Sausalito man arraigned for alleged murder
A heated argument, a crowbar and heavy rain set the scene for a murder in Sausalito last week. The body of David Richard Morgan, 57, was found slain at his home at 601 Nevada Street on Thursday, after officers responded to a medical call for help at around 12:30pm.
Conrad Justin Smith, a tenant of Morgan’s, is accused of killing his landlord with a crowbar, following an argument the day before. Smith, 51, who locked himself in the garage of the residence after Morgan’s body was discovered, engaged in a long standoff with police before surrendering at around 8pm. Smith—scheduled to be arraigned on Dec. 16—was arrested on suspicion of murder, and booked in Marin County Jail.
Morgan’s cause of death is pending, but head trauma was detected. Morgan was the proprietor of Golden Gate Bike Shuttle, “a quicker, easier, and more affordable way to get you and your bike to Sausalito and San Francisco,” according to the company’s website.
A police investigation is ongoing.—Molly Oleson
Bay Area film critics honor ‘Boyhood’ Richard Linklater’s 12-years-in-the-making Boyhood grew on the San Francisco Film Critics Circle (SFFCC) this year.
Meeting at the Variety Club Preview Room on Market Street in San Francisco, the group of 35 Bay Area film critics discussed the merits of the year’s films and performances. With writers from the Pacific Sun, San Francisco Chronicle and other Bay Area media in the discussion, a consensus was reached that Boyhood was the best picture of 2014, and Richard Linklater the best director. Patricia Arquette, as Boyhood’s enduring mother, earned best supporting actress honors, and Sandra Adair took the best editing prize for crafting the narrative’s years-long progression.
Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu’s screwball existentialist picture Birdman also took wing, in the categories of best actor (Michael Keaton, regarding himself in a funhouse mirror as a manically put-upon former superstar), best supporting actor (Edward Norton as Keaton’s foil, an egomaniacal thespian), and screenplay (Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu; Nicolas Giacobone; Alexander Dinelaris; and Armando Bo).
Best actress went to Julianne Moore for mining the mental, physical and psychic toll of early-onset Alzheimer’s in Still Alice, while Paul Thomas Anderson—as the first to bring novelist Thomas Pynchon to the screen—scored the best adapted screenplay honor for Inherent Vice. The group also gave laurels to best documentary, Citizenfour, best foreign language picture, Ida (Poland), and best animated picture, The Lego Movie.
The SFFCC also honored Ida’s Ryszard Lenczewski and Lukasz Zal for best cinematography, and The Grand Budapest Hotel’s Adam Stockhausen for best production design, while singling out Charlie McDowell’s indie head-trip The One I Love for a Special Citation. The group’s Marlon Riggs Award for courage and innovation in the Bay Area film community went to Joel Shepard, programmer of the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco.
www.sffcc.org.—Jason Walsh
