2 articles. 1. Racing returns at Santa Anita. The historic Santa Anita racetrack reopened Friday for racing amid concerns for horse safety and the future of the track and the industry. There were no deaths in eight races Friday, which had been closed for racing since March 5.
2. Back in the saddle: racing resumes without incident after 26-day closure.
4th Annual Downtown Arcadia Patriotic Festival, an Independence Day celebration, takes place on First Avenue between Bonita Street and Diamond Street, Sunday, July 1, 5-9 PM.
20-year-old man Jason Scott Gustin found guilty of attempted murder of his ex-girlfriend in Arcadia. On August 22, 2016, according to testimony at trial, Gustin met near Arcadia and sat in his car to talk when he pulled out a knife and slashed her throat and then began strangling her. As the victim tried to escape, he stabbed her multiple times. She ran away to a nearby convalescent home. He was arrested a short time later after he showed up at his mother’s workplace in Arcadia.
$24 million winning lottery ticket purchased at Golden Donuts Place, 104 E. Foothill Blvd in Arcadia. It is unclaimed so far. See also Arcadia Weekly, p. 1, December 25, 2014.
30th annual Breeders' Cup World Championships brings exciting racing to Santa Anita Park. Record crowds filled the stands. Sierra Madre jockey Gary Stevens came out of retirement to win the Breeders' Cup Classic aboard horse Mucho Macho Man.
A 61-year-old construction worker who died after being run over by a bulldozer while working to level a vacant residential lot in Arcadia last month was identified as Sirpriano Dorame-Martinez of South Gate. The accident took place April 15 in the 900 block of Monte Verde Drive.
69-year-old Arcadia resident David Tran is the owner of Huy Fong Foods, the maker of Sriracha hot sauce. Huy Fong Foods should be operational in a new $50 million, 650,000 s.f. factory in Irwindale, by September. The factory is moving from Rosemead.
210 Freeway sound wall is finished. The Metro project, which started in 2009, consists of 2 miles of sound walls along westbound and eastbound lanes of the 210 Freeway between Santa Anita Avenue and California Avenue in Arcadia and Monrovia, paid with Measure R funds. The sound walls provide at least 5 decibels of noise reduction. A ribbon cutting ceremony was held. Several Arcadia residents near Victory Chapel on N. First Avenue, where the sound wall ends, are disappointed the barrier doesn't extend farther west.
375 Arcadia High School Apaches are set for marching in the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Parade on January 2, 2017, and at the Rose Parade Band Fest on New Year's Eve at Pasadena City College. Band director is Mr. Seth Murray. The Apache Marching Band has performed in the Rose Parade 15 times over the past 50 years.
1980s pop group Air Supply plays at the Arcadia Performing Arts Center on January 25, 2014. Also playing this season are America (2/22), Susan Egan (3/1), and The Temptations (6/7).
2001 Arcadia homicide suspect, 72-year-old Richard Cole, arrested by Los Angeles Sheriffs Department Homicide and Arcadia Police Department, in the stabbing death of his wife, Charlotte S. Cole. She was killed September 1, 2001 on the 50 block of Las Tunas Drive, in Arcadia.
The 2001 murder of grocer Adel Karas, a 48-year old Egyptian man from Arcadia, a few days after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, was initially thought to have been a hate crime. He was shot at his store International Market at 1381 E. Last Tunas in San Gabriel. Now police suspect Adel Karas was the victim of extortion. The suspects are two Latinos in their mid-20s.
2011 Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) scores show a majority of area schools are progressing. California's STAR program assesses public school students' knowledge of the math, English and science in grades 2 through 11. At Arcadia Unified School District, these are the percentage of students who scored proficient or advanced in core subjects: English-Language Arts 83.9%; History 76%; Mathematics 82.4%; Science 84.7%; Science end of course 80.4%. STAR scores from other area schools are given.
Abandoned pet turtles, specifically red-eared slider turtles that are native to Louisiana, are turning up at the Los Angeles County Arboretum in Arcadia (shown in photograph), Huntington Library, and local golf courses. It is illegal to buy turtles less than 4 inches long and to dump them. They threaten to push out the state's only native turtles species in urban and natural waters here.