BRIEFLY : AREA MAN PLEADS NOT GUILTY IN SLAYING.

VAN NUYS - A Camarillo man charged with fatally stabbing a Sherman Oaks woman in December, then fleeing across the border, pleaded not guilty Monday in Van Nuys to a murder charge.

Luis Phillip Ponce, 24, was arrested Sunday while trying to cross back into the United States from Tijuana, said Los Angeles police Detective Jim Rahm.

Ponce was wanted in connection with the killing of Eva Marie Trachsel-Gooch, 34, whose body was found in her apartment on Dec. 9, Rahm said.

Police officers checking a report of an open door found Gooch's body about 6 p.m. in the 4900 block of Van Nuys Boulevard.

The front door of the apartment had been forced open, police said.

- City News Service

State will receive half of GM award

Survivors of a fiery crash awarded $4.9 billion from General Motors will donate half of the punitive damages to the state of California for the care of future burn victims, an attorney said Monday.

The decision to make the donation was made by Patricia Anderson, her four children and a family friend, all of whom were burned when the Chevy Malibu they were in exploded in flames when struck from behind in South Central Los Angeles on Christmas Eve 1993, said plaintiff's attorney Brian Panish.

- City News Service

Woman gets jail time for bilking Robbins

An ex-bookkeeper who embezzled more than $200,000 in rent paid at an apartment building owned by former state Sen. Alan Robbins was sentenced Monday to 16 months in prison and ordered to repay the money.

Lanier Quoc Tang, 25, entered a no contest plea to a grand theft charge and was immediately sentenced by West Los Angeles Municipal Judge Frank J. Johnson.

Robbins is majority owner of a series of about 100 apartments in Westwood that are rented to professionals and UCLA graduate students.

- City News Service