New Jersey High School Senior Gets Accepted to All 8 Ivy League Schools, Plus Stanford
A New Jersey teenager has to make a decision soon most high school seniors can only dream of — deciding on which Ivy League school to attend in the fall. The problem, if you want to call it that, is that she was accepted into all eight of them.
Ifeoma White-Thorpe said she was shaking when she got the eighth acceptance letter.
“I was like, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, like this might be eight out of eight and I clicked it and it said ‘Congratulations’ and I was like oh my goodness!” White-Thorpe told CNN affiliate WABC-TV.
White-Thorpe, a senior and student government president at Morris Hills High School in Rockaway, has to choose between Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Columbia, the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton, Dartmouth and Brown.
She wants to study biology and pursue a career in global health. Since all of the Ivy League schools “have great research facilities,” she decided to apply to them all.
Students getting into all of the Ivies is a monumental feat, but it’s happened to a handful of teens over the past couple of years — Kwasi Enin in 2014, Harold Ekeh in 2015 and Augusta Uwamanzu-Nna and Kelly Hyles last year.
So where will she go?
Her parents said the choice is totally up to her; White-Thorpe said she just doesn’t know yet.
She can add another elite school to the mix as well — she also got into Stanford University.
Fresno Police Work to Identify Nearly Naked Woman Who Claims to Be Mermaid
Local authorities are asking for help identifying a nearly naked woman found wandering in Fresno, California street Tuesday morning.
The woman’s hair was wet when she was found around 3 a.m., and she told officers that she was a mermaid, and that her name was Joanna, according to the Fresno Police Department.
The woman, who has two webbed toes on both feet, told officers that she had been in the water, but replied “I don’t know” to “most questions,” police said.
She is 5-foot-4, weighs about 150 pounds and has brown eyes and brown hair. She was found walking down the middle of Millerton Road across from the Eagle Spring Golf & Country Club, about a mile south of Table Mountain.
Anyone with information about her identity is asked to call (559) 621-2455 or email the missing persons unit Detective Paul Hill at [email protected].
via: http://ktla.com/2017/04/04/police-woman-found-wet-and-nearly-naked-claiming-to-be-a-mermaid/
Woman Stabbed 13 Times by Ex-Boyfriend While Staying as Patient in Long Beach Hospital
A woman said she was stabbed Tuesday by her ex-boyfriend who came to her hospital room while she was a patient at St. Mary Medical Center in Long Beach.
Police responded to a stabbing call at the hospital around 2:50 a.m., said Long Beach Police spokesperson Marlene Arrona. A suspect was arrested after investigators determined the attacker was visiting the patient’s room when a domestic dispute escalated into a stabbing incident, she said.
Traci Mattox says she drowsy after receiving treatment for stomach ulcers when her ex-boyfriend, 30-year-old Lorenzo Moss — who she had broken up with during his previous hospital visit — returned with a knife.
“Earlier that day he had came to the hospital and I told him, ‘I think it would be best if we just separate,’ and he didn’t give me any argument and he left the hospital,” Mattox told KTLA. “I woke up again that morning at 2:40 (a.m.) and he was there. I said, ‘You know what, like I told you earlier. I don’t even know why you’re here — it’s after visiting hours.’ “
That’s when the situation became violent, Mattox said.
“I saw something shiny sticking out, and I said, ‘Do you have a knife?’ “ she recalled. “When I said that is when he hit me the first time, and he stabbed me in the back of the neck. I started screaming, ‘Help! Somebody help me!’ ”
Traci Mattox displays wounds left on her back after being attacked in her hospital room by her ex-boyfriend on March 28, 2017. (Credit: KTLA)
She was able to fight him off but suffered cuts to her head, ears and hands.
No hospital employees responded to her cries for help, Mattox said.
“And you let this guy walk down the hall? And I screamed, ‘Get him, he just stabbed me,’ she said.
Although Moss escaped initially, Long Beach police arrested him a short distance from the hospital, Arrona said.
He was later booked into Long Beach City Jail on suspicion of attempted murder and domestic violence, officers said. His bail has been set at $1.04 million.
But ultimately, the hospital’s security should have prevented the attack or apprehended Moss sooner, according to Mattox.
“If somebody is in there screaming, got stabbed 13 times — help (them),” she said.
St. Mary Medical Center declined to comment directly on the incident.
“The safety of our patients, visitors and staff is of utmost important,” hospital officials said in a statement. “We respectfully uphold the privacy of our patients and are cooperating with local authorities.”
Police are continuing to investigate the incident.
In addition to recovering from medical treatment and stab wounds, Mattox said she has been emotionally scarred as well.
“I’m crying every 15 minutes,” she said. “Being with somebody who you think loves you and they stab you 13 times.”
Kentucky Man Stabbed Father in Church After He Was ‘Moved by the Message’
A Kentucky man was sentenced to 10 years in prison after he pleaded guilty but mentally ill to stabbing his father during a church service last year, PEOPLE confirms.
Ethan Buckley, 21, reportedly told officials he was “moved by the message” before stabbing his father in the neck. He was charged with first-degree assault.
On August 14, Buckley was arrested after a church pastor told police he was standing at the altar and heard a “weird noise,” according to the Bowling Green Daily News.
According to the paper, the pastor heard Buckley’s father say, “Don’t let him kill me, don’t let him kill me.”
Another pastor heard the disturbance and jumped over chairs to get Buckley off his father. Buckley’s father was taken to the hospital and treated for his injuries.
In an affidavit for a search warrant, Bowling Green Police Department detective Mike Nade wrote, “Ethan Buckley stated his father’s time here on earth was up because he had done a lot of good things in life.”
Nade continued, “Ethan Buckley stated he resented his father because his father was such a good guy while he was a screw-up and a drug addict.”
Chris Cohron, commonwealth’s attorney for the eighth judicial circuit, would not comment on the details of the case.
Cohron said Buckley must serve at least 8 years before being considered for any type of release, according to reports. Since he pleaded with mental illness, his sentence allows him to have mental health resources available to him.
Buckley’s attorney James Rhorer did not return a call to his office.
via: https://www.yahoo.com/news/kentucky-man-stabbed-father-church-224707629.html
Mom watches as two sons are gunned down in restaurant
A mother watched on Thursday as a man approached the Chicago south side restaurant where she works and opened fire, killing her two sons and two other men in a shooting that police described as gang-related retaliation, media reported.
A lone gunman opened fire just before 4 p.m. local time at the Nadia Fish and Chicken restaurant in the South Shore neighborhood, killing Dillon and Raheem Jackson, who were found outside the establishment when police and rescue workers arrived, the Chicago Tribune reported.
“I can’t go on, my life is over. I’m ‘bout to … kill myself,” their mother told the Chicago Tribune as she wept, still wearing a red apron from her job at the restaurant as her sons’ bodies lay nearby. “I was standing right here in the window, they killed ‘em right in front of me.”
Two other men were found dead inside the restaurant, the Chicago Police Department said in an email to Reuters.
No arrests have been made in the shooting, police said.
The shooting was believed to be gang-related retaliation “from another incident,” an NBC affiliate reported, citing police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi.
The men were among the nine people shot on the city’s south side Thursday, including a pregnant woman who was found dead earlier in the afternoon in her apartment about a mile from the restaurant, the Tribune reported.
That shooting did not appear to be related to the restaurant killings, the newspaper reported.
Homicides are down about 10 percent so far in 2017 in the third-largest US city after a particularly deadly year in 2016, when there were 60 percent more homicides than in 2015, the Tribune reported.
via: http://nypost.com/2017/03/31/mom-watches-as-two-sons-are-gunned-down-in-restaurant/
Chicago Area Man Credits Cellphone App for Helping Him Lose 500 pounds
A 45-year-old man once-confined to his suburban Chicago-area home for years said he lost 500 pounds with the help of a cellphone app.
In 2011, Rafael Zuniga weighed over 800 pounds. His weight was a lifelong battle that spiraled out of control, KTLA sister station WGN-TV reported.
Over the past six years, he has lost 500 pounds. While he did the work alone, Zuniga said that ultimately, it was an app that got him on the path to living again.
Stress from work as a real estate adjuster and a bad break up left him at an all-time high of 831 pounds. Alcohol and fast food were his best friends.
“I’m always thinking I’ve got to lose a couple hundred pounds and I’ll be back in the mix,” he says. “But it wasn’t a couple hundred pounds. My weight doubled. I was in shock. As stupid as it sounds, I was in shock.”
Rock bottom
“When I was unable to keep cleaning myself, I guess that was my rock bottom,” he told WGN.
In July 2011, he was taken to the hospital and labeled morbidly obese. He was fighting lymphdema, hypertension, and cellulitis among other things.
It was a turning point for Zuniga.
“It was a beautiful day out and I had seen everybody. Life was passing me by,” he said.
That is when Zuniga decided to change his path of physical and financial ruin to one of wellness. After researching weight loss, he discovered the app “LoseIt!”
Zuniga’s goal was to weigh 250 pounds and travel the world.
“The image of me just being by an ocean, man, that helped me out tremendously,” he says.
How the weight loss app changed his life
Zuniga uses the app to count his calories, track his meals, and seek support from other users trying to lose weight. The app taught him to eat smarter, he said.
But he also started exercising. At first, it meant the smallest of movements.
“I was sitting at the edge of my bed doing sit ups. I refused to believe that I was disabled,” he says.
Zuniga now does cardio five times a week and lifts weights two to four times a week. He eats a high-protein diet, cuts out the carbs, and counts every calorie he eats.
And he has not had any surgical procedure to lose the weight. There is no more alcohol and he does take a prescribed appetite suppressant.
The real motivator? A vacation
In 2014, Zuniga’s dream came true. Labeling himself as “skinny for him” — he was down to 400 pounds — his father booked him a business class seat to the Dominican Republic.
Over the past three years, Zuniga has shed another 100 pounds bringing his overall weight loss in excess of 500 pounds.
He told the station he’d like to lose another 50 and get his doctors more comfortable with the idea of double knee replacements for his severe osteoarthritis. Removing his excess skin might get him close, but insurance doesn’t cover the procedure.
Zuniga is just the beginning of the rest of his life. Clean living with the help of an app is opening a whole new world for him, he said.
via: http://ktla.com/2017/03/31/man-says-app-helped-him-lose-500-pounds/
Video Shows L.A. County Deputy Ignoring Radio Call, “Saying ‘Someone’s Getting Shot – Oh Well’
A Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy is under investigation after a video posted to YouTube showed him apparently ignoring a radio call to go to a shooting while talking instead to his now ex-girlfriend.
Deputy Jeremy Fennell was placed on administrative leave in January in connection with the video, a spokesperson for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department confirmed to KTLA on Thursday. The video, published to YouTube Feb. 23 by an account dubbed “Compassionate Cop,” appears to show the deputy on a video call. He is sitting in his patrol vehicle, laughing, when a female dispatcher’s voice comes over the police radio.
“She can go f— herself, OK?” the deputy says.
The dispatcher’s voice refers to a 417, a radio code for a person with a gun.
“I want you, you, you, you,” the deputy says, pointing at the camera. “Somebody’s getting shot right now. … I know I gotta go, but I’m not gonna go because you mad, so I’m not gonna go.
“Someone’s getting shot. Oh well,” he continues with a shrug. “Oh well. Because I want to make things right with me and you.”
He continues, air-kissing at the camera, and saying the kisses can be returned “in person” at 11 o’clock.
The woman who posted the video, Priscilla Anderson, said she is Fennell’s ex-girlfriend. She told KTLA he recorded more than 100 such videos in an attempt to get her attention.
She also alleges he physically abused her, and that he took out his anger against her on everyday people, pulling them over and giving them tickets.
“I was struck in the neck; I was choked,” Anderson said. “I was threatened. I had a gun pulled to my head.”
Anderson said she called the sheriff’s Lakewood Station, where Fennell was posted, to try to get help. No one responded, according to Anderson, so she went to court to seek a restraining order, and then posted the videos online.
Fennell is indeed the subject of a restraining order issued Feb. 23, the same day the main video was published, local criminal justice blog Witness L.A. reported.
Fennell was arrested Jan. 25, the date on which he was placed on leave, by the sheriff’s Internal Criminal Investigations Bureau, according to county jail records. He’s 26, the records show.
Fennell bailed out of custody a little over three hours after his arrest, putting up $50,000 bail.
Anderson’s attorney is calling for an investigation into who knew what at the Lakewood Station. Anderson is being represented by Ben Meiselas with the office of famed L.A. defense attorney Mark Geragos.
“You have a deputy here who’s clearly gone rogue,” Meiselas said. “If we as a community lose the trust in our police department to protect victims of abuse when police are the perpetrators of that abuse, we lose confidence in the whole system.”
Sheriff Jim McDonnell issued a short statement: “We are very concerned about what is depicted in the video. The department is currently investigating the matter.”
A second video published by the “Compassionate Cop” account shows the same deputy threatening the person he’s calling.
“I’m going to come down there and get you. I’m going to make you call me,” the deputy says. “You see these lights, you know what I’m wearing? I can make you call me.”
Fennell is the son of sheriff’s Cmdr. Joseph Fennell, who was a driver for recently convicted ex-Sheriff Lee Baca, Witness L.A. reported.
Hemet Police Investigating After 7-Month-Old Baby Girl Dies at Possible Unlicensed Daycare
Hemet police are investigating on Wednesday after a 7-month-old baby girl went into cardiac arrest at a daycare and later died.
Officers were called to a home in the 1200 block of Stepstone Court around 8 a.m. Monday with reports of an unresponsive 7-month-old girl. There, they found Addison Watkins and began life saving measures.
Addison was transported to a local hospital where she was pronounced dead, according to the Hemet Police Department.
Her mother, Kristin Watkins, dropped off Addison and her brother, 3-year-old Nolan Watkins, that morning around 7 a.m., a family friend said on a GoFundMe page.
Kristin Watkins learned her daughter was in full cardiac arrest around 8:30 a.m. and rushed to the hospital with her husband, Steve Watkins, according to the friend, Darnisha Tossell.
By the time the couple arrived at the hospital Addison was already pronounced dead, Tossell said.
Addison showed no obvious signs of trauma, police said in a press release.
The Watkins family have been using the residence as a daycare since Nolan was 6-months-old, according to the family. The babysitter was not a family member, Tossell added.
Hemet police are working with Riverside Child Protective Services to determine any licensing issues with the daycare.
The family is accepting donations for funeral expenses on the GoFundMe page.
MAN ALLEGEDLY TRIED TO RECORD GIRL IN PALATINE FITTING ROOM
Palatine police are looking for a man a girl said held his cell phone underneath her fitting room door at Target.
Police said they responded to the Target on East Dundee Road on Sunday afternoon for a report of disorderly conduct. The girl, who is a minor, told them she was in a fitting room when she saw a cell phone being held under the door. The victim said the man holding it fled when she screamed.
Police released a surveillance image they said shows the suspect and are asking for help identifying him. The white male is wearing a black baseball cap with “Bauer” in yellow lettering offset on the front, police said.
Target released a statement Tuesday night, saying, “At Target, our guests are at the center of everything we do and our commitment to creating a safe and secure shopping environment in our stores is unwavering. As a part this commitment to safety, we have robust procedures, policies and trainings in place to ensure that our stores are safe places to shop and work. As soon as this incident was brought to our attention, we immediately partnered with local law enforcement. As this is an active investigation, please direct further questions to them.”
If you have any information about the man in the photo, contact Palatine police at 847-359-9000.
COUPLE TRIES TO SELL A BABY ON CRAIGSLIST FOR $3K, SHERIFF SAYS
Authorities say a Tennessee couple is accused of trying to sell a 5-month-old baby online for $3,000.
Local news outlets report that the Greene County Sheriff’s Office says 37-year-old Deanna Lynn Greer and 26-year-old John David Cain were arrested Friday on charges of aggravated child abuse and aggravated child neglect or endangerment.
Sheriff Pat Hankins says authorities were alerted after another couple saw an ad posted on Craigslist listing the infant for sale.
Hankins says an undercover officer contacted Greer and Cain and was given the price for the child. He says the couple then met with the agent at a store, exchanged the baby for cash and both were then taken into custody.
Hankins says the child is in state custody.
It’s unclear if Greer and Cain have attorneys.