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Abby Sewell

FILE - In this April 25, 2010 file photo, singer Whitney Houston performs at the o2 in London as part of her European tour. An autopsy report shows that cocaine was found in Houston's system and that investigators recovered whity powdery substances from her hotel room. Houston died Feb. 11, in California at the age of 48. (AP Photo/Joel Ryan, file)

Whitney Houston drowned in scalding hot water

Abby Sewell, Andrew Blankstein Los Angeles Times

Last updated Thursday, April 5, 2012 - 10:31am

LOS ANGELES -- The coroner's investigation into the death of Whitney Houston came to a close Wednesday with a final autopsy report that described the singer submerged face-down in hot water in the bathtub of her Beverly Hills hotel suite with a unidentified white powdery residue left in a spoon on the bathroom counter.

The report released Wednesday confirmed that the 48-year-old singer drowned in a bathtub, with heart disease and cocaine use listed as contributing factors. It concluded that Houston's death was accidental.

Entertainment, Features, Coroner, Drowning, Singer, Whitney Houston, Music Read more Comments

Church gay nativity scene vandalized

Abby Sewell Los Angeles Times

Last updated Thursday, December 29, 2011 - 3:56pm

CLAREMONT, Calif. -- An unusual nativity display at a Claremont church that conveyed a gay couple was vandalized over the weekend in an incident authorities are investigating as a hate crime.

Crime, Hate Crime, Christmas, Gay, Nativity scenes, Vandalism, National Read more Comments

Loaded guns in checked bags becoming a problem

Abby Sewell Los Angeles Times

Last updated Wednesday, October 26, 2011 - 11:33am

For all the security improvements at airports after 9/11 -- full-body scans, bans on liquids, pat downs -- there is one check that airports aren't doing.

Bags checked at airline counters are scanned for possible explosives but not for loaded guns.

Airports, Guns, Security, TSA, National Read more Comments

Loaded gun tumbles from airport baggage

Abby Sewell, Andrew Blankstein Los Angeles Times

Last updated Monday, October 24, 2011 - 12:13pm

LOS ANGELES -- A loaded and undeclared .38-caliber handgun tumbled from a checked bag at Los Angeles International Airport Sunday, prompting police to detain the gun owner temporarily.

Airport, Guns, National Read more Comments

Mother pushes daughter out of train's path but can't save herself

Abby Sewell Los Angeles Times

Last updated Monday, October 10, 2011 - 7:24am

LOS ANGELES -- A Riverside, Calif., woman died Saturday evening when she struggled to push a baby stroller over a gated railroad crossing and was struck by a passing train. The woman's 2-year-old daughter missed being hit and survived.

Fatal, Train, Accident, National Read more Comments

City fire trucks may have been used in porn films

Abby Sewell Los Angeles Times

Last updated Friday, September 23, 2011 - 5:53am

LOS ANGELES -- The Los Angeles Fire Department is investigating allegations that two stations allowed department fire trucks to be used in porn shoots.

Fire trucks, Pornography, National, Movies Read more Comments

This image provided by the Orange Police Department shows Sonia Hermosillo who was arrested Monday, Aug. 22, 2011, on charges that she allegedly tossed her 7-month-old son from the upper level of a parking structure. The baby who was in critical condition at University of California, Irvine Medical Center has now died. (AP Photo/Orange Police Department)

Baby tossed from parking structure dies

Abby Sewell Los Angeles Times

Last updated Wednesday, August 24, 2011 - 5:32pm

LOS ANGELES -- A 7-month-old baby boy whose mother allegedly dropped him from the roof of a parking structure died Wednesday, officials with the Orange Police Department said.

Baby, Child Abuse, National Read more Comments

A photographer shoots outside the Ritz Carlton in Marina del Rey, Calif., Sunday, Aug. 14, 2011, where a Rembrandt drawing believed to be called "The Judgement" was stolen Saturday evening from a private art exhibit. The pen-and-ink drawing, valued at more than $250,000, was nabbed Saturday night while a curator was distracted by a guest at the hotel, Los Angeles County Sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said Sunday. (AP Photo/Los Angeles Times, Anne Cusack)

Rembrandt drawing stolen from exhibit

Abby Sewell Los Angeles Times

Last updated Monday, August 15, 2011 - 1:43pm

A drawing by Rembrandt was stolen from an exhibit at a luxury hotel in Los Angeles over the weekend in what authorities called a carefully planned heist.

The small pen and ink drawing, valued at more than $250,000, was taken from the Ritz-Carlton Marina del Rey during an exhibit Saturday night. Los Angeles County Department sheriff's investigators said a man working with accomplices is believed responsible.

Crime, Art, Burglary, National Read more Comments

Tsunami's effects in California offer clues about future

Abby Sewell, Los Angeles Times

Last updated Monday, March 21, 2011 - 11:46am

LOS ANGELES -- Although the effect of the tsunami was minuscule in California compared with Japan, the scattered damage is providing a rare opportunity to study how the waves work and to help officials better prepare for what could be a far more destructive seismic event along the state's coast.

Teams of scientists combed the California coast all last week, comparing damage from port to port and harbor to harbor. The result will be a set of recommendations that could give better indications of which areas are most at risk and how to mitigate damage.

Tsunami, National Read more Comments

Nathan Papes/Los Angeles Times/MCT
An excavator takes methodical swings at the First Baptist Church of Picher, Oklahoma, quickly demolishing it into a pile of rubble, January 31, 2011. The entire town of Picher is being demolished, except for a few buildings deemed historically significant, because of lead contamination and the threat of underground mine collapse.

Time's up for toxic town

Abby Sewell, Los Angeles Times

Last updated Monday, February 21, 2011 - 12:05pm

PICHER, Okla. -- A track hoe sidled up to the modest yellow brick church, paused for a moment to position itself, then drove its teeth into the roof with brutal efficiency.

Shingles tumbled into the sanctuary. With the second blow, the wall buckled. The track hoe worked its way across the building, finally smashing the wall where a simple cross was emblazoned in red brick. Within 20 minutes, the First Baptist Church was rubble, ready to be loaded in waiting dump trucks and hauled away.

Behind the church, a water tower that now serves six households bears the legend "Picher Gorillas since 1918." It touts the mascot of a high school that won a state football championship in 1984, a year after the town was declared a toxic waste site. The school no longer exists.

Picher is a town that had held on through misfortune after misfortune. Now its death is near.

Features, Fires, Pollution, Slideshow, National Read more Comments

States taking action against 'bath salts'

Abby Sewell, Los Angeles Times

Last updated Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 6:44pm

LOS ANGELES -- The website that hawks the "concentrated bath salts" warns in red letters: "Not for human consumption."

It cautions against using alcohol and prescription medications while "bathing," and adds, "PLEASE do not use this as SNUFF."

But the little packets of powder, with names like "Ivory Wave" and "Vanilla Sky," were never intended for the tub, and they're not among the fragrant samples in the bath and body shop at the local mall. The "bath salts," are powerful synthetic stimulants, designed to be comparable to cocaine or methamphetamine, and with similar risks, law enforcement and health officials say.

But unlike cocaine or meth, the stimulants are legal in most of the United States, at least for now, selling for about $25 to $40 a packet online and in convenience stores and head shops.

They've become the latest designer drug to raise alarms, as enterprising chemists find ways to stay a step ahead of drug laws.

Bath salts, Drugs, National Read more Comments

Alabama governor's religious words raise eyebrows

Abby Sewell, Los Angeles Times, Richard Fausset

Last updated Wednesday, January 19, 2011 - 4:56pm

On the day of his swearing-in, Alabama Republican Gov. Robert J. Bentley raised concern among the state's non-Christians by declaring that people who had not accepted Jesus Christ were not his brothers and sisters.

Speaking to a large crowd Monday at Montgomery's Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church -- where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once preached -- Bentley said that "if you're a Christian and you're saved ... it makes you and me brother and sister," according to a report in the Birmingham News.

"Now I will have to say that, if we don't have the same daddy, we're not brothers and sisters," he added, according to the paper. "So anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I'm telling you, you're not my brother and you're not my sister, and I want to be your brother."

Politics, Religion, National Read more Comments

FBI finds bomb along MLK Day march route in Spokane, Wash.

Abby Sewell, Los Angeles Times

Last updated Tuesday, January 18, 2011 - 11:02pm

A "potentially deadly" explosive device that could have inflicted severe casualties was found along the intended route of a Martin Luther King Jr. Day march in Spokane, Wash., a half hour before it was to begin, the FBI said Tuesday.

Crime, Bomb Plot, Martin Luther King Jr., Safety, Threats, Holiday Read more Comments