Father throws one-year-old daughter off a cliff after stabbing pregnant mother in stomach, police say
A California man allegedly killed his one-year-old daughter by throwing her off a cliff after stabbing his pregnant wife in the stomach.
Police said that the registered sex offender, 49-year-old Adam Slater, also stabbed a bystander who tried to help the girl after her father drove the two off a highway and flipped their car in Coachella Valley.
The series of alleged attacks began about 8:30 am on Wednesday when police and family say Mr Slater beat and stabbed his wife, Ashley Grome, in the parking lot of the Southwest Community Church in Indian Wells before fleeing with their daughter, Madalyn Payton Slater.
“My daughter was the absolute love of my life and she meant everything and more to me,” Ms Grome, 23, wrote in a GoFundMe page for her daughter’s funeral costs.
“Everything I did and everything I will do for the rest of my life is for her. She was beautiful and her smile was contagious, even after a bad day, she always cheered me up. She was taken from this world way too soon.”
According to police and family, Mr Slater drove off of Highway 74 south of Vista Point around 9 am. When a man stopped help and pulled Madalyn from the overturned vehicle a short distance from the road, Mr Grome allegedly stabbed him too before grabbing his daughter and taking her to the cliff’s edge.
“The driver then ran to the passenger side of the vehicle, where he stabbed a male who had assisted getting a young girl from the vehicle,” Riverside County Sheriffs’ Department said in a statement.
“Multiple witnesses saw the suspect take the child and throw her over a cliff into a ravine. The suspect then fled on foot into the canyon,”
After a short foot pursuit, deputies arrested the Palm Desert man before recovering the body of his daughter.
The victim’s uncle, Chris Grome, told News Channel 3 that Mr Slater tried to stab his wife, who is six-months pregnant, several times in the stomach and throat.
“She fought him off and tried to protect herself,” Mr Grome said.
“She’s got some pretty bad cuts and wounds, you know, stabs. To be that violent where you’re going to plot and plan and try to kill somebody like that and purposely do that — and then to do what he did to an infant, a one-year-old infant, no,” he said. “I don’t really have much to say to him.”
Mr Slater, who family confirmed to News Channel 3 was a registered sex offender dating back to a 1995 conviction, was charged with murder.
via: https://currently.att.yahoo.com/att/xandr/father-throws-one-old-daughter-144853505.html
Photo Credit: gofundme
A bus driver told a rider to wear a mask. Then the passenger spit on her.
(CNN) — Miami-Dade County bus driver Miakeya Rolle says she hasn’t had a good night’s rest since a passenger intentionally spit on her.
On the afternoon of April 19, a homeless woman boarded Rolle’s bus and began coughing on passengers, according to a police report. Rolle told her she needed to wear a mask. The woman spat on Rolle and fled the bus.
Miami, like many transit systems, requires passengers to wear masks during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Rolle cleaned herself off with Clorox wipes and hand sanitizer as she waited for police to respond. She was later tested at a hospital. When she returned home, she undressed outside and threw her uniform in the garbage.
Rolle has yet to return to driving a bus.
“That’s how I feed my family. But as of right now, I can’t do it,” said Rolle, who has tested negative for Covid-19. “I’ve never had anything like that happen to me. I’m about to lose my mind.”
Another Miami-Dade County transit bus driver, Denys Santos, was charged with aggravated assault on April 29 after chasing and swinging a metal pipe at a rider who removed his mask to talk on a cell phone, according to a Monroe County Sheriffs Office police report.
Bus drivers nationwide are facing new challenges as they try to protect passengers and themselves from a virus that’s killed at least 135 transit workers nationwide, according to reports from the largest transit unions, the Amalgamated Transit Union and the Transport Workers Union.
Leaders of transit unions say protections for bus drivers are lacking. They want high-quality masks available more widely, and drivers to get help with new duties, such as enforcing mask requirements and making sure buses aren’t crowded. Some transit systems have put a cap on the number of passengers to promote social distancing. In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for instance, buses are restricted to 10 passengers.
King County Metro, which operates in Seattle, Washington, is generally limiting capacity to 12 riders on 40-foot buses, and 18 riders on 60-foot buses. Roanoke, Virginia allows no more than nine passengers on buses. Pittsburgh caps its 35-foot buses at 10 people, and 40-foot buses at 15 riders.
John A. Costa, International President of the Amalgamated Transit Union, said that fewer than half of his local unions in the US and Canada have proper protective equipment.
Bus drivers face more risk than colleagues who operate trains or maintenance workers, because they’re in close contact with passengers. Many have no physical barrier between themselves and passengers. Some jurisdictions have tried temporary measures, such as hanging shower curtains, according to Costa. Bus drivers still must touch wheelchairs to help those riders board, exit, and secure their wheelchairs on board.
“I wake up every morning and if I don’t have a report of a fatality it’s like a good morning,” John Samuelsen, international president of the Transport Workers Union, told CNN Business. “That’s how crazy this is.”
Governments and the private companies that operate some buses and trains know they must protect drivers and riders so that ridership eventually returns to levels before the pandemic.
Thierry Mallet, CEO of Transdev, which operates transit systems in 18 countries and has 82,000 employees, said many riders will shift to personal cars.
“We have a key challenge,” he said. “We need to reclaim the trust and confidence of our passengers.”
Transdev is considering offering hand sanitizer on all of its buses and trains, he said.
Transit operators run into practical and cultural hurdles as they take steps to protect workers and passengers. Buses used in US transit systems generally aren’t designed to distance drivers from passengers. And some passengers refuse to wear masks.
European countries like France, Germany and the Czech Republic are requiring masks nationwide as they prepare for a return to regular service and ridership.
Unions representing US transit workers, including the Amalgamated Transit Union, Transport Workers Union of America and AFL-CIO, have called on the Federal Transit Administration to require that passengers wear masks nationwide. The administration has recommended transit agencies make policies regarding facial coverings to reduce the risk of Covid-19, but stopped short of a mandate. Federal law says that the secretary of the Department of Transportation may “issue directives with respect to the safety of the public transportation system.”
The Federal Transit Administration declined to comment for this story.
Some cities and states, including Massachusetts, Illinois and Denver, have started requiring masks this month. Others, such as New York City, already had requirements.
Requiring masks isn’t a panacea, and the requirements can be hard for drivers to enforce. Even worse, they may trigger a backlash or dangerous incidents.
Donna Schinkle, transit director of Chillicothe, Ohio, which introduced a mask requirement this week, said she’s already heard criticism of her requirement.
Unlike most transit operators, Schinkle isn’t overly concerned about people shying away from transit because of Covid-19 fears.
“For the majority of folks in Southern Ohio, they just seem to think it really isn’t a thing,” she said. “We have more of a struggle of trying to make them abide by the rules.”
Photo Credit: kmov.com
Meghan Markle and Prince Harry move into $18M mansion owned by Tyler Perry
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are living in a sprawling, ultra-luxe $18 million Beverly Hills mansion owned by Hollywood mogul Tyler Perry.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex and their one-year-old son Archie have set up home in Perry’s hilltop eight-bedroom, 12-bathroom Tuscan-style villa in the swanky gated Beverly Ridge Estates, Page Six has confirmed.
Perry is currently out of town in Atlanta setting up to re-start production in his studio, a source exclusively tells us.
The couple is believed to have been introduced the “Madea” star by their close friend Oprah Winfrey, who has taken them under her wing after working with Harry on a docu-series about mental health.
Page Six revealed that Winfrey has been a guiding force to the Sussexes as they made their controversial decision to leave the royal family. The media queen is also very close to Meghan’s mother Doria Ragland.
Meghan and Harry moved to LA after fleeing their bolthole in Canada in late March as it closed its borders over the coronavirus. They’ve been spotted only a handful of times since their move to LA, delivering food to the vulnerable and walking their dogs.
Perry’s 12-bathroom Tuscan-style villa sits on 22 acres on the top of a hill, offering sweeping views of the city. It is not confirmed if the Sussexes are renting the house from Perry, but sources said they are likely staying as guests while he is out of town.
We revealed this week that they are on the hunt to buy their own property in the region of $10-20 million — as broker to the stars Josh Altman said they could “low ball” their way into an amazing home.
The “Million Dollar Listing” guru told us: “You’ll get a great deal over the next six months. If you’re looking to spend $10 to $20 million, there are five or six gated communities that are perfect.” Altman cited Beverly Ridge as a great gated development.
Reps for Harry, Meghan and Perry declined to comment.
Photo Credit: pagesix.com
Princess Love files for divorce from Ray J
“Love and Hip Hop: Hollywood” star Princess Love is bowing out of her almost four-year marriage to Ray J, according to TMZ.
Love, 35, filed papers Tuesday in LA County Superior Court. She and Ray J, 39, had already been living separately after their epic Las Vegas meltdown last year, in which Love accused J of stranding her and their 1-year-old daughter Melody Love in Sin City following the BET Awards.
The divorce will come as no surprise to anyone familiar with the debacle, after which Love said she had no desire to be married any longer and Ray J was snapped out and about without his wedding band.
In January, the couple welcomed a baby boy, Epic Ray Norwood, and earlier this month, Page Six exclusively reported that Love was keeping Ray J in quarantine — and monitoring his activities via Instagram — in a hotel 10 minutes from his LA home before allowing him to see the children.
Photo Credit: nypost.com
7-year-old boy with sickle cell disease beats coronavirus that led to pneumonia on both lungs
(Meredith) – A Maryland boy with sickle cell disease is winning his fight against COVID-19 after suffering serious complications.
Deshannon Striggs took her 7-year-old son, Nasir, to Baltimore’s Sinai Hospital last month after he started having trouble breathing. He tested positive for COVID-19, and an X-ray revealed he had pneumonia on both of his lungs.
While battling the virus, the young boy also needed three blood transfusions due to his underlying medical condition. Sickle cell patients often have a low number of red blood cells. The disease also interferes with the delivery of oxygen to the tissues and can lead to anemia.
“To watch him go through that, it was really scary,” Striggs told WBAL-TV.
The mom said Nasir finally bounced back, thanks to a lot of prayer and the dedicated medical staff who took care of her son.
“Keep the faith, just keep the faith. That’s the message: Keep the faith,” she said.
Doctors are still monitoring Nasir via telehealth appointments as he recovers at home. They said he’s doing great.
Photo Credit: kmvt.com
Nearly 20,000 teens in Georgia have received their driver licenses without a road test
The sweaty palms on the steering wheel. The repeated exclamations of “Sorry!” The nervous glances from the examiner.
They’re all part of the dreaded road test, which, for decades, has been a rite of passage for every American teenager to obtain their driver license.
Well, until now.
“I had been nervous about the driving test — with the parallel parking and all that,” said 17-year-old Willa Pevey from Tucker, Georgia.
“So I was happy that I didn’t have to do it.”
Neither did thousands and thousands of other teens in Georgia. All of them got their licenses without taking an official road test. It’s Georgia’s way of handling the backlog of the thousands of road test requests that have been put on hold due to the coronavirus pandemic.
On Wednesday, the state’s Department of Driver Services released just how many teens had their permits upgraded since the road test waiver was announced last month: 19,483 teens.
Wisconsin will also start waiving road tests
Georgia isn’t the only state that is waiving road tests. Wisconsin announced this week that it will start doing the same for 16- and 17-year-olds, starting Monday.
The Wisconsin Department of Transportation estimates that out of the 16,000 road test requests that have been on hold, its new program will allow 10,000 of those requests to be eligible for the waiver.
Tom Rathkamp from Cedarburg, Wisconsin, is father to 17-year-old Stephanie and they plan on applying for her license with a road test waiver, but not without a bit more practice first.
“Both my wife and I have said that we were going to take her out practicing more to see that she’s ready,” Rathkamp said. “We’re going to give her our own little driving test if you will because we are the ones signing off on giving her a license, we want to make sure… I think that with responsible parents, this can go without a hitch.”
Some argue it’s dangerous
Of course, Georgia and Wisconsin both have requirements teen drivers must meet first.
In Georgia, they must have held their learners permit for 1 year and 1 day with no violations and completed at least 40 hours of supervised driving.
In Wisconsin, teens must have held their learners permit for at least six months with no violations and completed at least 30 hours of driving with their parents.
But some parents are still wary of waivers.
Laurie Walters’ son was also able to get his license online — but because he is over the age of 18, he didn’t need his parent’s permission.
“It’s dangerous for there to be no person to have the checks and balances to make sure that this person knows the skinny pedal on the right is gas and the left pedal is brake,” Walters, who lives in Cumming, Georgia, told CNN.
Sarah Casto, a driving instructor at 1st Stop Georgia Driving Academy, has started an online petition to get Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp to reverse his decision on waiving road tests.
“Everyone’s response is always that parents should be responsible for their kids, but we can’t assume that everyone has responsible parents. That is a dangerous idea,” Casto told CNN.
Teens like Pevey, however, are psyched.
It doesn’t matter she can’t take part in that other teenage rite of passage: taking off in their parents’ Camry, license in hand, tasting freedom.
At least, not just yet — with a pandemic raging.
“It’s still really cool to have it,” she said.
CNN’s Jamiel Lynch, Madeline Holcombe and Carma Hassan contributed to this report.
Photo Credit: kmov.com
Inmate escapes by posing as fellow detainee, wearing a face mask
An inmate at a Chicago jail escaped over the weekend by putting on a face mask and posing as a fellow detainee who was about to be released, officials said.
Jahquez Scott — who had been locked up on a weapons charge while on parole for battery of an officer — allegedly promised Quintin Henderson $1,000 to swap places with him, Cook County sheriff’s spokeswoman Sophia Ansari said Tuesday.
To complete his disguise, Scott, 21, put on a face mask and traded hooded sweatshirts with Henderson, who was set for release without bail in a drug case, officials said.
When guards called Henderson’s name Saturday for discharge, Scott stepped forward in the get-up and signed the release papers — making his escape from the Cook County Jail.
Later, Henderson, 28, feigned ignorance, asking correctional staff if his name had been called and claiming to have been sleeping, prosecutors said during a bail hearing.
Henderson is now being held in lieu of $25,000 bond on charges of aiding and abetting the escape of a felon.
Scott was still at large Wednesday.
The sheriff’s office is conducting an internal investigation into the incident, Ansari said.
The Cook County Sheriff’s office was ordered by a federal judge to provide face masks for all inmates who are quarantined amid the coronavirus pandemic, according to CBS Chicago.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/05/06/inmate-escapes-by-posing-as-fellow-detainee-and-wearing-a-face-mask/
Photo Credit: Cook County Sheriff’s Office
Dallas salon owner who reopened despite coronavirus restrictions gets 7 days in jail
A Texas salon owner was given seven days in jail on Tuesday after she refused to apologize for defying coronavirus related restrictions by remaining open for business.
Dallas business owner Shelley Luther was given a choice: She could offer an apology for selfishness, pay a fine and shutdown until Friday, or serve jail time.
“I have to disagree with you, sir, when you say that I’m selfish because feeding my kids is not selfish,” she told the judge. “I have hairstylists that are going hungry because they would rather feed their kids. So sir, if you think the law is more important than kids getting fed, then please go ahead with your decision. But I am not going to shut the salon.”
After her refusal to show contrition, bailiffs led her away to be booked. Her sentence reportedly symbolizes the seven-days she stayed open, despite county regulations.
Luther had been cited by city officials but chose to ignore the warnings. She must also now pay a $7,000 fine.
Gov. Greg Abbott held a press conference Tuesday about the reopening of barbershops and salons, which is set to take place on Friday.
Texas hair salons, barbershops, nail and tanning salons can reopen Friday. Gyms will be allowed to reopen at 25 percent capacity on May 18.
There will only be one customer per stylist and people can only wait inside if they maintain social distancing. Appointment scheduling is encouraged to avoid large crowds.
Everyone will be encouraged to wear masks, Abbott said.
“This allows these types of businesses to open up, but it doesn’t require them to do so,” he explained. “Every owner of every salon should use their own best judgment.”
There’s still no date set for bars to reopen in the state, but Abbott said his administration is working on a solution.
He added that the 25 percent capacity limits do not apply to outdoor seating at restaurants, but the social distancing rules of 6 feet do.
The governor also said weddings are part of the ceremonies involved in rules for religious services, funerals, burials and memorials. They can occur, but must all have limited seating arrangements.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/05/05/dallas-salon-owner-who-reopened-despite-coronavirus-gets-jail-time/
Photo Credit: AP Photo/LM Otero
Woman arrested after calling cops to report fire in her crotch
An Ohio woman was placed under arrest after reportedly calling 911 to ask for help extinguishing a fire in her crotch.
Katrina Morgan, 50, called the cops in Port Clinton at about 10 p.m. Saturday, to allegedly falsely report her “p—y” ablaze, the Port Clinton News-Herald reported.
Morgan asked the cops if the fire department’s “hose is working” and said, “I need somebody to come put it out with their hose,” according to the outlet.
Police arrived to find Morgan at her friend’s home, where she and others had been drinking, residents told the officers.
Cops moved to arrest Morgan for false reports and disrupting police operations, according to the newspaper.
Morgan became agitated and yelled at the officers as she resisted arrest, only relenting when an officer threatened her with a stun gun, the report said.
Morgan faces charges of disrupting public services, making false alarms, resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, according to the police department.
Her friends during police questioning denied seeing Morgan on the phone, the News-Herald reported.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/05/05/woman-arrested-after-calling-cops-to-report-fire-in-her-crotch/
Photo Credit: Ottawa County Jail
Mexican mob storms hospital, claiming coronavirus is government conspiracy
An angry mob stormed a Mexican hospital to “rescue” a coronavirus patient, claiming the global pandemic is a lie and a government conspiracy, according to news reports.
A crowd of nearly 300 people, egged on by chatter from a local Facebook group, rushed the hospital in Motozintla, in the southern Mexican province of Chiapas, on Monday, demanding to examine the unnamed patient themselves, Mexican News Daily reported.
“Coronavirus is a lie,” one member posted on the Mercado Libre de Motozintla Facebook page. “Let’s not fall for it.”
The crowd also demanded an end to coronavirus lockdown restrictions, claiming the virus doesn’t really exist, according to the report, originally published Tuesday in the Mexican newspaper El Universal. Family members of the patient, who were part of the mob, said they feared for his safety.
The man was the third resident of the town to be hospitalized with COVID-19 ,the outlet said.
Hospital officials blocked the entrance and called in the national guard, which secured the scene and cordoned off the building and part of a nearby park, the report said.
Mexico had more than 26,000 confirmed coronavirus cases as of Wednesday, with 2,507 dead from the global pandemic, according to Johns Hopkins University.
Photo Credit: nypost.com