PUBLIC SAFETY
18-year-old held in attempt to smother manAn 18-year-old former Newport Harbor High School student was arrested Feb. 18 after allegedly attempting to smother a 91-year-old man in his bed at a local convalescent hospital near his residence, police said.
Joshua Matthew Drougas of Costa Mesa was charged Wednesday with attempted murder with premeditation and deliberation, elder abuse, and residential burglary. If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of 15 years to life in prison. He did not enter a plea.
Late Feb. 18, Drougas walked into Mesa Verde Convalescent Hospital and went past a nurse's station into the room of sleeping 91-year-old Ted Mastos of Newport Beach, according to Costa Mesa police and the district attorney's office. Police said Drougas attempted to smother Mastos with a pillow, but the man woke up and called for help.
Mastos was unharmed, police said.
Results from a blood test on Drougas for drugs and alcohol will come out this week, Costa Mesa Det. Sgt. Bob Phillips said on Wednesday.
EDUCATION
Report: Rabbit Island is too expensive for OCCA team of field experts who visited Orange Coast College last week urged the school to sell Rabbit Island, a British Columbian property where OCC runs courses during the summer. The school's foundation has entertained selling the island, calling it a drain on annual resources, but a group of professors invited the team to campus for an outside opinion.
The experts, led by Colorado-based consultant Susan Allen Lohr, arrived on Wednesday and set to work interviewing different groups on campus. On Friday, the group presented its report in the Student Center Lounge. Lohr told the two dozen students, professors and administrators present that the island, which would cost $150,000 a year if fully staffed, was too expensive to maintain.
