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Grizzly Bear Exhibit Opens at the County Museum
Drunken Driver Convicted of Murdering Three Teens After Collision in Orange County Page 16
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Go to MonroviaWeekly.com for Monrovia Specific News MONDAY, OCTOBER 7 - OCTOBER 13, 2019
VOLUME 23, NO. 39
WRONGLY IMPRISONED MAN, SUES RIVERSIDE COUNTY AND OFFICERS WHO FRAMED HIM Horace Roberts spent two decades behind bars for a murder he didn’t commit
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oberts was a forty-year-old U.S. Marine Corps veteran and father of two when officers of the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department allegedly framed him for the murder of Terry Cheek in 1998. After spending two decades in prison, Roberts was exonerated in 2017 with the help of the California Innocence Project. Roberts maintained his innocence throughout the twenty years he was behind bars. Conclusive DNA evidence shows that Roberts had nothing to do with Cheek’s murder. In fact, no forensic evidence has ever tied Roberts to the crime, and no eyewitness has ever implicated him. Instead, the suit alleges that evidence suppressed by Riverside officers showed that other men, including Cheek’s estranged husband Googie Harris Sr., were responsible for the crime. Today, Googie Harris Sr. and his nephew Joaquin Leal stand accused of the murder and are awaiting trial. Roberts’ complaint alleges that Riverside officers “abandoned their role as unbiased investigators, decided first that Plaintiff was the killer, and then manufactured a case against him.” The defendant officers allegedly fabricated police reports, witness testimony, and other false evidence in order to frame Roberts. Roberts was convicted of Cheek’s murder in 1999 and received a sentence of 15 years to life in prison. For twenty years, Roberts was wrongly imprisoned in dangerous maximum-security prisons, unsure if he would ever be free again. He was taken from his family and friends, and he missed much of the lives of his son and daughter. Once a well-respected professional at Quest Diagnostics, Plaintiff’s reputation in the community was ruined by the defendant officers’ alleged misconduct.
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Horace Roberts filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Riverside County and the officers who allegedly framed him.- Courtesy photo
Professional Mixed Martial Artist Los Angeles County Swindler Sentenced to 20 Years in Federal Prison Indicted by Orange County Grand Jury on Felony Assault Charge A long-time con artist was sentenced to 240 months in federal prison for running a multimillion-dollar real estate scam that conned elderly people out of their homes, gouging them with fraudulent threats of litigation and extorting monthly payments for illegal foreclosure and eviction delay. Michael “Mickey” Henschel, 70, of Van Nuys, was sentenced by United States District Judge Virginia A.
Phillips. A restitution hearing in this matter has been scheduled for December 2. Henschel pleaded guilty on May 13 to one count of mail fraud after spending years filing fraudulent documents on homeowners’ properties, and then using the fraudulent filings and fraudulent litigation to steal money from victims, sometimes stealing
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A professional mixed martial artist and owner of several Gracie JiuJitsu academies has been indicted by the Orange County Grand Jury on a felony assault charge for an unprovoked attack on a five-time Jiu-Jitsu world champion that knocked out the victim’s two front teeth. Ralph Gracie, 39, of Danville, was indicted
on one count of felony assault with an enhancement for inflicting great bodily injury for attacking five-time World Champion Flavio Almeida on the sidelines of the 2018 International Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Federation World Championships in Anaheim. Gracie holds a
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San Bernardino County Has Reached 1M Registered Voters About 1,200 county residents registered to vote last week, pushing the total number of registered voters in San Bernardino County past the one million mark for the first time ever. More than 75 percent of eligible county residents are now registered to vote. The Registrar of Voters processed the registration records submitted last week and determined which were new voters and which were
updates to existing voter records. The Registrar of Voters confirmed today that the one million registered voters’ milestone was achieved on Wednesday, September 25, 2019. “It’s great to see this level of interest in voting in our county. Voter participation increases our community’s influence on regional,
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