Week in Review

PHOTO OF THE WEEK

Stopping the presses

It’s not often a photographer can call the newsroom and say “Stop the presses!” But the timing was right to suggest holding the front page for late-breaking news of a two-alarm fire on Tuesday night. The timing was bad for my shift — but perfect for the situation.

I worked quickly once I arrived at the fire and paid attention to where the action was. It was 10:40 p.m. when I quit shooting and called the newsroom. Reporter Alicia Robinson was down the street at Newport City Hall and went to the scene to get the details of the fire after I’d left.

The news desk was confident enough to pull back the front page, which had been sent to the printer, wait for my return and re-do the cover. Luckily, we could easily switch out part of the page for the more significant photos I’d taken. The late shift crew worked simultaneously to report, edit and design with acute efficiency once we settled on the pictures and got the relevant information from the authorities.

It was important to tell readers what was going on — I’m sure they were wondering what all the sirens, lights and police tape was about. When we finished the paper around 11:45, it was just a matter of hours before they would know.

— Don Leach

BUSINESS

Campers line up for chance to buy a PlayStation 3

If you are not a video game addict and happened to walk by Best Buy in Costa Mesa on Wednesday, you may have wondered why there was a long line of people outside the store.

The people, some sitting in lawn chairs, were camping outside the store hoping to buy a Sony PlayStation 3, which went on sale Friday. By about 9 a.m. on Friday, nearly every PlayStation in Newport-Mesa had sold out, as stores received only limited shipments.

At Circuit City in Fashion Island and South Coast Plaza, police gathered before dawn to control the crowds. Costa Mesa Police Lt. Dale Birney said he sympathized with the hundreds who went home empty-handed. “They’ve sold what they had, and everyone who didn’t get one has gone home — not very happily, I’d imagine,” he said.

The coveted console is priced at $499 for the basic model and $599 for a system with extras.

PUBLIC SAFETY

Wife of murder suspect convicted of killingsJennifer Henderson-Deleon was found guilty Friday of first-degree murder for her role in the killing of Tom and Jackie Hawks of Newport Beach.

Although she was not aboard when the couple was tied to an anchor and thrown from their boat, Well Deserved, her role in helping execute the plan was enough to convict.

Prosecutors argued that Henderson-Deleon, then pregnant, helped put the couple “at ease” about a week before they were killed by bringing her 9-month-old baby aboard the boat with her husband Skylar Deleon.

Deleon, Alonso Machain and John Fitzgerald Kennedy were also charged with the murder. Police are seeking the death penalty for Deleon and Kennedy.

An appeal will be filed. Henderson-Deleon’s sentencing is scheduled for February.

The man, whom police did not name, was driving at high speed when officers spotted him near MacArthur Boulevard and Bison Avenue. They lost sight of his car but found it again on Jamboree Road, where it had crashed into the median. The man was dead from a gunshot wound to the head, and a rifle was found next to his body.

Binh Thai Nguyen, 30, of Westminster, arrived at the apartment during the raid and was arrested on suspicion of possession for sale of more than two ounces of cocaine police found on him, according to police.

The drugs confiscated in the raid include more than five pounds of marijuana, crystal methamphetamine and painkillers. Police also found more than $4,900 in cash.

NEWPORT BEACH

Council votes to allow Catholic church to expandThe City Council on Tuesday voted to let Our Lady Queen of Angels Roman Catholic church and school expand with a new sanctuary, gym and 10 more classrooms. Several nearby homeowners associations had appealed the approval of the expansion, complaining it will worsen existing traffic problems, but they didn’t convince the council, which unanimously approved the church’s plan.

The church and school will move into space now occupied by St. Mark Presbyterian Church, which is building a new facility at another site. The number of kindergarten through eighth-grade students at the school could eventually reach 600.

Residents of the area told the council they are worried about how they’d get out of the neighborhood in an emergency with the road closed. The Irvine Co. argued it’s safer to separate construction traffic from residents’ cars, but the council sided with residents, who were pleased by the decision.

POLITICS

Local GOP congressmen suffer power setbackNewport-Mesa’s Republican members of Congress said last week they’ll have less power to get legislation passed now that Democrats have taken control of Congress. Huntington Beach Rep. Dana Rohrabacher lost the chance to chair the House science committee, and he and Newport Beach Rep. John Campbell will become voices crying in the wilderness about illegal immigration rather than leading policy decisions.

Rohrabacher said he expects most major issues to stall for the next two years, except for immigration. That topic will likely be addressed by President Bush, who wants a guest worker program that some Republicans have blocked until now, Rohrabacher said.

EDUCATION

UCI to open first public law school in state in 40 yearsForty-one years after its founders proposed the idea, UC Irvine finally got a law school this week as the UC Board of Regents voted to approve Chancellor Michael Drake’s plan. The UCI law school, which will serve a maximum of 600 students, is expected to admit its first class for fall 2009.

UCI’s program will be the fifth public law school in California, joining UC Davis, UC Berkeley, UCLA and Hastings College of the Law. The last UC campus to open a law school, Davis, did so in 1965.

With the law school accepted, UCI immediately announced plans to begin a nationwide search for a founding dean. Andy Pelicano, the dean of the Paul Merage School of Business, will chair the committee.

For nearly a decade, the district and the community have lobbied to create a high school football stadium in Costa Mesa. The district pledged $500,000 for architectural plans in 1999, while the citizens group Costa Mesa United garnered around $4 million in pledges for the stadium and an Olympic-sized swimming pool at Costa Mesa High School.

Deputy Supt. Paul Reed said the stadium landed first on the Measure F list because the district already had plans in place for it. Also scheduled for the first batch of projects are a gym at TeWinkle Middle School and a replacement for the closed Robins Hall at Newport Harbor High.