The handwriting on the wall

Racist murals depicting black women in sexual situations are found during the latest search for Mitrice Richardson

By Justin Chapman and Andre Coleman, Pasadena Weekly, 7/22/2010

The search for Mitrice Richardson has taken a bizarre racial turn, the Pasadena Weekly has learned, with a group searching the last places Richardson was seen discovering an isolated drainage culvert in unincorporated Calabasas covered with degrading murals of nude African-American women, some bearing a resemblance to the missing woman.
 
The site, located in Monte Nido, is near the home of veteran Los Angeles newsman Bill Smith, formerly of KTLA Channel 5, who reported seeing a woman who looked like Richardson sitting on the back steps of his home some five hours after Richardson was released from the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station — located about 12 miles from there — the morning of Sept. 17. Smith could not be reached for comment by press time.
 
The 24-year-old Richardson, a dean’s list graduate of Cal State Fullerton who has been caring for her aging great-grandmother and has bi-polar disorder, was in custody briefly on Sept. 16 for allegedly skipping out on an $89 tab for meals for two people at Geoffrey’s Restaurant in Malibu at 10 p.m. A resident of South Los Angeles, she was released shortly after midnight the following morning without a phone, money or transportation to her home, where she was living with her great-grandmother.
Her car, which was parked at the restaurant, was impounded the next day, said her mother. Inside the vehicle was her cell phone and purse, she said.
 
A search party led by Maurice Dubois, father of 14-year-old Amber Dubois, who was kidnapped and murdered in February 2009, discovered the disturbing graffiti June 6. Authorities painted over it soon afterward.
 
Pasadena’s Shirley Spencer, television producer Chip Croft and Dr. Ronda Hampton, a psychologist and mentor to Richardson, also helped organize the search party. 
 
According to Hampton, the search ventured so far away from where Richardson was released because a few hours after she was released Smith called the Sheriff’s Department to report a woman fitting Richardson’s description in his backyard at approximately 
6 a.m. Believing this was the last known sighting of Richardson, the search party checked a number of sites in the area.
 
According to Richardson’s mother, Latice Sutton, trained dogs picked up Richardson’s scent just down the street from Smith’s home, but lost it on that block. The Sheriff’s Department is continuing its investigation of the racist murals, which the missing woman’s mother and others remain convinced are somehow tied to Richardson’s disappearance.
 
“We certainly hope the Sheriff’s Department conducts a full, thorough, detailed investigation,” said Croft. “They definitely should check for fingerprints, as there would likely have been some left on the paint tools,” he said of some of the implements left behind at the scene. The perpetrators left paint can lids, brushes, feces, toilet paper and other evidence in the isolated, mountainous area. Searchers had previously put out a call for volunteers to look for Richardson, and whoever did this could have known the search was being conducted that day.
 
“These images are hateful and degrading to African-American women and are obviously the work of a very sick, deranged mind,” said Croft. “Also, I feel analysis of the paint could determine the time of application, the manufacturers and ultimately point of sale,” he said. “This is another reason for the FBI to come in. Plus, this is potential evidence of a hate crime. So now we need to keep pressure on the sheriff’s detectives to be sure they take this seriously and conduct the best possible investigation.”
 
According to Richard French of the LAPD media relations office, the LAPD has become involved in the case because Richardson is a resident of Los Angeles. Sutton filed the original missing person report at the Malibu/Lost Hills Station and, after discussing the case with the missing woman’s family, Sheriff Lee Baca had his detectives open a homicide investigation.
 
“His theory is that it would offer more resources to detectives if he assigned it to homicide,” said Sutton, a resident of Diamond Bar. “They say they have no proof that Mitrice is deceased. I think that’s ludicrous. They must have some evidence of foul play. They don’t just give away extra resources.”
 
In December, Congresswoman Maxine Waters sent a letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller requesting that the FBI “open an investigation into Mitrice’s disappearance and the circumstances surrounding her arrest, detention and release from the custody of the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff Station,” according to her letter. The letter goes on to say that “there are questions as to whether the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station acted properly in releasing this young woman during the pre-dawn hours without money or transportation, all while she was suffering from what the Los Angeles Police Department’s doctors have concluded to be bipolar disorder.”
 
On June 29, attorney Leo Terrell filed a lawsuit against LA County and individual deputies alleging negligence in releasing Richardson without a ride or resources the night she disappeared. Filed on behalf of Richardson and her mother, the suit alleges that the Sheriff’s Department committed negligent and discriminatory acts that caused Richardson’s disappearance.
 
“Mitrice was going through a mental crisis at the time of her arrest,” said Sutton. “I watched the booking video and it’s very clear from her behavior that someone should have known that there was something going on with her. She passed the field sobriety test, but the sheriffs never had an answer for her behavior. She had a severe bipolar episode. Absolutely, they should have referred her to a psychiatric evaluation.”
 
She added that she personally witnessed an unidentified uniformed deputy in the video leave the station right after Mitrice was released. He followed her out the same door and walked in the same direction Mitrice went.
 
The Sheriff’s Department has since declined to release the videotape. The Pasadena Weekly has filed a state Public Records Act request to gain access to that tape. The paper has obtained digital images of the racist murals.
 
“With this lawsuit, we hope to subpoena the Sheriff’s Department to get them to release that booking video and other related documents,” said Sutton. “We’re trying to hold them accountable for misleading us, for withholding information and not gathering information. They also tell us that when we go to the media, we impede the investigation. If we didn’t go to the media, we wouldn’t have gotten a lot of the information we have now. Of course, the sheriffs go to media when it suits them and makes them look good.”
Spencer, a longtime local activist and head of the Friends of the Pasadena Commission on the Status of Women who has been working with Richardson’s family and pushing the Sheriff’s Department to do more on the case, was shaken after seeing the images firsthand.
“It seems that the images were painted in anticipation of being discovered by the searchers,” said Spencer, who was there when the group walked onto the scene. “I have had difficulty finding words to express my shock in seeing this sick creation.”
 
On July 13, the LA County Board of Supervisors renewed a $10,000 reward for information leading to Richardson’s whereabouts. The city of Malibu has offered a $15,000 reward.
 
Mitrice’s father, 43-year-old Michael Richardson of Hawthorne, who was not married to Sutton, said he has been in contact with sheriff’s investigators and does not believe his daughter is dead. He blames the young woman’s mother for what happened to his daughter. 
 
He also does not think it is right to sue the county over his daughter’s disappearance.
 
“There’s some gross negligence on the part of my daughter’s mother,” said Michael Richardson. “This is not publicity or fun, this is my kid. There is some fault on the part of the sheriffs, but her mother could have got her ass up and got her that night. If you start blaming people, then you have to claim some accountability also. This is my damn daughter.”
 
He said the last time he saw his daughter was at a barbeque a couple weeks before her disappearance and that Mitrice was exhibiting bizarre behavior before the incident at the restaurant in Malibu.
 
According to the Malibu Surfside News, which published a story containing edited versions of the murals, Capt. Joe Stephen of the Lost Hills station said deputies are looking at the monikers the taggers used and are comparing the murals with samples in their database.
 
Mitrice’s father doesn’t believe the graffiti is connected to his daughter’s disappearance. According to both parents, Lt. Andrew Rosso of the Sheriff’s Department is still investigating the murals. 
 
“I think Mitrice is having a nervous breakdown and someone is capitalizing on it,” Michael Richardson said. “I wouldn’t even say someone is holding her against her will. If someone has her, they may not even be holding her against her will. They could be feeding her drugs to keep her under their control.” He added that Mitrice did not have a history of drug use.
 
Mitrice’s mother believes wholeheartedly that the murals are connected in some way to her daughter’s disappearance because the search party widely publicized that they would be searching in that area prior to the search. She noted that Michael Richardson was not part of the search and did not even know about the murals until she told him about them. According to his own Web site, Michael Richardson has been repeatedly asked by detectives to provide a DNA sample, but he has refused to do so. “Haven’t we learned anything from Mark Fuhrman,” he wrote, referring to the former LAPD officer in the OJ Simpson murder case accused of tampering with blood evidence.
 
“I most certainly believe they are connected to Mitrice, whether it’s the person who took her in that area or someone who knows what’s going on,” said Sutton. “I don’t think it’s coincidental. Taggers normally want their work to be seen and this was such an isolated area. Of course, the authorities think it’s a far-reaching theory.”
 
Sutton does, however, agree in part with Michael Richardson that it is possible Mitrice is being held against her will. She said anyone who knows Mitrice would say that she would not willingly run away from home.
 
“I don’t have any recent communications with Michael,” Sutton said. “Our interactions are very contentious. I do believe Mitrice had a nervous breakdown. 
 
If she is not deceased, someone is definitely holding her against her will. She loves me and her sister more than anyone on this planet. She wouldn’t willingly let us believe she’s dead if she wasn’t.” 

Editor Kevin Uhrich contributed to this report.



The handwriting on the wall

Racist murals depicting black women in sexual situations are found during the latest search for Mitrice Richardson

By Justin Chapman, Pasadena Weekly, 7/22/2010

The search for Mitrice Richardson has taken a bizarre racial turn, the Pasadena Weekly has learned, with a group searching the last places Richardson was seen discovering an isolated drainage culvert in unincorporated Calabasas covered with degrading murals of nude African-American women, some bearing a resemblance to the missing woman.
 
The site, located in Monte Nido, is near the home of veteran Los Angeles newsman Bill Smith, formerly of KTLA Channel 5, who reported seeing a woman who looked like Richardson sitting on the back steps of his home some five hours after Richardson was released from the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station — located about 12 miles from there — the morning of Sept. 17. Smith could not be reached for comment by press time.
 
The 24-year-old Richardson, a dean’s list graduate of Cal State Fullerton who has been caring for her aging great-grandmother and has bi-polar disorder, was in custody briefly on Sept. 16 for allegedly skipping out on an $89 tab for meals for two people at Geoffrey’s Restaurant in Malibu at 10 p.m. A resident of South Los Angeles, she was released shortly after midnight the following morning without a phone, money or transportation to her home, where she was living with her great-grandmother.
Her car, which was parked at the restaurant, was impounded the next day, said her mother. Inside the vehicle was her cell phone and purse, she said.
 
A search party led by Maurice Dubois, father of 14-year-old Amber Dubois, who was kidnapped and murdered in February 2009, discovered the disturbing graffiti June 6. Authorities painted over it soon afterward.
 
Pasadena’s Shirley Spencer, television producer Chip Croft and Dr. Ronda Hampton, a psychologist and mentor to Richardson, also helped organize the search party. 
 
According to Hampton, the search ventured so far away from where Richardson was released because a few hours after she was released Smith called the Sheriff’s Department to report a woman fitting Richardson’s description in his backyard at approximately 
6 a.m. Believing this was the last known sighting of Richardson, the search party checked a number of sites in the area.
 
According to Richardson’s mother, Latice Sutton, trained dogs picked up Richardson’s scent just down the street from Smith’s home, but lost it on that block. The Sheriff’s Department is continuing its investigation of the racist murals, which the missing woman’s mother and others remain convinced are somehow tied to Richardson’s disappearance.
 
“We certainly hope the Sheriff’s Department conducts a full, thorough, detailed investigation,” said Croft. “They definitely should check for fingerprints, as there would likely have been some left on the paint tools,” he said of some of the implements left behind at the scene. The perpetrators left paint can lids, brushes, feces, toilet paper and other evidence in the isolated, mountainous area. Searchers had previously put out a call for volunteers to look for Richardson, and whoever did this could have known the search was being conducted that day.
 
“These images are hateful and degrading to African-American women and are obviously the work of a very sick, deranged mind,” said Croft. “Also, I feel analysis of the paint could determine the time of application, the manufacturers and ultimately point of sale,” he said. “This is another reason for the FBI to come in. Plus, this is potential evidence of a hate crime. So now we need to keep pressure on the sheriff’s detectives to be sure they take this seriously and conduct the best possible investigation.”
 
According to Richard French of the LAPD media relations office, the LAPD has become involved in the case because Richardson is a resident of Los Angeles. Sutton filed the original missing person report at the Malibu/Lost Hills Station and, after discussing the case with the missing woman’s family, Sheriff Lee Baca had his detectives open a homicide investigation.
 
“His theory is that it would offer more resources to detectives if he assigned it to homicide,” said Sutton, a resident of Diamond Bar. “They say they have no proof that Mitrice is deceased. I think that’s ludicrous. They must have some evidence of foul play. They don’t just give away extra resources.”
 
In December, Congresswoman Maxine Waters sent a letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller requesting that the FBI “open an investigation into Mitrice’s disappearance and the circumstances surrounding her arrest, detention and release from the custody of the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff Station,” according to her letter. The letter goes on to say that “there are questions as to whether the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station acted properly in releasing this young woman during the pre-dawn hours without money or transportation, all while she was suffering from what the Los Angeles Police Department’s doctors have concluded to be bipolar disorder.”
 
On June 29, attorney Leo Terrell filed a lawsuit against LA County and individual deputies alleging negligence in releasing Richardson without a ride or resources the night she disappeared. Filed on behalf of Richardson and her mother, the suit alleges that the Sheriff’s Department committed negligent and discriminatory acts that caused Richardson’s disappearance.
 
“Mitrice was going through a mental crisis at the time of her arrest,” said Sutton. “I watched the booking video and it’s very clear from her behavior that someone should have known that there was something going on with her. She passed the field sobriety test, but the sheriffs never had an answer for her behavior. She had a severe bipolar episode. Absolutely, they should have referred her to a psychiatric evaluation.”
 
She added that she personally witnessed an unidentified uniformed deputy in the video leave the station right after Mitrice was released. He followed her out the same door and walked in the same direction Mitrice went.
 
The Sheriff’s Department has since declined to release the videotape. The Pasadena Weekly has filed a state Public Records Act request to gain access to that tape. The paper has obtained digital images of the racist murals.
 
“With this lawsuit, we hope to subpoena the Sheriff’s Department to get them to release that booking video and other related documents,” said Sutton. “We’re trying to hold them accountable for misleading us, for withholding information and not gathering information. They also tell us that when we go to the media, we impede the investigation. If we didn’t go to the media, we wouldn’t have gotten a lot of the information we have now. Of course, the sheriffs go to media when it suits them and makes them look good.”
Spencer, a longtime local activist and head of the Friends of the Pasadena Commission on the Status of Women who has been working with Richardson’s family and pushing the Sheriff’s Department to do more on the case, was shaken after seeing the images firsthand.
“It seems that the images were painted in anticipation of being discovered by the searchers,” said Spencer, who was there when the group walked onto the scene. “I have had difficulty finding words to express my shock in seeing this sick creation.”
 
On July 13, the LA County Board of Supervisors renewed a $10,000 reward for information leading to Richardson’s whereabouts. The city of Malibu has offered a $15,000 reward.
 
Mitrice’s father, 43-year-old Michael Richardson of Hawthorne, who was not married to Sutton, said he has been in contact with sheriff’s investigators and does not believe his daughter is dead. He blames the young woman’s mother for what happened to his daughter. 
 
He also does not think it is right to sue the county over his daughter’s disappearance.
 
“There’s some gross negligence on the part of my daughter’s mother,” said Michael Richardson. “This is not publicity or fun, this is my kid. There is some fault on the part of the sheriffs, but her mother could have got her ass up and got her that night. If you start blaming people, then you have to claim some accountability also. This is my damn daughter.”
 
He said the last time he saw his daughter was at a barbeque a couple weeks before her disappearance and that Mitrice was exhibiting bizarre behavior before the incident at the restaurant in Malibu.
 
According to the Malibu Surfside News, which published a story containing edited versions of the murals, Capt. Joe Stephen of the Lost Hills station said deputies are looking at the monikers the taggers used and are comparing the murals with samples in their database.
 
Mitrice’s father doesn’t believe the graffiti is connected to his daughter’s disappearance. According to both parents, Lt. Andrew Rosso of the Sheriff’s Department is still investigating the murals. 
 
“I think Mitrice is having a nervous breakdown and someone is capitalizing on it,” Michael Richardson said. “I wouldn’t even say someone is holding her against her will. If someone has her, they may not even be holding her against her will. They could be feeding her drugs to keep her under their control.” He added that Mitrice did not have a history of drug use.
 
Mitrice’s mother believes wholeheartedly that the murals are connected in some way to her daughter’s disappearance because the search party widely publicized that they would be searching in that area prior to the search. She noted that Michael Richardson was not part of the search and did not even know about the murals until she told him about them. According to his own Web site, Michael Richardson has been repeatedly asked by detectives to provide a DNA sample, but he has refused to do so. “Haven’t we learned anything from Mark Fuhrman,” he wrote, referring to the former LAPD officer in the OJ Simpson murder case accused of tampering with blood evidence.
 
“I most certainly believe they are connected to Mitrice, whether it’s the person who took her in that area or someone who knows what’s going on,” said Sutton. “I don’t think it’s coincidental. Taggers normally want their work to be seen and this was such an isolated area. Of course, the authorities think it’s a far-reaching theory.”
 
Sutton does, however, agree in part with Michael Richardson that it is possible Mitrice is being held against her will. She said anyone who knows Mitrice would say that she would not willingly run away from home.
 
“I don’t have any recent communications with Michael,” Sutton said. “Our interactions are very contentious. I do believe Mitrice had a nervous breakdown. 
 
If she is not deceased, someone is definitely holding her against her will. She loves me and her sister more than anyone on this planet. She wouldn’t willingly let us believe she’s dead if she wasn’t.” 

Editor Kevin Uhrich contributed to this report.





Really fast food

Social networks and diverse menus create instant success for a growing number of fast-food trucks

By Justin Chapman, Pasadena Weekly, 7/22/2010

They’ve seen their share of controversy over the past few years, but mobile food trucks — many now offering fare that is affordable, convenient and delicious — only seem to be growing in presence and popularity across Los Angeles County.
 
One reason for this surge in the number of these types of mobile meal trucks cruising around is the deft marriage of instant communication — social networking tools like smart phones, Twitter, Facebook and the Internet — with instant accessibility to a product, in this case good, cheap food on wheels, or these days, really fast food.
 
Many of these trucks have also been expanding their menus, going from simple burritos and tacos to a tantalizing collection of sometimes exotic cuisines — Korean barbeque to Vietnamese sandwiches to Chinese dumplings.
 
While areas of LA County and other cities around the country have cracked down in recent years on taco trucks in particular, about 30 fast-food trucks have applied for permits to operate in Pasadena, according to Ronald Victor, an inspector with the Pasadena Health Department’s Environmental Division. And that number is only growing, he said, with as many as 20 more mobile meal trucks applying for permits so far this year. 
 
Victor believes there are two main reasons for the rising number of these trucks. One is the worsening economy. “A lot of people who want to go into the restaurant business realize that the overhead is less with a truck,” Victor said. “If you have a building, you have to pay utility bills and you have more staff, among other factors. That goes into the decision-making of the operator. A lot of people who are going to culinary school, once they do the research they figure the cost of running a truck is much smaller than your standard culinary restaurant.”
 
The other reason, Victor said, is Twitter and similar social networking sites, which have revolutionized advertising possibilities, giving these otherwise tiny businesses huge exposure across cyberspace. 
 
Most trucks have a Twitter account, a Facebook page and a Web site where they post menus and locations where their trucks will be parked and operating. Most of the trucks working in Pasadena also offer catering services for almost any event. 
 
“The use of new online technology and smart phones has also played a large role in the proliferation of these trucks,” Victor said. 
One such food truck company, Kogi, has a Web site, kogibbq.com, with a calendar letting its more than 50,000 followers know where its four trucks will be on any given day, be it Orange County or Eagle Rock. According to Kogi Chef Roy Choi, “Kogi has developed a menu that delivers high-end food at street-level prices.” With a Korean-Mexican combination menu and its use of online networking, it’s no wonder Kogi is one of the most popular food truck companies in LA County.
 
But while Pasadena residents seem to be enjoying food from the growing number of mobile food trucks, other communities around the county and across the country consider them a nuisance, with some creating restrictions aimed at limiting or ending their operations in places stretching from Palos Verdes Estates to Houston, Des Moines and North Carolina. Governing bodies in these places, according to a 2008 Time magazine report, passed laws specifying when, where and how these types of trucks can operate.
 
In one instance in Georgia, the magazine reported, an official called the growth of taco trucks there “gypsy-fication.” In another, officials in Jefferson Parish, La., banned those types of trucks completely. Before his case was thrown out of court, an attorney in Houston representing a vendor called that city’s recently enacted anti-taco truck laws “a classic case of discrimination, because 95 percent of the people who own them are Hispanic.”
 
UC Davis Law School Dean and Chicano Studies Professor Kevin Johnson told Time that restaurant owners who are often most opposed to these types of businesses tend to be longer-term residents and taco truck owners more recent arrivals. “This, in my mind, is another example of that tension between the established Mexican-American citizens and the immigrants,” he told the magazine.
 
In spring 2008, the LA County Board of Supervisors passed restrictions on food trucks operating in unincorporated areas. But those rules were later struck down by a Superior Court judge as unconstitutional. In some cases, it was the owners of Mexican restaurants who tried to get rid of the trucks, which are viewed as competing unfairly by having little overhead and being able to park anywhere for any length of time. In fact, one such county restriction made it illegal to park a taco truck in one spot for more than an hour, a crime once punishable by a $60 fine that would now be $1,000 or six months in jail or both. 
 
In other places around the country, however, taco truck opposition has come to symbolize resistance to the growing number of immigrants moving into those communities.
 
“It’s hard for me to see how this whole taco truck controversy is separate and apart from the continuing clash of cultures in the US,” Johnson told Time.
 
To get into the business, most operators apply for a permit with the county. Once approved, trucks requesting to operate in Pasadena must undergo a second going-over during which city inspectors make sure the trucks have basic amenities, such as cold and hot water, a sizable sink to clean, rinse and sanitize utensils, and the proper equipment to handle hot and cold foods. Food trucks are also required to have a designated commissary where they can properly dispose of waste from holding tanks at the end of the day. While Pasadena does have one commissary, it is mainly used for a smaller type of food push cart, according to Victor. Therefore, Pasadena requires food truck operators to submit a letter from a commissary somewhere in LA County where they can park, clean up and dispose of waste.
 
While most food trucks operate all over the county, many make regular stops in Pasadena, giving summer diners many great selections to choose from. All have Web sites with calendars and locations, and most use Twitter and Facebook to inform their customers where they’re going to be. Some of these include Cool Haus Ice Cream Sandwiches (eatcoolhaus.com), The Grilled Cheese Truck (thegrilledcheesetruck.com) and Helen Pan’s Dumpling Station (dumplingstation.com), which serves a wide array of Taiwanese dumplings and other tasty, inexpensive meals. Pan said she has 1,200 followers on their Twitter account.
 
Pan’s Dumpling Station truck services Pasadena on a regular basis because the owners are also residents of the city. They operate in other communities, some as far away as Torrance, but they have great backing in Pasadena.
“We love serving our food in Pasadena,” said Pan. “The community has been really good to us.” 

Editor Kevin Uhrich contributed to this report.





Something in the air

WP-3D Orions collect air samples to better understand climate change impacts

By Justin Chapman, Pasadena Weekly, 7/1/2010

Radar planes that typically track hurricanes for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have been flying over the San Gabriel Valley in recent weeks in a multi-agency project involving Caltech called CalNex aimed at determining the nexus of pollution and climate over California
 
Using three types of aircraft — a WP-3D Orion four-engine turboprop aircraft with a 100-foot wing span, the Atlantis, a research vessel operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and a DeHavilland Twin Otter aircraft packed with instruments to collect air particles all over the Los Angeles basin and along the coast of California — the goal is to provide regional information on climate and air quality issues. 
 
According to Jose-Luis Jimenez, a University of Colorado professor, CalNex is one of the largest air quality experiments ever performed, measuring particles and pollutants in a mission to help policymakers better understand and deal with climate change.
“We want to understand very thoroughly where these particles come from, what they’re made of, how they evolve, and eventually how they’re removed,” said Professor John Seinfeld, who headed the Caltech team, according to a Caltech press release.
It will now take years to analyze all the data collected during the four-month project. 
 
“Data analysis will go on for quite some time,” said Richard Flagan, executive officer of chemical engineering at Caltech, who worked with Seinfeld on CalNex. “People are already starting to analyze it, but it will certainly be going on for at least a year. Many samples were collected, and after they’re analyzed then comes the hard part: what we see in the air.”
 
The LA Basin portion of the project began in March, when researchers from NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory, NASA, Harvard, University of Colorado, University of Miami and Caltech set up shop at several locations in Ontario, Rancho Cucamonga and the Caltech campus. 
 
Flights began May 1 and continued through June 22.