Newborn baby boy found atop a trash can in a Chicago alley
CHICAGO — A newborn baby boy is hospitalized in critical condition after being found atop a trash can on Chicago’s Northwest Side.
Fire Department Deputy Chief Curtis Hudson says a passer-by discovered the boy and brought the baby to a nearby fire station.
The baby was initially taken to Norwegian American Hospital. The baby’s condition was stabilized before he was transported to Lurie Children’s Hospital. A fire department spokesman says the baby was “crying and kicking.”
Chicago police say they have not determined who left the baby on top of the garbage can.
A mother in crisis who can’t care for a newborn may anonymously surrender a baby up to 30 days old at hospitals, emergency medical care facilities, police and fire stations.
The Baby Safe Haven Law was enacted in 2001.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/05/08/newborn-baby-boy-found-atop-a-trash-can-in-a-chicago-alley/
Photo Credit: Getty Images
Teen allegedly kills man wrongfully accused of sexually assaulting his sister
A teenage boy fatally attacked a man after the teen’s younger sister told her brother that she was sexually assaulted by the man on a public bus in Utah — an incident that investigators say never happened, according to reports.
Police say the 16-year-old girl told her 17-year-old brother that she was sexually assaulted aboard a Cache Valley Transit District bus around 3 p.m. April 23, the Salt Lake Tribune reported.
The brother immediately sprang into action and tracked down 62-year-old Michael Fife — the man his sister accused — as the man was exiting the bus in the city of Logan, according to the news outlet.
The teen then attacked Fife, who suffered head injuries and was beaten unconscious.
Fife fell to the ground and was left lying on the sidewalk as the teenage boy fled, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
Later that night, the boy’s sister reported the sexual assault to police, who discovered that surveillance footage from the bus showed that the assault never happened.
“Logan Police detectives reviewed the video footage of the alleged assault,” authorities said, according to the news outlet. “The video showed Mr. Fife walking past the girl, but no sexual assault occurred.”
Fife died from his injuries four days after the attack.
The identities of the teen brother and his sister were not released because of their ages.
The Cache County Attorney’s Office is also investigating the case.
Photo Credit: Getty Images
Florida man arrested after refusing to remove ‘I eat a–’ bumper sticker
The Florida man who gained instant internet fame for choosing jail instead of removing the “I eat a–” decal on his car said Wednesday that only “sour apples” don’t like his raunchy sticker — which he will continue to display with pride.
Dillon Shane Webb said he was fighting for his First Amendment rights Sunday afternoon in Lake City when he refused police orders to remove the sexually suggestive bumper sticker from his Chevrolet truck.
“It was the fact that I was standing up for what everybody back in the day fought for — that freedom,” Webb told The Post.
The 23-year-old insisted he doesn’t engage in the particular act purported on the decal, but said he is willing to face jail time to protect those who choose to say they do.
“I’ve got to fight for free speech,” Webb continued. “It needs to be kept alive for a reason.”
Webb said he purchased the decal with pals, who all put them on their cars. He had been driving around with it for a week before he was pulled over.
“It was part of me and my friends’ group,” Webb said. “We just point and laugh and take pictures and so does everyone else, besides a couple sour apples.”
Not among the fans was the deputy who confronted him on US Highway 90 about the signage on the brown truck’s rear window.
The officer warned the Webb the sticker violated a state obscenity law. Webb responded by claiming the content of the decal was “just words,” police said.
When asked how a mom or dad would explain the sticker to a young child, Webb reportedly replied that it would be “up to the parent.”
Webb was asked whether he would remove one letter of the sticker, but he refused, citing his First Amendment right, according to authorities.
Webb now faces charges for obscene writing on vehicles and resisting an officer without violence. He was booked at Columbia County Detention Facility and released about an hour later when his mom posted his $2,500 bond, he said.
“She supports her son like any other mother would,” Webb said.
The self-described First Amendment crusader said he plans to drive to his next court appearance May 21 with the decal intact.
“I’d be a fool not to,” Webb said.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/05/08/florida-man-jailed-for-i-eat-a-bumper-sticker-refuses-to-back-down/
Photo Credit: nypost.com/Columbia County Sheriff’s Office; Courtesy of Dillon Webb
9-year-old boy charged with murdering his mom in Michigan
A 9-year-old boy is accused of fatally shooting his mother at their Michigan home on Monday, according to court documents.
The young suspect was charged with murder on Tuesday for allegedly using a rifle to kill his mom, Pauline Randol, at their Fawn River Township home, according to court records obtained by WWMT-TV.
The child is undergoing a psychiatric evaluation at a state-run juvenile facility, according to St. Joseph County Sheriff Bradley Balk.
It’s unclear if the suspect was charged as an adult.
Neighbors told WWMT-TV that the boy is a second-grader at a nearby elementary school.
via: http:// https://nypost.com/2019/05/08/9-year-old-boy-charged-with-murdering-his-mom-in-michigan/
Photo Credit: nypost.com/facebook
Father accused of killing 1-month-old baby over video game
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – A Kentucky father is charged with murdering his 1-month-old son after he allegedly punched the boy out of frustration over a video game.
Anthony Trice, 26, who faces charges of murder and criminal abuse, appeared in court Monday.
Police say the Louisville father was home alone with his son, De’Anthony Trice, playing video games on Friday night when he became enraged after losing, according to WAVE.
Trice allegedly punched De’Anthony, then took him into the kitchen to make a bottle and dropped him. Police say Trice later noticed the boy was in distress and called 911.
“He was like, ‘Get to the hospital. The baby was throwing up milk,’” De’Anthony’s maternal grandmother, Tanjia Howlett told WLKY. “So, I told my daughter, ‘Why would he take the baby to the hospital for choking on baby milk?’”
The 1-month-old was rushed to Norton Children’s Hospital. Doctors were unable to save De’Anthony, who died Sunday night.
“I wouldn’t have ever thought this would happen to our family,” Howlett said. A GoFundMe page has been set up to raise money to pay for De’Anthony’s funeral.
Trice is being held on a $1,000,000 cash bond.
via: https://pix11.com/2019/05/07/father-accused-of-killing-1-month-old-baby-over-video-game/
Photo Credit: pix11.com
Man who used corpse to fake his own death pleads guilty
In 2011, a decomposing body was found on the side of a dirt road in Moldova; the man was carrying Igor Vorotinov’s passport and other identifying documents, and soon his ex-wife, Irina, traveled from Maple Grove, Minn., to Moldova to identify the body as that of her ex.
A funeral was held for the Minnesota man back in the US, Irina cashed in on a $2 million life insurance policy, and the following year, one of the couple’s two grown sons was visiting a family friend in Moldova when he ran into his father—very much alive, but using a fake name.
He didn’t tell authorities, but in 2013, another tipster did, and US Customs and Border Protection detained the son and his fiancee after one of their trips to Moldova. After years of investigation and searching for Vorotinov, he was arrested in Moldova last year and extradited to the US. On Friday, the 54-year-old pleaded guilty in federal court, the Washington Post reports.
Prosecutors want a 41-month prison sentence when Vorotinov is sentenced in July. Irina, 52, was sentenced to 37 months in prison after pleading guilty in 2016; authorities say she was in on the scheme all along and staged a “sham funeral,” intending to split the life insurance money with her ex. And the 29-year-old son pleaded guilty in 2015 to not reporting the scheme once he uncovered it; he was sentenced to three years of probation.
“We now know that there really was a body found in a field in Moldova. The government executed a search warrant on the urn at Lakewood Cemetery, and it really contained human remains,” federal prosecutors wrote in court documents, alleging that Moldovan officials, police, morgue employees, and the medical examiner were all in on the scheme. (Irina had the body cremated in Moldova, the St. Paul Pioneer-Press reports.)
But prosecutors have not revealed how the Vorotinovs procured a dead body on which to plant Igor’s ID.
via: https://pix11.com/2019/05/07/man-who-used-corpse-to-fake-his-own-death-pleads-guilty/
Photo Credit: pix11.com
Naked man accused of assaulting baby in stroller in NJ
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Atlantic City police say a naked man was under the influence of narcotics when he assaulted a baby in a stroller.
Police say they found Stephon Whitfield naked, yelling and bleeding while beating on the front door of an apartment building on Caspian Avenue Monday evening. Police say he had approached a woman pushing her 9-month-old child in a stroller and attacked the child.
The baby was treated at a hospital for what police say were non-life threatening injuries.
Whitfield was taken to the hospital for evaluation. The 28-year-old is charged with aggravated assault, endangering the welfare of a child and disorderly conduct.
via: https://pix11.com/2019/05/08/naked-man-accused-of-assaulting-baby-in-stroller-in-nj/
Photo Credit: pix11.com
Students who owe lunch money in Rhode Island district will get jelly sandwiches until debt is paid
Students at a Rhode Island school district who owe money on their lunch accounts will have the sole option of a sunflower butter and jelly sandwich until they are able to pay their balances, the district announced Sunday.
Warwick Public Schools, which has more than 9,000 pre-kindergarten through 12th grade students, said the district-wide policy will go into effect on May 13.
“If money is owed on a paid, free, or reduced lunch account a sun butter and jelly sandwich will be given as the lunch choice until the balance owed is paid in full or a payment plan is set up,” said a post from the district on Facebook.
Warwick School Committee chairwoman Karen Bachus told NBC News that the sandwiches are served with the vegetable of the day, a fruit and milk.
Public schools in Rhode Island are mandated by state law to provide lunches to students.
Nearly 70 percent of school lunches in Rhode Island are served for free or at a reduced price based on family income, according to the state. But some parents who commented on the announcement from Warwick Public Schools said even though they qualify for free lunches, their children still owed money because they had added something to their trays that wasn’t included with the free lunch, like extra milk.
Other parents noted that the policy of giving out jelly sandwiches to students who owed money would likely leave those children embarrassed and prone to bullying. “This is absolutely awful. Our schools shouldn’t be in the business of shaming children,” one person wrote beneath the Facebook announcement.
“Just give the kids lunch. … we cant spring for a chicken patty for a hungry kid? What if this is their only meal of the day?” another commenter to the post asked.
The sunflower butter and jelly sandwich is an option on the regular lunch menu that many students opt for anyway, Bachus said.
“Before we used to give a cheese sandwich which did single them out, but now we’ve gone with an on-the-menu meal,” she said. “So what’s wrong with that?”
Bachus said that the district implemented the new policy because it is owed more than $78,000 on account of outstanding lunch payments. She said more than 1,600 students in the district of 8,700 owe money.
“We have sent out letters and certified letters to every family,” Bachus said. “All they have to do is contact us to try to work it out.”
The issue is not specific to Warwick. More that 75 percent of schools reported that they were owed money for lunches at the end of the 2016/2017 school year, according to the non-profit School Nutrition Association. And 40 percent of schools reported that the amount of students without adequate funds to pay for lunch had increased during the same school year.
The association said that schools found they were able to help parents and students by allowing them to pay outstanding funds online, reminding them about low balances and taking advantage of charitable donations.
Warwick Public Schools, meanwhile, refused a $4,000 donation offered to them from a local restaurant owner, Angelica Penta. “I have met with Warwick twice and the second time I left in tears after they refused to take a $4,000 check,” she wrote on Facebook.
Penta raised the money by setting up a donation jar at her restaurant, Gel’s Kitchen.
The district said in a statement that it didn’t take the donation because they didn’t want to be responsible for allotting which students the money benefited. “Each time these offers were made, Warwick Public Schools stated that the school department was not in the position to single out or identify specific students that should be selected for a reduction in their lunch debt while excluding others,” the statement said, according to NBC affiliate WJAR.
A statement released by the district Wednesday said they are working with attorneys to “ensure that we accept donations in compliance with the law and that the donations are applied in an equitable manner.”
Photo Credit: Getty Images
Kentucky teen who sued over school ban for refusing chickenpox vaccination now has chickenpox
A northern Kentucky teenager banned from school for refusing the chickenpox vaccination due to his religious beliefs has come down with the childhood malady, his attorney said Wednesday.
Jerome Kunkel, a student at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Assumption Academy, first started showing chickenpox symptoms last week and hopes to have recovered by next week, a lawyer for the 18-year-old told NBC News.
Kunkel and his family have no regrets about their decision to not be vaccinated.
“These are deeply held religious beliefs, they’re sincerely held beliefs,” family attorney Christopher Wiest said. “From their perspective, they always recognized they were running the risk of getting it, and they were OK with it.”
Some ultraconservative Catholics oppose chickenpox vaccinations because it was developed in the 1960s from cell lines of two aborted fetuses.
A chickenpox outbreak at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Assumption Academy in March prompted state health officials to order unvaccinated students to stay away from school. Kunkel unsuccessfully challenged the state ban in court.
Now that Kunkel has had the chickenpox, and is thus immune to it, he hopes to be back in class soon for the first time since March 15.
Had state health officials not intervened, Wiest said, his client would have had the chickenpox earlier this year.
“The ban was stupid,” Wiest said. “He could have contracted this in March and been back to school by now.”
Once the banned student can show that all of his chickenpox lesions have scabbed over, he’ll be allowed to return to school, according to Doug Hogan, spokesman for Kentucky’s Cabinet for Health and Family Services.
State health officials also lashed out at Wiest, accusing him of “downplaying the dangers of the chickenpox.”
“Encouraging the spread of an acute infection disease in a community demonstrates a callous disregard for the health and safety of friends, family, neighbors and unsuspecting members of the general public,” according to a statement by Laura Brinson, a spokeswoman for the Northern Kentucky Health Department.
Earlier this year, opponents of mandatory vaccinations seemed to pick up support from Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin, who admitted he’s exposed all nine of his children to chickenpox.
“We found a neighbor that had it, and I went and made sure every one of them got it. They were miserable for a few days and they all turned out fine,” Bevin told WKCT, a radio station in Bowling Green, Kentucky, in March.
Despite his unorthodox actions, Bevin urged parents to get their kids vaccinated.
Photo From Video Still from: www.nbcnews.com
Illinois troopers patrol undercover dressed as construction workers
EAST MOLINE, Illinois — Illinois troopers plan to start dressing up like construction workers as they patrol work zones.
“Somebody is going to get hurt,” disguised Illinois State Trooper Ron Salier said. “That’s why we’re out here. We are trying to make a difference and educate people.”
WQAD-TV reports that undercover patrols were underway Monday, May 6 to raise awareness for Work-Zone Safety Week.
Police said they planned to conduct more patrols in the future, but didn’t have plans in place.
“It’s not about writing tickets,” Illinois State Trooper Jason Wilson said. “It’s not about pulling people over, it’s about keeping people safe.”
Wilson says so far in 2019, 19 trooper cars have been hit. 17 of those cars were pulled over on the side of the road.
“Reminding drivers the human element that they are actually driving through,” Wilson said. “This is a work zone. Imagine if you were at your office and somebody drove through at 80 miles an hour.”
According to the Illinois State Police, troopers will be watching for speeders, distracted drivers and other violators in construction zones. The campaign is called “Operation Hard Hat.”
“Our hope is the plain-clothes Trooper doesn’t observe any violations. That would mean drivers were operating their vehicles safely,” said District 7 Commander Captain Jason Dickey. “Sadly, that will probably not be the case.”
Up until now, patrols in work zones have been in marked vehicles.
“They are still in great danger while they are out here doing their jobs,” Wilson said. “They deserve the exact same safety everyone else does.”
According to Blatti Law, out of Joliet, Illinois, a first-offense speeding ticket in a construction zone is penalized by a $375 fine. A second offense could bring a $1,000 fine and a 90-day driver’s license suspension.
This detail consisted of 1 observation Trooper and 3 enforcement Troopers patrolling in the zone for 2 hours. Within that time, 10 traffic stops produced 10 speeding contacts,1 seatbelt violation, and 2 other equipment warnings.
via: https://fox2now.com/2019/05/07/illinois-troopers-patrol-undercover-dressed-as-construction-workers/
Photo Credit: Getty Images