Video Recordings

Two San Fernando Valley teenagers accused of randomly attacking pedestrians and bicyclists with baseball bats and paint-pellet guns kept their eyes averted in court Tuesday as prosecutors presented evidence that left viewers recoiling and cringing--a videotape of the attacks shot by the young men themselves.

"Here, feel my tummy." Denise Austin, 38, proffers her bare midsection, a tanned rectangle between the top of her neon-orange exercise shorts and matching bra top. It feels like you could drive a car over it and she'd still be breathing. "That's my trademark," she says. "Everybody's felt my tummy." George Bush has felt her tummy, and Colin Powell and Phil Donahue and Kathie Lee Gifford. It's a very impressive tummy. Indeed, Austin is impressive all over.

Studios hoping to capitalize on the cachet of an Oscar nomination often re-release films that came out early in the year and alter plans for video release. "The Oscar nominations just give an extra boost of awareness," said Evan Fong, executive director of publicity for MCA/Universal Home Video. This year is an unusual one: Four of the five best picture candidates premiered during the summer.

O.J. Simpson resumed his deposition in the wrongful death suit against him Thursday as the father of one of the victims lashed out at him for his comments about the bereaved families. In his $29.95 mail order video, Simpson expresses compassion for the families of the two victims but said, "I lost more than you did. I lost a person that I loved. I've lost my life." "I think he has colossal gall to say something like that," Fred Goldman said. "He's equating his money to human life.

Video Vigilance A group of Yucca Street property owners and residents has installed three video cameras along the half- mile "Yucca corridor" in Hollywood in an effort to stem drug dealing and gang activity. They expect to add three more cameras in the coming months.

Police called it a dope supermarket, a notorious corridor on Yucca Street in the heart of Hollywood where cocaine dealers ruled the streets and residents hid behind their doors from gunfire after dark. Law enforcement targeted the area, making scores of arrests and pressing owners to board up vacant buildings that had become drug dens. But impatient neighborhood leaders felt that more had to be done, so they decided to take up the fight themselves. Drawing a lesson from the Rodney G.

An attorney for Edward Patrick Morgan Jr. admitted Tuesday that his client savagely killed a woman outside an Orange nightclub two years ago, but argued for a lesser murder conviction that would spare the convicted rapist a possible death sentence. "This is not a whodunit," defense lawyer Julian W. Bailey told an Orange County Superior Court jury as the murder trial opened.

Americans overwhelmingly condemn as "unjustified" the actions of two Riverside County sheriff's deputies caught on video beating illegal immigrants, a new Los Angeles Times Poll has found. Indignation at the sheriff's deputies, shown yanking a woman by the hair and clubbing a cowering man on the back and shoulders, swept across all demographic groups. A total of 71% criticized the beating as unjustified, including 56% who termed it strongly unjustified.

Sheriff's Deputy Tracy Watson, one of two officers being investigated in the baton beating of two illegal immigrants April 1--is suing the department, charging that his superiors coerced him into writing a potentially self-incriminating report. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, asks for unspecified financial damages and demands that the report be kept out of the hands of investigators in Los Angeles who are considering criminal and civil charges against him.

Ten illegal immigrants were detained Thursday after a traffic video camera perched above the San Diego Freeway captured an image of a large group of people spilling out of a van at the roadside and running into a nearby neighborhood, authorities said. The 10 people were hiding in bushes and running through the south end of the Woodbridge neighborhood, according to Lt. Tom Hume, spokesman for the Irvine Police Department. The nine men and a lone woman were turned over to U.S.