By Miriam Raftery

File photo: Rabbi Ysroel Godstein of Poway

December 15, 2025 (Poway) – Rabbi Eli Schlanger, the nephew of Chabad Poway’s founding Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein, was among 16 people murdered in a mass shooting yesterday during a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia.

Goldstein was injured during the April 2019 shooting at Chabad Poway, when he lost a finger and was credited with leading children to safety. 

Inmate suffered head and spinal injuries after being smashed head first into wall, left bleeding in cell without medical attention

East County News Service

December 13, 2025 (San Diego) -- San Diego Sheriff’s Deputy Jeremiah Manuyag Flores was convicted by a federal jury yesterday of violating the civil rights of a man in pretrial custody at the San Diego Central Courthouse by using excessive force that caused serious injuries, writing a false report to cover up his illegal actions. Sentencing is scheduled for April 1, 2026.

East County News Service

December 3, 2025 (San Diego) – An investigation led by the FBI’s San Diego Field office has resulted in the Scam Center Strike force seizing a third web domain used to defraud countless Americans, including at least 400 victims in San Diego.  

East County News Service

November 27, 2025 (Julian)— U.S. Border Patrol agents from the San Diego sector have apprehended a felon who escaped from a Cal Fire work camp in Julian early on Nov. 24. The escapee, Joseph Lee Randall, was serving time for crimes including corporal injury, petty theft, vehicle theft, and grand theft.

Using the Border Patrol’s specialized tracking methods, agents located Randall at 5 p.m. near Camp Cuyamaca in Descanso. They apprehended him and returned him to CDCR custody. He will face administrative and criminal review following his return to state custody.

By Miriam Raftery

November 22, 2025 (San Diego) – The Medical Examiner has concluded that 82-year-old Karim Talib died of natural causes in the San Diego Central Jail on July 28.  The autopsy determined that the cause of death was high blood pressure and heart disease complicated by acute kidney disease due to a urinary tract infection. ECM has emailed the Sheriff’s department to learn whether Talib had previously been diagnosed with these conditions and if he was receiving medication for them at the time of his death.

CA Attorney General is investigating the shooting

East County News Service

November 21, 2025 (Alpine, CA) – A concerned neighbor called 911 to request a wellness check on her neighbor on November 5,  after she found his door partially open and he did not answer. The incident ended tragically. Sheriff’s deputies fatally shot the resident, 72-year-old Robert Edmund Liddell,  after they saw him holding what appeared to be a gun, but was later determined to be a replica weapon.

The Sheriff’s Department has released video of the shooting. Viewer discretion is advised.  

East County News Service

November 19, 2025 (Santee) -- A reckless driving suspect struck multiple vehicles while leading Sheriff’s deputies on a pursuit from Santee to San Diego on November 18^th.

East County News Service

November 13, 2025 (Poway) – San Diego County Sheriff seeks public help to locate Cameron Johnson, 18, on weapons violations.

On Nov. 11, deputies from the Sheriff’s station in Poway responded to multiple calls reporting a man shooting a rifle in an open field near Hidden Valley Drive and Birch Lane in Poway. Johnson, who was dressed in military-style camouflage fatigue, fled from deputies. The officers found a rifle with no serial number in the brush nearby.

East County News Service

Nov. 4, 2025 (El Cajon) – El Cajon Police officers on Sunday rescued a woman who called 911 on Sunday afternoon to report that her husband had assaulted and strangle her, holding her hostage in an El Cajon motel room located at 1368 East Main St.

After police evacuated the victim, the suspect, later identified as Ruben Castro, 44, barricaded himself inside the motel room.

East County News Service

October 30, 2025 (Lemon Grove) – The hopes and dreams of Nadia Charles, 19, and Junior Joseph Juste, 20, cousins who came to America from Haiti seeking a better life, were snuffed out on New Year’s morning when two vehicles collided in Lemon Grove. The crash pushed one of the vehicles into the two cousins, who were pedestrians crossing the street at Buena Vista and Broadway.

Now, 10 months later, charges have been filed against Victor Zuniga, 20. Authorities allege that he was on his phone at the time of the crash. He is charged with vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence, as well as reckless driving that resulted in serious injury to another driver. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up eight years in prison.

Judge had threatened sanctions over 55 hours of deleted video

By Alexander J Schorr

Photo: The late Hayden Schuck

October 29, 2025—San Diego County Supervisors have voted to approve a historic settlement to resolve the in-custody wrongful death of Hayden Schuck. In the case of Estate of Hayden Schuck v. County of San Diego, et al. (Case 23-cv-00785-DMS-AHG), they approved a record $16 million payout and deputy training reforms to address the ongoing jail death crisis, according to the civil rights law firm  McKenzie Scott PC.

Schuck was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence and drug possession back in March 2022, two months after Kelly Martinez was appointed Undersheriff, overseeing the department until she was elected Sheriff and sworn in the following January.

The 22-year-old was taken into custody at San Diego’s Central Jail, where he died six days later in his cell due to dehydration. 

 By Alexander J. Schorr

October 28, 2025— A San Diego County Sheriff deleted 57 hours of video footage that may have shed light on a 22-year-old man’s death in a San Diego County jail. US District Judge Dana Sabraw and Magistrate Judge Allison Goddard  have sanctioned San Diego County for erasing this footage, which could have shown whether deputies or medical staff ignored the inmate William Hayden Schuck in the days before he died.

Magistrate Judge Allison Goddard, who has sharply criticized the San Diego County Sheriff’s Office failure to retain the footage, called this “shocking in the height of negligence.”