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SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO JSerra Catholic High School has hired Dr. John Freeh—brother of the former FBI Director Louis Freeh— as its new principal. Dr. Freeh, who holds a doctorate in English Renaissance Literature from Oxford University, will take the helm of the 1,050-student school in July. Freeh’s resume includes teaching and leadership roles at Gonzaga, Hillsdale College in Michigan and Wyoming Catholic College; he was Director of University Ministry at Gonzaga and directed Hillsdale’s RCIA program for students preparing to enter the Catholic Church. Freeh also holds master’s degrees from Georgetown and Northwestern. The school is conducting a nationwide search for a new president/CEO to replace Frank Talarico, who accepted the top job with Goodwill of Orange County, which is Orange County’s largest nonprofit organization.
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DANA POINT Border Patrol agents took seven people into custody Saturday afternoon at Dana Point Harbor for illegal human smuggling. At about 3:30 p.m. Saturday Border Patrol agents responded to assist Orange County Sheriff’s Department Deputies and the Customs and Boarder Protection Office of Air and Marine with the detention of a pleasure boat and seven passengers at the Embarcadero Launch Ramp, authorities said. Six of the seven detainees were determined to be in the county illegally—five Mexican nationals and one from Brazil. The seventh person taken into custody is a U.S. citizen. Three of the seven are females—the Brazilian and two Mexicans. According to San Diego Sector Border Patrol spokesman Jerry Conlin, the American is being held and will be prosecuted for alien smuggling and the six in the country illegally were processed for deportation.
SAN CLEMENTE’S TOP 5 HOTTEST TOPICS
What’s Up With... 1
… Shooting?
THE LATEST: A man shot by an Orange County Sheriff’s Deputy early Tuesday morning outside San Clemente High School died and an autopsy was being performed, according Jim Amormino, a sheriff’s spokesman. The shooting occurred about 4:45 a.m. after a deputy made a traffic stop. The suspect pulled his vehicle in the school parking lot, according to Amormino. The deputy was not injured. Amormino said the driver of a white GMC Yukon plowed through a gate that blocked vehicle traffic to an access way on the west side of the gym. As the car was being towed away late Tuesday morning, it appeared to have front-end damage. It was unclear whether a passenger had been in the Yukon. A sheriff’s car with a blood hound in the back seat left the high school late in the morning. Classes at 700 Avenida Pico campus resumed Tuesday on schedule but authorities closed off the western most portion of the parking lot for hours while they completed their work. For the investigation, the Sheriff’s Department set up a mobile command unit in the closed-off section of the parking lot and detoured school traffic to the central entrance. WHAT’S NEXT: Deputies were awaiting the results of the autopsy. The incident is being investigated by the Orange County District Attorney’s office because a deputy was involved in the shooting. The DA’s office does not release information until the investigation is complete, spokeswoman Farrah Emami said by email. FIND OUT MORE: To see the full story and photos, visit www.sanclementetimes.com. — Jonathan Volzke and Stacie N. Galang San Clemente Times February 9–15, 2012
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… SONGS?
THE LATEST: Amid growing criticism, mechanical woes and a worker accident at San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, both reactors at the power plant remained offline. Gil Alexander, spokesman for plant operator Southern California Edison, said this week engineers were preparing to inspect the Unit 3 steam generator, which had been shut down Tuesday, January 31 after sensors detected a water leak in the closed loop of water that circulates from the reactor, where it’s heated, to the bottom of the steam generator and back to the reactor. But local residents expressed concerns about the problems at the power plant and called for its closure at this week’s City Council meeting. “We don’t need San Onofre running to meet our power needs in Southern California,” said Patti Davis of San Clemente. Others called for an independent system to collect radiation data in the area and an epidemiological study to determine the power plants’ impact on cancer rates. Alexander has described the water leak as “best characterized by extremely small” and “mildly radioactive.” “It never did and still doesn’t pose a risk to workers or the public,” he said. Alexander said detectors near the leak registered “slightly elevated radiation” though not significant to pose a hazard to workers. Other detectors at the plant showed increased levels. “It was only a very slight uptick that then ended within several hours,” he said. Alexander said radiation levels returned to normal when the unit was shut down. Victor Dricks, a spokesman with the Nuclear Regulator Commission said the leak was .06 gallons per minute. The threshold for SONGS to declare what’s
Former San Clemente Police Chief Al Ehlow stands with retired officers Vern McGarry, Tom Jordan and Tom Haight. Photo by Stacie N. Galang
called an unusual event is a 25-gallons-perminute leak. On January 27, a contract plant worker fell into a reactor pool. He has since been put through a battery of medical tests and suffered no injuries or contamination, Alexander said. The worker returned to work the same day. He described the accident as “extremely rare.” “We will continue to monitor him for several days,” he said.
generator that served for over 30 years. The utility company planned to have the Unit 2 reactor offline for two months, a timetable that has not been changed, Alexander said. Dricks said so far only two of the 10,000 tubes had extensive enough wear and would now need to be plugged and taken out of service. SCE will be required to develop a plan for the other tubes showing unusual wear, he said.
WHAT’S NEXT: Dricks said the NRC has no restriction keeping SCE from returning Unit 3 to service. The SCE spokesman said engineers are preparing to conduct the inspections of the Unit 3 generator tubes and expect the process to take several days for an initial assessment. Already offline for planned upgrades, Unit 2 was installed 18 months earlier. The unit is showing accelerated wear, which Alexander described as indicative of new steam generators and consistent with the some wear patterns in the original steam
FIND OUT MORE: See www.sanclementetimes.com —SNG
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… the Steed Memorial?
THE LATEST: The Interstate-5 sign to memorialize San Clemente’s only officer to die in the line of duty in 65 years was dedicated Friday, February 3 near the Cristianitos exit. (Cont. on page 4) www.sanclementetimes.com