Demonstrations Orange County

Westminster City Councilman Tony Lam filed a lawsuit against the city last week, seeking reimbursement for attorney fees that he paid in an effort to keep protesters away from his restaurant. The suit, filed in Orange County Superior Court on Wednesday, argues that Lam should be paid because he is a city employee and took the advice of the city attorney to stay away from massive protests on Bolsa Avenue in January 1999.

For the last two months, an anti-Communist demonstrator has been videotaping patients as they enter the offices of a prominent Little Saigon doctor whom he considers a communist for supporting normalized trade with Vietnam. The protest has sparked a legal battle over where to draw the line between free speech and privacy rights at a time when anti-Communist protesters are increasingly turning to these tactics.

An immigrant rights group Tuesday gave Anaheim officials 30 days to break the Police Department's ties to the Immigration and Naturalization Service or run the risk of civil disobedience by thousands of Latinos. Nativo V. Lopez, national co-director of Hermandad Mexicana Nacional, urged Anaheim City Council members to "put an end to the present policy which permits local Police Department cooperation with the INS. . . .

Relatives of seven people killed in a 1976 mass shooting at Cal State Fullerton are trying to build a national campaign of victim rights groups, law enforcement organizations and elected officials to oppose the release of gunman Edward Charles Allaway. With a state mental hospital now recommending Allaway's release, the victims' families said it's essential that they organize to keep the mass killer in custody.

They are neighbors, but these days, Santa Ana and Tustin are far from neighborly. Particularly when it comes to deciding the future of the mothballed Tustin Marine Corps Air Facility. And don't look for the relationship to improve any time soon. When the Department of the Navy approved Tustin's reuse plan for the 1,561-acre former helicopter base Feb.

Days after a popular Anaheim Hills resident was killed when a runaway truck clipped and crumpled a dozen cars at a congested intersection, parents, students and teachers rallied Monday for big rigs to be banned from local streets during school hours. Motorists honked horns and yelled encouragement as they drove through the intersection of Imperial Highway and Nohl Ranch Road, where 50 or so protesters held signs reading, "Stop Commercial Traffic" and "Public Safety First."

A group of protesters waving picket signs and screaming slogans gathered outside the Anaheim Union High School board meeting Thursday night, demanding that board members settle a lawsuit with the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU has charged the district with censorship after administrators removed biographies of gays and lesbians from junior high school libraries.

A candlelight vigil at Cal State Fullerton on Wednesday drew more than 100 people to remember the victims of Orange County's deadliest mass murder. Their message: no release for Edward Charles Allaway, the man who shot seven people to death in the basement of the campus library 25 years ago and has been in mental hospitals since. "In my opinion, he should have been put to death 25 years ago," said county Supervisor Todd Spitzer, who helped organize the event.

More than 60 protesters marched on Huntington Beach City Hall and police headquarters Monday, charging racism after investigators confirmed that the gun an 18-year-old farm worker allegedly pointed at officers during a fatal weekend shooting was a toy rifle. Toting handwritten signs saying, "We don't trust the H.B. Police any more," relatives and friends questioned police accounts that Antonio Saldivar, who has no history of violence, pointed any weapon at officers before he was killed.

About 70 people protested outside Assemblyman Lou Correa's Santa Ana office Friday morning, then marched into the building to urge him to vote against a bill relating to same-sex domestic partners' rights in California. Correa (D-Santa Ana) was not in at the time, so the protesters signed in at the front office, then left.