El Cajon Stories
On May 24, a pitbull attacked a six-month-old puppy at the off-leash dog area at Wells Park. The puppy was badly injured; however, the owner of the pitbull refused to exchange information and declined to …
A suspected burglar was arrested after a random tandem bike ride in El Cajon on April 22. The 35-year-old parolee allegedly marketed the stolen bicycle on Craigslist after the owners reported it stolen from a …
On March 26, an elderly woman living on Brockton Street in El Cajon allowed a stranger into her home and became the victim of a robbery. According to a Neighborhood Watch block captain, the perpetrator …
The lights were dim and the stage was set. Fifty El Cajon residents sat inside council chambers waiting to address councilmembers and comment on what the city should do with the El Cajon Performing Arts …
An El Cajon supermarket is irritating its customer base by allegedly scheduling staff below an acceptable standard. On March 20, shortly before 8 p.m., approximately 30 customers were lined up at the two checkstands open …
On Saturday and Sunday, February 27 and 28, up in the skies of East County, residents could see a WWII-era B-17 bomber soaring overhead. The nonprofit Liberty Foundation out of Tulsa, Oklahoma, brought its Liberty …
A pair of occupied vans parked on the corner of North Marshall Avenue and Fesler Street in El Cajon has caused some employees from nearby businesses to become uneasy. According to local workers, the vans …
Mary Louise Wilson was sentenced to nearly 20 years in state prison on February 8. The 54-year-old admitted to setting fires at the two nursing homes she stayed at briefly during 2009. According to state …
New improvements and enhancements may be in the works for Wells Park in El Cajon. The City of El Cajon recently announced that it is applying for a $5 million state grant to revitalize the …
The circular interior of St. Ephrem’s church might serve as an eclectic museum of Catholic devotional art. So many styles, drawn from so many traditions: a golden mosaic rendering of the icon of Our Lady …
I wake up at 5.30, and I’m usually out the door by 6.15. I can fit in three or four jogs around my neighborhood a week; the other days I walk the dog for a …
The downtown area of El Cajon will continue its transformation with the approval of the Prescott Promenade project plans by the El Cajon City Council during their January 12 meeting. The promenade is a small …
On Tuesday, January 4, at about 11:00 p.m., El Cajon police took three young men into custody for felony vandalism. An officer reportedly became suspicious of the teens’ passenger-side window being rolled down on such …
Sunday was assistant pastor Dave Holmquist’s last at El Cajon Wesleyan. After the opening worship — a singer/guitarist and a bongo player alone on the vast, spotlit, blue-green stage — he took his place down …
The Department of Motor Vehicles has been forced to close every second Friday of the month in order to help ease the state budget. This month, the DMV is closed for three Fridays and a …
At about 10:15 p.m. on Thursday, October 15, according to police radio traffic, two people were stabbed on the corner of Graves Avenue and East Madison Avenue in El Cajon. El Cajon PD stated that …
“Russ?” “Yup.” “It’s me. I’m in El Cajon.” I’m calling on my first-ever cell phone. Hate the end of freedom. But now I need this thing. “That Dubai restaurant you were crazy about? It’s closed! …
As I write this, Transformers 2 has just finished taking in over $200 million in five days. One of the main characters in that film is a robot who disguises himself as a 2009 Chevy …
Sitting on a park bench at Prescott Promenade on a hot July afternoon, John stares at a brawny tattooed man in his 50s smoking a cigarette under a “No Smoking” sign. “Who knows what this …
About a month ago, I drove to El Cajon for an annual horseshoe tournament in memory of Jack and Duke, two deceased friends of the organizers. When Chris called to tell me about it, he …
At approximately 3:15 a.m. on Wednesday, June 3, residents of Bella Vista apartments in El Cajon awoke to the incoherent screams of a man in the parking lot. Before residents went to check on the …
Matthew “Beau” La Madrid, no longer a registered investment adviser with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), nonetheless convinced 300 people that he had a surefire way of beating the stock market. He said he …
Guns don’t kill people, people kill people, and monkeys do too (if they have a gun). — Eddie Izzard I exited the freeway 20 or so miles east of San Diego. Noting the prevalence of …
Should it appear in California, there might be no stopping it: citrus greening, or huanglongbing. The fearsome citrus-killing bacterium, first seen in China in the early 1900s, has spread steadily across the continents. It recently …
About a month ago, I went to the opening of a music store in El Cajon called Guitar and Bass Land. A guy was talking about how he plays bass in a Dio tribute band. …
“Oh how I would love for the world to know who you really were.” So begins a mother’s letter to a son fatally shot by police three weeks ago. The letter is at the center …
Since the late ’90s, Mike Kamoo’s Earthling Studios has been a vital cog in the San Diego music scene. The studio, headquartered in a corporate park in El Cajon, has a well-worn path to it …
The Hell’s Angel takes me aside. It’s 10:00, Saturday night. A bunch of them stand around outside their headquarters by a row of angle-parked Harleys, here where Palm meets El Cajon Boulevard. ”Look, we’ve had …
In the early hours of Monday, March 2, two houses on Alderson and Andover streets in El Cajon were broken into and purses and small amounts of money were taken. These robberies were the two …
The Foothills Adult Education Center on Melody Lane in El Cajon will not be offering summer classes this year. Fall classes may not be available either. An education facility under the control of the Grossmont …
Shortly before 7 a.m. on Friday, February 13, a green sedan traveling on South Second Street veered off the asphalt, hopped the curb, and crashed into a number of utilities’ service facilities. A witness reported …
This month and in early February, city managers and finance directors in cities across San Diego County are appearing before their respective city councils to report significant budget deficits. Of the county’s 18 municipalities, 14 …
Author: Joshua Rhome Neighborhood: El Cajon Age: 30 Occupation: Student I sit here in the little room I rent in a house off Magnolia Avenue and think about El Cajon and my past and how …
“Those who look like the artists they are portraying will probably go far,” says producer Randy Wood. “A Michael Jackson impersonator — with all the dancers and everything — went to Mexico last year and …
Inside Alliance Gym, near downtown Chula Vista, Eric Delfierro bustles from one end of the gym to the other, sweating almost as much as the 15 mixed-martial-arts fighters he is training. Of those 15 fighters, …
The City of El Cajon is broke, and according to a July press release, the community is losing nearly $6 million a year. “The City of El Cajon has a fiscal crisis, which is not …
At a weekly Reader meet-up, at North Park’s Claire de Lune coffeehouse, I was prepared to hear typical neighborhood concerns from residents; too much graffiti, not enough police, errantly positioned stop signs, the usual type …
“I wish I’d known you were coming,” said Pastor Dan Slagle when I spoke with him after the service. If he had known, he could have warned me that part of the regular band was …
Before Thomas Weller leaves his El Cajon house and “goes out to play,” he looks like a character from the movie Mystery Men: he puts on black shin-guards (like the kind worn by baseball catchers), …
Najem Al Ekabi sits beneath the forest of red, white, and black Iraqi flags. He’s intent on a video on his laptop. “Look, see?” he says. “The one on the left. That’s me. Winning the …
"They've been fighting fires all day. What da heck have we done?"
Shade of Orange I scurried through dancing shadows to reach my carpool pick-up spot at the swimming pool-mailboxes annex within the condo complex. I glanced at my watch. It was 6:07 a.m. All was quiet …
Shocked shoppers see a woman fall to her death from a parking structure at Parkway Plaza in El Cajon. Was she pushed? In Chollas View, a mother loses the second of her two sons to …
A boy 3-1/2 months old was the youngest homicide victim in San Diego County during the first half of 2007. The oldest was a 75-year-old woman. Both were killed by family members, allegedly, the infant …
Most-Filmed Wild West Main Street Don't look yet. Turn off Woodside onto Maine and behold a li'l old Wild West street that'll knock your spurs off. It huddles beneath a perfect movie-set backdrop of towering …
"Signs of Life," read the banners affixed to the light poles in the parking lot. In the church vestibule, piles of take-home magnets bore images and Scripture verses explaining the signs. Week three was Worn-Out …
At the Mass's opening, Father Felix Shabi's voice sounded from behind the red curtain concealing the Sanctuary. "In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit..." The curtain hung …
Kayla Morales called to tell me about a party raising funds for her motorcycle-racing pursuits. She knew a lot about the sport and was informative. She talked about wanting to go to Nashville to race. …
The first drive-in theater I snuck into in San Diego was also the first one built here, the Midway, on the northwest corner of Mission Bay Drive and Sports Arena Boulevard. It was December 1979, …
“Even the ground meat’s kosher, for Jewish and Muslim customers.”
"This is what I like worship to be like," said one teenaged boy to another before the service began. "A guitar solo in every song." He was right. The opening 25 minutes might have been …
"I am so excited," said Pastor Jack Forness as he opened the Maundy Thursday service at East Valley Christian Fellowship. "We get to start to minister on this Easter weekend and be excited about what …