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El Cerrito: Photographer charged with raping woman during photo shoot

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

EL CERRITO — An East Bay photographer has been charged with raping a woman during a photoshoot here last April, court records show.Xinyu Chen, of Berkeley, was charged in October with two counts of forcible rape and one count of forcible oral copulation of a woman during an April 9 photoshoot, court records show. The woman allegedly came forward to police in April with allegations that Chen had sexually assaulted her after they met at an El Cerrito residence for a photoshoot.Related ArticlesCrime and Public Safety | UC Berkeley chef charged with filming explicit video chat with prepubescent girls Crime and Public Safety | Trial set for East Bay siblings linked to 2021 killing of Carmel woman Crime and Public Safety | Antioch releases video of officers shooting less lethal round at transgender woman whose hands were raised Crime and Public Safety | East Bay man guilty of murdering romantic rival on Valentine’s Day...

Tens of thousands still waiting as California COVID rent relief program runs low on cash

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

BY BEN CHRISTOPHER | CalMattersIn March 2021, the Los Angeles film industry was just beginning to roar back to life after a prolonged COVID-induced slump, but Michael Addis, a freelance filmmaker, was still deep in the hole. For more than a year he’d been racking up IOUs to his landlord and the tab stood at $43,792.So Addis turned to an emergency state program designed to help people like him pay down rental debt accumulated during the pandemic.Later, in the summer of 2021, Gov. Gavin Newsom himself had touted the program, Housing Is Key, as the largest of its kind in the nation. “We’re laser-focused on getting this assistance out the door as quickly as possible,” he said at the time.Addis heard back 20 months after he applied.On June 5, 2023 — his 61st birthday — he received an email, which he shared with CalMatters, notifying him that a payment had been approved in full.But by then it was too late. Addis had already downsized, moving out of his apartment a few blocks from the Mari...

Daly City woman pleads no contest to felony charges connected to fatal collision that killed her car’s passenger

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

SAN MATEO COUNTY — A Daly City woman pleaded no contest to multiple felonies on Friday, more than 2 years after she ran a stop sign while drunk driving, resulting in a crash that killed her cousin, according to prosecutors.Tuuika Helina Otoota Salt, 26, was driving at a high rate of speed around 4:18 p.m. on Sept. 26, 2021 when she ran a stop sign at the intersection of North Humboldt Street and East Santa Inez Avenue in San Mateo, prosecutors said. She T-boned another vehicle in the process, injuring its two passengers.Salt’s passenger — her 41-year-old cousin, Tapaita Stoval — was rushed to a hospital but later died from her injuries. When police officers arrived, they felt that Salt smelled like alcohol and administered field sobriety tests, which she performed poorly, prosecutors said. She acknowledged that she’d had beer and tequila prior to the crash.Related ArticlesCrime and Public Safety | Sheriff’s Office arrests Half Moon Bay man who allegedly ...

Freight train hits and kills man in Berkeley

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

BERKELEY — A man was struck and killed by a freight train Sunday afternoon in Berkeley, authorities said.The coroner’s office on Monday identified the man as Joseph B. Fulgado, 33.  The coroner’s office did not list an address for him.Related ArticlesCrashes and Disasters | CHP officer details Highway 4 chase that ended with woman dying in fiery crash Crashes and Disasters | Man dies in Oakland hit-and-run traffic collision Crashes and Disasters | Person fatally hit by train at East Bay BART station Crashes and Disasters | Los Gatos motorcyclist killed in crash is identified Crashes and Disasters | Man killed in East Bay freeway multi-vehicle crash The collision happened about 2:30 p.m. Sunday on the railroad tracks near Bay and Potter streets, a short distance from Berkeley Aquatic Park.Fulgado was hit by a Union Pacific freight train, officials said. He was pronounced dead at the scen...

Israel orders evacuations, Palestinians running out of places to go

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

By Najib Jobain, Samy Magdy and Jack Jeffery | Associated PressKHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip — Israeli warplanes heavily bombarded an area around Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Friday as the military ordered mass evacuations from the town in the face of a widening ground offensive that is pushing Palestinians into a progressively shrinking portion of the besieged territory.The expanded assault posed a deadly choice for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians — either stay in the path of Israeli forces or flee within the confines of southern Gaza with no guarantee of safety. Aid workers warned that the mass movement would worsen the already dire humanitarian catastrophe in the territory.“Another wave of displacement is underway, and the humanitarian situation worsens by the hour,” the Gaza chief of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, Thomas White, said in a post on X.Israel has vowed to eliminate Gaza’s Hamas rulers, whose Oct. 7 attack into Israel triggered the dead...

Billie Eilish slams Variety for ‘outing me on the red carpet’

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

Billie Eilish apparently didn’t like the way she felt forced to come out as queer during a red carpet interview this weekend, blaming a reporter for putting her on the spot with questions about disclosures she made in a new Variety cover story and for pushing her to awkwardly say, “Wasn’t it obvious?”The multi-award-winning superstar posted a series of images and videos on Instagram Sunday, which address her momentous appearance at Variety’s Hitmakers ceremony on Saturday. One photo shows her legs as she’s apparently sitting on a toilet, with her pants and underwear down near her knees. In a caption, Eilish sarcastically “thanks” Variety, both for the award she received at the ceremony and “for also outing me on a red carpet at 11 am instead of talking about anything else that matters.”“I like boys and girls,” she wrote in her caption. “Leave me alone about it please literally who cares stream ‘what ...

Oakland airport reports delays, cancellations Monday, likely due to weather

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

(KRON) -- Oakland International Airport has seen widespread delays and some cancellations Monday morning, with the cause likely weather, according to an airport spokesperson. On the departure side, the airport has seen 22 delays and one cancellation.On the arrivals side, the airport has seen 24 delays and two cancellations. Additionally, eight flights have diverted to Oakland airport. LEGO Store at San Francisco Centre mall closes Much of the Bay Area was under a Dense Fog Advisory Monday morning, with the National Weather Service warning of reduced visibility for drivers.KRON On is streaming live news now.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }Overnight runway work on OAK's south field Runway 12-30 was not completed on time Monday, due to impacts from the fog. Planes were ...

SF car break-ins have dropped 50% in last three months

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) -- Car break-ins in San Francisco have dropped 50% over the past three months, according to San Francisco Mayor London Breed. The drop comes amid stepped-up enforcement efforts from the San Francisco Police Department and the San Francisco District Attorney's Office.SFPD and city leaders announced expanded auto burglary enforcement strategies back in August. At that point, Breed's office said, auto burglaries were flat year-over-year from 2022. Since the announcement of that enforcement, they have dropped 50%. LEGO Store at San Francisco Centre mall closes Expanded enforcement operations have included the use of bait cars, plainclothes officers, and aggressive prosecution, according to the mayor's office. Breed's office says city leaders including SFPD Chief Bill Scott and DA Brooke Jenkins, have a goal of sustaining these efforts and building on them.Mayor Breed is currently pushing legislation at the Board of Supervisors level that would enable the city to d...

Correcting the Record on My Book

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

This article was originally published as a newsletter from Ryan Grim. Sign up to get the next one in your inbox.Pushing a book into the world is a disorienting experience. It’s at once exhilarating — years of reporting, writing, and revising finally turned into something real — and terrifying. Will it get shredded by haughty reviewers? Or worse, ignored? The place of a book in our ecosystem of knowledge production and distribution remains unique. No other medium can have so much intellectual and cultural influence with so few people actually consuming it. Nobody buys books, and ever fewer people read them, yet they still can shape the way we understand the world. Most people who have their views of the world shaped by a book do so by a form of media osmosis, listening to podcasts, reading reviews, excerpts, or news reports about the book. As an author, you hope that your themes and your message are clear enough that they land with some semblance of their original meaning by the...

Uber set to join the S&P 500 index in latest sign of a turnaround for the ride-hailing service

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:52 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Uber’s stock is set to join the S&P 500 index later this month, the latest sign that the ride-hailing and delivery company is turning its business around after struggling through much of the pandemic.The San Francisco company will be added to the benchmark index prior to the opening of regular trading on Dec. 18, S&P Dow Jones Indices said late Friday.Inclusion in the S&P 500 can be a big boost for a stock because the index is widely tracked by many funds designed to mirror the holdings of the S&P 500, which is at the heart of many 401(k) accounts. That translates into more demand for stocks in the index, driving up their price.Shares in Uber Technologies Inc. were up almost 4% in afternoon trading Monday at $59.43. That’s not far from their all-time high of $63.18 per share set in February 2021. The stock is up more than twofold so far this year.The strong rally marks a major turnaround from as recently as the summer of 2022, when the stock ...