Louis Theroux: LA Stories

Louis enters the bizarre world of LA's dogs, meeting the characters whose lives revolve around the city's huge canine population. In the toughest neighbourhoods of South LA he has a terrifying encounter with a 'weaponised' dog, trained to attack on command. Louis meets the hard-pressed staff at the city's biggest animal shelter. But he also encounters the middle-class Americans who adopt some of these delinquent dogs and the colourful dog training gurus who claim to be able to take the ghetto out of the dog once the dog has been rescued from the streets.

Louis visits the city's most famous hospital - Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in West Hollywood - and talks to patients and their families as they face some of the toughest decisions imaginable; whether to accept death and die in relative comfort, or to gamble on further, possibly painful treatment in the hope that it will cure them or prolong their life. Over several months, Louis explores the very American way of death, which often involves never giving up and keeping faith right to the end. And in one of the stories he follows there is a dramatic and moving finale.

California is tough on its sex offenders even when they have served time for their offences. Under strict parole conditions they are tagged and served with severe restrictions on their lives. Placed on a register, anyone can find out their identity and learn about their past crimes. They cannot live near parks or schools and many are separated from their families. Louis enters the twilight world of hostels and homelessness and questions the purpose and effects of these laws. Is it really right to cut off any chance of redemption or is the public actually well served by these controls?