Bikeside LA

Rick Darge produced this excellent video of the Blood In protest & press conference:

Last year when Jesus Castillo was killed LA Critical Mass went to the site of his death, joined together around his ghost bike, and held a die-in to honor him, and call attention to the driver’s crime.
A little over a year later we are still plagued by hit and runs.  I humbly suggest that those [...]

Until Sara or I can write a proper post, here are some photos from the Blood In protest, courtesy Gary Kavanagh and “Barleye”:

For immediate release.  For information & interviews contact alexcthompson@gmail.com.
On Tuesday, July 27th, and Friday, July 30th, cyclists will gather at the Beverly Hills Courthouse to protest the tepid sentence handed down by Judge Elden S. Fox for Celine Mahdavi.  Mahdavi hit cyclist Louis Deliz and left him to die in the street on December 1st, [...]

“She shouldn’t drive unless she has a valid driver’s license.”  That was Judge Elden Fox’s message today to Celine Mahdavi, the women who clobbered Louis Deliz into 49 days of hospitalization.
Lindsay Lohan will likely serve 14 days of the 90 day sentence in County jail she began today.  She violated the terms of her probation [...]

Celine Mahdavi stands before the court for Felony Hit & Run and Felony DUI.
I’m outside the Beverly Hills Municipal Courthouse awaiting the arrival of Louis “Birdman” Deliz. The air is crisp and full of the murmur of morning gridlock along Burton Way. Louis shows up, I give him a handshake and we wait [...]

Today’s Caltrans Bicycle Advisory Committee kicked off with a brown-bag session of Bikeside presentations of Hit & Run incidents by Sara Bond, the LA Bike Map by Alex Thompson and the Greensters by Enci Box.
This two hour session attracted many folks from Caltrans, SCAG (Southern California Association of Governments), California Highway Patrol, LAPD, Burbank PD [...]

She’s sobbing, and a blood pressure cuff hangs from her arm, tracking her pulse.  Ten men and myself stand around and none are talking to her and she’s sobbing.  I feel sad for her, I feel sad with her.  I want to take her hand to connect to her and soothe her, to calm her [...]

(update: it was a no contest plea – an earlier version of this article wrote it was a guilty plea – confusion arose over how a no contest plea is handled in sentencing.  My apologies.)

Earlier today Glenn Gritzner plead no contest to misdemeanor hit and run, specifically to violating California Vehicle Code 20002(a): leaving the [...]

I just learned that the Porsche driver who hit cyclist Ed Magos has had charges filed against them by the City Attorney.  No word on the specific charges, but since it’s going through the City Attorney instead of the District Attorney, that probably means that it’s misdemeanor hit and run, not [...]