Men on trial over “Hotel California” lyrics
Tomo Chien
February 22, 2024
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If you’re a longtime reader with a few minutes to spare, I’d really appreciate your help. Onto the five USC, Los Angeles and California stories you need to know for today.
1.
Three New York men are on trial for allegedly conspiring to sell stolen draft lyrics of the 1977 Eagles hit album “Hotel California.” Prosecutors claim that the men — a rare-book dealer, former Rock & Roll Hall of Fame curator and memorabilia seller — bought the allegedly stolen handwritten lyrics from a writer who had worked on a book about the band that was never published. Clashes over music collectibles are fairly common, but such fights spilling into criminal trials like this are rare. What’s even more uncommon is that Don Henley, the band’s star co-founder, is expected to testify in the case between tour stops. He’s not, in other words, taking it easy.
2.
Yesterday, I wrote about how Russian authorities detained an LA woman on suspicion of treason — but missed a key detail: The charges stem from a donation of just $50 that the woman made to a New York-based charity that aids the Ukrainian military. Ksenia Karelina, a 33-year-old spa aesthetician who’s a dual U.S.-Russia citizen, now faces the full brunt of Vladimir Putin’s increasingly repressive wartime regime. Russian officials said Karelina is accused of “proactively collecting funds … which were subsequently used to purchase tactical medicine items, equipment, weapons and ammunition.” I’m sure her $50 went a long way.
3.
California’s budget deficit is expected to balloon by another $15 billion, analysts said. It now sits at $73 billion for the 2024-25 fiscal year. Earlier this year, Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed dipping into state reserves and cutting some short-term programs to cover the original projected shortfall, but it’s unclear what the state’s long-term solution might be; Newsom has rejected the idea of raising taxes or creating new ones to increase revenue. The governor is expected to outline a new budget in May.
4.
As a massive dam removal project near the California-Oregon border nears completion, an important question remains: Who does the newly emerged land belong to? The native Shasta people — who were exiled from the area partly due to the construction of the dam — are expected to reclaim a stretch of it, according to California officials. Descendants of the Shasta people were never able to regroup after being exiled from the Klamath River area more than a century ago. “We’ve longed for the return to our homelands for such a long time, and now we finally have hope,” said a tribal council secretary for the Shasta Indian Nation.
5.
Chinese pandas are returning to the San Diego Zoo after five years of absence and could arrive as soon as this summer. The bears have long symbolized U.S.-China friendship, dating back to 1972 when Beijing loaned a pair of pandas to the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. So when Chinese authorities started pulling pandas on loan to Western nations last year, analysts speculated it was due to deteriorating diplomatic relations with the U.S. The return to San Diego could help reestablish so-called “panda diplomacy.”