Deborah Luck

Five months ago, Deborah Luck was a graphic designer who didn't even know who sat on the Santa Clarita City Council. But a string of personal tragedies since then has transformed her into one of the area's most visible community activists. The 37-year-old Canyon Country resident initially gained notoriety after the slaying of her friend, Veronica Estrada, 29, in December. Estrada's body was found along a dark portion of Soledad Canyon Road near her home in Canyon Country.

Five months ago, Deborah Luck was a graphic designer who didn't even know who sat on the Santa Clarita City Council. But a string of personal tragedies since then has transformed her into one of the area's most visible community activists. The 37-year-old Canyon Country resident initially gained notoriety after the slaying of her friend, Veronica Estrada, 29, in December. Estrada's body was found along a dark portion of Soledad Canyon Road near her home in Canyon Country.

City officials are asking the federal government for $13,000 to help pay for the relocation of an upcoming festival that was displaced by the Northridge earthquake. The city will pay $15,000 to hold next month's Cowboy Poetry, Music and Film Festival at the historic Melody Ranch Motion Picture Studio in Newhall. The event was originally slated for the William S. Hart High School auditorium at a cost of $2,000, but had to be moved after the auditorium was severely damaged in the quake.

Four months after a woman was dragged off an unlit section of Santa Clarita's main east-west thoroughfare and strangled to death, city officials have authorized street lights for a dark stretch of the street. Veronica Estrada, 29, was walking along Soledad Canyon Road, near Camp Plenty Road, about 8:15 p.m. Dec. 15 when she was attacked and pulled over an embankment. She was a nationally ranked black belt in tae kwon do, and a popular instructor at a Canyon Country martial arts studio.

A second trial of a Canyon Country martial arts instructor accused of killing a female co-worker has, like the first, ended in a mistrial because of a deadlocked jury. Jurors on Wednesday voted 7 to 5 in favor of acquitting Stuart Edward Milburn, 27, of first-degree murder in the death of Veronica Estrada, 29, also of Canyon Country. Prosecutors alleged that Milburn strangled Estrada last December out of jealousy over her professional achievements in the martial arts field.