Los Angeles Times - 07.03.2020

LATIMES.COM B

CITY & STATE

The Twitter account de-
voted to the Americana at
Brand shopping complex in
Glendale was briefly sus-
pended this week.
For the thousands of fans
of the account, the tempo-
rary removal was more than
just the loss of reliable
spoofs of the wait times at
the Cheesecake Factory and
a skewering of the Ameri-
cana at Brand’s rivals.
“Twitter, you mess with
@americanamemes, you are
messing with me. This is un-
acceptable,” writer Dave
Schilling said on Twitter.
The creator of the ac-
count, a Glendale resident
who requested anonymity,
said he suspected an accu-
mulation of copyright claims
for popular music and im-
ages he posted led to the sus-
pension. He had mostly ig-
nored them.
On Thursday, he received
notice of a claim related to
video he posted this week
pairing the dancing fountain
with “Stupid Love,” the new
Lady Gaga song. In a tele-
phone interview with The
Times, he vowed to deal with
the copyright claims.
“I’m hopeful that I’ll get it
back. But this just might
take a long time and a lot of
emails,” he said.
By Friday morning, the
account had been restored.
A spokesman for Twitter de-
clined to comment.
The creator said that he
started the account with two
friends in May, at a time
when he was unemployed
and working in a grocery
store. He “fell down the rab-
bit hole” of niche memes, in-
cluding one feed that fea-
tured memes exchanged by
movie theater employees.
“They were sharing with
each other memes about Ya-
hoo.com having bad movie
times, or having to replace
popcorn. It was very specific
things — such a weird subset
of specific memes.”
After his wife told him
about a meme account
started by a town in upstate
New York, the idea took root.
“It suddenly clicked: I
think Glendale should have
one. And it would be really
funny to do one just on the
Americana,” he recalled. He
lives in Glendale and said he
found himself regularly visit-
ing the shopping complex,
even when he wasn’t shop-
ping, and he noticed that the
Americana had “a strong fol-
lowing of people who love it.”
“It still feels like there’s
always something special
there. It’s more than a mall.
It’s a weird oasis in Glen-
dale.”
Over time, he has used
the account to provide com-
mentary on current events
and trending issues, seizing
boomlets in the current
presidential race, for exam-
ple, and recasting them in
Americana-centric jokes.
He also pokes fun at the
Americana itself. He com-
pared the mural in the
Americana’s movie theater
lobby to the ceiling of the Sis-
tine Chapel. Last year, he
wished a Happy Father’s
Day to “The Americana’s
daddy, Rick Caruso!”
The account’s creator
said representatives for Ca-
ruso, whose firm built and
operates the Americana,
reached out a few months
ago, asking to meet. Before
the meeting, he was fretting
over what would come.
“In my head, ‘They are ei-
ther going to try to shut the
account down, or try to hire
me to run their social media
account.’ I went through,
‘What do I do? What do I do?
Should I sell out?’ ”
Neither came to pass.
“They wanted to get coffee
and introduce themselves,”
he said.
He feels like the account
is good publicity for Caruso’s
company. “But I still haven’t
gotten my free apartment
from them,” he ribbed.

Satirical

Twitter

account

flagged

Glendale man behind

popular Americana

Memes is suspended,

but stays on brand.

By Matt Hamilton

It’s time to ready those

rain boots and umbrellas be-

cause wet weather is return-

ing to Southern California

starting this weekend.

The first in a pair of

storms to hit the Southland

is expected to arrive Sat-

urday, dropping tempera-

tures into the low to mid-60s

and bringing a chance of

showers across the region

through Sunday. Precipita-

tion is expected to be light,

with totals less than a 10th of

an inch, said Kristen Stew-

art, a meteorologist with the

National Weather Service in

Oxnard.

“That’s really just the

precursor to the main event

next week,” she said.

On Monday, a moisture-

rich atmospheric river — fed

by a plume of subtropical

water vapor at the lower and

middle levels of the atmos-

phere — is expected to bring

widespread rain to the area.

The strongest rain is ex-

pected Tuesday.

That storm will linger

through at least Wednesday,

bringing 1 to 3 inches of rain.

Some southern areas, in-

cluding the foothills of the

San Gabriel Mountains,

could see as much as 4 inch-

es of rain, Stewart said.

Snow levels will start out

high, at about 8,000 feet, be-

fore dropping to about 6,

feet early Wednesday. That

means snow accumulation

will probably remain at the

resort level, where signifi-

cant totals are possible, ac-

cording to the weather serv-

ice.

The rain appears to be

just in time to help the re-

gion rebound from disap-

pointing precipitation totals

after a parched start to 2020.

A high-pressure ridge that

lingered over the eastern Pa-

cific Ocean for much of Janu-

ary and February rerouted

winter storms that typically

soak California and the Pa-

cific Northwest during what

are usually the state’s

wettest months.

A total of 0.04 inches of

rain fell in downtown Los

Angeles last month, placing

it in a tie with February 1899

for the 10th-driest February

on record. Downtown L.A.

also had its fourth-driest

combined January and Feb-

ruary on record after just

0.36 inches fell during the

first two months of 2020. The

driest combined January

and February occurred in

1912, when a scant 0.07 inches

of rain fell in downtown.

Forecasters and water

managers keeping a close

eye on precipitation are

hopeful that a wet month, a

phenomenon known by

weather experts as a “March

miracle,” may help bolster

lackluster winter rain totals

and help keep the state out

of drought conditions.

A dry few months have al-

ready taken their toll on

much of the state.

Nearly 70% of California,

including much of Los Ange-

les County, is considered to

be in abnormally dry

conditions.

Just over 34% of the state,

including portions of the

San Francisco Bay Area and

much of the San Joaquin

Valley, is considered to be in

moderate drought

conditions, according to

maps released Thursday by

the U.S. Drought Monitor.

“For the water year, we’re

4 inches below normal in

downtown L.A.,” Stewart

said.

“This upcoming storm

will bring us pretty close to

where we need to be.”

A PEDESTRIAN crosses rain-soaked University Avenue at Park Boulevard in front of the Georgia Street Bridge in San Diego last year.

Eduardo ContrerasSan Diego Union-Tribune

In anticipation of precipitation

Moisture-rich atmospheric river is expected to bring widespread rain to region

By Hannah Fry

Authorities are searching

for answers after a newborn

girl was found dead in a rest-

room stall at a Pasadena

park Thursday night.

Maintenance workers

found the body while pre-

paring to clean a restroom at

Memorial Park, 85 E. Holly

St., according to the Pasa-

dena Police Department.

Officers and fire paramedics

were called to the scene

about 10:10 p.m., police Lt.

Anthony Russo said.

“They discovered the de-

ceased newborn inside the

female restroom on a stack

of toilet paper,” Russo said.

The newborn appeared

to be full term, Russo said,

but the Los Angeles County

coroner’s office will have to

officially make that determi-

nation.

It was not immediately

clear when the baby was

born, but Russo said police

did not receive calls for serv-

ice or reports of a baby cry-

ing before the body was

found.

The girl’s body had not

been examined as of late

Friday morning, according

to coroner’s spokeswoman

Sarah Ardalani.

Russo said Pasadena has

a “safe haven” program in

which parents can surren-

der custody of their new-

borns to an on-duty fire-

fighter at a local station.

“There is a venue for

them to safely surrender the

child, and for us to get them

the medical attention neces-

sary,” he said.

The investigation is on-

going. Anyone with addi-

tional information is asked

to call Pasadena police at

(626) 744-4241. Tips can be

left anonymously at (800)

222-8477.

Newborn

is found

dead in

Pasadena

By Luke Money

Douglas Hodge, former

chief executive of Pimco,

plans to appeal his nine-

month prison sentence for

bribing his children’s way

into USC and Georgetown,

in light of newly disclosed

notes taken by the scam’s

ringleader, William “Rick”

Singer.

In an early sign that

those notes could roil the

government’s case, Hodge’s

attorney, Brien O’Connor,

asked Thursday to extend

the 30-day window Hodge

has to challenge his prison

sentence, citing the govern-

ment’s “inappropriate with-

holding” of notes Singer

wrote in his iPhone while co-

operating with federal

agents.

Singer was calling dozens

of his former clients on a re-

corded line, retreading deals

they’d brokered to get their

children into such schools as

Georgetown, USC and

UCLA. But Singer’s han-

dlers, he wrote, were insist-

ing he “tell a fib” and portray

the payments that clinched

their children’s admission as

bribes, not donations, to

university programs.

Hodge was sentenced

Feb. 7. Nineteen days later,

prosecutors disclosed Sing-

er’s notes to attorneys for

other parents charged in the

case.

Eric S. Rosen, an assist-

ant U.S. attorney, told the

lawyers in a letter that a

prosecutor first glimpsed

one of the notes in October

2018. Because Singer had
      written the notes to his own
      lawyer, Rosen and his col-
      leagues believed the writ-
      ings were protected by attor-
      ney-client privilege, Rosen
      wrote. Singer’s lawyer
      waived that privilege last
      week, and the notes were
      turned over.
      O’Connor said without

those messages, U.S. Dis-

trict Judge Nathaniel M.

Gorton had not viewed a

“full and accurate record” of

Hodge’s conduct before sen-

tencing him to nine months

in prison, the longest term

handed down in the case to

date. O’Connor declined to

comment Thursday.

Although Hodge didn’t

dispute his guilt and ac-

knowledged committing

fraud and money launder-

ing, he had argued that he

thought the money he paid

to get four children into USC

and Georgetown as bogus

athletic recruits — $850,

in all — was bound for school

coffers, not the personal

bank accounts of corrupt

university employees. Sing-

er, according to his own

notes, appears to have im-

parted this impression on

his clients, O’Connor wrote.

Hodge “takes full respon-

sibility for his conduct,”

O’Connor wrote. “But there

is an important distinction

when evaluating Mr.

Hodge’s culpability between

payments intended to bene-

fit a university and pay-

ments intended to benefit a

specific coach in his or her

personal capacity.”

Despite his planned ap-

peal, Hodge will report to

prison by March 20 as or-

dered, O’Connor wrote. He

has paid the $750,000 fine

Gorton imposed, O’Connor

added.

Two other parents who

pleaded guilty to fraud and

money laundering, Manuel

and Elizabeth Henriquez,

asked to delay their sentenc-

ing hearings after Singer’s

notes were disclosed.

The government is seek-

ing sentences of 18 months

and 26 months for the Ather-

ton couple, respectively.

Elizabeth Henriquez would

be sentenced March 31; Ma-

nuel Henriquez, April 8.

In a letter dated Monday,

Rosen told defense attor-

neys he was turning over a

tranche of evidence they had

squabbled over for months:

FBI and Internal Revenue

Service reports of interviews

with Singer and USC em-

ployees, and extractions

from the iPhone Singer used

as a cooperating witness.

Rosen added that by

March 13, he would furnish

the attorneys with, among

other records, the contents

of Singer’s Google Drive,

Singer’s handwritten notes,

videos of other cooperating

witnesses, the script Singer

used while calling clients on

a recorded line, and a re-

corded phone call between

Singer and his government

handlers.

After Singer’s notes were

disclosed, Judge Gorton

told defense attorneys they

could file motions to dismiss

the indictment against their

clients, suppress evidence or

seek sanctions for govern-

ment misconduct. Gorton

on Thursday extended the

filing deadline to March 20.

Ex-Pimco chief to appeal sentence

FORMERPimco CEO Douglas Hodge, shown in October, was sentenced to nine

months in prison for bribing his children’s way into USC and Georgetown.

CJ GuntherEPA/Shutterstock

Douglas Hodge’s plan

follows disclosure of

college admissions

scandal leader’s notes.

By Matthew Ormseth