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Phil Spector’s six years in Los Angeles County’s justice system, that started with an arrest for shooting a actress Lana Clarkson in 2003 will conclude Friday morning when he is sentenced to prison for murder. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler, who presided over the music producer’s two trials, has little discretion in punishing Spector, for the shooting– a death that jurors decided last month was second-degree murder.

The conviction carries a mandatory 15 years to life in prison, so the judge’s only choice will be whether to add on three, four or 10 more years to the minimum sentence for the use of a firearm. The music producer also could get three, four or 10 additional years for using a firearm in the killing that occurred at his Alhambra mansion in 2003.

Spector has been in jail since his April 13 conviction and has vowed to appeal his conviction. This appeal is likely to raise issues regarding the trial admissibility of testimony from five women who said Spector menaced them with guns in a manner that prosecutors said were similar to the circumstances of Clarkson’s death in the foyer of his Alhambra mansion—sometimes called “prior bad act” evidence.

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Thursday’s gang bust in Hawaiian Gardens involving 1400 local, state and federal agents resulted in 147 arrests for alleged racially-motivated crimes against African Americans. The L.A. Times is reporting that Operation Knock Out targeted associates of the Varrio Hawaiian Gardens gang (VHG) who were so pervasive in that community that one in 15 people living in the square-mile city just north of Long Beach has ties to it.

In its 193-page indictment outlining the racketeering case, federal authorities accuse the south Los Angeles County street gang of a litany of crimes, including the murder of a sheriff’s deputy and racially motivated attacks designed to drive African Americans from their town. The indictments included charges for murder, attempted murder, drug trafficking, weapons trafficking, extortion, kidnapping and witness intimidation. The gang members, allegedly boasted about being racist, referring to themselves as “the Hate Gang.” The document also details more than a dozen incidents where African Americans were allegedly beaten, shot at or harassed because of their race.

Authorities say that the gang was formed in the 1950s or early ’60s and has more than 1,000 members today–spanning several generations, with many connections to the Mexican Mafia.

In cases as large as this, it is expected that many of the smaller gang players will flip –or decide to testify for the prosecution–in order to implicate larger players and score a better plea bargain for themselves.

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Anna Nicole Smith’s former boyfriend and two of her physicians pleaded not guilty at their arraignment in Los Angeles Superior Court yesterday to charges of illegally providing prescription drugs to the reality star and former Playboy model.

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that Howard K. Stern is charged with conspiracy to illegally furnish Smith with thousands of prescription pills. In their court filing, prosecutors say that all three knew Smith was an addict and were warned that the prescriptions the doctors were writing were dangerous. The charges are the culmination of a two-year, multi-agency investigation.

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The L.A. Times is reporting that a robbery in a San Bernadino neighborhood has left a mother looking for her three year old son.

The San Bernardino Sheriff’s Office says that two men armed with handguns, allegedly robbed a San Bernardino home Sunday afternoon and tied up a mother and her five children. The men ransacked the home and took an unspecified amount of cash and property, and then kidnapped the three year old child.

According to reports, both suspects are described as thin, light-skinned Hispanic males. According to the Sherriff’s Office, one is believed to be about 18 years old, 5-feet-8 and wearing blue jeans, a green T-shirt and a black baseball cap. The other is believed to be about 24 years old, 5-feet-10 and wearing a black shirt, black pants and boots, and a white bandanna.

The boy is described as 3 feet tall, about 40 pounds, wearing a yellow shirt with blue sleeves, blue striped shorts and sandals.

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The Pasadena Star News is reporting that Los Angeles County Sheriff’s detectives who were staking out a robbery suspect on Thursday stopped an alleged rape in progress and captured the suspect. Kenneth Parker of San Gabriel was booked on suspicion of kidnapping to commit rape, attempted rape, burglary and assault with a deadly weapon.

Detectives from the Major Crimes Bureau were conducting surveillance looking for a serial robbery suspect when they saw Parker grab and attempt to rape a woman, a Sheriff’s statement said. The woman escaped before the detectives could intervene, but Parker then grabbed second woman moments later and dragged her into a business in on East Valley Boulevard, took the woman into a rear bathroom of the business and locked the door. Detectives rescued the woman and were able to take Parker into custody.

Parker is being held in lieu of $1 million bail and is due for arraignment at Alhambra Superior Court Monday.

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The Los Angeles Times has posted breaking news in the George Torres case. On Monday, Torres, an entrepreneur who built the multimillion-dollar Numero Uno grocery store chain, was convicted by a jury of racketeering, solicitation of murder, bribery in federal court.

In the trial, he U.S Attorney’s Office argued that Torres hired illegal immigrants at his stores, bribed a Los Angeles City planning commissioner and arranged to have people killed. The prosecution relied heavily on the testimony of two former Torres associates–both convicted drug dealers serving lengthy federal prison sentences who were cooperating with authorities in hopes of having the sentences reduced. Despite credibility issues with the prosecution’s star witnesses, jurors ultimately concluded that Torres arranged for the murder of a local gang member who tried to extort protection money. The man, Jose “Shorty” Maldonado was fatally shot as he walked with his girlfriend near Torres’ main market in 1994.

Torres’ legal team plans on asking the Judge for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict—or that despite the verdict, the government had not met its burden of proof. This post-trial hearing is set for June 1. He faces life in prison.

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Last week I posted on the sexting “epidemic” among U.S. teens, citing a statistic that one of five teenagers have shared nude pictures of themselves via cell phone or online. Now, reports are surfacing that show that those alarming statistics are inflated.

The Wall Street Journal reports claim that statistic, which was generated by CosmoGirl.com and The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, may be exaggerated because the same teenagers who have engaged in such behavior could be the ones most likely to say they have done so in an online poll. In other words, the sample was skewed towards those likely to be on the internet to begin with. Sources say that cohort might two to four times more likely to send nude photos of themselves than the average teen. The criticism of the study is that it didn’t poll teens by phone or by mail, which would make the group sampled more representative of the population.

So what’s the reality of teens and texting? Probably something probably less than the one in five statistic, but it may be nearly impossible to get information from teens by any other means but the internet. The chance that Janie or Johnnie will respond to a phone call on Mom and Dad’s landline regarding posting nude pictures of themselves on the web seems unlikely.

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According to the New York Times, one in five teens may be a child pornographer risking life in prison — for the crime of taking and distributing naked pictures of themselves.

According to a recent study commissioned by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy and CosmoGirl.com, 20 percent of teenagers have taken nude or semi-nude pictures or videos of themselves and sent them to someone or posted them online. Most send these gifts to their boyfriend or girlfriend (69 percent) or someone they want to date or hook up with (30 percent).

These statistics are alarming, but so is the fact that ‘sexting” is now a crime. So what may seem on the surface to be puppy love in the information age now could put kids in jeopardy for prison time- as child pornographers no less.

It’s illegal under federal and state child-porn laws to create explicit images of a minor and to posses them or distribute them. These laws were drafted to address adult abuse of minors, but it turns out they don’t exempt minors who create and distribute images, even if the pictures are of them. In fact, prosecutors in several states are going after creator-victims, in both federal and state court. Some kids are being charged as juveniles but under Federal law, there is no such equivalent.

So when a 16-year-old with takes pictures of herself and sends them to a boy to seduce him, she could get life in federal prison under current sentencing guidelines. If she does manage to get out, she may have to register as a sex offender.

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The Orange County District Attorney’s Office has obtained a grand jury indictment against a 20-year-old woman accused of killing another young woman while driving drunk.

According to reports, in the early morning of February 1st, Brittney Schuetz was driving between 90 and 100 mph on Imperial Highway when she failed to stop at a red light and collided with April Whang’s Acura Integra. According to reports, La Habra police found Schuetz sitting in the driver’s seat showing signs of intoxication, including giving off a strong odor of alcohol, having bloodshot eyes and watery eyes. Schuetz is accused of driving with a blood-alcohol content of 0.24 percent, three times the legal limit, while on probation from a 2007 driving-under-the-influence conviction.

Following the February 1st crash, the District Attorney’s Office charged the Santa Ana woman by felony complaint with one count of Murder. Yesterday’s grand jury indictment will allow prosecutors the opportunity to bring the case to trial more quickly by skipping a preliminary hearing. Preliminary hearings are usually after the arraignment, and is a preliminary determination where the judge decides whether there is enough evidence to force the defendant to stand trial. Defendant’s are not entitled to a preliminary hearing if the grand jury passes down an indictment.

At the preliminary hearing, the judge makes determination whether the state has a case using the probable cause standard–which is much lower than the state’s burden at trial which is to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt. Preliminary hearings are important to a defense for many reasons. For one, it gives the defense an opportunity to cross examine the state’s witnesses on the record which could be a great tool to use against them at trial. Second, if probable cause is not found, a judge can release the defendant who is held with no bond.

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The New York Times is reporting that last week an eight-week federal drug trial in Florida was jeopardized when the jurors admitted to the judge that they had been doing independent research throughout the trial on their cell phones. This is a direct violation of the instructions any jury receives–including Orange County juries–and as a result a mistrial was announced.

Use of BlackBerrys and iPhones by jurors gathering and sending out information about cases is an epidemic in courtrooms throughout the country, causing mistrials and frustrating judges and attorneys. For example, last week, a building company asked an Arkansas court to overturn a $12.6 million judgment, claiming that a juror used Twitter to send updates during the trial.

In trial, jurors are not supposed to seek information outside of the courtroom and are instructed to only base their verdict on facts presented to them in trial- and never, under any circumstance seek out additional evidence on their own.

These reports are unsettling as it calls into question a Los Angeles defendant’s constitutional right to a fair trial on every case regardless of whether it is a DUI or a murder case. At some point, I could see judges confiscating cell phones while jurors are serving on a panel. However, technology does have a silver lining for trial attorneys. Now more than ever, attorneys can find out more information about potential jurors and their opponent’s witnesses as a result of social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace.

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