San Diego bade farewell last week to Mayor Dick Murphy, who resigned, and, in a way, to Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, who announced he would not seek re-election next year. The county also will say goodbye to the Lego toymaker, which sold its park in Carlsbad. But Legoland will remain, under new ownership, that is.
Cunningham won't run for re-election
Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, targeted by wide-ranging investigations into his financial dealings with a defense contractor, announced Thursday that he will not run for re-election next year.
The 63-year-old Rancho Santa Fe Republican read a two-page statement at California State University San Marcos.
The FBI and a federal grand jury in San Diego, as well as the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington, are investigating Cunningham's ties to defense contractor Mitchell Wade, founder of MZM Inc.
"I can do my work in Washington and I can defend myself against these allegations, but I don't think I can do either of these things effectively in the midst of a political campaign," Cunningham said.
Last month, an article in The San Diego Union-Tribune revealed that Wade bought Cunningham's Del Mar-area home in 2003 and sold it at a $700,000 loss nearly a year later. When in Washington, Cunningham lived aboard Wade's yacht.
MZM has received $163 million in federal contracts since 2002 with the support of Cunningham, a member of the House defense appropriations subcommittee.
"I fully recognize that I showed poor judgment when I sold my home in Del Mar to a friend who did business with the government," Cunningham said. "I should have given more thought to how such a transaction might look to those who don't know me. I have spent an entire life building a reputation of integrity and trust. It pains me beyond words that I have jeopardized your trust."
Murphy's last day has personal touch
Nearly three months after Mayor Dick Murphy announced that he would resign, he departed Friday with praise for his staff and, as has come to be expected of him, little hint of emotions that might have been churning inside.
Murphy hosted the media for his final staff meeting, and as he stepped to the head of his conference table, he noted that it was "indeed a bittersweet moment for all of us."
He doled out personal messages to each of the more than two dozen staff members around the table, calling special attention to three who have been with him since he began his campaign for mayor in 1999: Deputy Chief of Staff Paola Avila, committee consultant Bill Baber and scheduling director Rachel Shira.
No council members attended the meeting, nor did City Manager Lamont Ewell or other top city officials.
Avila was unwavering in her support, calling it unfair that Murphy has endured so much criticism while caring for the city so much.
"I think he's the best mayor San Diego ever had," she said. "He didn't want it for power, and he didn't want it for money. He wanted it because he wanted San Diego to be better."
Corruption case in jurors' hands
The jury in the City Hall corruption trial completed its first day of deliberations Wednesday. Deliberations continued Friday and will resume tomorrow. Councilmen Ralph Inzunza, Michael Zucchet and Las Vegas lobbyist Lance Malone are accused of trading money for efforts to repeal the law banning touching between strippers and patrons. Council aide David Cowan, who worked for the late Councilman Charles Lewis, is charged with making a false statement to the FBI.
The eight-man, four-woman panel spent almost 15 hours deliberating last week.
The trial began May 3. About 40 witnesses testified and some 200 secretly recorded conversations were played for jurors.
Lego sells block of its parks stake
Controlling interest in Legoland California, the 128-acre park in Carlsbad, and three other Lego theme parks was sold Wednesday by the Danish toy maker to a large, private investment firm for $460 million.
The long-anticipated sale to the Blackstone Group of New York may accelerate the construction of new projects at the 6-year-old Carlsbad park. Blackstone bought 70 percent of the parks, with the remaining 30 percent to be held by Lego and its founding family.
"We're very excited," said John Jakobsen, president and general manager of Legoland California. "We see it as an opportunity to get more development here that could help make us more of a destination site."
With Lego parks in Carlsbad, Denmark, England and Germany, Blackstone plans to operate the division as part of its London-based Merlin Entertainments Group, which operates 28 attractions in eight European countries. Merlin said it is the ninth-largest theme park and attraction operator in the world.
Lego lost $314 million last year. When it announced last fall that its theme parks were for sale, Lego said it needed to concentrate its financial resources on its core toy business.
Boy hiker, 13, dies of heat exposure
A 13-year-old boy died of heat exposure in the Anza-Borrego desert last Sunday. His family's dune buggy had gotten stuck in mud and as the boy and his father hiked toward the family truck, he separated from his father to take a shortcut.
Bren Mulkins of Pacific Beach, his father, mother and sister had been riding the dune buggy in the desert when it became mired in the muddy Carrizo Marsh, 21 to 23 miles north of Ocotillo. Robert Mulkins and Bren began walking the 3 miles to their truck. The temperature was nearing 110 degrees.
They were just a few hundred yards from the truck when Bren said he would take a shortcut down a gully, his father said. That's where a search helicopter crew found the boy's body.
61% back measure on vector controls
Property owners countywide soundly approved a ballot measure to pay more to help fight the West Nile virus and other diseases carried by insects and rodents.
The county Board of Supervisors learned the results Tuesday, less than a week after health officials announced that the first case of West Nile in the county this year had been found in an infected crow in Carlsbad.
The measure passed with almost 61.5 percent in favor, said Jack Miller, chief of the Community Health Division of the county's Environmental Health Department. It needed the support of 50 percent of the returned ballots plus one to pass.
Miller said about 217,000 ballots of the more than 700,000 the county mailed to property owners in May were returned on time and counted.
San Diego Unified raises lunch price
For the first time in 25 years, the price of lunch in the San Diego Unified School District will increase when the academic year begins in September.
Lunch prices will increase by a quarter. Elementary school students will pay $1.25, and middle and high school students will pay $1.75.
Low-income students who meet federal eligibility standards for free or reduced-price meals won't be affected by the price increase. Fifty-three percent of the approximately 130,000 students in the district fall into that category.
The increase, which is expected to generate $860,000, was approved 4-0 by the school board Tuesday, with trustee Shelia Jackson absent.
Evangelist indicted over tax filings
Prominent San Diego evangelist Morris Cerullo was indicted by a federal grand jury Tuesday on three counts of filing false individual income tax returns, which underreported his income by $550,000.
The indictment alleges that Cerullo, president of Morris Cerullo World Evangelism headquartered in Kearny Mesa, filed false tax returns for 1998-2000.
The indictment alleges he underestimated his income by $290,000 for 1998, $110,000 for 1999, and $150,000 for 2000.
If convicted, he would face a maximum penalty of three years in prison and a $100,000 fine. Cerullo is to surrender to authorities at a later date, perhaps as early as this week, Assistant U.S. Attorney George Hardy said.
Staph research finds color is a key
Staph bacteria that cause deadly drug-resistant infections rely on the antioxidant properties of their golden pigment to fight off the immune system, scientists have found.
The discovery, described last week by scientists at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine and Children's Hospital in San Diego, offers drug makers a potential new target to battle the pathogen.
"This is the first time that the color itself has been proven to contribute to the virulence potential of the bacteria," said Dr. Victor Nizet, an associate professor of pediatrics at UCSD's School of Medicine and an infectious-diseases physician at Children's Hospital. Nizet was a senior author of the paper, published last week in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.
If scientists could develop a drug that prevents the bacteria from producing the pigment, the pathogen might be made vulnerable, Nizet said. "Here the concept would not be to kill the bacteria directly, but to render it more susceptible to the innate immune system," he said.
