');document.write('MercedSun-Star.com: Local
');document.write('Comfort provided in stained glass at Mercy Medical Center chapel
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One of the legacies the late Elmo Giampaoli left to Merced shines in a place a lot of people wouldn\'t consider.

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');document.write('Teen faces years in prison
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An idiotic crime, pulled off by a 15-year-old boy to please his fellow gang members.

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');document.write('Dogs thought to have attacked woman still quarantined
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Four dogs that allegedly attacked a 44-year-old woman July 16 on August Road are still being held by animal control pending further investigation, even though the 10-day quarantine ended Monday.

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');document.write('Tip List: A weedy welcome to Merced
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Elaine Valladao commutes to Valley State Prison for Women in Chowchilla five days a week for work. Her evening drive involves leaving Highway 99 at R Street, then traveling home along Highway 140.

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');document.write('Steve Cameron: Holding pols accountable
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So you live in Merced, or Atwater, or Los Banos. From your comfy Central Valley perch, it\'s easy to forget the catastrophe that struck the Gulf Coast and that will affect both human and animal life in the region for decades.

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');document.write('Mike Tharp: Murder, intrigue and Merced
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You couldn\'t make this stuff up. Thanks to two Sun-Star columnists, The Old Trainer and Sarah Lim, one of the 19th century\'s most intriguing yarns -- with Merced right in the middle -- can be retold today. The Old Trainer was raised on a cowboy ranch in Oklahoma, and Sarah is director of the Courthouse Museum. Both are steeped in the history of our state.

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');document.write('Carol Reiter: \'Good\' and \'bad\' dog breeds
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I had a call this week from someone who needed to have their dog given a canine good citizen test.

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');document.write('Four in custody in drug investigation
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Four people were arrested Tuesday during a task force investigation in Los Banos, after tips to the Merced County Sheriff\'s Department about reports of illicit drug sales in the area.

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');document.write('Merced fourth-hardest-hit area in U.S. for foreclosures
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LOS ANGELES -- Households across a majority of large U.S. cities received more foreclosure warnings in the first six months of this year than in the first half of 2009, new data shows.More than 1 million American households are likely to lose their homes to foreclosure this year, the firm said.

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');document.write('Woman accused of robbing elderly man
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WINTON -- A 49-year old Winton woman was arrested Tuesday by Merced County sheriff\'s detectives on suspicion of robbing an elderly man.

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');document.write('Leadership Merced seeks participants
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The Merced Greater Chamber of Commerce said its Leadership Merced program had begun recruitment of local leaders for \"Leadership Merced Class 26.\"

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');document.write('SummerFest to feature Modesto Folk Band
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SummerFest, the downtown farmers market and vendor fair, has added vendors and events for children.

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');document.write('Man fires at group of people standing outside house in South Merced
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Merced police are looking for a man who fired shots at a group of people standing outside a house on the corner of Seville Way and M Street on Tuesday night.

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');document.write('Local servicemen\'s deaths detailed in leaks
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Classified military documents published on the Internet this week contain new details about the deaths of two soldiers and a Marine from the Northern San Joaquin Valley and foothills who were killed in Afghanistan.

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');document.write('Merced County rallies doctors in whooping cough fight
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Because of the severity of the whooping cough epidemic in California, the state now recommends that anyone over the age of 7 be immunized for the disease.

Whooping cough, or pertussis, can be fatal in infants under six months, and in the past seven months, six infants have died in the state, and more than 1,500 cases have been confirmed. There have been 44 confirmed cases in Merced County.

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');document.write('Merced County starts its own ballot measure on growth
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A Merced County initiative meant to hinder the destruction of farmland and open space by residential development could be watered down come November.

The Merced County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted Tuesday to put an additional referendum on the ballot that would fundamentally weaken the \"smart growth\" ballot initiative by exempting 2,437 acres.

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');document.write('Gustine woman arrested for allegedly abusing her 11-month-old daughter
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A 26-year-old Gustine woman was arrested after Merced County sheriff\'s deputies say she abused her 11-month-old daughter.

Maria Galicia was taken into custody around 8 p.m. Monday.

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');document.write('Former Atwater mayor, others pitch in to help property
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ATWATER -- The lawn of a house on the corner of Spyglass Court and Harbor Drive was freshly cut and glistening with water Tuesday morning -- not because of a proud owner, but because of a proud former mayor and his neighbors.

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');document.write('Bill would open national cemeteries to Hmong
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WASHINGTON -- As the years went by and more Hmong war veterans passed with them, Charlie Waters attended funerals and read eulogies for the oft-forgotten allies in the U.S. war in Southeast Asia.

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');document.write('McSwain school district gets strict on dress code
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McSwain Union Elementary School District put its fashion foot down this year after it adopted a fairly stringent dress code policy.

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');document.write('UC Merced Connect: Officer makes mark on campus
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George Gongora\'s path to becoming an officer in the UC Merced Police Department has taken him all over the San Joaquin Valley.

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');document.write('State pursues Race to the Top funding
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U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said that California is one of 19 state finalists for more than $3 billion in federal Race to the Top funding.

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');document.write('Car crashes into home, DUI suspected
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A 23-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence early Tuesday after allegedly crashing his car into a South Merced home.

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');document.write('Atwater might post license reading cameras around town
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ATWATER -- Call it a CPS -- criminal positioning system.

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');document.write('Atwater fills city manager post for interim
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ATWATER -- City officials worked until 2:15 Tuesday morning trying to hammer out budget details, page-by-page, during a City Council meeting that started at 7 p.m. Monday.

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');document.write('For whatever reason, Livingston repairing sidewalks
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LIVINGSTON -- On the morning of July 20, Katherine Williamson, a 30-year resident on Ninth Street, woke up to the surprising sound of a backhoe on her usually quiet street.

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');document.write('Foster Farms wrongful death case delayed
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After he reviewed more than 400 candidates, the potential jury pool of a wrongful death lawsuit against Foster Farms was dismissed by a judge Thursday.

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');document.write('Court rules in favor of Foster Farms in privacy case against Atlanta bank
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Foster Farms\' long dispute with a bank over the illicit use of private financial information ended well for the giant poultry producer Monday after a San Francisco appeals court issued a $10 million ruling in its favor.

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');document.write('Fresno man\'s negatives are Ansel Adams\'
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FRESNO -- A trove of old glass negatives bought by a Fresno painter for $45 at a garage sale a decade ago has been authenticated as the work of iconic photographer Ansel Adams and are worth at least $200 million, a lawyer said Tuesday.

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');document.write('Book uncovers prehistoric Merced, Central Valley, Yosemite
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Most of the people who travel along Highway 140 east toward Yosemite don\'t realize the history they are passing by -- and over.

It\'s not just the history of Gold Rush country. It\'s also a prehistoric window on how the area was formed millions of years ago.

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');document.write('Ore. couple sue Yosemite after car crushed by tree
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An Oregon couple have filed a lawsuit against Yosemite National Park after a tree crushed their car.

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');document.write('\'Off the 99\' podcast: Whooping cough
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Whooping cough is rearing its ugly head at hospitals across the state. \"Off the 99\" brought in Richard Rios, an epidemiologist with Merced County’s Department of Public Health, and reporter Carol Reiter, who has been covering the epidemic for the Sun-Star, to take a closer look.

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');document.write('Photo gallery: Lucha Libre at Merced County Fairgrounds
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');document.write('Couple burned out of homeless camp
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Losing your home to a fire is always a cruel act of fate.

But when you\'re already homeless, fate\'s blows can feel like head shots and gut punches.

A.J. Fleming and his wife are fate\'s latest victims in Merced County.

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');document.write('Blog post: Merced woman, 88, a finalist in \'Hardest Working Person\' contest
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