Long Beach Police Department

Drago, the Long Beach Police Department dog who disappeared Monday from his handler's home, was found Wednesday at an animal shelter in Downey, authorities said. Someone in Lakewood found the Belgian Malinois sitting on a porch and brought him to the shelter on Monday, Sgt. Paul LeBaron said. "We're still not sure how he escaped," he said. The dog lives with a Long Beach police officer.

A nine-year veteran of the Long Beach Police Department has been arrested on suspicion of felony possession of child pornography after reportedly meeting a teenager while on patrol and soliciting explicit photographs of the youth through electronic messages, police said. Noe Yanez, 40, was taken into custody Thursday evening by Long Beach police after an investigation that began earlier this month. The alleged victim had told a school resources officer about the messages and authorities were alerted.

A Long Beach resident was found early this morning with a gunshot wound and later died at a local hospital, police said. Wimberly Kahari, 31, was found inside a home in the 1100 block of Orizaba Avenue at about midnight with a wound to his chest, according to a news release from the Long Beach Police Department. -- Ari B. Bloomekatz

Long Beach police shot and killed a man Sunday afternoon shortly after responding to a call from the Belmont Shore area about a man brandishing a gun. The shooting took place shortly after 4:40 p.m. in the courtyard of an apartment complex on the 5300 block of East Ocean Boulevard , said Sgt. Rico Fernandez of the Long Beach Police Department. The victim was an adult male. No officers were injured in the incident. No further details were available and the shooting is under investigation by the homicide division and the Los Angeles County district attorney's office, as is standard with officer-involved shootings, Fernandez said.

Staffing at the Long Beach Police Department will be reviewed by an independent consultant hired by the city to evaluate whether members of the police force could be more efficiently used. The study, approved this week by the City Council, is intended to answer questions raised during debate over a proposed city tax to pay for more police. The special tax would have to be approved by Long Beach voters, who have questioned whether the department is using its work force to the best advantage.

A male police dog named Drago disappeared from the yard of its handler early Monday, and the Long Beach Police Department asked the public's help in finding it. The 3-year-old Belgian Malinois, which slightly resembles a German shepherd, responds only to commands and may be dangerous to anyone but handlers. Anyone who sights the dog should call 911, police said. The dog disappeared from its home near Los Coyotes Diagonal and Palo Verde Avenue.

Predicted heavy rains have forced the Long Beach Police Department to postpone its "Operation Baja" goodwill mission until Dec. 19, a police spokeswoman said. Four tons of food, toys and clothing were scheduled to be taken across the border to impoverished communities in Tijuana and Rosarito today, said Officer Maria Mendez-Lopez. With the postponement, donors who still want to contribute items can drop them off at the center at 324 Pine Ave. The facility is open daily from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.

An 18-year employee of the Long Beach Police Department sued the city and the department Monday, claiming she was subjected to lewd comments and sexual advances from male officers. Laurie Lyons says three Police Department officials had her transferred to the juvenile department after she refused sex with at least one of the defendants. She also alleges that one of the defendants fondled her despite her objections. No one was available for comment at the Long Beach city attorney's office.

The Long Beach Police Department and a cellular phone company are providing wireless phones to 21 Neighborhood Watch groups as part of an innovative program intended to enhance community-based policing. "Wireless phones are an excellent crime prevention tool for our community patrol groups to possess since they help community members to become an effective extension of our policing efforts," said Long Beach Deputy Chief Tony Van Coutren. Hank Bonde, president of L.A.

Regarding your report that serious crime in Long Beach is up 5.9% (Southeast/Long Beach sections, Aug. 7), I suspect that if the Long Beach Police Department spent more of its huge budget in fighting crimes involving victims and less on enforcing victimless-crime laws there would be some decrease in this percentage. It is obvious to me that their priorities should be reviewed. Another suggestion would be to make the Long Beach police more accountable to the democratically elected City Council and less to the city manager.

Jim McDonnell, a top assistant to former Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton and a finalist to replace him, was named Wednesday as the next chief of the Long Beach Police Department. McDonnell, 50, oversees the LAPD's detective bureau and will be sworn in next month as Long Beach's 25th police chief. "I'm looking forward to working with the men and women of the Long Beach Police Department and the community to help make a great city an even safer city," McDonnell said.

A 4-year-old boy is in critical condition after being hit by a stray bullet in a gang-related shooting, police said. The boy was injured Wednesday night when a man got into an argument with a group of people that escalated into a fight and another man pulled out a gun, said Nancy Pratt, a spokeswoman for the Long Beach Police Department. The shooter's intended victim ran away and was not hit, police said. But the boy was struck while standing with his mother outside a relative's house on Earl Street.

Dozens of police departments throughout Los Angeles County routinely have not tested DNA evidence collected in rape and sexual assault cases, and are unable to accurately account for thousands of pieces of evidence that could potentially help solve crimes, according to a report to be released today.

Authorities on Monday identified a 24-year-old Latino woman who was among five people shot to death at a roadside encampment. Katherine Verdun was killed in the camp in dense brush beside the Santa Fe Avenue offramp of the 405 Freeway, Los Angeles County coroner spokesman Ed Winter said. Other victims publicly identified were Vanessa Malaepule, a 34-year-old mother of six, and Lorenzo Perez Villacana, 44. Pending notification of next of kin, authorities were withholding the identities of two victims described as a Middle Eastern man in his 40s and a white man in his 50s. Long Beach Police Department investigators continued Tuesday to search for clues in the killings first reported by an anonymous caller at about 8:30 a.m. Sunday.

An 8-year-old girl eluded a kidnapping attempt at her elementary school in Long Beach on Wednesday, and a 9-year-old boy walking to a different school nearby evaded a stranger who tried to lure him to his vehicle, police said. The incidents appeared to be unrelated, said Sgt. Dina Zapalski of the Long Beach Police Department. "It's highly unusual to have two incidents with two different types of suspects so close together, time-wise and location-wise," Zapalski said. The boy was on his way to International Elementary School in the 700 block of Locust Avenue about 7:30 a.m. when he was approached by a man in a light-blue pickup truck who motioned for the boy to get in the vehicle.

A 32-year-old Long Beach police department detective was found by her detective husband fatally shot early Friday in their Rancho Santa Margarita home, the Orange County Sheriff's Department said. The incident is being investigated as a possible suicide, sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino said. Suphada "Sue" Nelson suffered a single gunshot wound to her upper torso that "appeared to be self-inflicted," a department investigator said.