Author Archives: huffsantacruz

Homeowner protection bills go to governor

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Pete Carey

San Jose Mercury News, July 3, 2012

Two bills to protect all California homeowners from arbitrary foreclosures and loan fraud are headed to Gov. Jerry Brown following their passage Monday in the Assembly and Senate.

The bills — part of Attorney General Kamala Harris’ Homeowner Bill of Rights — would make California the first state to extend to all homeowners the provisions of a national mortgage settlement with five big lenders.

“We really got it right this time,” said Assemblyman Mike Eng, D-Alhambra, who helped pilot the bills through the Assembly. “It means more Californians will stay in their homes, and the California economy will be better for that.”

The vote passing the bills was 53-25 in the Assembly and 25-13 in the Senate.

The measures address one of the most vexing problems faced by struggling homeowners seeking to remain in their homes — sudden foreclosure while they are working with a lender on a loan modification. The legislation also tackles a common complaint from homeowners, who say they are shuttled from one bank officer to the next in a confusing process that requires the repeated submissions of documents.

The foreclosure crisis continues to roil the state. More than 600,000 homeowners are either not making their mortgage payments or are facing foreclosure, according to ForeclosureRadar. Banks currently own 75,000 foreclosed homes.

If signed by Brown, the Foreclosure Reduction Act and the Due Process Rights Act will require lenders and

servicers to:

–Decide on a loan modification application before beginning to foreclose on a home. This would end “dual tracking,” in which one department in a bank works on a loan modification while another initiates a foreclosure.

–Establish a “single point of contact” at a bank for borrowers who might be eligible for a loan modification. The point of contact would have to be knowledgeable about the borrower’s loan and personal circumstances.

The bills also give borrowers the right to sue before being foreclosed, and to recover damages following a sale, a provision the banking industry felt was too broad.

In addition, the legislation also imposes a $7,500 civil penalty per loan when the lender has filed unverified documents — a practice known as “robo-signing.”

“Passing these key elements of the Homeowner Bill of Rights represents a significant step forward for struggling homeowners,” Harris said in a statement. “These common-sense reforms will require banks to treat California homeowners more fairly and bring more transparency and accountability to their practices in our state. Responsible homeowners will have a better shot to keep their homes.”

The measures would have helped Jose and Maria Carrillo of San Jose. Their three-bedroom home was sold at auction Jan. 10 after a two-year struggle to modify their mortgage with Bank of America. Maria’s sister, Ana Nunez, helped with the modification and said that it involved a long, frustrating process of submitting and resubmitting documents.

During that time a default notice was filed and the house was scheduled for sale. “We were told not to worry,” Nunez said. “But my sister and husband were at home Jan. 10 in the evening when two gentlemen showed up to tell them they had three days to move out of the house.” The men had purchased the home at auction that day.

Nunez said she called the bank officer who was dealing with their modification. “The lady who answered the phone was very apologetic.”

The Carrillos’ story has a happy ending, but many such stories don’t. The Fair Housing Law Project of San Jose took their case and persuaded the bank it had made a mistake. The foreclosure was canceled and the couple’s loan modified.

“It never should have gotten to this point,” said James Zahradka, one of the lawyers who handled the Carrillos’ case. “This wouldn’t have happened” if the Foreclosure Reduction Act bill had been law last year, said Zahradka, who is also a board member of the California Reinvestment Coalition.

Sen. Noreen Evans, D-Santa Rosa, who co-chaired a joint conference committee on the bills with Eng, said she expects the governor to sign the legislation. “We did work very closely with the governor’s advisers in crafting the final compromise,” she said.

The measures were passed despite opposition from the banking and mortgage industry, which fears that the Due Process Rights Act — giving borrowers the right to sue their lenders — will spur lawsuits and raise the cost of making loans.

More than half a dozen banking and financial industry groups in California fought the bills. The groups, including the California Chamber of Commerce, said the measures are “overly complicated” and are likely to “encourage frivolous litigation.”

“Numerous studies have shown that when you lengthen litigation and lengthen the foreclosure process there’s no tangible benefit to borrowers,” said Dustin Hobbs, spokesman for the California Mortgage Bankers Association. “It significantly delays the recovery of the real estate market.”

But proponents said the bills merely level the playing field for all California homeowners.

“It’s one rare measure of accountability brought to banks,” said Kevin Stein of the California Reinvestment Coalition. The bills lay out what they are supposed to do. We hope they are going to follow the law, but if they don’t, consumers will be able to enforce their rights.”

The intent is to reduce wrongful foreclosures, but not all foreclosures, said Paul Leonard of the Center for Responsible Lending.

“There are 700,000 Californians who are today in some stage of delinquency or in foreclosure,” Leonard said. “There’s a large number of folks who could benefit from the protections that are included in the bill.”

Unlike the national settlement, which expires in three years, these laws are permanent, except for some provisions that sunset in 2018. The laws would go into effect Jan. 1.

Oakland school cops halt protest at closed Lakeview

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Will Kane
SF Chronicle, Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Oakland school police officers cleared out a dozen protesters early Tuesday who were camping in a closed elementary school.

The group of parents and activists had been sleeping at Lakeview Elementary School at 746 Grand Ave. since June 15 to protest the district’s decision to close the school.

District police officers entered the school across from the Grand Lake Theater about 4 a.m. and told the activists they would be arrested if they did not leave, said Troy Flint, a school district spokesman. All but two protesters packed up their belongings and departed.

The remaining two asked to be arrested, Flint said. They were cited and released.

Citing budget problems and declining enrollment, the school board voted in October to close five elementary schools in Oakland: Lakeview, Santa Fe, Marshall, Maxwell Park and Lazear. Parents have been fighting to save the schools ever since.

Flint said school officials had been unable to reason with the protesters.

“We didn’t act immediately because we didn’t want it to turn into a law enforcement event,” he said. “We do have to get prepared for the next school year, and there are plans for that facility.”

Flint said the school will house the district’s family services unit.

Jack Gerson, a retired Oakland teacher who was involved with the protest, said the group would continue to fight the proposed closure. Closing schools will hurt Oakland students, Gerson said.

Activists had held group discussions on their vision of the school’s future, Gerson said.

“We’re going to continue across the street for at least the next week,” he said. “We think (the community) stands for what is needed – not closing down schools.”

SoMa becoming free-trade zone for pot dispensaries

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C.W. Nevius
SF Chronicle, Monday, July 2, 2012

Neighborhood groups have been complaining about the pot club boom South of Market for years. But now that recently approved marijuana dispensaries are starting to open, the critics can point to the map and make the case that there should be a law against “clustering.”

Across from The Chronicle at Fifth and Mission streets, workers are putting the finishing touches on a dispensary at 952 Mission, set to open in July. And in April, the City Planning Commission approved another club just around the corner at Sixth and Jessie, about half a block away.

The hearing prompted debate, but until the storefronts open, it is hard to visualize the problem.

“If there were a number of Starbucks opening on the same block, or banks, I would still be here” objecting, said Daniel Hurtado, executive director of the Central Market Community Benefit District. “There’s literally another one around the corner. What’s the need?”

Unfortunately, regulating pot clubs is not a popular position. Then-Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi pushed through regulations in 2005 that kept dispensaries from opening, unregulated, all over the city.

Unfortunately, what seemed like reasonable restrictions at the time have basically turned the South of Market district into a pot free-trade area. The idea was that a dispensary could not be placed within 1,000 feet of a school for students younger than 18 and that it had to be zoned for commercial use.

SoMa, with its condos, apartments and single men and women, fits the profile perfectly. A rectangle, from Fourth Street to 10th Street three blocks wide, is nearly all wide open. When the two new clubs open this summer, seven dispensaries will be between Fourth and 10th streets.

The irony, of course, is that everyone from Mayor Ed Lee to neighborhood activists has been trying to get new businesses to move into the area around troubled Sixth Street. But creating a San Francisco version of pot-friendly Amsterdam was not what they had in mind.

Judges affirm that sleeping at any time or place is illegal

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Becky Johnson: One Woman Talking

July 1, 2012

Original Post

 Attorney Ed Frey is arrested for sleeping on August 7, 2010 as part of Peace Camp 2010
protest against sleeping bans. Photo by Bradley Stuart

Santa Cruz Superior Court Appeals Panel

affirms 6-month sentence for Sleeping

Santa Cruz, Ca. — A two-judge panel has affirmed the conviction of Ed Frey and Gary Johnson for sleeping.  The law, PC 647 (e), the statewide anti-lodging law, outlaws illegal lodging. But it was clear from evidence introduced at trial, statements by Judge John Gallagher, and finally statements by the two appeals Judges, Paul Marigona and Timothy Volkmann, that “sleeping” equals “lodging” for “the people.”
The judgement upholds the conviction for the two men, and Gallagher’s draconian sentence of 6 months in jail for sleeping for each man. Unmentioned at the appeals hearing was that Gallagher had also set bail at $50,000 each, a bail that was later modified to $110, which was the bail schedule all along for this “crime.”

Of course the “crime” in the case of PC 647 (e) violations is to use the extremely broad activity of “lodging” as an arrestable crime against homeless people who have no other choice than to live in public places, and against protestors, in this case, set against the backdrop of Occupy Santa Cruz.

A homeless man sleeps as part of Peace Camp 2010, in front of the Santa Cruz County Courthouse
on July 12, 2010  photo by Becky Johnson

Appeals Court Judge, Paul Marigonda began in support of denying the appeal by claiming the defendants were claiming “a right to sleep anywhere.” He claimed that neither County law nor the 9th Amendment to the Federal Constitution did not provide “any such right. That government provide any such place to sleep, is not there either.”

Marigonda then referenced three sources. He said that “lodging can be setting up in a place with the intention of spending the night,” language which he cribbed from section “c” of the Santa Cruz City Ordinance 6.36.010 Camping prohibited.

“It can be to occupy a place temporarily,” which Marigonda got from a regular dictionary.
“It can be to settle in or live in a place temporarily, that may include sleeping,” which is the definition Judge John Gallagher cobbled together to give to the jury that convicted Frey and Johnson in May of 2011. He asserted that “time, place and manner restrictions” were “entirely reasonable.”

Marigonda then addressed the six month sentence handed down to the two men. “It’s not unusual when the two men involved refused to accept the terms of the probation.”  Frey and Johnson had turned down 400 hours of community service and a 3-year probation including ‘obey all laws’.

A homeless kitten explores at Peace Camp 2010
Photo by Chris Doyon

Johnson, who is homeless, had objected to the ‘obey all laws’ clause saying that he “needed to sleep” and that he couldn’t go three years without sleeping. Gallagher had resolved that by jailing Johnson on the spot telling him he “could sleep in jail.” Frey had called the 400 hours of community service “slavery.” Considering that DA Sara Dabkowski had sought 50 times what a conviction for MC 6.36.010 section a, also known as “the sleeping ban,” the law they were there sleeping in direct violation as an act of civil disobedience.

Ed Frey, who was both a defendant and the defense attorney, began by correcting Marigonda.

“We weren’t attempting to say we had a right to sleep anywhere, we say we have a right to sleep somewhere.  We’re asking the Superior Court to acknowledge that sleeping is a valid form of expression. We’re all physical embodiments. Will we say to anyone who doesn’t have any property rights or access to a physical abode, that you don’t have a right to live?

Judge Timothy Volkmann assured Frey he had read Ed’s brief “four times.” “While sleeping is expressive conduct, it is subject to time, place and manner restrictions.”
“The statute itself says you can’t lodge anywhere in the State. And not at any time in a 24 hour day. And the California State Constitution doesn’t allow cruel or unusual punishment. Has anyone else you know been sentenced to six months in jail for sleeping?”

“You didn’t take advantage of your probation offer,” responded Volkmann.

Marigonda, referencing his experience as “10 years as a prosecutor in domestic violence felony cases” he said it was a common practice to charge the maximum sentence for defendants who refused probation terms. “And it could be just a touch.”

Frey countered, “We generally sentence based on harm to a victim. How did Gary and I harm anyone by sleeping in front of the courthouse when all the workers were home in bed?”

Marigonda: “Judgement of lower court is affirmed in its entirety.”

But Frey and Johnson were not immediately jailed to complete their 6-month terms for sleeping.
Frey sought permission from the court to certify the case for further appeal, which the court granted. However, on Friday, June 29th, the court turned him down. So now he is preparing a writ of Habeas Corpus to appeal to the Supreme Court of the State of California.

Shootout, arrest at illegal marijuana farm near Mount Madonna County Park

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By Stephen BaxterSanta Cruz Sentinel: 06/28/2012

MOUNT MADONNA – A man was shot in the arm and later arrested during a raid of an illegal marijuana grow near Mount Madonna County Park on Thursday.

Deputies searched for a second suspect Thursday afternoon but did not find him, said Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Sgt. Jose Cardoza.

They planned to finish the search for the outstanding suspect at sundown Thursday.

The illegal marijuana grow was in a remote area about an hour’s hike southeast of Hecker Pass Road outside the park, said Cardoza. Authorities did not know whether the outstanding suspect had a gun, but two rifles were found near the grow.

“Because it’s such a remote area we don’t believe he’s a threat to public safety,” Cardoza said of the suspect who fled.

About 6 a.m. Thursday, nine Santa Clara County Sheriff’s deputies and California Fish and Game wardens in a marijuana eradication team started a hike to the marijuana grow above Bodfish Creek.

They arrived and found two men. About 11:45 a.m. deputies fired several shots at them. It was unclear if the suspects fired back, Cardoza said.

One suspect was wounded; both fled.

About 12:30 p.m., Santa Cruz County 911 dispatchers received a call from a Spanish speaking man who said he was shot in the arm. He wanted medical help.

He talked to authorities by cellphone as law enforcement agents tried to find him from the air.

A Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s SWAT team coincidentally had been training in the area, Cardoza said. The man surrendered to them about 2:30 p.m. just off Whitehurst and Hecker Pass Road in Santa Clara County, according to dispatches.

They treated his injury – which authorities said was not life-threatening – and he was taken to a hospital.

The man was arrested on suspicion of illegal marijuana cultivation and faces potential weapons charges, Cardoza said. His name and age have not been released.

“It’s a dangerous operation that these suspects take part in,” Cardoza said of illegal marijuana grows.

Deputies have not yet estimated the size of the grow.

Cardoza said deputies have probed other pot gardens in Southern Santa Clara County near Santa Cruz County in recent years. The marijuana eradication team typically identifies the grows in March and April and raids them during summer harvests.

“It’s not uncommon for them to grow thousands of plants,” Cardoza said. Deputies “pull them out by hand, root and all.”

Thursday afternoon, a few dozen heavily armed deputies from both counties set up a perimeter in the forest south of Mount Madonna County Park. The 3,688-acre park marks the county line between Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties.

They used ATVs, K-9s and a helicopter in the search. California Highway Patrol officers also participated in the search.

As law enforcement agents staged near a ranger station, the quiet, hot park remained open to joggers, dog walkers, horseback riders and other visitors.

Kevin Campbell, who works at Mount Madonna School, was jogging in the park. He was not surprised that authorities found a marijuana plantation in the woods.

“The biggest thing for me is that they leave their trash,” Campbell said. Campfire cooking also could lead to wildfires, he said.

“It’s mostly the trash, the fire danger and the dudes with guns in the woods. That’s unacceptable,” Campbell said.

Santa Cruz, county jointly expand mental health outreach program

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By J.M. BROWN –
Santa Cruz Sentinel:  06/28/2012

SANTA CRUZ – With the state shifting greater responsibility for housing inmates to county jails, county and city leaders agreed this week to nearly double the amount of staff assigned to a mental health outreach program targeting downtown.

Officials say pursuing and sustaining treatment is the best way to keep out of trouble people with serious mental illness who also are at risk of committing crime.

“The right place for the mentally ill is not in jail and not in the streets acting out,” said County Supervisor Neal Coonerty, who spearheaded the expansion. “It’s in treatment.”

In adopting the county budget Thursday, the Board of Supervisors approved Coonerty’s request for nearly $275,000 in new funding to expand the MOST program, which stands for Maintaining Ongoing Stability through Treatment. Tuesday, the City Council granted his request to dedicate $80,000.

MOST pairs outreach workers with police to perform crisis intervention and provide ongoing case management for clients. Probation and corrections officials, as well as psychiatrist and a licensed vocation nurse, also are part of the team that will grow in July from 4.75 full-time equivalent employees to 8.5.

The program launched in July 2007 with funding from California Department of Corrections, but the county had to reduce it in 2008 amid the state’s deepening economic crisis. During the program’s first year, the number of total days people identified as mentally ill stayed in jail dropped from about 3,200 to about 150, the county reported.

Coonerty, a member of the county’s mental health advisory board, sought to expand the program after the Legislature last year passed Assembly Bill 109, which redirects many nonviolent offenders away from the overburdened prison system and in to county jails or diversion programs.

“With AB 109, jail beds will be at a premium,” Coonerty said.

The MOST expansion also comes seven weeks after a parolee who spent time in corrections facilities for the mentally ill allegedly stabbed a woman to death in broad daylight on Broadway. The man charged with murdering 38-year-old downtown store owner Shannon Collins is due in court Aug. 13 for a preliminary hearing.

“Somebody that is violent belongs in jail, but if someone is breaking rules and doing unlawful things because they are off their meds and acting out mentally, we have a way to wrap them into treatment,” Coonerty said.

County officials say Maintaining Ongoing Stability through Treatment will be able to assist about up to 90 clients on an ongoing basis, rather than the 40 or so served now. While outreach workers and police can identify people needing treatment, jail, probation and court officials also can make referrals to the program.

To pay for the expansion, the county will tap its general fund, as well as state money designed to help counties and jail officials absorb more inmates. The county’s total contribution for the program, including new funds and in-kind support, will be $1 million.

The city’s contribution also will come from its general fund. Santa Cruz has spent $75,000 annually to support the county’s downtown outreach worker, but the money came from redevelopment funding eliminated by the state last year.

City officials say the outreach worker has been critical in connecting mentally ill people with housing, counseling and other services.

“It’s so obvious where the good work that has been done has had a good outcome,” City Councilwoman Lynn Robinson said.

Also Tuesday, the council approved $25,000 in new funding for a major expansion of Homeward Bound, a program that provides bus tickets to homeless people who want to go to another community where they have confirmed support. Operated by the Homeless Services Center, the program is currently funded through a $5,000 anonymous donation.

Looking At All Sides

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by Mike Roberts, Santa Cruz
Good Times Letters to the Editor 6/21-27/12

I moved here three years ago and continue to find this the most wonderful place in many ways. I came here from Charleston, S.C., where I grew up. I worked 20-plus years for the woman that raised Jesse Jackson. I know something about ‘black’ people, I think. And I know it is increasingly inappropriate to consider race when chasing riddles, but I think the biggest misperception common to Shannon Collins’ murder was that which linked him to the homeless community here, a community which I have been a part of since I got here because I recognize these people as family regardless of their hygeine and sanity, for I am myself homeless. What I think should enter public thinking is the observation that the man was a big misfit, unable to reconcile himself to any idea of how to find a comfortable existence among all of these dirty, scary white people (and he had made basically just such complaint for the record at some point as I read it). Someone in his place is as lost as someone in a nuthouse who considers that the only way out is through the window, no matter how high, and he felt like he was on the roof of the nuthouse. Carrying a Bible, come on. Who did not see this as an outcry for some sort of personal, spiritual attention.

Local Nonprofits Benefit from CSA Shares

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by Cat Johnson
SC Weekly Jun 20, 2012

To visit the Homeless Garden Project’s Natural Bridges Farm is to step into a simpler world. Just blocks away from the unending flow of traffic on Mission Street and the chaos of downtown Santa Cruz, the farm sits away from it all. Bursting with life, it’s a collage of colors, scents and sounds. Dogs are sunbathing in the dirt; the farm staff and volunteers are bustling around harvesting and weeding, two people are putting together flower bouquets and the wind is coming off the bay at a steady 40 mph. The rows of vegetables, herbs, fruits and flowers seem unaffected by the wind. The humans look windblown, sun-kissed and happy.

I’m at the farm to meet Zac, a lanky 19-year-old with a shy smile and a thoughtful disposition. Part of the Independent Living Program (ILP), a local project that helps young people transition out of foster care into self-sufficiency, Zac is at the farm to pick up the boxes of freshly harvested food that ILP receives on a weekly basis. This week’s share contains fava beans, green garlic, strawberries, red and green leaf lettuce, winter bore kale, atomic red carrots and fresh rosemary. Some of the food will be prepared at the ILP Resource Center. The rest will be given to the young people to take home.

“I’ve never been too much on the organic side until I came here and saw what they were doing,” says Zac, who has also volunteered at the farm. “When you go to other farms you don’t see people walking around and you don’t see the variety of plants. It’s beautiful here.”

Susan Paradise, program manager of the Transition Age Youth Programs, of which ILP is a part, says that when the outfit first started receiving and preparing food from the farm, a lot of the kids didn’t know what the various vegetables even were. But the staff kept serving it, and the kids grew to love it.

“Growing up in foster care, they have so little control over what ends up on their plate,” Paradise says, noting that rates of malnutrition are high in the foster care community. “More often than not, it’s not fresh organic produce. But we have a lot of kids eating kale now. I think that our youth sense that this is special food,” she continues. “There’s a really positive energy around this whole process.”

 

A Healthy Change

ILP is one of four local nonprofits that receive donated Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) shares from the Homeless Garden Project. The others are the Beach Flats Community Center, Women’s Crisis Support and the Santa Cruz AIDS Project. The flowers from each share are donated to Hospice of Santa Cruz County.

The Homeless Garden Project offers transitional employment and job training through its trainee program. An important part of the program is then distributing the food grown by the trainees to underserved community members. Darrie Ganzhorn, executive director of the Homeless Garden Project, calls it feeding two birds with one worm. (She also calls it feeding two birds with one seed, but admits that dividing one seed sounds a bit like malnourishment.)

Ganzhorn emphasizes the importance of the relationship between CSA members, the farm and the farmers. “It isn’t just a connection to the food,” she says. “It’s a connection to the garden.”

A CSA share, which costs $650, comes out to approximately $20 per week. For boxes of fresh organic fruits and vegetables, this is a good price, but for someone who has to choose between rent and food, it may be out of reach.

For many low-income families, high-calorie, low-cost, low-nutritional-value foods become dietary staples, which contributes to our current national health crisis. According to the Centers for Disease Control, 35.7 percent of American adults and 17 percent of American children are obese.

For Ganzhorn, the solution-oriented way of addressing this crisis is to make fresh foods accessible and help people find ways to incorporate them into their diet. Through its donation program, the Homeless Garden Project gets healthy food into communities that may not have access to it otherwise.

But that costs money, so the Homeless Garden Project relies on donations from the community. From $5 to $1,000 and up, donations go directly to support the trainee and CSA donation programs. A U-Pick farm stand, open every day from 10am to 4pm at the Natural Bridges Farm, also benefits the programs.

With a goal of 15 donated shares this year, the Homeless Garden Project staff would eventually like to have the majority of the farm’s CSA shares going to community organizations.

“Fresh food shouldn’t just be for the wealthy,” says farm supervisor David Stockhausen. “The more the community at large continues to support us, the more we can do for the community. We’re recycling good.”

Before he leaves, Zac points out how much the farm does for everyone involved with it. “I’m just another person who’s affected by it, like so many others,” he says. “You’ve got to give thanks for that.”

Does Santa Cruz jail people for sleeping?

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Becky Johnson: One Woman Talking

June 14, 2012

Original Post


 At a January hearing in 2011, Ed Frey checks in with
expert witness, Dr. Paul Lee, as supporters Robert Norse
and Gail Page look on. Photo by Becky Johnson

by Becky Johnson
June 14, 2012

Santa Cruz, Ca. — While my title may seem absurd, it is clear that the answer is “yes.”  Both Gary Johnson, a homeless man, and his attorney, Ed Frey, slept outside the courthouse as part of Peace Camp 2010, to protest laws which criminalize the act of sleeping.  When County Counsel Dana McRae advised Sheriff’s that they could cite protestors with 647 (e), the statewide anti-lodging law, sheriff’s began to advise protestors that “illegal lodging would not be tolerated.”

The misdemeanor law can involve immediate arrest for the act of “lodging,” even though the legal meaning of that term is not defined within the law.

Because of this over-charging ( an infraction sleeping ban ticket would only have resulted in a maximum of 8 hours of community service, if found guilty) the very first ever jury trial on a sleeping ban was held before Judge John Gallagher last May.  Frey and Johnson were found guilty of sleeping.

To show his extreme displeasure with the whole process, Gallagher sentenced both Johnson and Frey to 6 months in jail for the “crime” of lodging, which court testimony said was sleeping. When Frey asked to be released on bail to appeal his conviction, Gallagher set bail at $50,000 each.  Both were handcuffed and jailed right as the hearing ended.

At a later hearing, Gallagher modified the bail to $110, which was, apparently, the bail schedule all along for 647 (e) violations.  Today, in Dept 5, a three-judge panel will hear Frey’s appeal.  If the conviction is upheld, Frey and Johnson may be remanded to jail to finish serving their six-month sentences.

Does Santa Cruz REALLY put people in jail for sleeping?  You bet they do.

Naked man causes a commotion

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SC Sentinel Cops and Courts 06/12/2012

SANTA CRUZ – A 46-year-old man was arrested Sunday evening after someone flagged down an officer on Dakota Avenue near San Lorenzo Park to report that there was a naked man near the bathrooms causing a commotion, police said.

The officer found David Torrell, naked, near the bathroom about 7:20 p.m., talking loudly to himself, and carrying pants, shoes and some tools, police spokesman Zach Friend said.

Torrell smelled like alcohol and had bloodshot eyes, slurred speech and an unsteady gait, Friend said.

The officer covered him with a blanket and arrested him on suspicion of being drunk in public, he said.

Torrell was described as a transient.