Reseda, CA

Since Saturday, Los Angeles firefighters have put out a string of 14 small fires across Reseda, which officials are now calling suspicious blazes that probably are connected, according to the Los Angeles Fire Department.

The fires have mostly ignited trash and debris, which firefighters quickly extinguished with limited damage, said Los Angeles Fire spokesperson Brian Humphrey. He said no one has been injured in the blazes and only minor property damage has been reported.

No suspect or suspects have been identified, Humphrey said. Officials have not determined the fires to be arson, which would require intent, but are calling the blazes “suspicious.”

California

Sept. 8, 2023

“Our investigators worked tirelessly throughout the night,” Humphrey said. “They have been speaking with witnesses, gathering evidence.”

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Firefighters responded to several of the 14 fires Monday evening and into early Tuesday, with almost all of them occurring in the “hours of darkness,” Humphrey said.

Humphrey did not release any suspect information or share a description of a possible suspect or suspects.

He said there could have been other fires in this San Fernando Valley neighborhood before or during this 72-hour period that are also connected to these 14 fires, explaining that investigators are “casting a wider net.”

One such fire, which is not currently a part of the 14 linked blazes, swallowed Brendan Yaffe’s backyard fence, a bamboo barricade and spread into a neighbor’s yard and nearby power lines during broad daylight — knocking out power and internet access for a few hours Sunday, Yaffe said.

A fire burns along Brendan Yaffe’s fence in Reseda, sparked Sunday, Sept. 10, 2023.

He wasn’t home when the blaze ignited at his Reseda home, but luckily his next-door neighbors spotted the smoke and called him.

“He’s just yelling, ‘Brendan, your house is on fire!’” Yaffe, 31, recalled. “I’m in tears, all I hear is my house is on fire.”

But when his neighbor rushed over to respond, he realized the home hadn’t yet caught fire, but the backyard blaze was spreading. With help from his brother-in-law and other neighbors, Julio Saavedra started hosing off the fire, trying to calm the flames.

“My neighbors jumped into action,” Yaffe said. They “literally saved my house.”

Aug. 2, 2023

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He and his pregnant wife haven’t been able to return because of extensive smoke damage to the house.

“A lot of smoke barreled into the house,” Yaffe said.

The cause of the fire at Yaffe’s house hasn’t been determined, and no one has been arrested, Humphrey said.

The initial call to the Fire Department described the fire as starting near a homeless encampment in the bed of the Los Angeles River, which backs up to Yaffe’s home. When firefighters responded to Yaffe’s yard, they spotted additional fires along the river, Humphrey said, though it wasn’t clear how those started or if they were related.

Yaffe suspects the fire that affected his property was intentionally set, and said he would like to see officials take these fires seriously and hold those responsible accountable.

RESEDA, LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- ehobby House in Reseda has been selling and repairing remote control vehicles for over 40 years. If it can fly, hover, or zoom across the floor with a remote, chances are Greg Boguslavsky can fix it.

"We sell and repair RC cars boats, planes, helicopters, airplanes, basically anything RC," said Boguslavsky.

Boguslavsky says he's had a passion for remote control vehicles ever since he was little.

"I remember somebody was selling some little remote control car and I was just begging my parents to buy it," Boguslavsky said.

When Boguslavsky took ownership of ehobby House in 2016, he says business was doing great and he had many loyal customers who loved the hobby.

"When I started in 2016, it was really good. 2017, 2018 got even better. 2018, 2019 was at its high," Boguslavsky said.

But then in 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic hit and Boguslavsky says the store was struggling.

"Everything went downhill starting with the delays in shipments, then we closed down. No money coming in because customers weren't coming and now we're barely hanging in there," Boguslavsky said.

Boguslavsky says he's behind on rent and utility bills, but he's remaining optimistic and started a GoFundMe to raise money for the store.

"I'm not trying to get the money for myself. I'm trying to preserve the store because it has been here for so long,"

Boguslavsky says the community is what makes this place so special and he hopes to raise $100,000 on GoFundMe to keep the store running.

"It makes me kind of sad because of the fact that, yeah you don't really have anywhere to go anymore," said customer Johnny Gallo.

"It's a very sad and dark feeling inside because this place brings so much happiness and joy," said customer Yasean Bruce.

Boguslavsky said he's not sure how much longer the store will survive, but he's doing everything possible to keep the doors open.

"I figured if I can get some help to get this thing going again, I'll use every resource I have," Boguslavsky said.

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For decades, the prestigious humanities magnet program at Grover Cleveland Charter High School sent students to the nation’s best colleges, but it also fostered a culture of sexual abuse in which students were exploited by their teachers. That legacy is now costing the Los Angeles Unified School District millions of dollars.

The L.A. Unified school board approved a $7.9-million settlement Tuesday with a 40-year-old woman who said she was sexually abused by a teacher who worked on the Reseda campus. The suit is the fourth settled by the district in connection with teachers in Cleveland’s Core humanities program.

With this settlement, the district’s total payout this year climbs to $15.1 million, to four former Cleveland students who alleged they were groomed, manipulated and sexually abused between the mid-1990s and 2009.

California

Sept. 27, 2023

Tuesday’s settlement involved a woman who said that when she was a teenager, now-deceased teacher Chris Miller and his colleague Vivian Atkin manipulated her into a sexual relationship. The litigation alleges the pair, married to other people at the time, were involved in an extramarital affair and groomed the teen for a couple of years before revealing their relationship to her when she was in the 11th grade.

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“Outrageously, the district’s lawyers argued, because the sex did not happen on campus, the district didn’t have a responsibility,” said attorney John Taylor, who represents the woman and four other former students in various lawsuits. “They ignored the grooming and manipulation that occurred on campus.”

Miller and his colleagues wanted to disrupt the status quo and cultivated contact beyond the classroom with students, blurring the traditional lines of behavior, according to the lawsuits.

Throughout her senior year in 2001, the woman alleged, she would often leave school early with one or both teachers. In January of that year, Miller began sexually abusing her at his home, she said. In May 2001, she alleged, while Atkin’s husband was out of town, Miller and the girl went to Atkin’s Brentwood apartment, and both teachers sexually abused the teen simultaneously and then forced her to watch Atkin engage in sexual relations with Miller.

According to court records, while denying she abused the girl, Atkin admitted in her deposition that Miller and the student came to her house in May 2001 while her husband was away so that they could have a “healing ceremony” due to her having had a mastectomy. Atkin’s version of the events states, “Candles and incense were lit and the girl painted Atkin’s bare chest.”

Sept. 27, 2023

David Ring and Taylor, attorneys for previous plaintiffs against the school, now in their 30s and 40s, say the Core program at the Reseda school campus had a long history of abuse by its teachers. They maintain that the district’s negligence allowed teachers to groom students so they could manipulate, exploit and abuse them and leave them with a legacy of post-traumatic stress.

The teachers named in the four suits settled were Atkin, Miller, Richard Coleman and Brett Shufelt, all of whom were part of the humanities magnet program. For more than 40 years, the nationally acclaimed program has produced graduates who have gone on to prestigious universities. None of the teachers named in the lawsuits are working in L.A. now.

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According to a brief prepared for trial, the school had received numerous complaints, including from a former student who is now a Superior Court judge, who told an assistant principal in the early 1990s that Miller behaved inappropriately with female students. Court documents stated that, in the mid-1990s, Miller pulled his pants down, exposing his underwear to his class, and also unzipped his pants in front of a student. Both incidents were reported to Cleveland’s administration.

In the 1994-95 school year, a student’s mother found inappropriate letters from Miller to her daughter and complained directly to the same assistant principal, court records show. At the end of the 1997-98 school year, another student’s mother complained directly to the then-principal of Cleveland High School about the teacher propositioning a female student.

According to the litigation, the abuse was rooted in the 1980s and began with another teacher who quit the school amid concerns about his behavior, but administrators “turned a blind eye to blatantly inappropriate behavior.”

California

Sept. 22, 2023

In another of the lawsuits, a woman alleged Miller, from 1994 to 1996, had a sexual relationship with her and coerced her into not reporting him. In April, that lawsuit was settled for $1.95 million, according to court records.

Another woman who attended the school from 1992 to 1996 said that, as a student, she was manipulated into a sexual relationship with teacher Coleman. In that case, the former student alleged Miller asked her if she was keeping Coleman “happy and smiling.” Los Angeles Unified settled the suit for $3 million in April.

The most recent allegation involved teacher Shufelt, who is accused of abusing a student in 2008 and 2009. The suit that resulted was settled in April for $2.25 million.

One lawsuit remains unresolved. That victim was abused by teacher Bill Paden in 2006. He was arrested in 2008 and, the following year, convicted of misdemeanor statutory rape. According to the lawsuit, the same teenager was also sexually abused by Coleman in her senior year in the spring of 2007.

Three interim housing sites across Los Angeles will benefit from more than $1 million in state funding to cover security improvements and renovations, city and state officials announced on Friday, July 21.

Mayor Karen Bass, joined by City Council members and state legislators, said they successfully secured funding in the 2023-24 state budget to support housing sites in Chatsworth, Reseda and El Sereno. The announcement was made during a news conference at the Travelodge motel in Chatsworth, one of the housing sites that will benefit.

The mayor’s office coordinated with the City Council and the Los Angeles delegation of the state legislature to identify projects that needed targeted funding to provide housing for people living on the streets in tents and encampments.

“This year’s budget reflects our commitment to confronting the number one crisis our city is facing,” Bass said.

The mayor thanked Assemblymembers Pilar Schiavo, Jesse Gabriel and Wendy Carrillo and state Senate senators Caroline Menjivar and Henry Stern for working with city leaders to secure “critical funds that will be used to make repairs and open more rooms in order to bring more Angelenos inside.”

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The more than $1 million in funding will support the following interim housing sites:

— Travelodge/Devonshire Lodge: The Devonshire Lodge is a former motel acquired through the state’s Homekey program for use as interim housing and conversion to permanent supportive housing. The site is located in Chatsworth and has 75 units. Stern secured $210,000 and Schiavo secured $200,000 for the city to fund safety improvements at the motel.

— Huntington Villas: Huntington Villas is a former motel which the city acquired in 2020 for utilization as interim housing and conversion to permanent supportive housing. The site has 52 units and is located near El Sereno. Carrillo secured $500,000 for the city to fund renovations, such as accessibility upgrades, Fire Life Safety system upgrades, and installation of security fencing, at the interim housing site.

—The Sieroty/Howard Johnson: The Sieroty is a former motel acquired through the state’s Homekey program for use as interim housing and conversion to permanent supportive housing. The site in Reseda has 75 units of interim housing. Menjivar secured $500,000 and Gabriel secured $300,000 in funding for the city to help ensure 100% occupancy for interim housing. The funding will support accessibility upgrades, Fire Life Safety system upgrades, electrical upgrades, and other necessary renovation.

“We need to get our unhoused neighbors off the streets and onto a pathway into permanent housing. I’m proud to have been able to secure $210,000 to ensure that sites like Travelodge in Chatsworth can be up to code and ready for occupancy,” Stern said in a statement.

Mejivar added that local and state leaders are committed to address the homeless crisis because “every Californian deserves to be safe and housed.”

According to Carrillo, the state has invested more than $17 billion to aid local governments in addressing homelessness since 2019. The 2021 and 2022 Budget Acts invested a combined $21.5 billion over multiple years to advance the greater availability of housing throughout California.

“The 2023-24 budget largely maintains these commitments and includes a housing package of $14.7 billion with an earmarked $3.5 billion in new funding for homelessness programs,” Carrillo said.

Council members John Lee, whose 12th District includes Chatsworth, and Nithya Raman, chair of the Council’s Housing and Homeless Committee, expressed their gratitude for the funding.

“Solving our homelessness crisis means seizing every opportunity we have to secure resources to help people on their journey off the street and indoors,” Raman said in a statement. “I am so grateful to Mayor Bass and our state leaders for this critical infusion of funds for lifesaving beds in my district and throughout the city.”

RESEDA, LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- It's an issue homeless shelters throughout Southern California face - best serving the population inside the facility without having a detrimental impact on the community right outside.

At the Tiny Home Village in Reseda, some residents have complained about tents and vehicles popping up outside the shelter, which isn't allowed under the city ordinance, 41.18.

"These are people that are street people, that are on drugs and so forth and so on, and they just keep doing what they're doing because that's all they know how to do. If they feel too closed in... me too. I will come out and sit in my car," said Patricia Lynn Chapman, who is homeless and lives at the Reseda Tiny Home Village.

The 66-year-old it has helped her get back on her feet by providing a safe place, hot meals, a shower, and legal and medical services.

But, the facility has rules. No drugs, alcohol, or weapons are allowed inside. Some of the residents who live nearby tell Eyewitness News some struggle with the rules.

"She had nowhere to put her stuff because they towed her car out of here. That's was the only thing she could think of doing to protect her stuff. That's just temporary, she's waiting to get a storage," Chapman said.

Hope of the Valley is the service provider who says they've been able to get storage units for residents of the shelter whose belongings don't fit inside - to prevent them from being left outside. They're working to remove any vehicles being used for housing or for illegal activity.

"Do I believe that permanent and supportive and affordable housing is the ultimate answer? I do. But, the streets cannot and should not be the waiting room for permanent housing. We must bring people indoors and that is the function and purpose of interim housing," said Ken Craft, the founder and CEO of Hope of The Valley Rescue Mission.

"We make a promise to a community when we bring a cabin community, or another intervention there... There's benefits to the community as well. They're getting those folks off of the streets nearby. It's a bargain to some extent where you're also saying, we're not going to let this become a magnet for encampments," said Los Angeles City Councilman Bob Blumenfield, who represents Reseda.

"They're trying to get the people off the street. So they're not dying out there. If they make a difference in just one life, it matters," Chapman said.

The city and service providers say they want to know about any issues or violations of 41.18 outside city shelters so they can be addressed immediately. The best thing to do is contact the manager of that facility, the service provider, or your councilmember's office.