players from local schools on Ivy League rosters:

Harvard: DB Chase Mason, San Juan Hills; DB Iroc Cordova, Inglewood; K Dylan Fingersh, Capistrano Valley; OL Nate Turk, Loyola; DL Mikhal Johnson, Sierra Canyon.

Brown: DL Caden Harman, Sierra Canyon; DL Mitch Mooney, San Marino.

Yale: DB Dillon Rickenbacker, St. John Bosco; WR Davis Wong, Brentwood.

Pennsylvania: LB Trevor Pajak, Mater Dei; WR Tyler George, Corona Centennial.

Columbia: WR Caden Butler, Chaparral; WR Bryce Coleman, Crean Lutheran; WR Elliot Cooper, Sherman Oaks Notre Dame; DB Ethan Fullerton, Sherman Oaks Notre Dame; QB Caleb Sanchez, St. John Bosco; DL Austin Coronado, Glendora; WR Jarod Sersansie, JSerra; DL Will Matthew, Orange Vista; TE Santiago Hernandez, Harvard-Westlake.

Cornell: WR Cameron Shannon, JW North; DL Darryl Davis, Culver City; TE Brandon Gilbert, Murrieta Valley; TE Adrian Ortiz, Redondo Union; LB Jackson Renger, Los Alamitos; K AJ Salo, Chaminade.

Dartmouth: OL Ryan Turk, Loyola; LB Timothy Ioane Jr., Tustin.

Princeton: LB Fifita Tauteoli-Moore, Corona Centennial; QB Wyatt Becker, Sierra Canyon; RB Kai Honda, Gardena Serra.

Jim Harbaugh wants his teams to finish seasons the way they start them.

If the Chargers do that, they’re going all the way.

Counting his four seasons with San Francisco, Harbaugh is 6-0 in NFL season debuts as a head coach. That’s tied for the most opening victories without a loss in league history.

“It’s September. It’s time to play our first game,” Harbaugh told reporters this week. “And I support no cause, foreign or domestic, other than the greatness of the Los Angeles Chargers.”

His team plays host to the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday, and oddsmakers see a blowout in the making. The Chargers are favored by 9½ points, the biggest spread of Week 1.

Despite a 2-0 start last season, the Cardinals lost 14 of the next 15 and wound up with the third overall pick in the NFL draft, which they used on Notre Dame running back Jeremiyah Love. The rookie is questionable for this game because of an ankle injury.

Their quarterback is no longer Kyler Murray, now in Minnesota, but Jacoby Brissett, who is on his sixth franchise — and seventh if you count two stops in New England.

This game is the “Mike” drop, if you will, with Mike LaFleur coaching his first game for Arizona, and Mike McDaniel making his debut as Chargers offensive coordinator.

LaFleur and McDaniel have history. They were young offensive assistants in Cleveland, Atlanta and San Francisco and both represent branches of the Kyle Shanahan coaching tree.

There’s a link too between Harbaugh and LaFleur. Both are younger brothers of other current NFL head coaches: Matt LaFleur of the Green Bay Packers and John Harbaugh of the New York Giants.

The Los Angeles federal public defender’s office on Friday joined a renewed effort to oust Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in Southern California, accusing the government of “playing shadow games with the most consequential powers a government can wield against its population.”

Citing a recent order from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. Jackson, the public defender’s office renewed a motion seeking to disqualify Essayli from participating in or supervising the prosecution of their client, Jaime Ramirez.

The federal appellate court ruled last month that the Department of Justice cannot keep an official who has not been confirmed by the Senate in charge of a U.S. attorney’s office simply by giving that person a different title and the full powers of the job.

In their motion filed Friday, James Anglin Flynn and Ayah A. Sarsour, deputy federal public defenders, accused the government of asking them “to trust that there are some undisclosed limits on Essayli’s authority that render it valid.”

“The buck should stop here, and it should stop now,” they wrote.

The U.S. attorney’s office in L.A. did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

H. Dean Steward, a defense attorney, first kicked off the renewed effort last week, filing a motion asking Senior U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright to reconsider his prior ruling. Steward argued that Essayli should not be allowed to continue leading the office.

Seabright previously disqualified Essayli as acting U.S. attorney in October, finding he was “not lawfully serving” in the top role. But Seabright — who was appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush — said the court had “no basis to preclude Essayli from performing the lawful duties” of first assistant U.S. attorney, which left the door open for him to remain in charge.

Seabright scheduled a hearing for Oct. 13 on the latest motion. At a Zoom hearing on Aug. 28, Seabright appeared to signal which way he is leaning.

“I’m not sure if the government is just saying my decision was different from Jackson and therefore it stands. I’m not sure that passes muster given how the 9th Circuit ruled in Jackson,” Seabright said. “I think there’s going to have to be more in-depth briefing than the government has given me to date.”

The federal appellate court ruling stemmed from a challenge to the authority of Nevada’s top federal prosecutor, Sigal Chattah, whom the Justice Department had designated “first assistant” U.S. attorney. With no one above her in the office, Chattah has seemingly been calling the shots on federal prosecutions in the state, handling cases referred by the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration and other law enforcement agencies.

The Justice Department previously said it disagreed with the 9th Circuit’s decision and plans to appeal it to the Supreme Court. The agency did not respond to questions about what effect the ruling could have on Essayli.

The Trump administration has used a similar workaround to keep Essayli running the U.S. attorney’s office in L.A. without going through the Senate confirmation process, where he likely would have faced strong opposition from California’s elected representatives.

Essayli, 40, has continued leading the federal prosecutor’s office in the Central District of California as “first assistant” despite a federal judge’s ruling last year that said he was unlawfully serving as the acting U.S. attorney. The Justice Department did not appeal that ruling.

Instead, Essayli’s office has maintained that he can prosecute and supervise cases as first assistant. He also was appointed as a “special attorney” by the Trump administration, a title similarly held by Chattah in Nevada.

“To be sure, First Assistant Essayli may be the highest-ranking DOJ lawyer in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, and (like many in the office) he supervises others,” Assistant U.S. Atty. Alexander P. Robbins said in a filing last month. “But that cannot make him a “de facto” U.S. Attorney, and he does not purport to exercise “all of the functions of [that] office.”

Flynn and Sarsour pushed back on that claim in their motion, arguing that the government “is asking this Court to accept a theory that the Ninth Circuit rejected, nearly verbatim less than three weeks ago.” The government, they wrote, “appears to be asking this Court to consider and approve a hypothetical delegation to Essayli of some subset of the U.S. Attorney powers.”

“For over a year, this illegal exercise of prosecutorial powers has violated Mr. Ramirez’s constitutional rights and undermined the legitimacy of the criminal justice system in this district,” Flynn and Sarsour wrote. “In line with Jackson, two other Courts of Appeals have now affirmed the common-sense remedy that this illegality should be stopped.”

The deputy federal public defenders said a defense analysis identified invalid service as acting or de facto U.S. Attorneys in at least 16 districts across the country.

A former Republican member of the California state Assembly from Riverside, Essayli has used his position to act as one of Trump’s fiercest legal foot soldiers. He has pursued criminal charges against protesters, activists and immigrants while dropping cases involving administration allies and supporting lawsuits challenging transgender and environmental policies in California.

Essayli was sworn in as interim U.S. attorney in April 2025. Around the time he hit that role’s 120-day limit, he resigned from his interim role and was allowed to continue under his current titles by then-Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi.

Challenges to Essayli’s position were brought in several criminal cases, with defense lawyers arguing that charges filed under his watch are invalid and should be dismissed. The federal public defender’s office in L.A. had asked the judge to disqualify Essayli from participating in and supervising criminal prosecutions.