The 40,000-square-foot store, at 1180 S Diamond Bar Blvd., has updated registers, a revamped customer service desk, an expanded online grocery-pickup department and new signs.

Additional upgrades include digital touchscreens throughout the store where shoppers can search for products, and a community-inspired mural at the front of the market.

The mural showcases Diamond Bar’s natural surroundings, while also depicting the city’s history with its evolving architecture and urban landscape.

“We aimed to give our store a contemporary feel to demonstrate our commitment to our customers wants and needs,” store manager Do Nguyen said.

The store also features Walmart’s pickup option, which allows online shoppers to quickly collect their groceries without getting out of their vehicles. Home delivery service, touch-free Walmart Pay and the Walmart+ membership program are also available.

Walmart+ is designed to save customers time and money on everyday essentials. Perks include free delivery from the store, free shipping with no minimum order, mobile Scan & Go, member pricing on fuel and the ability to earn Walmart Rewards, among other services.

The market, which employs 120 workers, remained open throughout the transition.

Store manager Nguyen presented a total of $6,000 in grants to local nonprofits. They include:

• $2,000 — Diamond Bar Woman’s Club
• $2,000 — Walnut Diamond Bar Sheriff Booster Club
• $2,000 — Bright Magpie Charitable Foundation

On Nov. 14, around midnight, three suspects armed with handguns and wearing masks went into the house along the 1900 block of Viento Verano Drive though an unlocked, back door, sheriff’s Deputy Michael Chen said.

A woman, who spoke only Cantonese, was confronted and ordered, via a translation app on a cellphone, to go to the living room. Her 18-year-old grandson came downstairs after hearing her calls for help and was subsequently ordered into the living room as well.

The victims sat on the couch and had shirts placed over their heads.

The suspects stole more than $22,000 in cash and property, including rings from the woman’s hand and $500 from her purse before fleeing in a black Acura sedan, authorities said.

The victims were not injured.

On Wednesday, April 5, authorities served search warrants at residences in Los Angeles, Orange and San Bernardino counties and the three suspects were taken into custody, Chen said. They were identified as Rynell Verdin, 25, Arturo Gonzalez, 20, and Mattron Brown, 29.

The Sheriff’s Department did not disclose how it zeroed in on the three suspects.

Around $17,000 in cash, three illegally possessed firearms and personal items belonging to the victims were found during the searches of the suspects’ residences, authorities said. Clothing and ski masks worn during the robbery were also found, they said.

The three suspects were booked on robbery charges and were being held without bail.

Officers also found hundreds of rounds of ammunition, a shotgun, a bolt-action rifle, three machine-gun conversion devices, manufacturing parts and accessories including frames, barrels, slides and suppressors, police said in a statement.

“He was in possession of several illegal firearms,” Ontario Officer Joshua Luster said.

Officers served a search warrant at the home in the 2500 block of Harmony Hill Drive on Wednesday, when he was arrested.

The investigation started four to five months ago, said Luster, who declined to say what kicked off the probe citing it is still underway.

“He is illegally manufacturing parts of firearms and selling them,” Luster said. “We know he was selling in San Bernardino County.”

The suspect was booked on suspicion of manufacturing or distributing an assault weapon, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, possessing or transporting a machine gun, carrying a loaded firearm, possession of a loaded firearm while under the influence, and manufacturing firearms without a license, sheriff’s Sgt. Leticia Reyes said. The suspect posted bond.

Robinson Rin Yang, who also used the names Robert Mora and David Lee, pleaded guilty in December to one count of willful failure to pay employment taxes, court documents show. Yang, 54, operated B&S Staffing in Covina from March 2016 to March 2020.

“Under defendant’s management, B&S engaged in a long-running pattern of failing to pay federal employment taxes and timely file federal employment-tax returns,” according to the sentencing memo from the US Attorney’s Office. “Despite knowing of the company’s expanding tax debts, defendant repeatedly used his control over B&S to direct payments from the corporate bank account for his personal benefit andfor the payment of other expenses.”

From mid-2017 until the end of 2019, B&S accrued large unpaid employment-tax liabilities, failed to make timely employment tax deposits, and repeatedly failed to timely file quarterly employment-tax returns with the IRS, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Yang didn’t pay the IRS all the employment taxes, including income taxes and Social Security and Medicare taxes withheld from employee wages, authorities said.

B&S accrued $2,791,783 in unpaid employment taxes during a 2½-years; Yang agreed to pay that in restitution to the IRS, according to the statement.

At the time of the crimes, Yang was on probation for prior convictions for worker’s compensation fraud and failure to file state employment tax returns.

Brea police officers responded to a grand theft report at a Walmart on the 2500 block of East Imperial Highway, at Kraemer Boulevard, at 5:23 p.m., where four suspects had stolen multiple cartloads of merchandise. Police located the suspects’ vehicle on the 57 Freeway and pursued it to Diamond Bar, said Lt. Chris Haddad.

California Highway Patrol officers took over the pursuit, and the suspects eventually bailed on foot in a West Covina neighborhood. Three of the four suspects had been arrested as of Wednesday evening, according to Haddad.

The settlement is the equivalent of paying back roughly two-thirds of the $533,418 paid to Lockyer for his 20-month tenure as watchdog.

Neither Lockyer nor City Attorney Jamie Casso would comment on the settlement. A clause in the agreement prevents either side from discussing it with the media.

The city declined to release a November 2021 letter outlining its allegations against Lockyer, but a staff report states the dispute between the city and Lockyer’s firm, Brown Rudnick LLP, was “particularly with respect to the Tres Hermanos solar project” that is now the subject of a civil lawsuit by Industry against the developers and an ongoing criminal case.

The settlement agreement indicates the city alleged Lockyer and Brown Rudnick are liable for “alleged breaches” of their professional services agreement and “other statutory and common law claims” connected to the agreement.

Industry ultimately paid $20 million toward the solar project, which never broke ground, and later learned that many of the invoices submitted by the developer for reimbursement were allegedly fraudulent. Lockyer served as reform adviser from the start of the project in May 2016 until he was fired in January 2018.

The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office has filed charges against developer William Barkett, former state Sen. Frank Hill, former Industry City Manager Paul Philips and attorney Anthony Bouza in connection with the embezzlement scandal. Barkett is alleged to have used more than $8 million of the funds on personal items, including a lavish wedding for his daughter in the French Riviera. Court testimony and interviews indicate the project was pushed forward because of Hill’s close ties to the newly elected City Council.

Lockyer was not named as a defendant in either the civil or criminal cases. As part of the settlement, Industry and Brown Rudnick agreed to mutually release each other from any claims related to Lockyer’s work in the city, Tres Hermanos, the four defendants in the criminal case and the allegations outlined in the November 2021 letter. Brown Rudnick and Lockyer “each expressly deny any wrongdoing,” the settlement states.

Industry hired Lockyer, through his firm, in May 2016, following a scathing audit by the state controller that found “the potential for fraud, waste and abuse of public resources was extremely high” in the tiny manufacturing-focused city. Lockyer was to act independently from the city’s administration and was tasked with making sure the city followed through with its promises to fix several issues highlighted by the controller’s audit, including the city’s historically lax review of invoices submitted by third parties.

Around the time of Lockyer’s hiring, Industry began working in secret with Barkett and Hill to develop a solar farm on ranch land on the border of Diamond Bar and Chino Hills known locally as Tres Hermanos Ranch. Lockyer had known both men from his time in the state politics and Barkett, a frequent contributor to Democrats, had donated more than $70,000 to Lockyer’s campaigns over the years. Lockyer previously denied being influenced by his history with the two men.

Though the city’s reforms increased scrutiny of other projects, the Tres Hermanos project was treated differently. Funds flowed to the project with little oversight and, when questions were raised about invoicing in particular, the project’s funding was restructured into a loan and staff was told it no longer needed to watch the disbursements as closely. None of the money has been paid back in the years since the project was shut down.

Industry eventually fired Lockyer, alongside Philips and others working on the solar project, in early 2018 before cutting ties with the developers, too. Since then, the project’s developers and the city have filed multiple lawsuits against each other and, at one point, an attorney with ties to Barkett attempted unsuccessfully to get a judge to place Lockyer and Philips in charge of the city.

After his firing, Lockyer called for the district attorney’s office to investigate Industry and alleged his firing was prompted by a prominent family’s opposition to efforts to reform Industry’s housing program.

And politicos say that legislative melee is one that holds lessons for the ongoing turmoil in Washington, D.C.

Now, it’s a California congressman, Kevin McCarthy, who is struggling to get enough of his GOP colleagues to coalesce behind him to secure the speaker’s gavel. He’s lost several rounds of votes in a historic fashion as about 20 hardline Republicans refuse to back him.

But in the mid-1990s, it was another fight featuring Republican lawmakers in the California Legislature that led to some speaker shenanigans. As Alex Vassar, a legislative historian with the California State Library, puts it: Both situations involve many moving pieces.

At the start of the 1994 session, Jim Brulte of Rancho Cucamonga, the leader of a Republican caucus that had a narrow majority, seemed to be set for the speaker role.

But a few things happened: Paul Horcher of Diamond Bar bucked his Republican colleagues and voted for longtime Democratic Speaker Willie Brown, and Democrats were able to block Richard Mountjoy, a Republican who had recently won a special election for a vacant Senate seat, from participating in the vote.

Thus, Brown held onto the speaker role, and Horcher lost his seat after Republicans mounted a recall.

But the drama wasn’t over.

A few months later, Assemblymember Doris Allen, a Republican from Cypress, became the first woman to hold the speaker position in June 1995. Brown had said he’d only remain in the post until another member could put together the requisite number of votes needed for the job — and with the help of Democrats, Allen did.

She won the speaker spot with no Republican votes except her own.

Democrats said Allen was the right person for the job because she could maintain bipartisan control and would foster working relationships. Republicans, though, accused Allen of betrayal and making “a deal with the devil,” according to the Orange County Register’s reporting at the time.

Allen would only remain speaker for 102 days, resigning amid a recall effort. Her ally, Brian Setencich of Fresno, won the job for a short time — until Brown left the Assembly to become San Francisco’s mayor and Allen was replaced in the Assembly by Scott Baugh. She died in 1999.

And Assemblymember Curt Pringle of Garden Grove took over for nearly a year — the last Republican to hold the position.

“I believe that politics is a team sport,” Pringle, now a government affairs consultant, said. “You need to be a part of a team, a caucus, a party. That doesn’t mean you’re bound to everything that team does, but the only way you have any power is if you work together with the team.”

“In 1995, two members joined the other side. It’s somewhat interesting to see, in this case, that these 20 representatives (who aren’t voting for McCarthy) represent about 10% of the overall Republican makeup of the House, but they expect the 90% to do what they want as opposed to them working with the team they’re elected to,” Pringle added.

Brulte sees some similarities between the Republicans bucking the party leader both then and now: “The folks opposing McCarthy did nothing and gave little or no money to help elect Republicans in Congress. Those who opposed my election also did nothing to help elect GOP members to the Assembly.”

But in California, the vote margin was much narrower than what congressional Republicans have now. And in California’s Capitol, the speaker fights were “certainly not helpful at fostering good relationships” in a building where colleagues meet often and there are fewer members compared to Washington, Brulte, a former Republican Senate leader who is now a partner with California Strategies, said.

As for politics being a team sport, Brulte added: “On every team, there is always somebody who doesn’t care (if) the team wins or loses. They’re only for themselves.”

As of late afternoon on Wednesday, Jan. 4, McCarthy had lost six votes over two days as hardline Republicans continue to block his speakership.

Robinson Rin Yang, 54, pleaded guilty in Los Angeles federal court to one count of willful failure to pay over employment taxes. Sentencing was set for Feb. 27, at which time Yang will face up to five years in federal prison, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

From March 2016 to March 2020, Yang operated B&S Staffing, a Covina-based staffing service business. From mid-2017 until the end of 2019, B&S accrued large unpaid employment tax liabilities, failed to make timely employment tax deposits, and repeatedly failed to timely file quarterly employment tax returns with the Internal Revenue Service.

B&S did not file — until February 2019 — employment tax returns for the periods ending June 30, 2017 through December 31, 2018, prosecutors said.

After the tax returns were filed, B&S again fell into non-compliance with its reporting obligations. B&S did not file — until September 2020 —employment tax returns for the quarterly tax periods ending March 31, 2019, through December 31, 2019.

Yang admitted he was aware of B&S’ tax situation but willfully failed to pay over to the IRS all the employment taxes due and owing, including income taxes and Social Security and Medicare taxes withheld from employee wages. Instead, Yang repeatedly used his control over B&S to direct payments from the corporate bank account, which he controlled, for his personal benefit.

For example, in July 2018, for the quarterly tax period ending on June 30, 2018, Yang willfully failed to account for and pay over about $221,108 in B&S payroll taxes.

In total, B&S accrued roughly $2,791,783 in unpaid employment taxes during this 2 1/2-year period. Yang has agreed to pay this amount in restitution to the IRS, court papers show.

Federal prosecutors said that despite the fact Yang earned hundreds of thousands of dollars from his operation of B&S during each of the calendar years 2017 through 2019, he failed to timely file federal income tax returns for those years.

The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office also charged 38-year-old James Edward Milliken Jr. of Diamond Bar in connection with the allegation that he used two weapons, a car and a knife, to commit the crime on Thursday, Dec. 1.

Milliken struck 63-year-old Rafael Barragan Jr. of Pomona with a car outside Building 9A, Sheriff’s detectives said. Barragan died there. Milliken remained at the scene and was detained.

Milliken was scheduled for a Monday arraignment at Pomona Superior Court, but it was continued until Tuesday, according to a court official.

The victim and the suspect worked as tram drivers for disabled students at the college located at 1100 N. Grand Ave. in Walnut. Milliken was a part-time driver from Oct. 13, 2016 to Sept. 23, 2021. College officials said he resigned.

In an Oct. 5, 2021 Facebook post, Milliken claimed his co-workers treated him unfairly, made racist comments, spread rumors about him and commented on his hair. He named Barragan and alleged Barragan threatened him on multiple occasions and convinced others to harass him.

However, detectives have not revealed a motive for the killing.

Mt. SAC president William Scroggins described Barragan as gracious, popular and respected.

Barragan came to work with a smile on his face every day and brought joy and positivity to everyone he interacted, she said.

“Ralph did so much more than transport ACCESS students – he was their friend, their mentor, their encourager. To colleagues, he was always around to be supportive, to smile, to wave, to stop to show you pictures of his family, to remember something about you, to take an interest in you and your life,” Yamagata-Noji said.

A campus memorial was set up for Barragan at the west end of the Student Services Center at Mt. SAC. It is the area of the campus where Barragan would park and board his passengers on the tram, she said.

The college will also host a memorial service to honor Barragan’s legacy at 3 p.m. Friday, Dec. 9, on the first floor of the Student Services Center.

–Staff writer Nathaniel Percy contributed to this report.

Editor’s note: The publication time of this article has been corrected.

The attorneys, Joe Weimortz and Steve Cooley, allege former Industry and Bell administrator Paul Philips was denied his right to due process because the judge barred witnesses from testifying about confidential discussions protected by attorney-client privilege or that occurred during the City Council’s closed session meetings.

The filing alleges the ruling prevented potentially exonerating evidence from being presented during Philips’ lengthy preliminary hearing, which ran sporadically from February until he was ordered to stand trial in October. Throughout the case, an attorney for the Industry raised objections whenever any topic began to veer into those forbidden areas. According to court records, privilege was invoked 39 times during the hearing to shut down testimony.

Following a hearing Wednesday, Nov. 16, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Ronald Coen scheduled a jury panel in January to review the matter, according to Cooley.

“This motion is asking the trial judge to either partially or entirely dismiss the criminal complaint,” Cooley said.

During the preliminary hearing, Industry’s refusal to waive closed-session privilege — something the City Council could do at any time with a majority vote — obstructed both the defense and the prosecution’s questioning.

Deputy District Attorney Ana Marie Lopez, in a written opposition to the defense motion, disagreed with the argument that Philips was denied his rights. Philips and his attorneys were allowed to present evidence during a closed hearing — that excluded the public, the prosecution and Industry’s attorneys — before Judge Michael Pastor, who presided over the preliminary hearing. Pastor, however, ruled the defense did not meet the burden necessary for him to allow Philips to pierce the confidentiality requirements protected by state law.

The defense also failed to take the necessary steps to challenge the excluded testimony during the preliminary hearing, Lopez wrote.

“Defendant did not ask to recall any witness or request an in-camera hearing to establish the materiality of any witnesses’ excluded testimony,” she wrote.

Philips, who led Industry from 2015 to 2018, is accused of assisting developer William Barkett and a consultant, former state Sen. Frank Hill, in an alleged scheme to pilfer funds from a proposed solar farm project. Philips is charged with misappropriation of public funds, embezzlement and money laundering. The last two charges were added after the preliminary hearing ended and are based on Philips’ alleged assistance with those crimes. No evidence was presented during the preliminary hearing to indicate he personally received any of the stolen funds.

The pitch to build a 450-megawatt solar farm on land Industry owned between Diamond Bar and Chino Hills was first secretly approved in closed session in May 2016 and was not voted on publicly until more than a year later.

Philips’ attorneys have alleged the former city manager merely followed the council’s orders.

By the time the project fell apart, Industry had paid out $20 million to San Gabriel Valley Water and Power, a company owned by Barkett and Hill, with very little oversight. Investigators later determined that invoices submitted to the city for reimbursement had been noticeably altered or outright forged, resulting in millions of dollars in overspending.

Barkett, the developer, is alleged to have spent more than $8 million of the funds on personal matters, including his daughter’s lavish wedding in the French Riviera.

Barkett, Hill and attorney Anthony Bouza, who served as the city’s negotiator even though Barkett owed him $1.5 million, have yet to begin their preliminary hearings. They previously pleaded not guilty to the various charges against them in March 2022.