By and | | Bay Area News GroupThe hiring of an Antioch police officer last year following his resignation as a cop in San Francisco has angered residents because it happened before that officer could be disciplined for actions that led to the fatal shooting of a homeless man more than four years ago.Approximately 200 people protested Michael Mellone’s hiring in what authorities said was a peaceful march from Antioch High to the police station on Tuesday night. It came amid heightened concerns about police violence and racism following the killing of George Floyd last month in...…By and | | Bay Area News GroupThe hiring of an Antioch police officer last year following his resignation as a cop in San Francisco has angered residents because it happened before that officer could be disciplined for actions that led to the fatal shooting of a homeless man more than four years ago.Approximately 200 people protested Michael Mellone’s hiring in what authorities said was a peaceful march from Antioch High to the police station on Tuesday night. It came amid heightened concerns about police violence and racism following the killing of George Floyd last month in...WW…

By and | Bay Area News GroupALAMEDA — A sheriff’s deputy and former Marine charged last year with sending sexual text messages to a 15-year-old girl was arrested Saturday after hitting a man during a drunken altercation, Alameda city police said Monday.Alameda County Deputy Jason Deitschman, 49, was arrested on suspicion of misdemeanor battery and public intoxication, Alameda police Lt. Hosh Durani said. The victim told police Deitschman had met him to discuss buying his boat, but ended up hitting him during an argument aboard the vessel in the Marina Village area.Normally a person would be...…By and | Bay Area News GroupALAMEDA — A sheriff’s deputy and former Marine charged last year with sending sexual text messages to a 15-year-old girl was arrested Saturday after hitting a man during a drunken altercation, Alameda city police said Monday.Alameda County Deputy Jason Deitschman, 49, was arrested on suspicion of misdemeanor battery and public intoxication, Alameda police Lt. Hosh Durani said. The victim told police Deitschman had met him to discuss buying his boat, but ended up hitting him during an argument aboard the vessel in the Marina Village area.Normally a person would be...WW…

GET BREAKING NEWS IN YOUR BROWSER. CLICK HERE TO TURN ON NOTIFICATIONS.XBy | | Bay Area News GroupRICHMOND — A Richmond father killed the mother of his children, then turned the gun on himself inside the couple’s residence, police said.The murder-suicide happened Tuesday morning in the 700 block of Thomas Drive, Richmond police Sgt. Aaron Pomeroy said. Police were called to the residence around 9 a.m. and found the two in a back bedroom.The Contra Costa County Coroner’s Office on Friday identified the woman as 28-year-old Claudia Justinian Mendoza, of Richmond. She had been shot several...…GET BREAKING NEWS IN YOUR BROWSER. CLICK HERE TO TURN ON NOTIFICATIONS.XBy | | Bay Area News GroupRICHMOND — A Richmond father killed the mother of his children, then turned the gun on himself inside the couple’s residence, police said.The murder-suicide happened Tuesday morning in the 700 block of Thomas Drive, Richmond police Sgt. Aaron Pomeroy said. Police were called to the residence around 9 a.m. and found the two in a back bedroom.The Contra Costa County Coroner’s Office on Friday identified the woman as 28-year-old Claudia Justinian Mendoza, of Richmond. She had been shot several...WW…

By | | Bay Area News GroupWith one injection, Dusta Eisenman and other Bay Area volunteers are joining the unprecedented search for a COVID-19 vaccine, eager to help end the worst pandemic in a century.“I wanted to do my part and be a team player, to get people back to working, people healthy and kids back at school,” said Eisenman, 44, a San Jose mother of three and Kaiser pediatric nurse.Kaiser’s study of a Pfizer vaccine, launched at their Santa Clara and Sacramento facilities on Monday, represents the beginning of several trials in the San Francisco Bay Area — part of a vast network of...…By | | Bay Area News GroupWith one injection, Dusta Eisenman and other Bay Area volunteers are joining the unprecedented search for a COVID-19 vaccine, eager to help end the worst pandemic in a century.“I wanted to do my part and be a team player, to get people back to working, people healthy and kids back at school,” said Eisenman, 44, a San Jose mother of three and Kaiser pediatric nurse.Kaiser’s study of a Pfizer vaccine, launched at their Santa Clara and Sacramento facilities on Monday, represents the beginning of several trials in the San Francisco Bay Area — part of a vast network of...WW…

UNION CITY, CA – JULY 17: James Logan High School football team players participate in a practice while maintaining the social distance on July, 17, 2020, in Union City, Calif. (Dai Sugano/Bay Area News Group)Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story misidentified the location as Grizzly Peak, rather than Mission Peak.It was no random act of kindness when a group of football players and coaches from James Logan High helped a stranger, a wheelchair-bound man, achieve his goal of reaching the summit of Mission Peak, just when he thought he’d failed.The group used straps to pull the man...…UNION CITY, CA – JULY 17: James Logan High School football team players participate in a practice while maintaining the social distance on July, 17, 2020, in Union City, Calif. (Dai Sugano/Bay Area News Group)Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story misidentified the location as Grizzly Peak, rather than Mission Peak.It was no random act of kindness when a group of football players and coaches from James Logan High helped a stranger, a wheelchair-bound man, achieve his goal of reaching the summit of Mission Peak, just when he thought he’d failed.The group used straps to pull the man...WW…

By | | Bay Area News GroupMARTINEZ — A man who crashed head-on into an oncoming car and killed its teenaged driver as both of them were fleeing an illegal sideshow pleaded guilty to vehicular manslaughter last month, prosecutors said.Atley Tafoya, 25, pleaded guilty to vehicular manslaughter and received a sentence of 240 days of house arrest, followed by three years probation. The sentence was offered by a Superior Court judge, not county prosecutors, according to a spokesman for the Contra Costa District Attorney’s office.The charge stemmed from an October 2017 crash in which Tafoya,...…By | | Bay Area News GroupMARTINEZ — A man who crashed head-on into an oncoming car and killed its teenaged driver as both of them were fleeing an illegal sideshow pleaded guilty to vehicular manslaughter last month, prosecutors said.Atley Tafoya, 25, pleaded guilty to vehicular manslaughter and received a sentence of 240 days of house arrest, followed by three years probation. The sentence was offered by a Superior Court judge, not county prosecutors, according to a spokesman for the Contra Costa District Attorney’s office.The charge stemmed from an October 2017 crash in which Tafoya,...WW…

By , , | and | | Bay Area News GroupChinedu Okobi was a Black man walking in a city where people of his race make up less than 1 percent of the population. And when he began acting oddly on an October afternoon in 2018, wandering into traffic on El Camino Real in Millbrae, sheriff’s deputies quickly arrived.Okobi, who wasn’t armed, tried to walk away when an officer questioned him. Minutes later, the father and Morehouse College graduate who had battled with mental illness was dead, stunned seven times with a Taser by a San Mateo County deputy until his heart gave out. At one point, he is...…By , , | and | | Bay Area News GroupChinedu Okobi was a Black man walking in a city where people of his race make up less than 1 percent of the population. And when he began acting oddly on an October afternoon in 2018, wandering into traffic on El Camino Real in Millbrae, sheriff’s deputies quickly arrived.Okobi, who wasn’t armed, tried to walk away when an officer questioned him. Minutes later, the father and Morehouse College graduate who had battled with mental illness was dead, stunned seven times with a Taser by a San Mateo County deputy until his heart gave out. At one point, he is...WW…

Firefighters from multiple agencies battle a five-alarm fire in Emeryville, Calif., near the West Oakland border, on Saturday, May 13, 2017. It’s the second time the five-story complex under construction on San Pablo Avenue has burned in less than a year. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group)if you’re having a problem viewing the photos on a mobile device.EMERYVILLE — The developer of a 105-unit apartment building that was twice destroyed by arsonists within a year says he plans to donate it to UC Berkeley for much needed student housing.Rick Holliday, of Emeryville-based Holliday Development,...…Firefighters from multiple agencies battle a five-alarm fire in Emeryville, Calif., near the West Oakland border, on Saturday, May 13, 2017. It’s the second time the five-story complex under construction on San Pablo Avenue has burned in less than a year. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group)if you’re having a problem viewing the photos on a mobile device.EMERYVILLE — The developer of a 105-unit apartment building that was twice destroyed by arsonists within a year says he plans to donate it to UC Berkeley for much needed student housing.Rick Holliday, of Emeryville-based Holliday Development,...WW…

By | Bay Area News GroupAfter Sacramento recently took the bold step toward becoming the first city in California to eliminate traditional single-family zoning, some San Jose housing advocates and residents hope the capital of Silicon Valley can build off of the momentum.San Jose is considering a similar zoning shift that would allow up to four dwelling units on a single-family lot — a conceptLiving in a neighborhood where each lot has one home and a surrounding yard is an ideal deeply embedded into American life, and single-family zoning is what ensures cities uphold that standard. But...…By | Bay Area News GroupAfter Sacramento recently took the bold step toward becoming the first city in California to eliminate traditional single-family zoning, some San Jose housing advocates and residents hope the capital of Silicon Valley can build off of the momentum.San Jose is considering a similar zoning shift that would allow up to four dwelling units on a single-family lot — a conceptLiving in a neighborhood where each lot has one home and a surrounding yard is an ideal deeply embedded into American life, and single-family zoning is what ensures cities uphold that standard. But...WW…

By | | Bay Area News GroupSACRAMENTO — Four people have been arrested and charged with federal methamphetamine distribution — and several others named as uncharged co-conspirators — in what federal authorities describe as a multi-state meth and heroin trafficking ring that operated mainly in Fairfield, Vacaville and part of Sacramento County.Michael “Smokes” Garcia, his wife Nancy Garcia, his father Gonzago Garcia, and a fourth person, Tylor Combs, have all been charged in federal court with conspiracy to distribute 500 grams or more of methamphetamine. The recently-unsealed criminal...…By | | Bay Area News GroupSACRAMENTO — Four people have been arrested and charged with federal methamphetamine distribution — and several others named as uncharged co-conspirators — in what federal authorities describe as a multi-state meth and heroin trafficking ring that operated mainly in Fairfield, Vacaville and part of Sacramento County.Michael “Smokes” Garcia, his wife Nancy Garcia, his father Gonzago Garcia, and a fourth person, Tylor Combs, have all been charged in federal court with conspiracy to distribute 500 grams or more of methamphetamine. The recently-unsealed criminal...WW…