The Very Biggest Stories in San Clemente This Year

When most media give you their top 10 stories of the year, it’s usually a judgment call. Some editor tells you what he thought were the biggest stories of the year, or maybe the most significant.

But when you work for an online-only publication, it’s easy to count the biggest stories of the year. YOU told us. With your clicks.

So here they are, the best read stories out of San Clemente Patch in reverse order. You may be surprised by some of them. I certainly was.

Penny

TOP 10 STORIES FROM SAN CLEMENTE PATCH

10) Student's Half-Nude Photo to Teacher Was Ticket to Little Classwork

The first of two stories related to convicted teacher-molester Richard Rack on our list.

After sending a half-nude photo to her teacher, schoolwork got a lot easier for one of Rack’s victims.

The former student, now 16 and entering her junior year, testified in court in August that she accidentally sent her math teacher a photo through Facebook, intending it for a boy her age. But after Rack indicated his approval – he liked what he saw – she sent two more, and suddenly, she didn’t have to work so hard in math class.

9) Nine People Injured in Capo Beach Crash on I-5

Nine people, including a father and his two children, were injured in October when a big-rig crashed through a freeway median and collided with multiple vehicles in Capistrano Beach.

The truck was headed north on the I-5 Freeway when the driver, a 47-year-old man from Whittier, lost control and the truck crashed through the median near Camino de Estrella and into the southbound lanes, where it came to a rest about 12:15 p.m., California Highway Patrol Officer Denise Quesada said.

8) Former Student Describes Sex Acts in the Classroom in Rack Trial

A high school graduate said she had sexual contact with a former math teacher both in and out of his Shorecliffs Middle School classroom when she was in eighth grade.

Somewhere along a series of tutoring sessions, the relationship became physical, the student said. It started with hand-holding, hugs and kisses. It escalated to her touching his penis and him touching her buttocks and breasts in the classroom.

7) Mom, Daughter Die in Accident Just South of Border Patrol Checkpoint

An Oceanside resident and her 4-year-old daughter with ties to San Clemente were killed this month in a crash on Interstate 5 near San Onofre State Beach.

The woman was heading north in the Camp Pendleton area shortly before 9:30 a.m. when her 2007 GMC Yukon plowed into the rear of a stationary big rig at the end of a line of trucks preparing to enter the San Onofre Commercial Vehicle Enforcement Facility, according to the California Highway Patrol.

6) San Onofre Closure to Cost $3 Billion, 1,100 Jobs

Trying to restart the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station just doesn’t pencil out anymore.

Southern California Edison announced in June it will permanently shut down the San Onofre nuclear power plant, leading to 1,100 lost jobs.

5) Former San Clemente Football Player Hit by Car, Killed

Nicholas 'Nick' Pasquale, a redshirt freshman football player at UCLA and described as the heart of San Clemente's 2011 team that reached the section title game, was struck and killed in September by a vehicle while walking down a street.
He was 20. 

4) Border Agents Nab Nearly $1M in Coke, Heroin, Meth

The U.S. Border Patrol stopped two suspected smugglers on the I-5 Freeway – one at the checkpoint south of San Clemente, the other near Oceanside – in January.

Agents stopped a 37-year-old Mexican man driving a Nissan Sentra at the I-5 Border Patrol checkpoint. Agents became suspicious of the man, pulled him over and brought out a drug dog, according to a release from the Border Patrol.

The animal indicated that drugs were in the trunk, and agents discovered 29 bundles of cocaine and one bundle of heroin inside of a speaker box.

3) Scientists to Study Cancer Risks for Those Living Near San Onofre Nuclear Plant

The communities surrounding the San Onofre nuclear power plant will be among seven near nuclear facilities scientists will scour for cancer risks, we learned in October.

2) Victims IDed in Car Crash that Claimed Four

Four people were killed and a fifth was injured earlier this month in a single-vehicle crash in San Clemente, where speed and alcohol played deadly factors, investigators said.

Deputies dispatched at 1:30 a.m. to South El Camino Real near the intersection of Avenida Valencia. There they found a BMW 3 series with extensive damage. Four of the victims, three men and a woman, were pronounced dead at the scene, he said.

1) Pit Bulls Maul Dog, Injure 3 People

Two pit bulls attacked and mauled a golden retriever along the San Clemente Beach Trail in May, injuring the retriever's owners and a passerby as they tried to pull the pit bulls off, according to a witness.

"This thing was horrific," said the retriever's owner Tim Frawley of Laguna Niguel. "My daughter was yelling 'they're killing him, they're killing him, they're killing him!' Flesh was ripping off the bones.”