Protests, Skydiver Deaths, Secession Talk Make News in Riverside County in 2011

RIVERSIDE - Protests against banks and mines, fatal skydiving accidents and calls for splitting the state in two were a few of the big happenings that made headlines in Riverside County in 2011.

Some high-profile criminal cases making their way through local courts also captured the public's attention.

A few weeks into the year, a Riverside woman who killed her 2-year-old son in what she allegedly described as a sacrificial offering was convicted of murder.

Lori Ann Burchett was given 25 years to life in prison for the Feb. 23, 2009, slaying of Garrison Burchett.

At trial, witnesses described how Burchett had became obsessed with apocalyptic predictions for 2012 and said she wanted to ''free'' Garrison before the worst happened. The child was beaten in the head, then disemboweled.

In early March, after a two-day preliminary hearing, accused cop killer Earl Ellis Green was bound over for trial in the Nov. 7, 2010, beating and fatal shooting of Riverside police Officer Ryan Patrick Bonaminio.

The five-year lawman and former soldier was gunned down while pursuing Green, who had allegedly stolen a semi truck and struck a motorist.

The ex-con has a rap sheet going back more than two decades and had been released from prison only weeks before allegedly killing the officer, police said.

In late March and mid-April, three skydivers from Perris Valley Airport died in two accidents while free-falling over the airport drop zone. In one instance, two parachutists -- both instructors -- became tangled and plummeted 300 feet.

The second accident three weeks later involved the same scenario. But one of the men who intertwined with his jump-mate survived the mishap. In late December, an experienced parachutist from Canada lost control of his descent during a jump over the south end of the airport, suffering fatal injuries when he plunged into a shallow pond.

For the third year in a row, the Riverside County Board of Supervisors struggled to balance the county's books without depleting reserves. After a number of hearings in April and May, the board enacted spending cuts averaging 25 percent for non-public safety agencies, while abstaining from cuts to the District Attorney's Office budget and minimal cuts to the sheriff's and public defender's offices, as well as the probation department.

All public safety agencies were saddled with greater burdens at the start of the 2011-12 fiscal year because of ''realignment,'' an initiative of Gov. Jerry Brown that shifted responsibility for adult and juvenile parole, as well as some inmate detention for lower-level prison convictions, to counties.

On July 4th weekend, Supervisor Jeff Stone grabbed national attention when he proposed dividing the state in two. Stone's proposal was in response to actions by the Democrat-controlled Legislature that led to four recently incorporated cities in the county losing vehicle license fee revenue that comprised almost half of their budgets.

The Republican supervisor called for a constitutional convention targeting a handful of the more conservative-leaning counties in Southern California. Stone said he envisioned a 51st state -- South California -- with a part-time legislature, no subsidies for illegal aliens and a balanced budget mandate.

The Board of Supervisors refused to allocate county resources for the effort, which had lost momentum by year's end.

In August, redistricting plans based on the 2010 census, which showed Riverside County growing the fastest of any county in the state, were finally adopted after numerous hearings. Three supervisorial districts expanded and two shrank under population targets set by a county committee.

The division of districts 1 and 2 -- the first represented by Supervisor Bob Buster and the second by Supervisor John Tavaglione -- became a point of contention because of where the new boundaries were proposed. Some of Buster's constituents, from largely black and Hispanic neighborhoods, protested being moved into Tavaglione's district.

To prevent the debate from dragging on, Tavaglione relented to leaving in place most of the boundary lines encasing the minority neighborhoods within Buster's district.

Also in August, the Riverside County Planning Commission voted 4-1 against a proposed strip mine just outside Temecula after weighing activists' complaints about ecological damage against the mine operator's promise of more local jobs and increases in revenue to county coffers.

The 414-acre Liberty Quarry project had been at the center of a three- year debate. Opponents said the enterprise posed an environmental risk and would increase traffic congestion around the site, which borders a nature preserve and the Pechanga Band of Lusieno Indians' reservation.

Proponents argued the quarry would incorporate mitigation controls to reduce impacts and would lower traffic-related pollution by providing a local repository for construction-grade aggregate, eliminating the need for developers to send trucks long distances to pick up gravel and sand for construction projects.

In October, ''Occupy Riverside,'' a spinoff of the Occupy Wall Street movement, set up a makeshift camp on the downtown Main Street pedestrian mall, just outside City Hall. Participants, who included a mixed bag of demonstrators with varying interests, numbered around four or five dozen at first. But after two police raids to dislodge the occupiers, their numbers declined dramatically, and they were no longer seen by early December.

In the year's final month, an ''Occupy Homes'' campaign began, with individuals and families who lost their residences to foreclosure moving back into the bank-repossessed properties. One occupier whose story generated significant buzz was Riverside resident Arturo de los Santos.

The former Marine and longtime metal worker, his wife and four children were evicted from their three-bedroom La Sierra house after he defaulted on his mortgage. De los Santos alleged that Chase bank refused to modify his loan and, with the help of supporters -- some of them bused in from Los Angeles -- moved himself back into the foreclosed property on Dec. 6. The rest of his family joined him on Dec. 24.

De los Santos vowed to remain in the house until he was arrested or until his loan was modified. He had listed the property in a personal bankruptcy petition, preventing the bank from auctioning it off.