Crash Aftermath

In its typical understated tone, the Daily News takes the award for most breathless headline: HORRIFIC!

It's as if the paper can barely contain its excitement over covering the carnage. At first glance, I could've sworn the headline actually read, TERRIFIC!.

:: Meanwhile, among other stories, the L.A. Times profiles Juan Manuel Alvarez, the suicidal man whose Jeep Cherokee triggered the massive train collision. The paper's website also reports that Alvarez was charged late Wednesday with 10 counts of murder under "special circumstances" (which will be amended to include an 11th victim, found late Wednesday). An arraignment had been scheduled for today, but was postponed because of Alvarez's medical condition, the paper says.

:: Several orgs report on the Costco employees who quickly came to the aid of injured passengers. With the store closed for the day (a KTLA reporter estimated the store's loss at $500,000), employees spent the day providing supplies and also making pizzas for rescue/recovery workers. I drove by the site this morning on the way to work, and although fire engines and other rescue vehicles still took up half of the Costco parking lot, it appeared that business was getting back to normal.

:: The local stations, of course, covered the carnage in detail. The most personal account may have come from KTTV/Fox 11's Chris Blatchford, who offered up a lengthy package on the life of one victim -- Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy James Tutino, 47 -- and at the end of the package choked up as he said this was a difficult story for him to report, as he knew Tutino personally.

:: I'm intrigued by the similarities and differences between this and the Santa Monica Farmers Market tragedy. The fast decision to charge Alvarez with murder is a contrast to the six months it took for George Russell Weller to be charged for plowing his car into a crowd and killing 10 people in July 2003.

I know, there are huge differences with that case. For starters, there's an element of premeditation in yesterday's case, since Alvarez initially intended to trigger an impact between his car and the train.

But on the flip side, you could argue that Alvarez changed his mind and attempted to move his car, while Weller was fully concious while driving into the car -- yet didn't make a real attempt to stop until a body trapped beneath his car finally slowed it down.

Don't get me wrong -- I think Alvarez should get the most extreme punishment possible. I'm just still baffled at how Weller was treated with such kid's gloves. This January Weller was eventually charged with vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence -- what took so long to arrest Weller, vs. Alvarez, and why the lighter charge? Race? Age? I'll let you debate.