www.latimes.com

A brawl between several people dressed as action figures erupted in front of the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood on Thursday evening, resulting in a Jack Sparrow character being pepper-sprayed by an attacker, police said.

Jack Sparrow was treated for minor injuries in the fracas that included Catwoman, an alien and a second pirate, the Los Angeles Police Department said.

Officers were searching streets in Hollywood after Catwoman, the alien and pirate fled following the free-for-all that played out in front of tourists on busy Hollywood Boulevard, Officer Norma Eisenman said.

The incident was the latest run-in between characters who pose for pictures with tourists and then aggressively demand money, according to police.

In September, a man dressed as SpongeBob SquarePants was detained by police outside Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood after an altercation with two women. In another incident, Spider-Man was led away in handcuffs.

Police officials acknowledge that maintaining peace in the area has been challenging. At one point, LAPD officials held a summit with characters to improve relations in the popular destination and even resorted to a temporary ban after problems persisted.

City rules allow people to tip characters, but prohibit them from demanding payment.

www.latimes.com

An Arizona man has been indicted for traveling to California and allegedly having sex with an underage boy from Ontario, the FBI said Thursday evening.

Michael Killala, 42, who lives in Peoria, allegedly got the boy intoxicated on vodka at a hotel before having sex, the FBI said.

Killala met the boy online in an Internet chat room and corresponded with the victim for several months, according to the FBI. The Arizona resident allegedly traveled to California in December and again this month to meet the victim.

The boy’s mother contacted the Ontario Police Department on Jan. 22 to report that her son had been in contact with Killala.

He was arrested that day at an Ontario hotel and consented to a search of his room, authorities said. He allegedly admitted that he had sex with the boy twice, gave him vodka and knew that he was underage, the FBI said.

Authorities said that Killala may have been in contact with other underage victims in California and Arizona. Anyone with information is asked to call the FBI at (888) 226-8443. Anyone in Arizona is asked to call authorities at (602) 534-3200.

Photo: Michael Killala. Credit: FBI

www.yahoo.com

Mark Zuckerberg may be the face of Facebook. But Sheryl Sandberg can take much of the credit for the company’s success. As chief operating officer — and the self-described “grownup” in the room — she was also the highest-paid employee at the social networking site. Her salary and stock awards last year: a cool $30.87 million, putting her on pace to be one of the wealthiest self-made women in the world once the company goes public.
Sandberg, who’s second in command at Facebook, is often not just the grownup in the room, but also the only woman, which she finds mind-boggling. As she told an audience at TED in Washington, D.C., “One hundred and ninety heads of state; nine are women. Of all the people in parliament in the world, 13% are women. In the corporate sector, women at the top, C-level jobs, board seats, tops out at 15-16%. The numbers have not moved since 2002 and are going in the wrong direction.”
Sandberg, however, is moving in a trajectory that goes straight up: She studied economics at Harvard, where Lawrence Summers, former U.S. Treasury Secretary, took notice of her. He, as you may remember from “The Social Network,” was president of Harvard when Zuckerberg was a student.
Summers became her mentor, and after he left to lead the World Bank, he hired her, launching her stellar career. Sandberg eventually ended up at Google and was recruited by Zuckerberg in 2008. As described in a story for the New Yorker, the two met for dinner twice a week for six weeks. Sandberg’s husband described the courtship as “dating.” They were a match.
Facebook wasn’t always a Wall Street darling. When Sandberg started, the company had 70 million users and was losing money. Four years later, the company has reversed course, with 800 million-plus members; it’s profitable and soon to be a public company. She is said to be in charge of everything except the product — which is Zuckerberg’s baby.
Sheryl is married to David Goldberg, chief executive officer of Survey Monkey. They have two children and juggle the responsibility of parenting with the demands of work. The shared responsibility of child care made it possible for her continued success. As Sandberg told an audience last year, “The most important career choice you’ll make is who you marry.”
Not that she doesn’t feel pangs of guilt — far from it. The working mom admitted in the New Yorker profile: “I feel guilty working because of my kids.” But she advises women to take care of their careers and says “don’t leave before you leave.” As she said at TED, “Don’t leave the workforce to have kids and not return because you didn’t get that job you wanted before you left.”
To this end, the woman who stands to become a billionaire when Facebook goes public, also sees that she can’t succeed alone. In a commencement address to Barnard College graduates, she said, “We need women at all levels, including the top, to change the dynamic, reshape the conversation, to make sure women’s voices are heard and heeded, not overlooked and ignored.”
To be sure, Sandberg will not be overlooked or ignored.

www.theatlantic.com

A larger-than-life, but not actually alive, Ruhollah Khomeini is trotted our for a very special military ceremony.

The Army of the Islamic Republic of Iran this morning reenacted a very important moment in their country’s history with a very bizarre ceremony. The solemn event was photographed by the state-run Mehr News Agency, the website of which has since gone down (as it often does). Fortunately, we have preserved the photos and reproduce them below.

But before the photos comes the history. On this day in 1979, Iranian religious leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returned home after 14 years in exile. He had been forced out by the secular and U.S.-backed Shah, who rightly feared his popularity. While in exile, he made high-profile sermons, wrote books, and circulated audiotapes explaining his vision for a Shia theocratic state. The revolution began in 1977 and, by the time the Shah fled in January 1979, Khomeini was living in France. When he flew home on February 1 he was joined by U.S. reporter Peter Jennings and others, and was met by millions of cheering Iranians at the airport. He declared his opposition to the interim government, led a popular campaign against it, and by the end of the year had established the Islamic Republic, with himself as Supreme Leader.

Thirty-three years later, Khomeini’s return is still remembered as one of the most important moments in the founding of Iran as we know it today. So you can perhaps forgive the country’s leaders for getting a bit carried away in commemorating the event. The idea to reproduce his arrival on the tarmac of the Tehran airport is an interesting one, but of course Khomeini himself can’t participate, being deceased. So, naturally, someone decided to construct not one, not two, but three giant cardboard constructions of the Islamic Republic’s founder and march them around the Tehran Airport.

Flipping through the photo above, you can watch a couple of sunglassed soldiers dutifully marching Khomeini’s scowling (and enormous) face out of an airplane and down the tarmac in an “inspection” of a waiting regiment. The gathered troops salute solemnly — trying not to laugh? genuinely moved? — as the fake ayatollah glares back. A marching band plays in the background, because why not. At this point, the ceremony switches to a smaller reproduction (presumably because the original is too large to transport), which is gingerly seated in a truck and driven off. My favorite part is the third Khomeini, an enormous free-standing photo of his original 1979 arrival, that stands in the back, watching over the entire ceremony.

http://www.freep.com/detroitcitynews

LOS ANGELES — A veteran elementary school teacher was arrested on horrifying child molestation charges after a film processor gave police photos showing blindfolded children with their mouths taped and cockroaches on their faces, authorities said Tuesday.

Mark Berndt, 61, was arrested Monday at his Torrance home and remained jailed on $2.3-million bail, according to a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department statement.

The charges involve 23 boys and girls ages 6-10 between 2008 and 2010.

The investigation started when the film processor gave authorities 40 photos depicting blindfolded children in a classroom with their mouths taped shut.

Berndt worked for more than 30 years at Miramonte Elementary in an unincorporated area of south Los Angeles before being fired as a result of the investigation. Miramonte serves a poor, mainly Hispanic neighborhood. More than half of its approximately 1,400 students still are learning English, according to the school’s website.

Some of the photos showed Berndt with his arm around children or with his hand over their mouth. Other pictures depicted girls with what appears to be a spoon up to their mouths as if they were going to ingest a clear-white liquid.

Sheriff’s Lt. Carlos Marquez of the Special Victims Bureau said it was determined the children were given semen on a spoon or on a cookie. A blue plastic spoon and container found in trash in Berndt’s classroom tested positive for semen, the sheriff’s statement said.

None of the photos showed the students actually eating the semen, but Marquez said the children reported they didn’t like the taste. Authorities are recommending the children be tested for sexually transmitted diseases.

Some of the children’s mouths and faces had large, live Madagascar-type cockroaches on them, according to the statement.

The incidents occurred during school hours, but not all the children were students of Berndt, Marquez said.

None of the alleged victims told anyone about the incidents, Marquez said. “They didn’t know they were being violated in that manner. They just thought it was a game,” he said.

Berndt is unmarried, has no children and there’s no indication of a previous arrest record, authorities said.

“I am sickened and horrified by the behavior of Mark Berndt,” Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent John Deasy said in a statement.

More than 80 current and former students and school employees were interviewed for the investigation. Searches of the classroom and Berndt’s home turned up about 390 photos depicting children, Marquez said.

In addition, a DVD depicting adult sexual bondage “which mirrored the bondage-type photos of the children” was found during the search, the sheriff’s department said, noting that those images are not a crime.

www.takepart.com

How many of you let your dog sleep in the bed with you?

If you are among the 56 percent of dog owners and 62 percent of cat lovers who share pillows and sheets with their pets, a new study’s findings may cause you to reevaluate the sleeping arrangements.

The study was conducted by Drs. Bruno Chomel, a professor at the University of California Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine, and Ben Sun, chief veterinarian for California’s Department of Health. The results will be published in next month’s issue of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Emerging Infectious Diseases.
AOL News reports that both Chomel and Sun are experts in zoonoses, diseases or infections transmitted from animals to humans. They explain the risk factors:

“The risk for transmission of zoonotic agents by close contact between pets and their owners through bed sharing, kissing or licking is real and has even been documented for life-threatening infections such as plague, internal parasites” and other serious diseases.

Anyone who’s paid close attention to their domestic beasts shouldn’t be too surprised by the warning. Dogs pick up diseases from fleas and other animals’ feces. Cats like to kill birds and rodents. The victims of this feline aggression can be covered with infectious bugs.

Here are some examples of diseases or infections that can be transmitted from man’s best friends:

1. Cat Scratch Disease: This bacterial infection comes from fleas and flea poop. Being licked or scratched by an infected cat can transmit the disease. The infection causes swelling and pain in the lymph nodes. Symptoms can be mild or severe and may include fever, achiness and loss of appetite.

2. Parasites: Puppies may pass the bacterium Campylobacter in their feces to humans, resulting in bouts of diarrhea in man and dog. The Centers for Disease Control warns that puppies and adult dogs may carry a variety of parasites that spread rashes or illnesses.

3. MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus): In mild cases, this bacterial infection causes sores or boils on the skin. A 48-year-old man and his wife contracted this infection again and again and eventually traced the origin to a dog that slept in their bed.

Okay, so creepy diseases are among the risks that go along with having a pet. Don’t send dirty Fido and filthy Fifi off to the pound. A load of extenuating health benefits come along with your furry friend.

For example, the CDC reports pets can decrease blood pressure, cholesterol levels and feelings of loneliness. Also, pet owners are likely to exercise more.

Basically, you need to spend lots of time with your pet, keep your hands and their paws clean, ensure they are flea-free, take them to the vet and learn the phrase, “I love you Sparky, but get out of my bed.”

CNN.COM

(CNN) — Top International Atomic Energy Agency officials arrived in Iran Sunday, state media reported, after the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog expressed fresh concerns that the Islamic republic was trying to develop nuclear weapons.
The six-member delegation, including chief inspector Herman Nackaerts, arrived at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport, Press TV reported.
“We are trying… to resolve all the outstanding issues with Iran,” Nackaerts told reporters earlier, as he was about to leave Vienna, Austria, according to Press TV. “We are looking forward to the start of a dialogue, a dialogue that is overdue.”
A mission to Iran by such a senior team — which also includes the agency’s second-in-command, Rafael Grossi — is unusual, the agency said when it announced the visit on Monday. The team is due to be in Iran through Tuesday, the IAEA says.

The announcement of the mission came shortly after the European Union imposed a tough round of new sanctions on Iran, aimed at cutting off funding to the country’s nuclear program. The United States and Australia have also ramped up sanctions on Iran in the past week.
The United States and its allies think Tehran is trying to develop nuclear weapons. Iran denies it.
Speaking Friday at the Davos Forum in Switzerland, energy agency Director General Yukiya Amano told reporters the visit is intended “to clarify the issues with possible military dimensions.
“We are not very sure whether Iran has declared everything and, therefore, we are not very sure that everything stays in peaceful purpose,” he said. “In addition, we have information that Iran has engaged in activities related to the development of nuclear weapons. Therefore, we need to clarify.”
“The preparations have gone well, but we need to see what actually happens when the mission arrives,” he said.
Inspectors are in and out of the country regularly, an agency spokeswoman said Monday, but a high-level visit of the kind taking place at the end of the month is more unusual.
Iran’s envoy to the energy agency said Saturday he was hopeful the trip will “resolve any ambiguity and show (our) transparency and cooperation with the agency.”
“This trip is aimed at neutralizing enemy plots … and baseless allegations, and proving the peaceful nature of our nuclear activities,” Ali Asghar Soltanieh told state-run Islamic Republican News Agency.
Amano said that the energy agency proposed the mission, and Iranian authorities “agreed to accept” it. But the Islamic news agency reported Nackaerts is traveling at Tehran’s invitation.
Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said he was ready to discuss the program with a group of world powers that have been having on-and-off negotiations with the country over its nuclear ambitions — including Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States.
The energy agency reported in November that it can no longer verify that the Iranian nuclear program remains peaceful, and Iran is under increasing international pressure to halt its nuclear fuel work.
Western sanctions have targeted its currency, the rial, driving up prices for goods within Iran, and the European Union announced Monday that it would stop importing Iranian oil as of July 1 in an effort to starve the country’s nuclear program of funding.
In response, an Iranian official said Sunday that Tehran would stop oil exports to “certain countries,” soon, according to the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency. Oil Minister Rostam Qassemi made the statement after a cabinet meeting Sunday, as Iranian lawmakers are debating whether to halt oil exports to European countries, IRNA reported.

CNN.COM

Kunduz, Afghanistan (CNN) — Police in the northern Afghanistan province of Kunduz are looking for a man they say strangled his wife after she bore him a third child that was not a son.
Sher Mohammed, 29, married his 22-year-old wife, Storay, four years ago, police said.
The couple had three daughters, the last of whom was born three months ago, said Khanabad district police chief Sufi Habib.
After the youngest daughter was born, Mohammed blamed his wife for not being able to deliver a boy, Habib said.
“Finally on Saturday, the man, with the help of his mother, first beat the woman and then strangled her to death,” the police chief said. Khanabad is about 50 kilometers (31 miles) from Kunduz city.
Police arrested the mother, Wali Hazrata, and detained her at the Kunduz city jail. But her son fled.
In a jailhouse interview, Hazrata said her son’s wife committed suicide out of guilt.
“My son did not commit the crime,” Hazrata said. “… But after three daughters, Storay herself felt guilty and committed suicide.”
The report comes weeks after Afghan police said they rescued a 15-year-old girl who was locked up in the basement of her in-laws’ house, starved, and had her nails pulled out.
The girl, Sahar Gul, was married off to a 30-year-old man last year. Authorities in the northern Baghlan province said the girl reportedly was tortured after she refused to submit to prostitution.
Activists say women continue to suffer in parts of Afghanistan despite overall progress since the fall of the Taliban.
In the second quarter of last year, the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) registered 1,026 cases of violence against women. In 2010, 2,700 cases were recorded.
In December, gunmen attacked and sprayed an Afghan family with acid in their home after the father rejected a man’s bid to marry his teenage daughter.
In another case, a 21-year-old, identified only as Gulnaz for her own protection, was sentenced to 12 years in prison after she reported that her cousin’s husband had raped her.
Her plight attracted international attention when it came out that she had agreed to marry her attacker to gain her freedom and legitimize a daughter conceived in the attack.
She was eventually freed, following the president’s intervention.

CNN.COM

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — A long list of tech IPOs captured attention in 2011, but no company has been drooled over like Facebook. And finally, its debut looks to be imminent.
The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Facebook may file for an initial public offering as early as this Wednesday. It’s still not certain if Facebook will actually file this week.

But that hasn’t stopped people from speculating about how much Facebook might be worth.
Some experts have suggested that the social network could be worth anywhere between $75 billion and $100 billion once it starts trading. No matter what the valuation Facebook’s IPO is undeniably hot, says Max Wolff, chief economist at GreenCrest Capital.
He expects Facebook will be valued at $85 billion to $100 billion, and that the company will sell about 8.5% to 10% of its available shares in the offering. Based on those estimates, Facebook would raise between $7.2 billion and $10 billion from the sale of its stock.
But there’s a lot more riding on Facebook’s paperwork than wealth creation. The social network has become an entire ecosystem, supporting independent app makers and gaming platforms like Zynga (ZNGA).
Facebook’s filing will have implications for companies that depend on it, as well as the social media landscape at large. Until then, analysts are left to speculate about Facebook’s revenue streams and profitability — and whether it really deserves a $100 billion market value.
Michael Pachter, a research analyst at Wedbush Securities, says the rumored valuation range is reasonable — though he won’t cite a specific estimate of his own.
How Facebook makes money — and could make more: The vast majority of Facebook’s revenue comes from advertising: a combination of search and display ads. And the sales growth is incredibly robust.
Research firm eMarketer estimated last September that Facebook’s ad revenue would more than double in 2011 to $3.8 billion and increase another 52% to $5.78 billion in 2012.

Facebook has grown by grabbing market share from Google and Yahoo. Last year Facebook comprised 16.3% of the so-called display (i.e. banners and other graphical ads) market, eMarketer estimates — compared with Yahoo’s (YHOO, Fortune 500) 13.1% and Google’s (GOOG, Fortune 500) 9.3%.
Martin Pyykkonen, analyst at Wedge Partners, says Facebook is highly appealing to advertisers because about two-thirds of its users fall into the coveted age demographic of 18-49. He thinks Facebook’s ad targeting will become even more effective over time.
“The ‘Like’ button option is a basic example of targeting,” Pyykkonen wrote in a note to clients Monday. “[It's] likely that advertisers will be able to even better target their audiences as Facebook goes deeper with integrating apps, games, movies, music.”
Facebook’s other revenue stream is its payment system for purchases within apps and games: Facebook Credits. Facebook keeps 30% of the revenue from those payments, and passes the remaining 70% on to the app developer.
Facebook Credits now comprises 10% of the company’s total revenue, up from 5% in early 2010, Pyykkonen estimates.
Those estimates will soon be backed up — or refuted — by hard numbers from Facebook. Once its IPO filing does finally land, it will help answer questions about the overall social media market.
“People are extrapolating outcomes into an environment that’s hungry for missing details,” said Wolff. “It’s like all the guys in the class spreading rumors about the prettiest girl in the school.”

CNN.COM

Washington (CNN) — Occupy DC demonstrators spent Sunday afternoon discussing how to respond to a call by the National Park Service to stop camping overnight at sites a few blocks from the White House.
The park service notified protesters on Friday that they “may be subject to arrest and their property subject to seizure as evidence” if there are evident “camping violations” by around noon Monday.
The notice for those in McPherson Square and nearby Freedom Plaza said that to comply with the federal agency’s camping regulations, demonstrators must remove all camping material from the sites and leave one side of all temporary structures open at all times. Authorities describe the purpose of the order as necessary to ensure public health and safety.
Oakland cleans up after “Occupy” clash
Video posted online from early Sunday showed a man appearing to walk away from U.S. Park Police members as he yelled out, “I have done nothing wrong.” Two officers tried to grab him before a third officer used a stun gun on the man, who was then handcuffed.
A CNN crew witnessed the arrest, which protesters said came after the man went from tent to tent removing notices posted by the National Park Service. There was no immediate comment from park police on the incident, including whether the man was charged.
Later in the day, a small group of protesters met for about three hours under the statue of Civil War hero Maj. Gen. James McPherson, which is in the middle of the park.
A protester named Eli — who would only give his first name, and who wasn’t participating in the meeting — said one of the ideas being mulled if Monday’s deadline were imposed would be to hold a “sleep strike,” in which demonstrators would play board games and do other things throughout the nights to avoid the “sleeping activities” banned by the Park Service.
“I plan on not leaving and not sleeping as long as possible,” Eli said.
Pastor Brian Merritt of Washington’s Palisades Community Church said area churches have discussed helping house some of the protesters overnight so that they could continue a 24-hour vigil if park police began enforcing the rules against overnight encampments.
Rich Coffman, a Dallas, Texas, resident who has been camping in the Washington park for three weeks, said demonstrators from Memphis and Nashville, Tennessee, and New York are expected to come Monday to show solidarity with the capital demonstrators.
Whatever happens with the camps and police, Caty McClure said it would not alter her and fellow demonstrators’ commitment to their cause or their activism.
“The park and the occupation of the park is a tactic, it’s not the movement,” she said, calling the camps “a really important symbolic statement.” “If we can’t sleep here, that does not end the movement.”
Occupy DC is part of a larger activist surge that began last year in New York and quickly spread. While the protesters have highlighted a number of causes, the overarching theme has remained largely the same: populist anger over what activists portray as an out-of-touch corporate, financial and political elite.
Demonstrators in Washington have been camping out in McPherson Square since the beginning of October. There was a daylong confrontation December 4 when protesters erected a wood structure overnight. It was eventually removed, after being deemed unsafe.
On Saturday, some of them made noise — and generated headlines — in Washington outside the 99th annual Alfalfa Club dinner thrown for high-level dignitaries, including President Obama.
As guests arrived, they were forced to pass through Occupy protesters. While police assisted attendees, demonstrators began throwing glitter. Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Connecticut, and other guests accompanying him were among those who were doused with the glitter.