Prop. 8 sponsors ask U.S. Supreme Court to stop same-sex weddings

SAN FRANCISCO — As same-sex couples raced to marry in California, the sponsors of Proposition 8 filed an emergency request to the U.S. Supreme Court asking it to stop weddings on the grounds that its decision was not yet legally final.

"If courts were free to disregard well-defined procedures at their whim, the public's confidence in the judiciary would suffer," lawyers for ProtectMarriage said in their 12-page application.

An attorney for the challengers of Proposition 8 expressed certainty that the request would be denied.

It went to Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, who hears matters involving the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. The 9th Circuit issued an order late Friday that allowed gay marriages to resume, a decision ProtectMarriage said was premature and in violation of procedural rules.

Kennedy wrote Wednesday's ruling that required the federal government to recognize same-sex marriages. He dissented in the Proposition 8 decision, which said ProtectMarriage and other initiative sponsors could not stand in the place of state officials to defend their measures in federal court.

UC Davis law professor Vikram Amar said Kennedy would agree to stop the marriages only if the court was willing to consider reopening the Proposition 8 case at the request of ProtectMarriage. Amar estimated that only one or two such requests are granted in a decade.

"I would be pretty shocked if he granted a stay," Amar said.

ProtectMarriage contended that the 9th Circuit should not have taken any action in the case until Wednesday's Supreme Court decision on Proposition 8 was technically final. The group said high court rulings are not binding for 25 days, a period in which a party in a case can ask for reconsideration.

The 9th Circuit normally waits 25 days before acting on a case just decided by the Supreme Court. But in a surprise move, a three-judge panel that included liberal jurist Stephen Reinhardt lifted a hold it had placed on a 2010 injunction ordering state officials to stop enforcing the gay marriage ban.

Gay couples were marrying up and down the state within hours.

Amar said the appeals court had the power to take such action. Chapman University law professor John Eastman, a supporter of Proposition 8, disagreed, saying the court's action had violated legal rules.

The couples who filed the federal challenge of the 2008 ballot measure headed out to get marriage licenses within an hour of the 9th Circuit's decision. One couple married Friday evening at Los Angeles City Hall, the other at San Francisco City Hall. San Francisco will continue to issue licenses and perform marriages through the weekend.

ProtectMarriage said the 9th Circuit's decision smacked of "corruption."

"Suspiciously, the 9th Circuit's announcement late Friday ordering same-sex marriages came as a surprise, without any warning or notice to Proposition 8's official proponents," ProtectMarriage said in a statement.

"However, the same-sex couple plaintiffs in the case, their media teams, San Francisco City Hall, L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and the California attorney general all happened to be in position to perform same-sex marriages just minutes after the 9th Circuit's 'unexpected' announcement."

The Supreme Court cleared the way for same-sex marriage in California by deciding 5 to 4 that ProtectMarriage did not have the legal authority to appeal the injunction against the measure. State officials, who did have the power, refused to appeal the injunction by now-retired Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn R. Walker.

ProtectMarriage has argued that the injunction applied only to the two same-sex couples who sued, and the group has not ruled out a long-shot challenge in a state or federal district court to limit the effect of Walker's ruling.

But Gov. Jerry Brown and Atty. Gen. Kamala D. Harris, supporters of gay marriage, said Walker's order compelled them to stop enforcing the marriage ban statewide.

maura.dolan@latimes.com

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The Supreme Court's new view of equal justice

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court promises "equal justice under law" — the words carved into stone on its facade — and last week, the justices set out a new definition of equal justice that they see as suited to this time.

On the last day of their term, they struck down a 1990s-era federal law that denied all legal recognition to the tens of thousands of same-sex couples who have been legally married in the last decade — a ruling that set off gay rights celebrations from the court's steps to the West Coast.

The scene could not have been more different than the day before, when the court struck down part of a 1960s-era voting-rights law that put the South under special scrutiny. Looking glum and voicing anger, African American lawyers and veterans of the civil rights movement spoke of a betrayal.

The pair of rulings, taken together, may have had few fans, but they reflect a consistent view of equal justice at the court's center, one held by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. It is skeptical of old liberal laws that put heavy emphasis on race, and just as skeptical of newer conservative laws that are biased against gays and lesbians. Both fail the test of equal justice, Kennedy said.

The Constitution promises liberty and equality to all, Kennedy says, and that means the government may not divide people into groups based on their race or ethic heritage, and now, their sexual orientation.

Since the 1960s, liberals have insisted the laws must sometimes take account of race and give special protections to black people to make up for a history of racial discrimination. But that time has passed, say Kennedy and the court's conservatives.

They had soured on the Voting Rights Act during the 1990s. Then they faced a series of cases from the South in which lawmakers — under pressure from Washington officials invoking the act — had drawn odd-shaped districts with the aim of electing more blacks and Latinos. The court's conservatives called it "racial gerrymandering."

Many were shocked last week when the nation's highest court — once a beacon of hope for racial justice — handed down a ruling that voids a key part of the Voting Rights Act. But to the justices in the majority, it means putting less focus on race when drawing election districts.

Kennedy sounded the same theme Monday in the decision that criticized an affirmative action policy at the University of Texas. School officials should avoid judging students based on their race, and instead try a "race-neutral" approach to bring diversity to the campus, he said.

His opinion striking down the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibited recognition of any marriage except one between a man and a woman, was based on the idea that it interfered with the "the equal dignity of same-sex marriages."

The government has no business treating the deep commitments and loving relationships of gay couples as "second-class" or less worthy of respect, he said. With those words, a new era of equal rights had arrived.

The court's gay rights ruling is sure to trigger new lawsuits in the 37 states that forbid same-sex marriage. Those states will face this question: What is the justification for denying equal rights to these couples?

But if one era of equal rights was beginning, another appeared to have ended.

Although it is unlikely the House and Senate will write a new law to fix the court's problems with the Voting Rights Act, in an Arizona case the high court made it clear that Congress has broad power to set regulations for elections. A 7-2 decision written by Justice Antonin Scalia rejected a law that required would-be voters to show proof of citizenship upon registration. It conflicted with the simplified registration form created by the federal Motor Voter Act, he said.

That ruling appears to allow Congress to adopt national standards that could, for example, require states to open polling places for early voting or set limits on the identification cards voters must show at the ballot box. President Obama seemed to endorse that concept Thursday, saying, "We should have mechanisms that make it easier to vote. And that is within Congress' power."

Moving beyond the major social issues, this year's court term saw another round of big wins for corporations. The justices said corporations could use arbitration clauses to shield themselves against class-action lawsuits, even when they may have short-changed their customers and violated the law. They gave makers of generic drugs a shield from being sued, tossing out a jury verdict in favor of a New Hampshire woman who suffered a toxic reaction and bad skin burns from a pain pill.

They also shielded international corporations from being sued for alleged roles in human rights violations overseas. And the justices made it harder for employees to sue their employer if they say they were harassed on the job or were retaliated against for having complained about discrimination. Most of these decisions came on 5-4 votes, when Kennedy joined with the court's conservatives.

Police and prosecutors also won two important decisions. In a Maryland case, the justices voted 5 to 4 to uphold the routine taking of DNA mouth swabs from people under arrest. Crime experts say this will lead to expanded computerized databases and help investigators solve unsolved cases.

And in a Texas case, they ruled prosecutors could tell the jury that a suspect refused to answer a key question posed by a police officer. This 5-4 ruling limits the reach of the famous "right to remain silent" that stems from the Miranda ruling.

Looking ahead, trouble looms for the Obama administration and liberal advocates on three fronts.

The so-called contraceptive mandate is being challenged by dozen of employers who say they object, on religious grounds, to being forced to pay for birth control as part of a health insurance policy. The Obama administration stands behind the provision as vital for working women, but the court's conservatives are likely to see the issue as one of religious liberty and excessive regulation by the government. At least one of those cases is likely to reach the court in its next term.

The justices are also likely to decide soon on how far states can go to regulate abortion. Republican-controlled legislatures have passed a series of new laws that restrict the time frame in which women can obtain an abortion, or that require them to undergo ultrasound tests. More than 20 years ago, Kennedy cast a key vote for a compromise ruling that upheld a woman's right to abortion but left room for state regulation. Antiabortion lawmakers are eager to test that compromise.

And in the fall, Obama's lawyers will have to defend the president's use of recess appointments to fill vacancies on the National Labor Relations Board. Since World War II, presidents have increasingly used temporary recess appointments to fill seats when the Senate refuses to act.

But a U.S. appeals court in Washington declared Obama's use of these appointments unconstitutional, and the Democratic president is asking the conservative-leaning high court to restore his authority.

david.savage@latimes.com

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Obama aims to spread electricity to more Africans

CAPE TOWN, South Africa -- President Obama on Sunday will unveil a new initiative to expand access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa, in a speech that will point to Nelson Mandela's work as evidence of the potential for rapid transformation on the continent.

Obama's initiative, dubbed Power Africa, will attempt to double the number of people with access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa, White House officials said. The president will announce an initial commitment of $7 billion over five years, federal money that will add to private investment and partnerships in six African countries. The first phase will aim to expand access to 20 million households and businesses, officials said.

More than two-thirds of the population of sub-Saharan Africa has no access to electrical power, a figure that is far higher in rural areas, according to the White House.

Obama will make the announcement in a speech at the University of Cape Town, after visiting the Robben Island prison cell where Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years as a political prisoner. As the iconic civil rights leader lies gravely ill in a Pretoria hospital, Obama has paid tribute to Mandela and his legacy at each stop of a weeklong tour of Africa. His power initiative too will be cast as guided by the Mandela model, said Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes.

"His example is the ultimate testament to how change can happen within countries and beyond countries' borders," Rhodes said.

The speech will also honor the imprint of an American political figure, Rhodes said. The University of Cape Town was the site of Sen. Robert Kennedy's 1966 "ripples of hope" speech, a call for racial equality in a South Africa then ruled by a white minority.

On his first tour of the continent as president, Obama has been charged with neglecting Africa in his first term, allowing other countries -- most notably China -- to rush in with new investment. The Power Africa program is part of the administration's answer to such criticism. Obama also will announce plans to host a summit of leaders from sub-Saharan Africa next year, officials said, and he will discuss his administration's commitment to supporting Bush-era health programs aimed at fighting HIV/AIDS.

The president is due to visit an HIV clinic run by the Desmond Tutu Foundation before the speech Sunday.

Power Africa is Obama's clearest attempt to launch his own legacy-making initiative. The White House said six countries will participate in its first phase: Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Nigeria and Tanzania. Those nations have committed to making energy sector reforms that will encourage outside investment, officials said.

Seven private companies have agreed to invest in improving and expanding the power grid. Those investors include General Electric, which plans to bring 5,000 megawatts online in Tanzania and Ghana, and Heirs Holdings, which has promised $2.5 billion of investment and financing in energy, according to the White House.

kathleen.hennessey@latimes.com

@khennessey

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Throngs rally to denounce Egypt's president

CAIRO -- Tens of thousands of protesters swept across villages and cities Sunday, denouncing Egypt's embattled Islamist president and raising fears that the days ahead will be marked with factional hate and bloodshed in what activists are calling a new revolution.

Protesters against President Mohamed Morsi filled streets and squares on the one-year anniversary of his inauguration. Chants to bring him down echoed against distant cheers of support from Islamists who held rival rallies in what has become an increasingly polarized nation.

A new youth movement, known as Rebel, has collected more than 22 million signatures on petitions calling for Morsi to step aside for early elections. The president and his Muslim Brotherhood party have refused to budge and the military has dispatched troops around government buildings and the Suez Canal.

Newspaper headlines read: "The Longest Day" and "Egypt Under the Volcano."

The country's immediate future appeared to hinge on two questions: Can Morsi survive massive, sustained protests? And, if widespread violence ignites, will the military take control of the government?

"We all feel we're walking on a dead-end road and that the country will collapse," said Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and an opposition leader. "All Egypt must go out (Sunday) to say we want to return to the ballot box and build the foundations of the house we will all live in."

The demonstrations early Sunday were largely peaceful. Thousands of anti-Morsi protesters waved flags and chanted "Leave, leave" in Cairo's Tahrir Square, the epicenter of rebellion, where more than two years ago a popular uprising brought down Hosni Mubarak. Across town, at a mosque near the presidential palace, thousands of Morsi loyalists prayed and were roused by speeches from clerics.

Security officials fear the two sides may collide. At least five people have been killed in recent days. Much of the violence erupted when anti-Morsi forces attacked Muslim Brotherhood offices in Alexandria and other cities. In what has been regarded as a snub to Morsi, the police, who have long been suspicious of Islamists, have refused to protect Brotherhood headquarters.

Those opposed to the president blame him for accumulating power to advance the Brotherhood's Islamist agenda at the expense of a faltering economy, broken institutions and widespread social problems. Morsi accuses anarchists and remnants of Mubarak's regime of instigating unrest to sabotage his government.

The stand-off has enraged nearly half the electorate who voted against Morsi and has spoiled what many hoped would be a new democracy to move beyond the corruption of the Mubarak years. Despair radiates across economic classes and has cleaved the country into two dangerous factions, each fighting for its vision of Egypt following the upheaval of the Arab Spring.

The likelihood of violence is expected to intensify as anti-government protesters march on the presidential palace, which over the last year has been the scene of clashes between demonstrators and Brotherhood loyalists.

jeffrey.fleishman@latimes.com

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Car bomb targeting convoy kills 15 in Pakistan

PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Militants detonated a car bomb near a security forces convoy in the northwest city of Peshawar on Sunday, killing at least 15 people in the latest in a series of extremist attacks to hit the South Asian nation since Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif rose to power this spring.

Shafeeullah Khan, a senior Peshawar police officer, said militants planted explosives in a Suzuki compact car and parked it on one of Peshawar's busy roads. The bomb exploded as a three-truck convoy carrying Pakistani paramilitary troops passed by, Khan said. Many of the dead were civilians, and at least three were children, he said. The explosives appeared to be detonated by remote control.

Khan did not know whether any of the casualties included members of the Frontier Corps, a paramilitary force that provides security throughout the country's troubled northwest. The blast partially damaged the last of the three trucks in the convoy. At least 35 people were injured in the explosion, many in serious condition.

Following his decisive victory in May parliamentary elections, Sharif has promised to rein in the country's insurgents, including the Pakistani Taliban, the group responsible for many of the terror attacks on thousands of civilians and security personnel in recent years. Though he has talked of starting talks with Pakistani Taliban leaders to end the insurgency, the group has continued to launch bombing attacks across the country.

Taliban leaders claimed responsibility for an attack on mountain climbers in the far northern Gilgit region last week that killed 10 foreigners, including one American of Chinese descent, and a Pakistani guide. So far, no group has claimed responsibility for Sunday's attack in Peshawar.

After meeting with British Prime Minister David Cameron in Islamabad on Sunday, Sharif told reporters that Pakistan was "resolved to tackle the menace of extremism and terrorism with renewed vigor and close cooperation with our friends."

Cameron, meanwhile, pledged Britain's support in improving counter-terrorism tactics in Pakistan, including assistance in combating militants' reliance on roadside bombs and support in better securing the country's infrastructure. "The enemies of Pakistan are enemies of Britain, and we will stand together and conduct this fight against extremism and terrorism together."

ALSO:

Throngs rally to denounce Egypt's president

In Senegal, Obama touts U.S. initiatives to end hunger

Terrorists harder to track after Snowden's leaks, officials say

Special correspondent Zulfiqar Ali reported from Peshawar, and staff writer Alex Rodriguez reported from Islamabad.

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Gay weddings resume in California

SAN FRANCISCO — Same-sex marriages in California resumed Friday when a federal appeals court lifted a hold on a 2010 injunction, sparking jubilation among gays and accusations of lawlessness from the supporters of Proposition 8.

In a surprise action, a federal appeals court cleared the way, bypassing a normal waiting period and lifting a hold on a trial judge's order that declared Proposition 8 unconstitutional.

The news came in a single, legalistic sentence Friday afternoon from the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

"The stay in the above matter is dissolved immediately," a three-judge panel wrote.

Gov. Jerry Brown told county clerks they could begin marrying same-sex couples immediately, launching plans for ceremonies up and down the state. The two same-sex couples who filed the federal lawsuit against Proposition 8 headed to the city halls in Los Angeles and San Francisco to tie the knot, ending their long fight to become legal spouses.

The first wedding, in San Francisco, began at 4:45 p.m. At 4:10 p.m., a cheer went up in the San Francisco City Hall rotunda. Kris Perry and Sandy Stier, made their way from the city clerk's office, where they got their marriage license, to the marble steps of City Hall, stopping for photographs.

In Southern California, Paul Katami and Jeff Zarrillo, the other plaintiffs in the lawsuit, headed to L.A. City Hall to tie the knot.

"It couldn't come a moment too soon," said Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who sparked the legal effort for gay marriage in California when he was San Francisco mayor.

"What extraordinary timing, right before [gay] pride weekend," Newsom said. " All that time, all the struggle, and the moment has arrived."

Supporters of Proposition 8 were furious that the 9th Circuit acted before the normal waiting period. ProtectMarriage, the sponsors of the ballot measure, has 25 days from the ruling to ask for reconsideration.

"It is part and parcel of the utter lawlessness in which this whole case has been prosecuted, said Chapman Law professor John Eastman, a supporter of Proposition 8. "Normally, courts let the parties kind of pursue their legal remedies before they issue a mandate."

He said the 25-day period for asking the Supreme Court to reconsider still applied and a rehearing, though extremely unlikely, remained a technical possibility.

"Tonight it is chaos and lawlessness, and anyone who is concerned about the rule of law ought to be deeply troubled by what happened here," the constitutional law professor said.

Andy Pugno, general counsel for ProtectMarriage, expressed astonishment and dismay.

"I am not sure what we do at this moment," he said. "It is 4:30 p.m. on a Friday. I am not sure what can be done at this point. This is beyond belief. I don't think anybody expected this. The Supreme Court decision is not even final, and yet the 9th Circuit is rushing forward."

A spokesman for the 9th Circuit had told reporters Wednesday that normally it took "at least" 25 days for the 9th Circuit to act.

But UC Irvine Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky said he knows of no instance in which the Supreme Court has granted a rehearing after delivering a full-blown ruling. He said he thinks the 9th Circuit's action was legally appropriate.

"I was surprised," Chemerinsky said. "They usually wait for the 25 days, and it just doesn't become an issue. But there is no way the Supreme Court is going to reconsider this."

He said the 9th Circuit undoubtedly realized that the decision was final and decided to end the waiting for same-sex couples. He noted that now-retired Chief U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn R. Walker's order had been on hold three years.

Some clerks' offices extended their hours so couples could marry. Cathy Darling Allen, the clerk for Shasta County and the head of the California Assn. of Clerks and Election Officials, announced: "We are all a go. It's starting to happen."

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U.S. says sheriff's deputies harassed Antelope Valley residents

Los Angeles County Sheriff's deputies harassed and intimidated blacks, Latinos and other residents in the Antelope Valley, the U.S. Justice Department has concluded after a two-year investigation.

Federal officials found a pattern of sheriff's deputies using unreasonable force, intimidation and "widespread" unlawful detentions and searches. Many of the findings involved residents who received low-income subsidized housing.

The allegations mark another setback for a troubled department that is also the subject of a federal investigation into deputy misconduct and brutality in the jail system.

Sheriff's officials said they are still negotiating with the Department of Justice over a settlement in the Antelope Valley case. But documents released Friday indicate that both sides are seeking a court-enforceable order and an independent monitor who would track the department's progress.

The findings are a vindication for Antelope Valley residents, who have long complained of surprise inspections of government-subsidized, or Section 8, housing. The checks were intended to ensure that residents meet the terms of their assistance. The inspections often involved armed sheriff's deputies, they said, which added a level of intimidation.

"This report confirms what we've been saying all along," said V. Jesse Smith, president of the Antelope Valley chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. "There is a great deal of injustice against blacks and Latinos in this community, and the good thing is that they are on the path to implementing some of these recommendations as we speak."

Civil rights attorney Connie Rice agreed, adding that it was gratifying that the Justice Department was able to expose the alleged misconduct.

"This is stuff like you used to find in the 1950s," Rice said. "It's 2013 in the big city, but when you get out into the rural areas and rural counties, things change. They don't always get the message."

The Justice Department laid out multiple areas in which deputies in the Antelope Valley abused their power:

Blacks, and to a lesser extent Latinos, were more likely than whites to be stopped and searched by deputies, even when controlling for factors other than race. Investigators concluded that deputies made stops "that appear motivated by racial bias."

Deputies commonly and improperly detained people in the back seat of their patrol cars — a tactic that must have a clear justification or else violates the Constitution and sheriff's policy. This kind of treatment was reserved not only for suspects, investigators said. Federal authorities found one instance in which two deputies handcuffed and detained in the back of their patrol car a woman who was the victim of domestic violence. They said there was "no articulated reason" for the treatment.

The department showed a pattern of unreasonable force, even against people who were handcuffed.

Supervisors failed to intervene when deputies were involved in unconstitutional policing. The investigators said the department had good policies against misconduct but found they were not often followed.

The investigators also said city officials in Palmdale and Lancaster expressed hostility toward some residents of subsidized housing. Lancaster Mayor R. Rex Parris said Friday he rejected the criticism.

"It is the most useless decision I have seen. All they do is come down and tell us how bad we did," Parris said. "I expected a lot more, and they are going to have to do a lot more if they want me to sign off on anything.... The idea we are at war with African Americans is not true."

Sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore also took issue with the findings.

"We disagree with their assessment about us racially profiling," he said. "We've been tracking this since 2000, and our information is completely different."

He added, however, that Sheriff Lee Baca "always believes we can improve."

There are a number of possibilities after federal authorities find a pattern of misconduct in a local law enforcement agency. But based on the documents released Friday, the county's longtime monitor of the Sheriff's Department, Merrick Bobb, said it appears both sides are moving toward a consent decree. Whitmore, however, said it's too early to know if a decree will be issued.

Under a decree, both sides agree to a set of reforms, a federal judge signs off on the agreement, and a monitor is appointed to make sure the local agency follows through and reports those findings back to the judge.

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Secret no-fly list blamed for American's Bangkok nightmare

WASHINGTON — For two weeks, Rehan Motiwala, a 29-year-old medical student from Pomona, sat stranded at the Bangkok airport, sleeping for 10 nights on a roach-infested mattress in a dank, windowless detention room reserved for deportees.

Motiwala, a U.S. citizen, wanted to return to his family in Southern California. But earlier this month, as he traveled from Jakarta, Indonesia, to LAX, airline staff in Bangkok refused to issue him a boarding pass for his connecting flight. U.S. and Thai officials told him that he could not travel but offered no explanation, leading him to believe he'd been placed on the U.S. government's secret no-fly list.

After dozing on benches and wandering the airport terminal for four nights, Motiwala was told that a Justice Department official had arrived from the United States to question him. When he declined to answer questions without a lawyer present, U.S. officials left him in the custody of Thai authorities, who tossed him into a detention center in the bowels of Suvarnabhumi Airport.

"They treat you like an animal," Motiwala said in a phone interview.

Motiwala's travel nightmare ended Friday morning when he was finally granted permission to fly out of Bangkok. But his ordeal underscores the mystery that continues to surround the no-fly list 12 years after its creation. U.S. officials refuse to say who's on the list or why, arguing that any explanation could alert potential terrorists about who is being watched.

In 2010, after the American Civil Liberties Union challenged the no-fly list, the government said it had created a procedure to bring American citizens and permanent residents stuck overseas back to the United States regardless of their no-fly status. The goal was to "quickly resolve the travel issues of U.S. persons located abroad," a senior FBI official told a federal court at the time.

Cases like Motiwala's show how the government has failed to carry out that policy, civil rights groups say.

"The onus is really on the government to facilitate the return of this person," said Fatima Dadabhoy, an attorney with the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Los Angeles, which is representing Motiwala. "Whether or not they're on the no-fly list, they can still come home."

The group says it is handling at least two other cases of U.S. people from the L.A. area who have been barred from flying and are marooned abroad.

Although travelers can petition to be removed from the no-fly list, civil liberties advocates say the Department of Homeland Security's redress process is so opaque that the only way to know if you've been cleared is to attempt to fly again.

A federal appeals court in Oregon last week heard arguments in a case brought by the ACLU, whose clients are suing the government to either be removed from the list or told why they are on it.

State and Justice Department officials in Washington offered no information about Motiwala's status, saying they couldn't discuss specific cases. The American Embassy in Bangkok, whose consular officers were in contact with Motiwala during his detention, declined to comment.

A Justice Department official said about 20,000 people were on the no-fly list as of October, including between 500 and 1,000 American citizens. Experts say cases of travelers being stuck in an airport are extremely rare.

Motiwala, whose parents are of Pakistani origin, was not told why he might be on the list. A likely possibility, however, is his contact with Tablighi Jamaat, a conservative Muslim missionary movement based in South Asia.

He took leave from medical school last year, traveled to Pakistan to visit relatives and went on to Indonesia to work with the group, members of which go around the world proselytizing for Islam.

Tablighi Jamaat is widely regarded as peaceful and apolitical, and claims millions of followers, but U.S. and European law enforcement officials have raised questions about possible connections to radical Islam.

John Walker Lindh, an American who converted to Islam, met Tablighi missionaries in California before joining the Taliban to fight U.S. forces in Afghanistan. British security officials allege that two of the suicide bombers who attacked the London transit system in 2005 had attended a Tablighi Jamaat mosque.

Motiwala first heard of the movement when he arrived last year in Karachi, the Pakistani mega-city where his family members live. Inspired by the Tablighis' devotion, he began attending their meetings, improved his Urdu language skills, grew a beard and shed his Western clothes for a Pakistani shalwar kameez, a long tunic.

"They were very welcoming," Motiwala said. "We would ask people to come pray at the mosque, talk about the greatness of God, sit in gatherings and listen to prayers."

Motiwala's parents said he wasn't particularly religious as a child. Born in Anaheim, he grew up in West Covina and Pomona with three brothers, including a twin. He attended UC Irvine, graduating magna cum laude in 2007 with a degree in neurobiology, a university spokeswoman said.

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Homeless numbers grow in L.A. County

The number of homeless people in Los Angeles County jumped by 16% over the last two years, fueled by lingering economic devastation from the recession and rising rents and housing prices, according to a survey released Friday.

The sharp increase from 50,000 to more than 58,000 homeless people marked a departure from counts in 2011 and 2012, which showed reductions of 3% to 7% over previous years. And it came despite hundreds of millions of dollars in government aid pouring into the county each year to get people off the streets.

"These numbers are troubling," said Mayor-elect Eric Garcetti, who pledged during his campaign to end homelessness. "The recovery has been more jobless than we would have liked."

It could get worse. More than $80 million in federal stimulus funds for emergency housing dried up in August, said Michael Arnold, executive director of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, the joint city and county agency that conducted the count in January. Federal sequestration has frozen emergency housing vouchers in the city of Los Angeles, the housing department said.

Gov. Jerry Brown's realignment program diverted more than 15,000 low-level felons to Los Angeles County jails and probation programs, the Los Angeles County Probation Department reported. Arnold said that led to more people being released from jail without adequate services or housing.

"The environment has conspired to make it look bad for Los Angeles," Arnold said. "We really need the economy to recover at a faster pace."

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has required a biannual homeless count since 2005 for jurisdictions that receive federal aid. This year's street count, involving 71 of the county's 88 cities and more than 5,000 volunteers, is considered the most accurate to date. The 58,000 figure reflects how many people are without homes on any given day; 190,000 lose their homes over the course of a year, authorities said.

The biggest jumps in the homeless numbers were among single men and people who have been without permanent shelter for a year or more, the study found. More white people are becoming homeless; the number was up 12% from 2011.

Homelessness among veterans and their families, on the other hand, showed a marked drop. Arnold said the improvement is an outgrowth of hundreds of millions of dollars of federal aid directed to veteran families.

"If we could have that same commitment to every other population, I think we would see a big dent," said Flora Gil Krisiloff, a deputy to Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky and a member of the commission that governs the Homeless Services Authority.

Homelessness traditionally lags behind economic downturns, Arnold said, as people hit with job losses or other setbacks struggle to stay afloat and then finally run out of options. The Los Angeles County unemployment rate was 11.2 % in 2012 and 13.2 % in 2011, one of the highest in the country.

"It takes a long time to burn through your resources and become homeless," Arnold said.

At the same time, the rising economy has pulled up housing costs. In 2009, the average rent for a two-bedroom apartment in the Los Angeles-Long Beach area was $1,361. In 2013, that jumped to $1,421, according to a study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

The number of emergency shelters has dropped by 8%, also because of the downturn, the study found.

"We have a real erosion in emergency shelter," said Kerry Morrison, another member of the homeless services commission. "It's worrisome that we're slipping down the slope with no place to put people."

Some homeless people were drawn to the county from outside by the weather, beaches, food banks and other assistance, the study found. Only 62% of those surveyed reported their previous address in Los Angeles County. An additional 18% said they were from other areas, and 20% refused to answer the question.

The rise in homelessness stemmed largely from an increase in the "hidden homeless" — people who stay in garages or backyards where they are difficult to find. But some homeless advocates questioned whether the hike in this category was accurate. Unlike the other numbers, it was based on telephone surveys of random households asking if they knew of people sleeping in cars, vans, carports, backyards or unconverted garages.

Garcetti said the homeless population is multifaceted, and every part of it needs to be studied.

"I've worked with homeless people since high school, and you cannot create one single portrait of who that is," Garcetti said. "I don't think there will ever be a one-size-fits-all solution."

gale.holland@latimes.com

emily.alpert@latimes.com

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Agency says Pacific great white shark not in danger of extinction

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced Friday that the northeastern Pacific Ocean population of great white sharks is not in danger of extinction and does not warrant listing under the Endangered Species Act.

NOAA had been researching the health of the great white population since last year, when the environmental groups Oceana, Shark Stewards and the Center for Biological Diversity filed a petition calling for endangered species protection.

The petitioners were reacting to the first census of great whites ever attempted. Conducted by UC Davis and Stanford University researchers, and published in the journal Biology Letters in 2011, the census estimated that only 219 adult and sub-adult great whites lived off the Central California coast, and perhaps double that many were in the entire northeastern Pacific Ocean, including Southern California.

"We are disappointed and feel this is the wrong decision, one that flies in the face of best available science," said Geoff Shester, Oceana's California program director. "This battle is far from over."

NOAA scientists concluded that the white shark population is a distinct genetic group with a low to very low risk of extinction now and in the foreseeable future.

"Our team felt that there were more than 200 mature females alone, an indication of a total population of at least 3,000," Heidi Dewar, a fisheries research biologist at NOAA, said in an interview.

NOAA's analysis, which will be made public Monday, was based on a comprehensive review of threats to the population, direct and indirect indicators of abundance trends and analysis of fisheries by catch in the United States and Mexico, Dewar said.

Some of the data reviewed by NOAA was provided by the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which was encouraged by the results.

"We will continue this work so we can gain a better understanding of population trends and the overall health of sharks that play a vital role in ocean health," said Margaret Spring, vice president of conservation and science at the aquarium.

Chris Lowe, a professor of marine biology at Cal State Long Beach who has been conducting state and federally permitted white shark research since 2002, said NOAA's findings confirm his own conclusion: The white shark population is rebounding for reasons that include federal laws that curb pollution, ban near-shore gill netting, protect sharks and halt the slaughter of marine mammals that sharks prey on for food.

The state Department of Fish and Wildlife later this year is expected to announce its own determination of the status of the great white population.

George H. Burgess, curator of the Florida Museum of Natural History's International Shark Attack File, is among nine scientists who recently completed an independent census that will show there are more than 2,000 adult and sub-adult white sharks off Central California.

That study was not submitted for review by NOAA until after it reached its conclusion, Dewar said.

louis.sahagun@latimes.com

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New Rowland Heights mosque a product of grass-roots effort

The sand-colored mosque rises against the San Gabriel Mountains, its blue-tiled dome and six minarets cutting a striking profile in an industrial area of Rowland Heights.

Inside, lush tapestries from Pakistan adorn the walls, and ornate chandeliers from Dubai hang over the prayer rooms. At the head of the men's prayer space, the 99 names of Allah are engraved in Islamic calligraphy into glass around the Arabic symbol for God.

After four years of construction and $5.5 million in fundraising, the Islamic Center of San Gabriel Valley formally opened its soaring new mosque Saturday. For Muslim worshipers, the transformation of their prayer space from a dilapidated church next to a smelly chicken farm purchased three decades ago to a 45,000-square-foot structure with a school, mortuary, health clinic and three libraries marks a coming of age for their community.

It's also powerful evidence of a building boom of new mosques in Southern California and around the nation.

Over the last several years, new mosques have risen in Mission Viejo, Irvine, Anaheim, Reseda, Rancho Cucamonga, Rosemead, Diamond Bar and Tustin. Additional mosques are slated for Temecula, Ontario, Lomita and Corona.

Strikingly, all of the new mosques have been funded entirely by local Muslims, who began settling in the region in the 1960s. Before 2001, new mosques were often funded by foreigners; the Saudis financed the King Fahad Mosque in Culver City, and Libyans helped build Masjid Omar near USC.

Stricter government scrutiny of foreign investments from Islamic countries after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, along with reluctance by local Muslims about accepting foreign money, helped change the practices, according to Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California.

"Post 9/11, the dynamic completely changed," Syed said. "The Muslim community at large in North America realized it is better if we develop our own funding, however long it takes."

Syed said many Muslims have built successful businesses over the last few decades and are now positioned to give back. Some did relatively well during the recession, as they were able to buy undervalued properties while not taking on risky investments or interest-incurring debt, which is barred in Islam, he said.

The majority of mosques in the United States are still existing buildings converted to an Islamic prayer space. But the number of newly built structures — such as the new Islamic Center of San Gabriel Valley — has doubled in the last decade, to 632 in 2011 from 314 in 2000, according to the American Mosque 2011 study. Among metropolitan areas, Southern California is home to 120 mosques, second only to the New York area, the study found. (Estimates of the Muslim American population vary, but a 2011 Pew Research Center study placed it at about 2.7 million nationwide and growing.)

At the new Masjid Qubaa in Rowland Heights, several members donated $100,000, and a few gave $500,000. The women held a fashion show, which raised $100,000. Dozens of skilled craftsmen contributed services and construction materials, which significantly reduced the structure's cost.

Syed Rizvi, the center's president, reflects the arc of success experienced by some of the community's more affluent members. He arrived in the United States from Pakistan in 1975 with a single suitcase and $7,500. But he had a medical degree and eventually opened several kidney dialysis centers. He donated a six-figure sum to the project, said Yasmeen Khan, a mosque leader.

"We were professionals, but we were not rich," Rizvi said. "America gave that opportunity for us all."

A couple from Orange County gave the mosque an interest-free loan from their pension. And, Syed said, the Islamic Center of Corona gave the Rowland Heights group a bridge loan of a couple hundred thousand dollars — a common practice among Southern California mosques to share their resources.

The mosque construction attracted no local opposition — unlike projects in Temecula, Lomita and Ontario. There, neighbors raised concerns about potential problems with noise, traffic and parking — objections Muslims have successfully addressed, according to Ameena Mirza Qazi of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Some of those debates were marked by anti-Islam comments and fears about terrorism expressed by some opponents.

Qazi said some Islamic centers have chosen to locate their new projects in industrial areas to avoid protests by homeowners. But doing so, she said, prevents mosques from serving as neighborhood centers, a traditional role for many religious institutions.

The San Gabriel Valley community, however, always located its Islamic center in an industrial area because the land was cheaper.

The original space, a church purchased in 1983, could fit only 300 people and was so cramped that worshipers during the monthlong Ramadan observance had to break their ritual fasts outside — even when the holiday fell during the chilly winter months. They bought a chicken farm to expand and rented space at Santa Ana High School, almost 25 miles away, to hold Sunday school. Preparations for burials were held at a mosque in Garden Grove.

By the late 1990s, members decided it was time to build a comprehensive facility. But the blueprint continued to change as the Muslim community grew.

Syed Raza, the architect, said the first plan drawn up nearly 15 years ago called for a 4,500-square-foot mosque — about one-tenth the size of the final design. The three-story structure includes separate entrances and prayer spaces for men and women, who can watch the imam's sermon through closed-circuit TV on the second floor. Syed of the Shura Council said that most new mosques include separate prayer spaces for the comfort of both genders but that all intermingle in other areas of the center.

Worshipers are especially excited that the center will now finally house all of their needed facilities in one space, including the charter school and mortuary.

Non-Muslims are welcome to visit and use the services, mosque leaders said. Females will not be required to cover their heads as Muslims do, and young men can wear Bermuda shorts. Muslim leaders in Southern California say they are trying to be less insular and reach out more to the non-Muslim community by holding blood drives, food giveaways, interfaith meetings and other activities.

Last week, thousands of elated worshipers flocked to the gleaming new mosque for its inaugural Friday prayer meeting.

"It feels like it's a whole new world," said 19-year-old Omar Yamak. "You have a sense of love of the community."

angel.jennings@latimes.com

teresa.watanabe@latimes.com

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Snowden leaves Hong Kong; final destination unclear

BEIJING -- Hong Kong authorities allowed wanted former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden to fly out of the city on Sunday after finding that documents supplied by Washington seeking his arrest did not "fully comply with the legal requirements under Hong Kong law."

Snowden was en route to a "third country," officials in the Chinese territory said. The South China Morning Post, a Hong Kong newspaper that had repeated contact with the American during his month-long stay in the city, reported that Snowden left on a flight bound for Moscow.

Russia's ITAR-Tass news agency, citing an unidentified Aeroflot airlines official, said Snowden would fly from Moscow to Cuba on Monday and then on to Venezuela. Last week, Iceland had also been mentioned as a possible destination for Snowden.

Exactly how Snowden's departure was arranged was unclear, but WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has praised him as a "hero," and according to the organization's Twitter feed, Snowden was accompanied on the flight to Russia by WikiLeaks legal advisors.

"WikiLeaks has assisted Mr. Snowden's political asylum in a democratic country, travel papers and safe exit from Hong Kong," the group said.

U.S. authorities are seeking to prosecute Snowden for disclosing to the media a trove of documents detailing secret American surveillance programs. On Friday, U.S. authorities revealed that Snowden had been charged with theft of government property and two violations of the Espionage Act: unauthorized communication of national defense information and providing U.S. classified intelligence to an unauthorized person.

Hong Kong officials said Sunday that U.S. authorities had asked Hong Kong to issue a provisional arrest warrant for Snowden but that without "sufficient information to process the request for provisional warrant of arrest, there is no legal basis to restrict Mr. Snowden from leaving Hong Kong."

Hong Kong authorities said they had informed the U.S. government of Snowden's departure and said they would continue to seek details from Washington about Snowden's revelations that U.S. hacking activities had targeted facilities in Hong Kong.

Snowden's departure from Hong Kong offered authorities in both the semi-autonomous Chinese territory and Beijing a face-saving if inelegant solution to a complicated situation that threatened to strain relations for years had Snowden exercised his various rights to appeal or applied for asylum. 

Hong Kong, a former British territory, has a treaty with the U.S. that allows for extraditions; however, mainland officials are allowed to intervene in cases that they determine concern foreign policy or national defense.

Willy Lam, a political analyst at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said it was "highly likely" that Beijing authorities had instructed Hong Kong officials not to surrender Snowden.

"The decision was basically made in Beijing not to send him to the U.S.," Lam said. "Hong Kong was seeking a politically expedient way out before the legal procedures started. What the Hong Kong government said is that they received Washington's request but were seeking more info. But they haven't gotten it. So the pretext was that they have no legal reason to detain him."

"This is a sort of a clever way out for the Hong Kong government to avoid getting into a more difficult situation," Lam added.

Simon N.M. Young, a law professor at the University of Hong Kong who has been closely monitoring Snowden's case, called Hong Kong's decision to allow the departure "a shocker."

"I thought he was going to stay and fight it out," Young said. "The U.S. government will be irate with their Hong Kong counterparts.  They may even question whether the Hong Kong government was acting in good faith pursuant to their treaty obligations."

Opposition to extraditing Snowden from Hong Kong had been building both in the city and on the mainland over the last several weeks. A public opinion poll last weekend in the city of 7 million found about half of respondents did not favor sending him back to the United States for prosecution.

An editorial last week in the Global Times, a Beijing newspaper with close ties to the Communist Party, inveighed against extraditing Snowden, saying "it would be a face-losing outcome for both the Hong Kong government and the Chinese central government if Snowden is extradited back to the U.S. Unlike a common criminal, Snowden did not hurt anybody. His 'crime' is that he blew the whistle on the U.S. government's violation of civil rights."

"His whistle-blowing is in the global public interest," the commentary added. "Therefore, extraditing Snowden back to the U.S. would not only be a betrayal of Snowden's trust, but a disappointment for expectations around the world. The image of Hong Kong would be forever tarnished."

In Hong Kong, support for Snowden hinged both on Hong Kong's historic status as a refuge for dissidents -- mostly from the mainland -- as well as locals' outrage over Snowden's revelations that their supposed ally, the United States, had been targeting the city for extensive surveillance activities.

Hundreds of Hong Kongers marched last Saturday on the U.S. consulate in the city, chanting slogans such as "Protect Edward Snowden!" and carrying posters of President Obama saying, "Big Brother is Watching You."

Law Yuk Kai, director of the Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor, said Sunday that he was pleased that the city government had "honored its obligation under our legal system to allow Mr. Snowden to leave" the city.

"Hong Kong was probably not a very good place for him," Law said. "The legal procedures involved had certain uncertainties: First, the legal system is not totally in our hands; Beijing has a lot to say. Second, the procedure relates to a large number of big legal issues … extradition legislation, refugee laws and constitutional obligations to protect rights under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights."

Tom Grundy, one of the organizers of last weekend's demonstration in support of Snowden, said he was "surprised and relieved" that the Hong Kong government "had the option to detain him and put out an arrest warrant and they didn't."

"It's probably good for him," Grundy said. "It could have been a bit messy. Had he claimed asylum … he would have found himself in a very much broken local immigration system. It could have been a long drawn out process. … We're relieved for him, and we hope his final destination country will provide him some asylum."

Young agreed that Snowden's situation would have "changed drastically" with the issue of an arrest warrant in Hong Kong.

"From his 'safe place' he would have been detained in prison awaiting the completion of both his surrender and asylum proceedings," Young said. "That would have been a harsh existence if he was to fight it out and no certainty that he would not be surrendered." 

Lam said the decision to allow Snowden to leave Hong Kong would certainly result in a "period of tension" both between the U.S. and Beijing and the U.S. and Hong Kong.

"The U.S. of course will now say that Hong Kong's position as an autonomous region might be jeopardized, because it is quite clear that Hong Kong has taken orders from Beijing not to extradite Snowden. I think it's likely U.S. will start asking questions about status of Hong Kong, whether it is really still that autonomous."

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Snowden stopping in Moscow en route to Cuba, Russian says

MOSCOW -- NSA leaker Edward Snowden is flying from Hong Kong to Havana via Moscow, a Russian Foreign Ministry official said Sunday.

The former National Security Agency contractor is expected to land in Moscow at 5 p.m. Sunday, a Foreign Ministry official told the Los Angeles Times on condition of anonymity.

The next flight to Havana is Monday afternoon so Snowden most likely will spend his time in the transit zone of Moscow Sheremetyevo airport, he said.

"Snowden doesn't have a Russian visa, and he can't get outside the transit area of the airport," the official said. "Even if there is an Interpol warrant for his arrest, of which we are not aware, our law enforcement agencies won't be able to do that in the transit area."

The official said Snowden is traveling in the company of at least one lawyer associated with WikiLeaks.

The Kremlin is not aware of Snowden's plans, said Dmitry Peskov, President Vladimir Putin's spokesman. "We know nothing about [Snowden's] plans, whether he is coming to Moscow or not," Peskov said.

Should Snowden ask for political asylum, Russia is ready "to consider his request," Peskov said. "We have special procedures for such cases."

Leonid Kalashnikov, deputy chief of the foreign relations committee of the Russian Parliament's lower house, said he wouldn't be surprised if Russia granted asylum to Snowden.

"The United States and the West in general more than once granted asylum to Russian special services defectors, so if we do it for a change, I don't think this will seriously harm our relations," he said. "But at this point we are not aware of such intentions on his part.

"Snowden is visiting Moscow in transit, and where he will end up in the end and which country will dare to finally host him, we can't say at this point," he added.

sergei.loiko@latimes.com

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DWP to build groundwater treatment plants on Superfund site

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power plans to build the world's largest groundwater treatment center over one of the largest Superfund pollution sites in the United States: the San Fernando Basin.

Two plants costing a combined $600 million to $800 million will restore groundwater pumping of drinking water from scores of San Fernando Valley wells that the DWP began closing in the 1980s, the utility said. The plants also will ensure that other wells remain open despite pollution plumes steadily migrating in their direction.

The plans mark a major shift at DWP, reversing a trend of recent decades in which the utility has offset diminishing use of groundwater with imports from Northern California and the eastern Sierra.

"By 2035, we plan to reduce our purchases of imported water by half," said James McDaniel, the DWP's senior assistant general manager.

The shift is necessary because environmental restrictions in the Sierra have reduced those imports and because the cost of water from the north has risen sharply — 84% over the last decade.

The San Fernando Basin accounts for more than 80% of the city's total local water rights, but because of contamination plumes of toxic chemicals including hexavalent chromium, perchlorate, nitrates and the carcinogen trichloroethylene, only about half of its 115 groundwater production wells are usable.

At the current rate of migration of pollutants, the city would be unable to use most of its groundwater entitlements in the basin within five to seven years, forcing it to buy and import more expensive water from the Metropolitan Water District, DWP officials said.

One treatment center will be built on DWP property in North Hollywood just north of Vanowen Street, between Morella and Hinds avenues. It will process three times as much water per second as the world's largest existing groundwater treatment facility, officials said. The DWP will build a second, slightly smaller center near the intersection of the 5 and 170 Freeways.

Construction is to begin in five years, said Marty Adams, director of water operations for the DWP. The DWP hopes to have both centers operating by 2022, producing about a quarter of the 215 billion gallons the city consumes each year.

The cost of the treatment centers will be largely borne by ratepayers, backed by municipal bond sales and spread out over 30 to 40 years, McDaniel said. The size of the rate increase for the project has yet to be determined, and the utility said it expects to field many questions from public officials and customers as the plans move forward.

Part of the cost will be offset by reducing demand for more expensive imported water and from financial compensation under the federal Superfund laws, which requires payments by parties responsible for contamination.

Over the last decade, local groundwater has provided about 11% of the city's total supplies, and nearly 30% in drought years. About 36% came from the Los Angeles Aqueduct system in the eastern Sierra Nevada and 52% from Metropolitan Water District supplies pumped from Northern California.

This year, amid ongoing drought conditions, the Los Angeles Aqueduct system is conveying less water from the Sierra than at any time since it was built in 1913.

Environmental organizations welcomed news about the treatment plants.

"The key thing is that Los Angeles is looking ahead. With climate change, we can no longer rely on snow in the Sierra Nevada range to be our reservoir," said Lenny Siegel, spokesman for the Center for Public Environmental Oversight.

Conner Everts, executive director of the Southern California Watershed Alliance, said environmental organizations have wanted to recharge the aquifer with more storm water and other sources "but DWP said it wasn't possible because of the pollution."

"It's exciting that the DWP is finally moving forward with greater reliance on local water supplies," Mark Gold, associate director of UCLA's Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, said. "However, it's long overdue. Could they have done this five years ago? Yes."

The basin's groundwater was contaminated primarily by improper storage and handling of chlorinated solvents, including trichloroethylene, also known as TCE, which was widely used after World War II to degrease metal and electronic parts. The solvents were dumped into disposal pits and storage tanks at industrial plants and military bases, where it seeped into the aquifer.

Other contaminants came from automobile repair shops and junkyards, unlined landfills, dry cleaners, paint shops, chrome plating businesses and historic dairy and agricultural operations.

The EPA determined in 2011 that TCE can cause kidney and liver cancer, lymphoma and other health problems.

The public can be exposed to TCE in several ways, including by showering in contaminated water and by breathing air in homes where TCE vapors have intruded from the soil. TCE's movement from contaminated groundwater and soil into the indoor air of overlying buildings is a major concern.

The DWP is currently drilling monitoring wells throughout the region to identify as many contaminants as possible and develop strategies for removing them, said Susan Rowghani, director of DWP's water engineering and technical services. Each contaminant will require its own specialized purification process.

For example, the current process for removing TCE is to pump water to the top of an aeration tower and, as the water flows back down, use an upward blower to send a countercurrent through it. TCE becomes trapped and is vaporized into a controlled airstream that is then filtered through activated carbon to ensure that it is not released into the atmosphere.

louis.sahagun@latimes.com

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CicLAvia fills Wilshire Boulevard with bicycles

Quincy and Monica Jeffries had never seen Wilshire Boulevard so quiet. They smiled up at the blue-green facade of the Wiltern theater.

"You just drive by, and you don't recognize all the beautiful buildings," Monica Jeffries, 40, said.

The couple had traveled from Santa Clarita to participate in CicLAvia, which offered a rare opportunity to enjoy a car-free 6.3-mile stretch of Wilshire Boulevard, from downtown to the Miracle Mile area. The Jeffrieses rode Trikkes — three-wheeled, scooter-like vehicles with no motors or pedals.

Sunday marked the seventh CicLAvia, a recurring event that is intended to give Angelenos a different perspective on the city. Wilshire was closed to motorized vehicles between Grand and Fairfax avenues for seven hours, the longest a CicLAvia has lasted.

Under a gray June-gloom sky, some riders had speakers in their bicycle baskets blaring music — one man's blasted Daft Punk songs — and others sang as they rode.

Some sported Spandex and rode with focus. One man pedaled quickly and stared ahead, while the young girl riding tandem behind him gazed around at the Korean barbecue restaurants they passed.

Les Golan, 57, pedaled her bicycle with her cockatiels — all 19 of them — perched on her shoulders, chest and neck. The music teacher has participated in multiple CicLAvias with her birds, which were all named after popular musicians and singers such as Billie Holiday and Dean Martin.

CicLAvia's organizers called Sunday's route the most pedestrian-friendly one yet. It began and ended with pedestrian-only zones, which featured activities such as Pilates and bicycle helmet decoration.

Judy Harper of Echo Park posed for a picture with a large Oscar statue near one end of the route at Fairfax Avenue. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences plans to open a film museum nearby.

"It's so beautiful to see," Harper, 52, said of the event. "People don't believe L.A. is a riding city, but it's great because it's relatively flat and we have beautiful weather."

The $350,000 cost to stage each event is paid for by the nonprofit CicLAvia and by the city, which uses state and federal money. CicLAvia was inspired by similar ciclovía events in Colombia, which started more than 30 years ago as a response to the congestion and pollution of city streets.

Sunday's event drew more than 100,000 people, CicLAvia spokesman Robert Gard said.

J.J. Keith, 33, a writer from Hollywood, clutched her husband Alden's shoulder as she tried to maneuver in a pair of roller skates. Alden Keith, 35, pushed a stroller carrying their young son.

Their daughter Beatrix, 4, rode ahead on a Razor scooter, wearing a blond ponytail and pink helmet. She smiled as she got too far ahead and her mother told her to slow down.

"She's just always wanting to scooter," Alden Keith said, laughing as his wife tried to catch up to Beatrix. "We don't have a lot of parks without cracks and potholes; this really is one of the only places she can do it."

As her parents slowed down, Beatrix turned around and looked up at them. "What's wrong with you guys?" she said, adding that she was done "relaxing."

A few blocks later, her parents were grinning. A tired Beatrix rode in the back of the stroller while her father carried the scooter on his shoulder. Her mother had traded the skates for a pair of sandals.

emily.foxhall@latimes.com

hailey.branson@latimes.com

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Snowden an eccentric, but hardly stood out at NSA

WASHINGTON — The National Security Agency is the size of a small town, with more than 30,000 employees and as much variety. There are blue-haired iconoclasts who work in their socks, buttoned-down military types and pale-faced introverts who avoid eye contact in the hallways.

On the surface, at least, Edward Snowden was hardly unusual at America's largest and most powerful intelligence agency. A self-taught computer whiz who wanted to travel the world, Snowden seemed a perfect fit for a secretive organization that spies on communications from foreign terrorism suspects.

But in hundreds of online postings dating back a decade, Snowden also denounced "pervasive government secrecy" and criticized America's "unquestioning obedience towards spooky types."

At least online, Snowden seemed sardonic, affably geeky and supremely self-assured. In 2006, someone posted to Ars Technica, a website popular with technophiles, about an odd clicking in an Xbox video game console. A response came from "TheTrueHOOHA," Snowden's pen name: "NSA's new surveillance program. That's the sound of freedom, citizen!"

On Friday, U.S. officials said a criminal complaint had been filed against Snowden over his leak of classified NSA programs that sweep up Americans' telephone records and foreigners' email traffic. Since the disclosures first appeared in the news two weeks ago, investigators have searched for clues in his past that might have hinted at his intentions.

In one way, he was no anomaly: The NSA has hired thousands of people in their 20s and 30s (Snowden turned 30 on Friday) — including techies, hackers and video gamers — since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, to keep up with the digital explosion and expand America's cyber spying.

"It's a very eccentric group of individuals with some really far-out ideas about the world," said Matthew Aid, author of "The Secret Sentry," a book about the agency. "They're more liberal. They're better educated than their predecessors."

The NSA "has been forced to suck in its gut a little bit, saying we'll put up with these techno geeks … as long as they keep their mouth shut and abide by the rules," he added.

The NSA director, four-star Army Gen. Keith Alexander, even showed up in a black T-shirt and jeans last year at Defcon, a major conference for computer hackers, to deliver the keynote speech and look for recruits. "In this room right here is the talent we need to secure cyberspace," Alexander, who normally wears his military uniform, told the group.

Many of those at the NSA could earn fatter salaries in Silicon Valley or elsewhere in the private sector, as Snowden did. Before he emerged into the spotlight (and then went into hiding, apparently in Hong Kong), he worked for 15 months as a contractor at an NSA facility in Hawaii, first for Dell and then for Booz Allen Hamilton.

Experts question whether Snowden's history raised any red flags when a Virginia contractor, USIS, conducted his background check.

Federal investigators are conducting a criminal inquiry of USIS, which does two-thirds of federal background investigations, for "systematic failure to adequately conduct investigations under its contract," according to Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), who chairs the subcommittee on financial and contracting oversight.

Cedric Leighton, a retired Air Force intelligence officer who was the NSA's deputy director for training in 2009-10, said vetting procedures were stricter for analysts and those engaged in offensive cyber operations than for systems administrators like Snowden.

But more rigorous vetting might not have stopped Snowden from being hired or found grounds to deny or revoke his security clearance.

"When you get a security clearance, you don't stop having political beliefs," said Jeff Moss, a renowned ex-hacker and cyber consultant who serves on the Department of Homeland Security Advisory Council.

In any case, Snowden's online posts sound more juvenile than subversive. Raised in Crofton, a small town near the 350-acre NSA headquarters campus at Ft. Meade, Md., he dropped out of school in 10th grade and never obtained a college degree, although he bounced around among several schools.

In the early 2000s, he worked for Ryuhana Press, a startup website for Japanese comics, and wrote on his profile page, "You see, I act arrogant and cruel because I was not hugged enough as a child, and because the public education system turned it's [sic] wretched, spiked back on me."

He was a frequent contributor to the Ars Technica forum, posting more than 700 times on a variety of topics. In 2003, he solicited advice on how to hide his Internet activity, saying, "I wouldn't want God himself to know where I've been, you know?"

Snowden's climb in the intelligence community remains puzzling. He somehow rose from lowly security guard at a NSA-affiliated research center at the University of Maryland in 2005 to a position as a CIA computer analyst assigned to a plush post in Geneva from 2007 to 2009.

In 2006, apparently after he'd joined the CIA, Snowden embraced a popular online cause. He wrote that he had signed a petition calling on the Recording Industry Assn. of America to cease legal action against people who downloaded copyrighted music without payment or authorization.

In later years, Snowden was proud of his career advancement, bragging about his salary ("I make $70k, I just had to turn down offers for $83k and $180k") and dispensing online advice like a world-weary veteran.

He talked up the perks of a State Department information-technology job, which requires a security clearance. "If you're cleared, have a lifestyle, and have specialized IT skills, you can go anywhere in the world right now," he wrote. "Thank god for wars."

Michael Hayden, who was NSA director from 1999 to 2005, said the agency needed to continue hiring young techies but do a better job of screening recruits.

"We know which population has the skills we need," he said. "And almost all are loyal Americans." Snowden, he added, "was a mistake."

shashank.bengali@latimes.com

Times staff writer Richard A. Serrano contributed to this report.

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Fatal stabbing a reminder of gussied-up Tinseltown's darker past

The corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue offers a picture postcard view of the new, revitalized Tinseltown.

The boulevard is jammed with tourists, the streets lined with tour buses. Street performers dressed in colorful costumes entertain and panhandle on the sidewalk in front of chain stores such as Forever 21, Sephora, the Hard Rock Cafe and Express. Comedian Jimmy Kimmel films his late-night show across the street.

But this week, Hollywood got a stark reminder that for all the upscale development and trendy venues, the district hasn't fully shaken off its darker past. On Tuesday, in front of the American Eagle clothing store, a 23-year-old woman collapsed after being fatally stabbed. Police arrested a transient who had allegedly demanded $1 from her after she took his photo.

The death of Christine Calderon left the Hollywood tourist district stunned and on Friday prompted Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck and Mayor-elect Eric Garcetti to call for increased patrols, including by horse-mounted units.

We "don't want to lose any of the ground that's been gained in Hollywood," Beck said. "What we don't want is for this tragedy to go unrecognized."

Hollywood's transformation over the last decade or so has been dramatic. The once-glamorous district had been in steep decline for decades, bottoming out in the 1990s when crime reached new highs and many of the old theaters that once dominated the boulevard closed down.

The Hollywood & Highland complex where Calderon was found stabbed — an imposing shopping center that includes the theater where the Oscars take place each year — was the first of several mega-developments that transformed the area. The most recent is the luxury W Hotel development at the iconic corner of Hollywood and Vine.

These days, tourists dominate during the day. After the sun sets, Hollywood's nightclub scene kicks into high gear.

Few argue with how much Hollywood has changed. But those who live and work in the area said there are gritty remnants, with a sizable homeless population and plenty of opportunities for petty crime.

Despite its makeover, crime remains a daily occurrence in Hollywood, according to a Times analysis. Recent weeks show no unusual increases, but thefts are common in high-traffic areas and more than 300 major violent crimes were reported in the neighborhood over the last six months.

Adjusted for population, its violent crime rate ranked 30th and its property crime rate 33rd among more than 200 neighborhoods policed by the LAPD or the L.A. County Sheriff's Department.

"You get some of everything here," said Dylan Watson, assistant manager of the American Eagle store at Hollywood & Highland. "Nothing is really surprising."

It's not uncommon, he said, for someone to approach him during a smoke break outside of the store and ask for cigarettes. If he refuses, he said, the response is often aggression.

"They always seem like they want to fight," he said. "Some of them are clearly crazy."

Officials in Hollywood said that they were discussing the need for a crackdown — especially on aggressive panhandlers — long before Calderon's death.

Garcetti, who represents part of Hollywood on the City Council, said some of the panhandling is more like extortion. In some cases, people hand out CDs and then demand money. Performers pose with tourists and do the same.

"I'll be damned if we're going to go back to where we were a decade and a half ago in Hollywood," he said in an interview Friday. "I want to have regular prosecutions that will send a clear signal."

Kerry Morrison, the head of the business improvement district in Hollywood, said one of the biggest concerns is aggressive panhandlers and some of the costumed characters. In the past, some of the actors have gotten into physical altercations with passersby.

Authorities said Calderon was strolling down the Walk of Fame with a co-worker at 8 p.m. Tuesday. She pulled out her cellphone to snap a picture of three transients displaying signs asking for money with four-letter insults and a smiley face.

Moments later, according to a law enforcement source, one of the men demanded she pay a dollar for the picture. When she refused, police say, two of the men allegedly pinned Calderon's co-worker against a wall. The third man, Dustin James Kinnear, 26, allegedly jumped on Calderon and fatally stabbed her.

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Teen who murdered baby in dad's arms gets 90 years to life

Sixteen-year-old Donald Ray Dokins' short stature and baby face belie the crime he committed: the fatal shooting of a 1-year-old boy in the arms of his proud and doting father.

As he prepared to sentence the teenager, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Pat Connolly could barely contain his contempt.

"You have no intestinal fortitude to sit up and look at me," Connolly said to Dokins, who was staring at the floor, avoiding the judge's gaze. "You have hatred in your heart that I can't understand."

Prosecutors say that on June 4, 2012, Dokins, a then-15-year-old gang member, rode up on a bicycle to a family gathered outside a home in Watts. He drew a revolver and opened fire, killing 14-month-old Angel Mauro Cortez Vega and wounding his 21-year-old father, Mauro Cortez. Dokins, authorities say, mistakenly believed the father was a member of a rival gang because of the color of his T-shirt.

Prosecutors charged Dokins as an adult. Connolly sentenced him to 90 years to life in prison.

"You'll never have another opportunity to kill an innocent victim," Connolly said. "You're not capable of showing remorse today, but I hope some time you will be able to…. A man can't change the length of his life, but he can change its depth and substance."

Before the sentencing, friends and relatives of both the victims and Dokins addressed the court.

Dokins' brother Derrick Washington described his sibling as a straight-A student who wrote poetry. Washington broke down in tears, asserting his brother's innocence.

"He's not a monster. He's just a little boy," said Washington, wearing a rosary around his neck.

Another family member told the judge that Dokins wouldn't be around to raise his own daughter, who police said is close to the same age as the child he killed.

Susan Cuscuna, a creative-writing instructor in the state's juvenile-justice centers who has taught Dokins for more than a year, said he is a "very good" student.

"He's little in size and little inside, and he's frightened," Cuscuna said.

Dokins' killing of a 1-year-old Latino has required him to go into "the shoe" — a protective-custody unit, she said.

Threats to Dokins' life are so grave, said his attorney Winston Kevin McKesson, that he opposed broadcasts of the sentencing, fearing that additional pictures of his client in the media would jeopardize his life.

Connolly allowed journalists to photograph and record the proceedings, saying that Dokins "has made his bed, and he will now lie in it."

Liliana Nava, 23, narrated the brief life of her son, sobbing as she marked his exact age: 1 year, two months and three days. Her husband, Mauro, a construction worker, could not attend out of fear it would worsen his anxiety attacks, so she spoke on his behalf.

"We loved him, and to us, he was perfect," said Nava, wearing a pendant of an angel commemorating her son.

The baby's godmother, Marisol Perez, 34, described the day before the shooting, when she and her husband played with Angel in a nearby park. She read aloud a poem titled "Memories," eliciting tears from family and friends present.

"Our family chain is broken, and nothing seems the same," Perez said.

The sentencing capped a trial that concluded in early April when a jury at the Compton Courthouse found Dokins guilty of first-degree murder and attempted murder after less than 90 minutes of deliberations, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Danette Gomez, who prosecuted the case.

During the trial, three witnesses identified Dokins as the killer: a family friend present on the night of the shooting; Nava, who was standing near her husband; and a neighbor who saw Dokins fleeing from the scene on his bicycle.

A gray hooded sweatshirt — which witnesses identified the shooter as wearing — was found burning in an abandoned home, Gomez said. Investigators found Dokins' DNA on the sweatshirt's cuff and collar.

At the time of the shooting, Dokins' gang was actively feuding with a rival gang from Grape Street, authorities said. Prosecutors argued that Dokins shot both victims because the child's father was wearing a purple T-shirt, the signifying color of the rival gang. The child's father is "absolutely not" a member of a gang, Gomez said.

Since his arrest, Dokins has maintained his innocence.

McKesson, Dokins' attorney, sought a new trial Friday, arguing that the eyewitness testimony was inconsistent and that conclusive evidence was lacking. Investigators say they did not find the gun or the bicycle used in the slaying.

Connolly denied the motion, saying the evidence "overwhelmingly" showed Dokins' guilt.

matthew.hamilton@latimes.com

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LAPD's firing of Christopher Dorner was justified, report says

Christopher Dorner, the ex-Los Angeles police officer who went on a killing rampage to avenge his firing from the LAPD, lied repeatedly to further a "personal agenda" during his short time on the force and deserved to be thrown out of the department, police officials concluded in a report released Friday.

Police Chief Charlie Beck ordered an internal review of Dorner's 2009 firing to address claims Dorner made about the department in a rambling manifesto he posted online, in which he described an LAPD rife with racism and corruption.

Beck made the move after a chorus of critics from within the department and outside its ranks latched on to Dorner's allegations, saying that although they condemned the killings, Dorner's dark description of the agency rang true. That swell of harsh criticism, Beck and others feared, threatened to undo years of work by police and city officials to rehabilitate the department's reputation after decades marked by abuses and scandal.

"I directed this review because I wanted to ensure that the Los Angeles Police Department is fair and transparent in all that we do," Beck said Friday in a prepared statement. "All of us recognize that as a department we are not perfect; nonetheless, this report shows that the discharge of Christopher Dorner was factually and legally the right decision."

Dorner was fired in 2009, and in February of this year, police say, he shot to death an Irvine woman — the daughter of the attorney who defended him at his disciplinary proceedings — and her fiance. Dorner then killed two police officers and wounded three other people as he evaded capture during an intense manhunt, authorities said.

After more than a week on the run, Dorner was discovered in the mountains near Big Bear and chased into a cabin in the woods, where he died from what the report confirmed was a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The 39-page report, written by Gerald Chaleff, a former criminal defense attorney who serves as a special assistant to Beck, staunchly defended the decision to kick Dorner out of the LAPD. Police investigators at the time, Chaleff concluded, were right when they found that Dorner, then a rookie, fabricated a story in 2007 accusing his training officer of repeatedly kicking a handcuffed, mentally ill man.

Chaleff focused largely on the fact that Dorner waited nearly two weeks before he reported the alleged kicking to a supervisor and then offered conflicting explanations for the delay. For example, he at one point told investigators he trusted only one supervisor at his station and wanted to wait until he could report the abuse to him. Records, however, showed that the supervisor and Dorner worked the same shift on several days before he spoke up, the report found.

The report also buttressed the finding of officials at the time of what motivated Dorner to fabricate the story of the kicking. He made up the story, Chaleff said, only after his training officer warned him that his performance in the field had been poor and that she was contemplating whether to give him failing marks in an upcoming assessment.

"The inconsistencies in Dorner's various explanations as to why there was a delay in his reporting the alleged kicks to a supervisor, and the fact that he offered no reasonable rationale for such delays, cast considerable doubt on the credibility of his allegations," the report said. "Dorner's statements concerning the delay continued to change throughout his testimony and appeared to be self-serving and in several instances were blatant fabrications."

Chaleff wrote that he found no credible evidence to support Dorner's claim. The mentally ill man who was arrested was too sick to be coherent, and three witnesses to the arrest all said they did not see the man get kicked.

Chaleff also knocked down allegations made by Dorner that his training officer was friends with a member of the disciplinary board that fired him and others involved in the investigation. Interviews with the various officers, as well as others who might have known about the alleged relationships, turned up nothing to support Dorner's claims, according to the report.

The report outlined other apparent lies Dorner told and what Chaleff said were his attempts to use the LAPD's discipline system "to further his own agenda." In one instance, internal affairs investigators asked him if he had suffered any retaliation at work for reporting his training officer, and Dorner said he had not. Days later, however, he filed a retaliation complaint, saying an unknown officer had urinated on his uniform jacket. Tests on the jacket by the LAPD lab disproved the allegation.

Chaleff emphasized as well that Dorner appealed his firing twice in the courts and to the LAPD's independent inspector general, and each time the decision was upheld.

"Based on the evidence at hand, it appears that the allegation of his training officer kicking an arrestee was ... an allegation to further his personal agenda," Chaleff wrote. "After careful examination of all the evidence, it is clear that Dorner could not be deemed credible."

Also on Friday, the city's inspector general of the LAPD, Alex Bustamante, examined the department's review of the Dorner case. In a brief report, Bustamante said he "ultimately concurs with the department's conclusions" and found no evidence to bolster Dorner's claims. Bustamante's report did point out some inconsistencies in the voluminous case file on Dorner's firing but said none of them would have affected the decision to remove Dorner from the force.

Rafael Bernardino, a member of the Police Commission, which oversees the department, said he didn't think the department's review of the case was necessary since "I never even considered Dorner's claims to be realistic."

"Perceptions of the department are different than the reality. They change long after the facts of the place have changed, and I understand that the chief had to be sensitive to that," he said. "I grew up in Los Angeles and I know the troubled history of this department … but it is different today."

Beck ordered a second review, still underway, that will examine the LAPD's discipline system in general and claims by officers that it is unfair.

joel.rubin@latimes.com

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California's job picture gets brighter

Just a few years ago, California was hemorrhaging tens of thousands of jobs and had one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation.

But on Friday the Golden State reached a turning point: Helped by a recovering housing market, its jobless rate plunged to 8.6% in May, down from 9% in April and the lowest level in nearly five years. The improved economy has cut the number of unemployed Californians to 1.5 million from a peak of 2.3 million in 2010.

Economists said the latest batch of government data showed the state is creating jobs faster than the labor force is growing, a sign of true strengthening in the labor market. Some previous dips in the unemployment rate were the result of discouraged job seekers dropping out of the workforce.

"California is making a big comeback," said Esmael Adibi, a Chapman University economist. "That's why you see such a sharp drop in the unemployment rate."

The state's employers added 10,800 employees to their payrolls in May, according to figures released Friday by the state Employment Development Department. Nearly all industries added workers, led by the leisure and hospitality sector, which added 9,000 jobs, mainly at hotels and restaurants.

Over the last year, California has added 252,100 jobs. That has helped California lower its unemployment faster than any other state since May 2012, when the jobless rate stood at 10.7%. The unemployment rate is also well below the 12.4% peak reached in February 2010.

The gains mean that California is no longer competing with Mississippi and Nevada for the dubious distinction of having the highest unemployment rate in the nation. Five other states now have higher unemployment rates than California, according to federal data.

Although the state's economy is improving, it is far from healed. California's unemployment rate is higher than the 7.6% national rate, and the state is still 601,000 jobs short of its peak employment level reached in July 2007.

"We are not at Champagne and caviar yet," said Brandi Britton, district president of professional staffing firm Robert Half International. "Although it certainly feels like each month gets better."

Driving the job expansion this year is the construction industry, which is heating up along with the real estate market. Nearly 39,000 jobs have been added since May 2012, although last month showed a decline of 8,500 jobs that economists believe was an anomaly.

But it's not just laborers swinging hammers and hanging up drywall. The housing recovery has had a ripple effect that's leading to hiring in related industries such as banking, insurance and retail.

That is good news to Aaron Lobliner, a 28-year-old urban planner who graduated from college in 2009 near the depths of the recession.

Unable to find full-time work, Lobliner hustled for two years flipping burgers at an In-N-Out restaurant and working part-time internships in his field. He recently nabbed a full-time job in Orange County working on a housing development in Rancho Mission Viejo.

My job "is tied to the real estate industry," Lobliner said. And "there's been a significant uptick in hiring. People are hiring architects again. People are hiring engineers. And you need planners. We're all in the same boat."

These kinds of white-collar jobs have driven the recovery over the last year. The professional business services sector, which includes many higher-paying jobs, added 73,000 new positions in the last 12 months.

Still, many of the jobs being created in California are low-wage jobs. The leisure and hospitality sector posted the second-highest employment gain during the same time period, swelling by 64,000 jobs.

A separate government survey of households offered more clues about the state's economic well-being. Total employment grew by nearly 84,000 in May. That's an indication that Californians have turned to self-employment or consulting work not captured in the payroll data.

This might be part of an overall shift in the state's job market, economists and employment experts said. They worry that many companies might rely on temporary or contract workers even after the economy fully recovers.

"We may be hitting an employment tipping point," said Michael Bernick, former director of California's Employment Development Department. "The cost of unemployment insurance, worker's comp and most of all healthcare is becoming so large that companies are looking at other options such as independent contracting, technology or overtime for existing employees."

That means job seekers such as Jerry Levinson, 51, may continue to struggle by piecing together part-time work or settling for a salary far below their expectations.

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Federal judges order California to free 9,600 inmates

SACRAMENTO — A trio of federal judges ordered Gov. Jerry Brown to immediately begin freeing state inmates and waived state laws to allow early releases, threatening the governor with contempt if he does not comply.

Citing California's "defiance," "intransigence" and "deliberate failure" to provide inmates with adequate care in its overcrowded lockups, the judges on Thursday said Brown must shed 9,600 inmates —about 8% of the prison population — by the end of the year.

Unless he finds another way to ease crowding, the governor must expand the credits that inmates can earn for good behavior or participation in rehabilitation programs, the judges said.

"We are willing to defer to their choice for how to comply with our order, not whether to comply with it," the judges wrote. "Defendants have consistently sought to frustrate every attempt by this court to achieve a resolution to the overcrowding problem."

If Sacramento does not meet the inmate cap on time, the judges said, it will have to release prisoners from a list of "low risk" offenders the court has told the administration to prepare.

Brown had already taken steps to appeal the court-imposed cap to the U.S. Supreme Court, and he vowed to fight the latest ruling as well.

"The state will seek an immediate stay of this unprecedented order to release almost 10,000 inmates by the end of this year," he said in a statement.

He had immediate backing from the California Police Chiefs Assn. The court order shows "a complete disregard for the safety of communities across California," said the group's president, Covina Police Chief Kim Raney.

"Pressing for 9,000 more inmates on the streets," Raney said, shows "an activist court more concerned with prisoners than the safety of the communities."

But a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said it did not expect to have to contend with a flood of ex-convicts to watch over.

"It is never a positive step when prisoners have to be released," said spokesman Steve Whitmore, "but the Sheriff's Department is prepared for this eventuality."

Brown has until July 13 to file his full appeal with the high court, the same body that two years ago upheld findings that California prison conditions violated the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.

Lawyers for inmates, meanwhile, said Brown has few options but to let some prisoners go.

"At this point, the governor is an inch away from contempt," said Don Specter, lead attorney for the Prison Law Office, which in 2001 filed one of two lawsuits on which the judges based their order. "He must make every effort to comply immediately."

In May, Brown told the court under protest that he could further trim the prison population by continuing to use firefighting camps and privately owned facilities to house state inmates, and by leasing space in Los Angeles and Alameda county jails. In that plan, increasing the time off that inmates may earn for good behavior would have had little impact.

Thursday's order requires, absent other solutions, that the state give minimum-custody inmates two days off for every one served without trouble and to apply those credits retroactively. Such a step could spur the release of as many as 5,385 prisoners by the end of December.

A separate lawsuit, dating to 1990, alleges unconstitutionally cruel treatment of mentally ill inmates. That the courts are still trying, after two decades, to fix prison conditions was not lost on the three-judge panel that oversees prison crowding, U.S. District Judges Lawrence Karlton and Thelton Henderson and U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Stephen Reinhardt.

Their order accuses the state of "a series of contumacious actions" and challenges Brown's sincerity about obeying their orders. They noted that the governor lifted an emergency proclamation that allowed inmates to be transferred to prisons in other states, for example.

Requests from prison lawyers that the administration be held in contempt "have considerable merit," the judges wrote.

The governor's reluctance to set prisoners free early has the backing of legislative leaders, including Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento). He joked openly on Wednesday about intending to kill any population-reduction plans the courts might order the governor to submit to the Legislature.

Republicans in the Legislature have pushed a plan to resume prison expansion in California.

In April, they urged Brown to restore borrowing authority that would have allowed 13,000 beds to be added. They also asked that he continue to pay to house some prisoners in private facilities in the interim. Brown did not include such provisions in the budget that is now on his desk.

The judges said there could be no delays in compliance with their order for appeals or for amendments to the plan Brown submitted in May.

They rejected state officials' assertion that "with more time, they could resolve the problem."

California voters may be more willing than Brown to release inmates to reduce crowding. In a recent USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll, they were wary of sacrificing public safety, but at the same time supported steps to reduce crowding.

Sixty-three percent said they favored releasing low-level, nonviolent offenders from prison early.

paige.stjohn@latimes.com

Times staff writers Chris Megerian and Richard Winton contributed to this report.

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