La Cañada History: 3 taken into custody after police standoff on Rockland Place

Ten Years Ago

A stolen laptop computer led Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department investigators to a home on Rockland Place in La Cañada, where Ronald Young was arrested and charged with 15 felony counts of identity theft. Young had allegedly used the personal information he’d found on the stolen computer to purchase items online. While at the house, a standoff occurred when deputies learned that two of Young’s companions on the property, Donald Reade and John Pineda, were wanted on outstanding warrants. After some tense moments, they were also taken into custody.

Twenty Years Ago

The La Cañada Flintridge City Council was considering the possibility of adding a shuttle bus option along Foothill Boulevard to the bus service then serving the community.

Thirty Years Ago

The longtime owner of La Cañada’s TV Lab store lost his request before the Planning Commission to keep a large display satellite dish antenna on the street-front portion of the roof of his business.

Forty Years Ago

A Dalmatian named Don Pecoso de La Cañada was “sworn in” as the new mascot for Boy Scout Troop 501, based at Church of the Lighted Window (La Cañada Congregational Church).

Fifty Years Ago

Local resident Bill Lukehart was named the new varsity basketball coach at La Cañada High School, where he was a teacher in the science department. Lukehart had mentored the junior varsity cagers to a league championship in 1965-66.

Sixty Years Ago

The sixth-grade class at La Cañada Elementary School was the first to donate to the “Bell Fund,” a PTA-backed project to build a monument to house the town’s first school bell, which had graced the school house built in 1885. When the wood building burned down in 1892, its bell was set aside, seemingly forgotten until 1957, when it was found in a small outbuilding on the grounds of the rebuilt structure by a student named Buzz Fitch, who suggested using the old bell as an emblem for the school. Today it can be found prominently displayed on the LCE campus.

Compiled from the Valley Sun archives by Carol Cormaci.