Suv

It was billed as a "shocking tell-all" and a "world exclusive," but the National Enquirer's March 26 cover story landed with a thud. TMZ, Page Six and other major players in celebrity gossip ignored the article in which a masseur claimed John Travolta offered money for sex. FOR THE RECORD: An earlier version of this article used the term "masseuse"; it should have said "masseur. " Five weeks after the issue left the checkout aisle, a DUI attorney from Pasadena put the anonymous masseur's tawdry tale in a lawsuit and it became an overnight pop culture sensation, topping Google News, trending on Twitter and meriting a segment on "Good Morning America.

BEIJING — Fuel-efficient vehicles are the rage in the United States, but in China gas-guzzling SUVs are looming large. Automakers including Ford Motor Co., Chrysler Group, Daimler and Land Rover are seizing on soaring popularity for the vehicles here, tailoring new models for Chinese consumers, and in some cases shifting manufacturing to China. Chinese drivers purchased about 2.1 million SUVs last year, according to LMC Automotive, a figure that's expected to double by 2014.

Your life is about to change, and your sports car is terrified. A Peg Perego Duette child stroller. The pair of Old English mastiffs you're dog-sitting indefinitely. A glee club. A metamorphosis of priorities has dropped one or more of these into your world, and suddenly your slick little two-seater won't work for you anymore. So let me offer a suggestion: Check out BMW's redesigned 2011 X3 xDrive35i. It's not necessarily the best all-around vehicle in the luxury compact SUV segment, which includes the Audi Q5, Mercedes-Benz GLK and Acura RDX. But without question, this second-generation X3 is the fastest, sportiest and most fun to drive of its peers.

If there's an ideal vehicle for every buyer, consider matching Mazda's 2013 CX-5 with Zeus or better yet, his kids' baby sitter. Although no gilded chariot, this all-new compact sport utility vehicle has the sturdy construction to climb Mt. Olympus, impressive safety features to keep little Herakles in one piece and the adroit handling ability to outmaneuver any errant lightning bolt thrown its way. Plus, for anyone with a bit of a commute...

Lamar Odom's voice on the phone frequently was barely above a whisper. The pain clearly registered in words that flowed in stops and starts as he delivered a soliloquy about death and the effect it has had on his psyche. The Lakers forward spoke deliberately and expressed how emotional it has been for him to deal with two recent deaths. Odom attended a funeral in New York on July 13 for his 24-year-old cousin, who Odom said was murdered. The next day, Odom was a passenger in an SUV in Queens when it collided with a motorcycle.

Let's kill two birds with one stone. Let's take the patently inefficient, non-carpool-encouraging diamond lanes and turn them into SUV-mandatory lanes. By requiring all noncommercial, visually obstructive vehicles to line up single file, blocking each other's views, it will encourage people to buy the low, light, fuel-efficient vehicles known as automobiles. Remember those? ALAN HOLLEB Santa Monica Isn't it odd that certain segments of our population get villainized almost at random.

The Ford Escape - an aging vehicle that looks pretty much like the model that first debuted in 2000 - has quietly become one of the biggest success stories at Ford Motor Co. The automaker has sold more than 200,000 of the small sport-utility this year, making it the 5th best selling vehicle in America and the top SUV. Of all Ford models, only its F-series pickup truck does better. Decent interior room and cargo space make the Escape a good mommy car. But its masculine rectangular SUV design also makes the vehicle popular among male buyers.

An "explosive" scene littered a Fontana intersection after a sport utility vehicle ran a red light and slammed into two other cars, killing three brothers and an 11-year-old boy, authorities said Monday. A Chevrolet Suburban carrying the three brothers was traveling east on Baseline Avenue in Fontana on Sunday when it ran a red light at Cherry Avenue and sheared the back off a Honda sedan carrying a 40-year-old Fontana woman and her 11-year-old son, said Sgt. Billy Green of the Fontana Police Department.

Paris Hilton was "extremely embarrassed" after Las Vegas police pulled her SUV over Friday night and allegedly discovered cocaine in a purse she was carrying, according to a police report. Police said they pulled over Hilton's vehicle because they smelled marijuana coming from it. When they did so, a crowd gathered, with some taking pictures. Hilton was "extremely embarrassed, due to all the people taking pictures of her," the report said. Police allege they found 0.8 grams of cocaine in a purse she was carrying.

Regarding the hybrid SUV/fuel question, just think how disappointed actor Luke MacFarlane would be if he had spent the $49,000-plus on a Lexus RX 400h, only to max out at 20 miles per gallon on city and highway driving as I did ("Whither the SUV?," by Patrick J. Kiger, Aug. 28). Perhaps that would give new definition to the term "sticker shock." I can only hope that on subsequent tanks of gas, and without running the air-conditioning, the mileage improves so I don't feel like a total idiot for justifying spending that kind of money on a new SUV because of the potential fuel and environmental savings.

A grainy surveillance tape from the Orange County high school where a Marine sergeant was shot to death by a sheriff's deputy shows a white sport-utility vehicle slamming through a gate leading to the campus. A Sheriff's Department patrol car enters the San Clemente High School parking lot a short time later, and three more squad cars and an unmarked unit follow, the tape shows. The surveillance video, which was provided to The Times on Tuesday, captures what appears to be the minutes leading up to the fatal shooting of Sgt. Manuel Loggins Jr., a career Marine who died behind the wheel of his white GMC sport-utility vehicle with his young daughters in the back seat.

SANFORD, Fla. — The nation's leading civil rights advocates and outraged everyday people packed this laid-back lakeside community Monday to demand the arrest of the man who killed African American teenager Trayvon Martin, even as police sources portrayed the unarmed youth as the aggressor. Beneath an incongruously cheerful Florida sun, the passionate but well-behaved crowd marched, chanting and shouting, toward the Sanford Civic Center. Inside, the City Commission ceded most of its regularly scheduled meeting to Martin's grieving parents, their lawyer and a roster of civil rights luminaries who criticized the city's leadership and its handling of a case that, to some, symbolizes lingering racism and a justice system that too often fails black victims of violence.

The victim of a reported kidnapping died Thursday after her alleged abductor crashed the sport utility vehicle he was driving head-on into another vehicle in Westlake as he was trying to flee police, authorities said. Police were alerted to the kidnapping shortly after 8 a.m. when witnesses reported a woman inside a GMC Yukon frantically waving for help near the intersection of 6th Street and Westlake Avenue, said Cmdr. Andy Smith of the Los Angeles Police Department. Patrol officers spotted the SUV, which was being driven by a man. He pulled a U-turn in front of them and fled, Smith said.

In an unusual move, the union representing an Orange County sheriff's deputy who shot and killed an unarmed Marine last week is now blaming the Marine for creating "a situation that put his children in danger and ultimately cost him his life," according to a statement released Tuesday. The statement, which the Assn. of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs said was based on information gathered from the Sheriff's Department and the unnamed deputy's attorney, purports to offer new details of the Feb. 7 confrontation that resulted in the fatal wounding of Sgt. Manuel Loggins Jr., 31, in the dark parking lot of San Clemente High School.

Tesla Motors Inc. has yet to deliver the much-touted Model S — the electric sedan it is making at its auto factory in Fremont, Calif. — but that didn't stop the automaker from taking reservations for a sport utility vehicle it doesn't expect to begin selling until 2014. The Palo Alto, Calif., maker of electric vehicles unveiled the Model X, an electric-powered SUV, and said interested buyers could put down a $5,000 deposit to reserve one, though the vehicle's price hasn't been set yet. The Model X looks more like a crossover than a traditional utility and features unusual gull-wing doors that lift up and out. Tesla plans to start manufacturing the vehicle at the end of 2013, with sales to begin the following year.

An "explosive" scene littered a Fontana intersection after a sport utility vehicle ran a red light and slammed into two other cars, killing three brothers and an 11-year-old boy, authorities said Monday. A Chevrolet Suburban carrying the three brothers was traveling east on Baseline Avenue in Fontana on Sunday when it ran a red light at Cherry Avenue and sheared the back off a Honda sedan carrying a 40-year-old Fontana woman and her 11-year-old son, said Sgt. Billy Green of the Fontana Police Department.

Re "Fear and Loathing on the Highway," Nov. 10: Sport utility vehicles return the highest profit per unit than any other category of automobile. This, combined with lower safety requirements (read: lower costs of manufacture) and higher fuel consumption, makes these vehicles very desirable items for both the auto and the gas industries to push on to the consumer. Again, it appears we are being led to think what the Industrial Powers want us to think, rather than to use our common sense.

Buick on Tuesday unveiled a small sport-utility vehicle scheduled to go on sale a year for now, as the brand moves to broaden the range of models sold at its dealerships. The Encore, shown at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, will be the General Motors division's second SUV, joining the much larger Enclave, which has become a popular model for the resurgent brand. The five-seat Encore comes equipped with a turbocharged, four-cylinder engine and features the high driving position and visibility that have made small crossovers and SUVs a growing segment of the U.S. auto market.

If the parking lot were high school, the all-new Range Rover Evoque would throw the best parties, vacation in places we mispronounce and read magazines that are delivered to only the truest of sybarites. It would be cooler than us. This is to be expected, given that the Evoque has the looks and the pedigree to make a member of any royal family jealous. Yet anyone who carries themselves with a calculated air of indifference has insecurities lurking within. The Evoque is no different.