Santa Clara County DA's student art contest takes aim at animal cruelty

Leland High School junior Angelica Liljenstam wanted her passion for animals to come through in the poster she created for an art contest about animal cruelty sponsored by the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office.

Her poster has a neglected dog front and center, but if you look around the main image, you’ll see a lot more going on. There are caged rabbits, parrots, chickens and even reptiles.

“I wanted to bring attention to all the neglect that a lot of the species we commonly overlook also experience,” Liljenstam said. “As a reptile owner myself, I’ve seen a lot of neglect, especially in the exotic animal industry and I wanted to bring attention to all of that with my poster.”

Her poster won first place in the “Justice for All” contest, an annual competition held by the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office that often tackles difficult topics like cybercrime and the dangers of fentanyl. This year’s theme must have really struck a chord with Santa Clara County young people, as the contest received more than 130 submissions from high school students all over the county.

Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen said being with our pets — whether its a dog, cat, horse or even a goldfish — makes us happy.

“It’s almost impossible to imagine that anyone would want to hurt an animal, and yet we know that animal cruelty comes in many forms,” Rosen said. “I think there’s something in the hearts of human beings that finds it very cruel and wrong to mistreat an animal.”

Friday afternoon, Liljenstam received a $1,500 check from the district attorney’s office. Also honored were Allison Li, a sophomore at Oakwood School in Morgan Hill who received $1,000, and Kimani Rivera, a junior at KIPP San Jose Collegiate who received $500. The top three posters will be displayed in different areas of the District Attorney’s office, and Liljenstam’s has been reproduced and will be distributed at public events around the county.

Rosen said the award money comes from funds seized through asset forfeiture, which he likened to putting bad money to a good use. And all three students said they’d be saving the money to put toward college, though Liljenstam said she was going to spend a little on one of her pets.

“I’ll use some of it to buy rats for my snake,” she said.

TRIBUTE TO INNOVATION: It makes sense that if you’re talking about innovation — especially in California — Silicon Valley is the place to be. That’s why the American Innovation $1 coin for California, which was released by the U.S. Mint on Tuesday, features none other than a Silicon Valley icon: late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

The image on the coin’s reverse, designed by artist Elana Hagler, captures a young Jobs relaxedly sitting in a cross-legged position amid an oak-covered California landscape. This was the design preferred by Jobs’ family and Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office, although a Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee recommended another design last year featuring an older Jobs wearing his glasses and iconic black turtleneck.

"The innovative and entrepreneurial spirit of Steve Jobs embodied the best of California, creating the future we all know today,” Newsom said in a statement. “His tenacity and fearless pursuit of the California Dream made so many American dreams possible. May we all attempt to fill his shoes as we seek our own California Dreams."

The commemorative coin will not be put into circulation but is available in rolls of 25 or bags of 100 on the U.S. Mint website, usmint.gov.

COMMUNITY MEMORIALS: A memorial service will be held May 30 for the Rev. Peter Pabst, who died May 2 at age 71. Pabst, who had various health challenges over the past several years, retired a few months ago as chancellor of Cristo Rey San Jose Jesuit High School, which he helped found in 2014 following more than a decade as the founding president of Sacred Heart Nativity Schools. The funeral mass will take place at 1 p.m. at Five Wounds Portuguese National Church, which is next to the Cristo Rey campus.

And a public memorial for former Santa Clara County Supervisor Rod Diridon has been set for 2 p.m. on June 25 at the San Jose Civic Auditorium. Diridon, known as the father of Silicon Valley’s modern transit system, died April 3 at age 87, and the memorial is expected to draw statewide and national political figures who worked with him over his long career.

ME AND GUY: A few sharp-eyed readers noticed me on the May 8 episode “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives” that featured Willow Glen eatery El Halal Amigos.

Here’s the backstory behind my 15 seconds of Food Network fame: El Halal Amigos owner and chef Hisham Abdelfattah included PR-guy-to-the-stars Michael Jacobi among his guests to be diners during the taping of the show the Friday before the Super Bowl in February. Jacobi asked me along, figuring it would be fun for me to see behind the curtain on one of these shows.

It’s a very hush-hush deal — there are waivers and non-disclosure agreements signed — but we’d already heard by that afternoon the crew had visited other San Jose spots including Fox Tale Fermentation Project and Angkor Chef in downtown San Jose. It’s hard to miss host Guy Fieri’s cherry red convertible Camaro parked in front of a restaurant.

I expected to be anonymously in the background, but a producer decided I’d be among the diners Fieri talked to. It wasn’t as casual as it looked: I spent nearly two hours sitting outside the Lincoln Avenue restaurant with the other “diners” while they set up inside, and got about three bites of a delicious chile relleno burrito before I was rotated out so the Mayor of Flavortown could talk to someone else. Oh well, that’s showbiz.

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This story was originally published May 16, 2026 at 1:10 PM.