Speaker 1: On the John Phillips Show, Mister Randy wanings in Culver City.
Speaker 2: John, I've said it before, I'll say it again. Local
Speaker 2: news gets results. Just two days after all of our
Speaker 2: local TV stations in southern California started covering the crazy
Speaker 2: Naked Guy in Resita, the LAPD arrests the crazy Naked
Speaker 2: Guy in Resita.
Speaker 3: Once again.
Speaker 1: The City of Los Angeles teaches you that if you
Speaker 1: want to solve a problem, you have to go outside
Speaker 1: the chain of command got him on felony, criminal threats
Speaker 1: complaints that have been made for over three years, one
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty calls to LAPD. Nithia claims she's only
Speaker 1: just heard about it, but as soon as naked Guy
Speaker 1: got on the TV, the government started working. Eight hundred
Speaker 1: two two two five two two two is a telephone
Speaker 1: number one eight hundred two two two five two two two.
Speaker 1: It is our pleasure to welcome our next guest to
Speaker 1: the program. She is a candidate for the California Insurance
Speaker 1: Commissioners post. The incumbent Insurance Commissioner, Ricardo Lara, is termed
Speaker 1: out and can't run for a third term, so the
Speaker 1: seat is open. Her name is Stacy Course garden and
Speaker 1: you can get her online at Stacyfinsurancecommissioner dot com. Stacy
Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining us.
Speaker 4: It's great to be with you. John, thank you for
Speaker 4: having me.
Speaker 1: Why should you be the next insurance commissioner for the
Speaker 1: state of California.
Speaker 4: Simply put, it's experience. I've spent my career as an
Speaker 4: insurance and a financial advisor. I started my firm right
Speaker 4: out of college in nineteen eighty eight, and I've helped people,
Speaker 4: small businesses and working families have the proper insurance before, during,
Speaker 4: and after acclaim. So I've a nationally recognized agency. So
Speaker 4: I've had a lot of success, and I just cannot
Speaker 4: sit by and watch inexperience just destroy the security that
Speaker 4: families need in California. It's just falling apart, and I
Speaker 4: know how to fix it.
Speaker 1: Whenever we talk to fire victims who call into the show,
Speaker 1: whether it be in Alta, Dina or Pacific Palisades, or
Speaker 1: even before that in Malibu, we hear the same story
Speaker 1: over and over and over again from the homeowners, which
Speaker 1: is they're having some sort of problem with their insurance company.
Speaker 1: They call the California Department of Insurance and they cannot
Speaker 1: get a call returned. We know that the current insurance Commissioner,
Speaker 1: Ricardo Laura, has been an absentee landlord where he's been
Speaker 1: traveling around the globe from hotspot to hotspot, being wined
Speaker 1: and dined by the insurance industry, going to conferences in
Speaker 1: every desirable vacation destination on planet Earth, while he's not
Speaker 1: doing his day job. As someone who understands the insurance industry,
Speaker 1: what is it that needs to be done in that
Speaker 1: office so that the basics are completed, so that calls
Speaker 1: are returned and people don't feel like they're on their own.
Speaker 4: The fire that occurred in Altadena, Pacific Palisades and the
Speaker 4: Malibu area, it actually is a sample or an example
Speaker 4: of everything that's wrong with the system from the insurance
Speaker 4: company level all the way up to the Department of
Speaker 4: Insurance if as commissioner, and it's part of my plan
Speaker 4: on my website is the Department of Insurance should have
Speaker 4: had a physical presence, some kind of unit of some
Speaker 4: kind of building or a mass unit where they were
Speaker 4: there to handle complaints and to serve the customer. The
Speaker 4: prime role of the Department of Insurance is to advocate
Speaker 4: for the customer in the middle of a catastrophe like that,
Speaker 4: insurance companies are their claims department have blown up too.
Speaker 4: They have so many claims they do not have the
Speaker 4: manpower to actually handle it in the beginning, so they
Speaker 4: bring catastrophe adjusters from all over the country. What's happened, though,
Speaker 4: is there have been some large examples where they the
Speaker 4: insurance companies never got over that initial shock. They did
Speaker 4: not bring in a stable adjuster workforce to help adjust
Speaker 4: the claims, and so people in that area. Some of
Speaker 4: them have been very well served. I've heard great examples,
Speaker 4: but the other examples are simply atrocious. It's not it's
Speaker 4: so hard to hear well. The Department of Insurance role
Speaker 4: is to advocate for the consumer. They need to down there.
Speaker 4: I do want people to remember Ricardo Laura's name because
Speaker 4: he should never ever run for public office again. He
Speaker 4: has in eight years done so much damage. So what
Speaker 4: are the solutions right now? The Department of Insurance is
Speaker 4: coming down hard on State farm and as they should.
Speaker 4: I've heard examples that there have been what's called a
Speaker 4: Roulette situation where there's been many, many adjusters. The problem
Speaker 4: that I see and my concern about how the department
Speaker 4: has handled it is. State Farm has always had a
Speaker 4: good reputation. I would have liked to have seen the
Speaker 4: complaints be addressed in months one month, two month, three,
Speaker 4: so this could have been resolved because where it stands
Speaker 4: right now is very concerning for me because State Farm
Speaker 4: is potentially going to lose their license for a year.
Speaker 4: What that means is that twenty percent of the people
Speaker 4: in California could potentially their insurance policy could be at stake.
Speaker 4: I am one to as a leader and a communicator.
Speaker 4: I thought and defended my clients for nearly forty years.
Speaker 4: When they're a problem, arose is you have to settle
Speaker 4: the problem quickly and efficiently. An insurance policy is a contract.
Speaker 4: The insurance companies have to abide by that contract, and
Speaker 4: if that's not being done, that needs to be handled quickly,
Speaker 4: not sixteen months after the initial event. So yes, it's
Speaker 4: still a mess, and the leader the Department of Insurance
Speaker 4: a commissioner, needs to lead and guide everyone involved to
Speaker 4: a very speedy and accurate claims adjustment of of any claim.
Speaker 1: We know that After the fires occurred and the mayor
Speaker 1: and other elected officials met with President Donald Trump, when
Speaker 1: he came to Los Angeles to assess the damage. They
Speaker 1: promised the federal government that they would move heaven and
Speaker 1: earth to get these people back in their homes, to rebuild,
Speaker 1: to clean up all of the damage, to make those
Speaker 1: neighborhoods safe again, so that it doesn't look like a
Speaker 1: bomb went off. Well, it still looks like a bomb
Speaker 1: went off over there. The rebuilding process is way behind schedule,
Speaker 1: and it doesn't look like people are going back into
Speaker 1: their homes anytime soon. How much of those delays do
Speaker 1: you think can be attributed to the California Department of
Speaker 1: Insurance not doing their job? And I asked that question
Speaker 1: because when you talk to homeowners and you talk to
Speaker 1: fire victims, at the top of their list, besides the
Speaker 1: city taking forever with the permit process and those administrative hurdles,
Speaker 1: their problems with their insurance company are number one or
Speaker 1: number two on the almost every list that I've seen.
Speaker 4: So the big problem when you have a catastrophe or
Speaker 4: a let's say it was a single home here, it
Speaker 4: was whole neighborhoods, In my opinion, that check should be
Speaker 4: very quick. We're talking dwelling, personal property, loss of use,
Speaker 4: that would be food and lodging. When you're displaced out
Speaker 4: of your home. It's actually an often it's an easier
Speaker 4: claim to pay out because it's a complete loss where
Speaker 4: the problems are some of the things that are questionable,
Speaker 4: some of the events that have happened. It was a
Speaker 4: very dirty claim, and so we're dealing with smoke damage,
Speaker 4: We're dealing with contamination. We're dealing with soils with contaminations
Speaker 4: inside the dry wall and inside the property. So the
Speaker 4: Department of Insurance again needs to be there to advocate
Speaker 4: for the client and to advocate for the consumer. How
Speaker 4: would that be done? Well, there's possibly could be some
Speaker 4: of the loss, part of the loss that was not
Speaker 4: covered under the provision of the policy. We have to
Speaker 4: find a solution there are Would there be some kind
Speaker 4: of state coverage where we could draw upon the state taxes.
Speaker 4: I always bring this up because California Insurance is taxed
Speaker 4: to the tune of four billion dollars and that money
Speaker 4: goes to the general fund. We have such an unusual
Speaker 4: event here down in the Palisades, could we redirect some
Speaker 4: of that money to cover to speed up the recovery
Speaker 4: and the development, redevelopment of this precious neighborhood. I would say, yes,
Speaker 4: it's going to take leadership, arding from the governor and
Speaker 4: the legislature and also local governments, but the Department of
Speaker 4: Insurance should be the one to spearhead this and organize
Speaker 4: and find solutions. In California, we have grit, we're strong people,
Speaker 4: but right now we have very very weak leaders. And
Speaker 4: you can see people that are coming in from the
Speaker 4: private sector everywhere, from Mama Bears for superintendent to people
Speaker 4: that are running for mayor, and people that are running
Speaker 4: for like me, that are running for the insurance commissioner
Speaker 4: that can't stand to see what's happening. The taxpayer, the policyholder.
Speaker 4: Californians do not feel represented. So I can tell you
Speaker 4: that there are many, many solutions and the Department of
Speaker 4: Insurance could be the center of finding those solutions for
Speaker 4: this issue.
Speaker 1: You are a Republican. Ricardo Laura, the termed out incumbent,
Speaker 1: is a Democrat. So far, to my eye, everyone privately
Speaker 1: is willing to acknowledge that the guy is a disaster
Speaker 1: on just about every level, from ethics to performance and
Speaker 1: all points in between. Yet the only elected official on
Speaker 1: the Democratic side of the isle who I have seen publicly.
Speaker 1: Willing to call him out for his failure. Is John
Speaker 1: Gary Mendi, the Congressman from northern California, former insurance commissioner
Speaker 1: here in California. How bad is it that the Democratic
Speaker 1: Party that elected officials within the Democratic Party have failed
Speaker 1: to call him out publicly when they know he is
Speaker 1: failing the people of California and the policy holders in California.
Speaker 4: Well, I got to say that the Democrat Party definitely
Speaker 4: sticks together. We are so beyond that in California. We
Speaker 4: have to get past this. We need competent people that
Speaker 4: are going to create a functional prosperous I say prosperous state.
Speaker 4: We have so much opportunity in California and it's being
Speaker 4: denied us as homeowners, as people that reside here. So
Speaker 4: I want to say that one of my objectives when
Speaker 4: I'm elected as commissioner, this role needs to not be
Speaker 4: an elected office. It needs to be an appointment. And
Speaker 4: this is why I say this. Ricardo Laura started his
Speaker 4: misbehaving pretty quickly out of the gate. He had traveled
Speaker 4: on about forty four trips. He's being investigated for ethics violations.
Speaker 4: If we had a competent chief executive officer called the governor,
Speaker 4: and the governor saw that the insurance commissioner was not present,
Speaker 4: wasn't competent that role. That person could be replaced, could
Speaker 4: be fired and be replaced with someone that's competent. I
Speaker 4: also feel that the commissioner needs to of great experience
Speaker 4: in insurance. We do not have time in California to
Speaker 4: teach someone about auto insurance, about work up, about business
Speaker 4: insurance liability. Those are things I've had forty years of school,
Speaker 4: the experience in fighting for my clients. We do not
Speaker 4: have time to teach someone on the job. We need
Speaker 4: someone to walk in the office and say to the
Speaker 4: commission to the Assembly, to the Senate. They have insurance committees.
Speaker 4: I could walk in day one and tell them, this
Speaker 4: is your punch list. California is not insurable right now.
Speaker 4: Our forests aren't well maintained, they aren't being finned. We
Speaker 4: have stacked brush. We have homelessness on the streets, which
Speaker 4: increases crime. We have Prop thirty six, seventy percent of
Speaker 4: the people in California voted for that John and yet
Speaker 4: the people in Sacramento are not funding it properly. We
Speaker 4: need to support our police, so when you open up
Speaker 4: your policy, all of those things that I listed, fire, theft, vandalism,
Speaker 4: all of those things are covered under your homeowner's policy
Speaker 4: and all of those risks have gone up. It's risky.
Speaker 4: So the insurance companies are saying, well, you aren't allowing
Speaker 4: us to rate properly for decades, We're out of here.
Speaker 4: So this is just simply put, we do not have
Speaker 4: practical thinking people. So I will open up a new
Speaker 4: business division at the Department of Insurance that will from
Speaker 4: day one say, insurance companies, we know that there's AI,
Speaker 4: there's capital people. Insurance companies want to come into state
Speaker 4: of California. We have to quickly depopulate the people that
Speaker 4: are on the fair plan or are seeing their existence.
Speaker 4: Existing carrier are raising their rates. People are suffering, and
Speaker 4: how do we relieve that suffering? We lower our risk.
Speaker 4: We have to feel safe as people and businesses in
Speaker 4: californ that includes insurance companies. They have to look and
Speaker 4: see well they care about the risk. And then we're
Speaker 4: going to bring in competitions so we can have fierce
Speaker 4: competition for the policy holders in California. And this cannot
Speaker 4: be done by someone that does not know what they're doing.
Speaker 4: It has to be someone that's experienced.
Speaker 1: Right before the fires were started in Alt Dina and
Speaker 1: Pacific Palisades, the woman in charge of the Fair Plan
Speaker 1: testified in front of the state legislature and said that
Speaker 1: they were one massive fire away from insolvency. We've seen
Speaker 1: not just one fire, but two main big fires since
Speaker 1: she made those remarks. Yet the number of people on
Speaker 1: the California Fair Plan has not gotten smaller, it's gotten bigger.
Speaker 1: How big of a problem is that? And how do
Speaker 1: you depopulate the fair Plan?
Speaker 4: Okay, John, it's a huge, huge problem because what happens
Speaker 4: is is the fare plan has just ballooned. So there's
Speaker 4: more exposure on the Fair Plan. And now we've had
Speaker 4: some pretty good rains and it's going to get hot
Speaker 4: here pretty quick. We have a high chance of another problem,
Speaker 4: another fire. But what a lot of people don't know
Speaker 4: is when you're an admitted carrier in the state of California,
Speaker 4: let's say State Farm, Farmers, Triple A, all of those
Speaker 4: companies that people might recognize, they are also on the
Speaker 4: hook for the Fair Plan. So let's say there's a
Speaker 4: huge loss the Fair Plan runs out of money, than
Speaker 4: the fair Plan can or this Department of Insurance excuse me,
Speaker 4: can say okay, well we're two billion dollars short this time.
Speaker 4: The fair Plan's two billion dollars short. So State Farm
Speaker 4: you have twenty percent of the market share, you get
Speaker 4: twenty percent of that two billion dollars. Ya Farmers you
Speaker 4: have fourteen percent. You pay fourteen percent of that two billion.
Speaker 4: So the really convoluted and dysfunctional part of it is
Speaker 4: that the policyholders have to pay part and in some
Speaker 4: cases could pay all of that assessment on their policies.
Speaker 4: So even though a company might have looked at your
Speaker 4: house and said, you know what, it doesn't qualify, we're
Speaker 4: not going to write you. So you go over to
Speaker 4: the fair Plan and you sign up. If there's a loss,
Speaker 4: there's a very good chance that the fair plan will
Speaker 4: run out of money, and then your company that denied
Speaker 4: you initially will have to pay a check, and then
Speaker 4: that check gets assessed on your policy. So everything we're
Speaker 4: one large claim away from another disaster. We have a
Speaker 4: storm brewing with State Farm. If they want to say, well,
Speaker 4: like Hewlett Packard Tesla, they say well we don't want
Speaker 4: to do business in California, then all of those policies.
Speaker 4: It's more complicated than that. But if we lose state
Speaker 4: farm out of California, that's huge too. So your last
Speaker 4: question was how do we fix this? I'm going to
Speaker 4: go back to the basics of insurance. Number One. You
Speaker 4: have to have an insurable risk. And so if I
Speaker 4: go to your house and your house is beautiful in
Speaker 4: a normal world, I can insure it. Let's bring it
Speaker 4: to the state of California. Is the state of California insurable?
Speaker 4: And I say no, because we haven't managed our forest,
Speaker 4: we haven't managed or mitigated our wildfire risk, we haven't
Speaker 4: mitigated our crime, all of the things that are so
Speaker 4: we need to lower that. Simultaneously, we need to bring
Speaker 4: in insurance companies. And I can tell you they want
Speaker 4: to come in. There are companies that want to come
Speaker 4: into the State of California. We need to let them
Speaker 4: in to take on some of the risk that's out
Speaker 4: there to That's what insurance does. It distributes the risk,
Speaker 4: and right now it's too concentrated on few companies. Not good.
Speaker 4: So it is a very fixable problem, and I have
Speaker 4: hope that we cannot continue going down the destruction of
Speaker 4: the insurance number one. We have to hold the insurance
Speaker 4: companies accountable, but we need to find relief because people
Speaker 4: cannot afford what's going on in the insurance policy world.
Speaker 4: By bringing in more companies, that will help the affordability
Speaker 4: and we'll have more access to more cover.
Speaker 3: Itt Stacy Course Godden.
Speaker 1: She is a candidate for Insurance Commissioner here in the
Speaker 1: state of California. You can get her online at Stacy
Speaker 1: for Insurance Commissioner dot com. Stacy, thanks so much for
Speaker 1: stopping by.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: John eight hundred two two two five two two two
Speaker 1: is telephone number one eight hundred two two two five
Speaker 1: two two two. If you'd like to email the show,
Speaker 1: you can do so at Johnny don't Like show at
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Speaker 1: dot com.
Speaker 3: And Randy.
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Speaker 1: Right now, it's time to open up the California Crime Blotterer.
Speaker 3: It's happened yet again. Nice cee.
Speaker 5: Time for the California Crime.
Speaker 3: Blodder and Randy.
Speaker 1: We're all in luck today because this edition is an
Speaker 1: Ed Lascos edition and it's on.
Speaker 5: Like donkey kong.
Speaker 2: Ed Lascos is here to cover someone trying to carjack
Speaker 2: a semi truck on the two ten freeway. But Johnny,
Speaker 2: before we get to that, there is actually some breaking
Speaker 2: Blotterer news as the LAPD and the DEEA are doing
Speaker 2: a massive drug rate in MacArthur Park right now, good
Speaker 2: clean that place out. The Feds are finally coming from
Speaker 2: MacArthur Park. All right, let's hear what Ed Lascos has
Speaker 2: to say about the attempted carjacking on the two ten.
Speaker 6: In Silmhar's the following and breaking news out of sill Mar,
Speaker 6: where police shooting has led to road closures on the
Speaker 6: two ten freeway. The westbound lanes of the two ten
Speaker 6: at Polk Street remained close tonight. It began before the
Speaker 6: thick of rush hour as a police investigation took place.
Speaker 6: Let's go live to Fox Lovem's Ed Alascos there and
Speaker 6: Silmar with more for us, Ed.
Speaker 5: And Marla. A quick update just moments to go.
Speaker 7: CHP LAPD reopening the two ten freeway, So all the
Speaker 7: westbound lanes here through the Silmar area on the two
Speaker 7: ten open again after a closure of almost seven long hours.
Speaker 2: They closed that part of the freeway for seven hours.
Speaker 3: That had to make that commute real peachy.
Speaker 5: Following a gunman who runs right onto.
Speaker 2: The well, you know you can always take the scenic route.
Speaker 2: You get off on Yard now and you drive past
Speaker 2: the juvenile Hall and then you get on the five.
Speaker 3: Have you noticed that.
Speaker 1: The crime blotter has just kind of been San Fernando
Speaker 1: Valley news lately.
Speaker 8: Yes, yes, I have noticed that.
Speaker 7: Following a gunman who runs right onto the freeway right
Speaker 7: in the middle of the traffic, trying to carjack the
Speaker 7: driver of a big rig let's start it off with
Speaker 7: the captain from LAPD.
Speaker 3: Listen there.
Speaker 9: I don't know their involvement, but I do know at
Speaker 9: least one motorists. He attempted a carjack.
Speaker 5: But this is crazy.
Speaker 7: Usually if you have these attempt at carjacking sits on
Speaker 7: a city street, dot it on the middle of a freeway.
Speaker 9: Certainly, I mean, it's certainly outrageous. We don't see this
Speaker 9: all the time.
Speaker 7: But we did see it right here, right in the
Speaker 7: middle of the two tent treeway. That's the suspect there.
Speaker 7: He's down, his hands up.
Speaker 8: And doing the play by play on arrest. You can't
Speaker 8: beat it.
Speaker 5: After running from police wanted on a drug warrant.
Speaker 9: It's at some point he runs from them. I don't
Speaker 9: know his exact rut of travel, but he goes down
Speaker 9: onto the freeway and that's where he confronts an uninvolved motorists,
Speaker 9: attempts to carjack him, while carjack that motorists while armed.
Speaker 2: By the way, this tells you how slow the freeway
Speaker 2: was moving that somebody could run onto the freeway and
Speaker 2: try to carjack somebody. You only can do that when
Speaker 2: the freeways moving about three miles an hour and you know.
Speaker 1: What people are doing during commute. They're talking on the phone,
Speaker 1: they're eating a breakfast sandwich, they're putting on their makeup.
Speaker 1: They're doing everything they're not supposed to be doing. And
Speaker 1: then all of a sudden, some nut tries to take
Speaker 1: your car from you while armed with a handgun from
Speaker 1: sky Fox.
Speaker 7: There's the handgun. See it down on the freeway. And
Speaker 7: it's not just any carjacking here. He is trying to
Speaker 7: jack the driver of this big rig. Hey, you're gonna
Speaker 7: go for it, go big Okay.
Speaker 1: Now, my guess is that driver wasn't putting makeup.
Speaker 5: On with LAPD hot on his tail.
Speaker 9: The officers gave him commands to drop the weapon. He
Speaker 9: didn't comply, and then an officer involved shooting occurred. At
Speaker 9: that time, the subject was struck by officers gunfire. He
Speaker 9: fount of the ground in close proximity to that weapon,
Speaker 9: and he still continued to not comply with officers.
Speaker 7: That's when the LAPD fires. It's forty millimeters less lethal round.
Speaker 7: There's the shell casing from that. It's right there on
Speaker 7: the freeway.
Speaker 2: That's why they shut down the freeway because they got
Speaker 2: to collect the shell casings.
Speaker 5: Good lord, marked by evidence marker number three.
Speaker 2: Look, you got the guy. I know you have to
Speaker 2: do an investigation. I know that you want to be thorough,
Speaker 2: but seven hour closure seems excessive.
Speaker 1: In the old days, they would have turned him into
Speaker 1: a piece of Swiss cheese.
Speaker 7: Marked by evidence marker number three. The driver of the
Speaker 7: big rig. He's shaken up after nearly being jacked by
Speaker 7: a gunman. While you think commute is jack do'll tell
Speaker 7: you by this huge backup, Look at this traffic.
Speaker 5: It's a nightmare.
Speaker 1: One a hole ruins the commute for everyone. And now
Speaker 1: couter has PTSD well. And the way that our freeway
Speaker 1: system works. You clogged that section of the two ten.
Speaker 1: Now you're clogging the one to eighteen. Now you're clogging
Speaker 1: the five. Now you're clogging the four h five. It
Speaker 1: just as one goes down, they all go.
Speaker 7: Down, stretching on for miles, with all the lanes of
Speaker 7: the two ten West closed for nearly seven long hours,
Speaker 7: all after a wild scene. That gunman running onto a
Speaker 7: busy freeway, running between traffic, just trying to jack an
Speaker 7: eighteen wheeler.
Speaker 9: What a dangerous, rapidly escalating situation. Those officers quickly.
Speaker 5: Took action We're so lucky no one has heard it.
Speaker 9: Thank god, nobody was seriously hurt, especially given the time
Speaker 9: that it occurred this afternoon.
Speaker 2: What is it about the culture of Los Angeles that
Speaker 2: the immediate instinct is to run, and it's to carjack,
Speaker 2: and it's to evade the police on the freeway. I
Speaker 2: feel like that is a very uniquely La thing well.
Speaker 1: And it's also indicative of the fact that they don't
Speaker 1: believe there are consequences for anything.
Speaker 3: If you're gonna do.
Speaker 1: All of that in broad daylight under normal circumstances, you
Speaker 1: go to prison for a long time. But here they
Speaker 1: think they're just gonna get away with it with either
Speaker 1: nothing happening to them or a slap on the wrist.
Speaker 5: And awlah the captain right about that.
Speaker 7: At the time this afternoon, when all this goes down
Speaker 7: leading into the evening rushes, you know the two ten
Speaker 7: here westbound, especially those lanes heading over to the one
Speaker 7: eighteen to five to four h five northern part of
Speaker 7: the valley main artery, and then you have, of all things,
Speaker 7: is one of the bystanders said, you expect a big
Speaker 7: traffic jam like this. Marlaurie, as he was saying you
Speaker 7: expect a big cigarette when you have a horrible accident
Speaker 7: on the two ten freeway. We have a lot of
Speaker 7: folks who are known to speed, but the last thing
Speaker 7: you'd expect is someone with a gun running onto the freeway,
Speaker 7: running from trying to carjack the driver.
Speaker 2: Of an I'm telling you the big takeaway from this
Speaker 2: story is the traffic is so awful. Cars are moving
Speaker 2: so slowly that someone can even try to carjack someone
Speaker 2: on the freeway.
Speaker 7: The driver of an eighteen wheeler. Really crazy situation here, A.
Speaker 6: Very unusual situation out there. But the good news tonight
Speaker 6: as timing would have it back open. But the ripple effect,
Speaker 6: I imagine, is still there.
Speaker 7: It really was, especially on a lot of the surface
Speaker 7: streets here. Glen Oaks really was one of the main
Speaker 7: arteries that sort of runs surface streets but parallels the
Speaker 7: freeway in this area that was jammed for several hours
Speaker 7: finally easing up here.
Speaker 2: You know what happens when you get into a big
Speaker 2: traffic jam like this is everyone's got their Google Maps
Speaker 2: or their Apple Maps or their ways open, and they
Speaker 2: all give you the same stupid advice, and then everyone
Speaker 2: takes that advice, and then they all get off on
Speaker 2: the side street and now that's jammed.
Speaker 1: Could you imagine how furious you would be if you
Speaker 1: were late for work and got in trouble, or you
Speaker 1: missed your flight, or you missed your cruise ship, or
Speaker 1: you missed whatever important event you were supposed to go
Speaker 1: to that particular day, because this idiot deciding to do that.
Speaker 7: Finally easing up now as we move in past the
Speaker 7: nine o'clock hour. As for that gunman, he's hit by police,
Speaker 7: taken to the er, not seriously heard. We're told that
Speaker 7: he's already been out of the hospital, already booked on
Speaker 7: all of these charges.
Speaker 5: The driver of the big rig shaken.
Speaker 7: He's okay, but certainly, as the captain was saying, you
Speaker 7: got to imagine feel sorry for the guy. He's just
Speaker 7: trying to make a delivery.
Speaker 2: Yep, those goods aren't going anywhere anytime soon. There you
Speaker 2: go ed Lasco's narrating the jackass trying to evade the
Speaker 2: police that attempted to carjack a big rig on the
Speaker 2: two ten freeways.
Speaker 5: How crazy is that?
Speaker 1: I hope that idiot was treated by a doctor at
Speaker 1: the hospital who was educated at a medical score that
Speaker 1: advertised on Moury and I hope he forgot a sponge
Speaker 1: inside him and sewed it up. It's time to reopen
Speaker 1: to the California crime Blodder.
Speaker 5: It's happened yet again. This wow, Wow, what's not weird?
Speaker 4: Dun dun dunn dun dun.
Speaker 5: Dun reached the Califonia crime bladder with.
Speaker 3: John and.
Speaker 1: This next edition of the Blotterer involves well, something that
Speaker 1: Randy loves more than motherhood and apple pie advantage miles.
Speaker 2: Some horrible, awful person decided to hack into a frequent
Speaker 2: flyer's account and steal all their airline miles.
Speaker 1: I hope that person got stuck at DFW For more,
Speaker 1: here is kc RA three in Sacramento.
Speaker 5: Up to a case every three investigation.
Speaker 10: Scammers are now finding ways to take off with your
Speaker 10: loyalty reward points.
Speaker 5: When an American Airlines customer learned.
Speaker 2: A hack, hey, if you steal enough points in one go,
Speaker 2: do you get status?
Speaker 3: You might be exec plat.
Speaker 6: When an American Airlines customer learned a hacker stole her
Speaker 6: frequent flyer miles, it was a time to call three
Speaker 6: to investigate.
Speaker 10: Here's KSERI THREEZ Curtis may Edie Golston. Many of us
Speaker 10: may have miles or hotel loyalty rewards points, and some
Speaker 10: of us hore them for maybe a special trip or
Speaker 10: to use if there's some sort of an emergency.
Speaker 2: But we have well, they also devalue them all the time,
Speaker 2: so you have to hoard them to be able to
Speaker 2: even use them.
Speaker 3: And the emergency is you.
Speaker 10: Really want to go to Maui to use if there's
Speaker 10: some sort of an emergency. But we have learned hackers
Speaker 10: are finding your points valuable.
Speaker 5: Lid roths.
Speaker 2: Okay, if they've got music behind us, it sweeps weak everybody.
Speaker 10: Lida Roth has traveled the world, racking up frequent Flyer
Speaker 10: miles as a passenger American Airlines and by using their
Speaker 10: branded credit card.
Speaker 1: But one weekend, all right, so is she group one? Well,
Speaker 1: it depends what kind of status she has. It depends
Speaker 1: on where she's sitting on the plane. If she fakes
Speaker 1: an injury, she could board before group one.
Speaker 2: I'm group four, and I'm always jealous of those Group one,
Speaker 2: two and three people.
Speaker 1: Well, aren't they normally in wheelchairs?
Speaker 10: Though one weekend, she logged into her American Advantage account,
Speaker 10: I wish just crash nearly two hundred thousand of her
Speaker 10: heart earned frequent Flyer miles gone. A hacker got into
Speaker 10: her account.
Speaker 2: And that's almost like half of one way for a
Speaker 2: business class ticket unless you buy those things last minute.
Speaker 2: If you just like six months from now, I want
Speaker 2: to go to Europe and you want to fly business
Speaker 2: class on American to any major city, whether it's London,
Speaker 2: it's Dublin, it's Madrid, American's like, yeah, four hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty thousand points.
Speaker 8: Please.
Speaker 2: If you wait till like three weeks before and you
Speaker 2: don't really care what country you're going to, you'll find
Speaker 2: a deal for seventy thousand points.
Speaker 1: I am so cheap when it comes to spending those points,
Speaker 1: you would not believe it.
Speaker 10: Hacker got into her account and bought gift cards with them.
Speaker 2: That's your first red flag. Who the hell is using
Speaker 2: advantage miles to buy gift cards?
Speaker 3: That's a strange one.
Speaker 10: And you're hearing you're not going to get them back?
Speaker 5: What did you think?
Speaker 11: You know? It's a violation, it's a theft. And I
Speaker 11: did shed a few tears. I did cry, you can.
Speaker 8: Use them, I would do.
Speaker 2: You know how hard I've worked to get all these
Speaker 2: points and all these different credit cards, and do you.
Speaker 1: Know how much abuse you've gone through going through all
Speaker 1: of those airports.
Speaker 8: You can use them for almost anything these days.
Speaker 10: Flint Henderson, with a Points guy, says two years ago,
Speaker 10: scammers also targeted his American Advantage miles booking cars in
Speaker 10: New York City.
Speaker 2: Who's using miles to book a rental car? You could
Speaker 2: use those miles for a lot of things. You can
Speaker 2: get magazine subscriptions with them.
Speaker 8: Who's doing that?
Speaker 2: That definitely wasn't me, And sure enough my account had
Speaker 2: pretty much been drained.
Speaker 10: And get this, he says. American claimed his nearly four
Speaker 10: hundred and fifty thousand stolen miles were worth a whopping
Speaker 10: thirteen thousand, two hundred and sixty dollars.
Speaker 8: Maybe depends what you use a lot of money.
Speaker 2: It depends what you use them for and how much
Speaker 2: the cash value is on those business class flights.
Speaker 8: You might be right.
Speaker 2: Seriously, I don't understand how anyone buys any of those
Speaker 2: flights with cash. You're talking five six thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: Well, the problem is once you sit in first class,
Speaker 1: you get addicted to it fast because you have huge,
Speaker 1: comfortable chairs, you have plenty of leg Room, all the
Speaker 1: newest magazines. It's like going to Supercuts.
Speaker 3: These things do have real value.
Speaker 5: So just how are the bad guys doing it?
Speaker 10: Well, they are searching the dark web for all of
Speaker 10: your breached user names and passwords.
Speaker 2: They then, you know how, every three weeks you get
Speaker 2: a letter in the mail from Target saying that all
Speaker 2: your data was breached. It ends up on the dark web.
Speaker 2: Then they guess what your password is and they use
Speaker 2: it on every possible account you can have. Did you
Speaker 2: see that our union just got compromised and all of
Speaker 2: our information was stolen? But they'll only give you part
Speaker 2: of the settlement if you can prove that someone stole
Speaker 2: your identity.
Speaker 8: Sounds about right.
Speaker 10: They then start plugging them into various sites.
Speaker 8: It's Union duws month, isn't it it is?
Speaker 10: They then start plugging them.
Speaker 8: I put that on my credit card. I'm getting points.
Speaker 10: They then start plugging them into various sites and siphoning
Speaker 10: your points just as quick as they can.
Speaker 2: Now, both Clinton's I don't feel like I get a
Speaker 2: whole lot for my union dues, but I am going
Speaker 2: to hit that bus on my MX.
Speaker 3: Well, there you go.
Speaker 10: Now, both Clinton and Linda learned even if you catch
Speaker 10: the crooks right away, it could be tough to report
Speaker 10: it to the American Airlines fraud department. And that's because
Speaker 10: the fraud department is closed on the weekend.
Speaker 1: What why are these departments not open twenty four hours?
Speaker 3: Aren't they all in the Philippines anyway?
Speaker 2: The fraud department for American Airlines is only opened by
Speaker 2: phone Monday through Friday from nine to five.
Speaker 3: Come on, American.
Speaker 11: The thieves know that, and they take advantage of it,
Speaker 11: and suit get it.
Speaker 8: They take advantage.
Speaker 1: You know what's funny. When the AI goes over the
Speaker 1: intercom at the gates, they call it a advantage instead
Speaker 1: of advantage.
Speaker 3: It tricks the computer.
Speaker 11: The thieves know that, and they take advantage of it,
Speaker 11: and so they'll steal yourself on the weekends when there's
Speaker 11: no way to report it.
Speaker 9: I don't think in this day and age, that you
Speaker 9: can have your fraud department on the open business hours
Speaker 9: Monday through Friday.
Speaker 8: I think that doesn't work anymore.
Speaker 11: There's nothing we can do in our policy is that
Speaker 11: we cannot brand state your mouth.
Speaker 10: I reached out to American Airlines, which says, when we
Speaker 10: identify or are made aware of unauthorized activity in an
Speaker 10: advantage account, we act quickly to secure the account and
Speaker 10: work directly with a customer to resolve the issue and
Speaker 10: help prevent similar incidents. They suggest using strong, unique passwords
Speaker 10: and opting and to multi You know.
Speaker 2: They say that, but when you have to have a
Speaker 2: password for every website in the world that you use
Speaker 2: on a regular basis, every single company you do business with,
Speaker 2: who's writing down fifty five unique different passwords, it's just
Speaker 2: not feasible.
Speaker 1: When I upgraded my iPhone, I got locked out of
Speaker 1: every single app on my phone, and I cursed and
Speaker 1: I swore, and I was angry for about three to
Speaker 1: four weeks.
Speaker 5: And opting in to multi factor authentication.
Speaker 8: Now, I do say that is a good thing.
Speaker 2: And every app that you don't have that on, if
Speaker 2: they allow that where they text you the little one
Speaker 2: time code, that's great. And you know, I love I
Speaker 2: love the website to let you do that instead of
Speaker 2: your password, because everyone forgets their password. Well, you know
Speaker 2: the problem with that facial recognition though, what's that if
Speaker 2: Rachel Maddow or Ron Reagan Junior were ever able to
Speaker 2: get a hold of my phone, they'd be able to
Speaker 2: get right in