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Pitts: Prison may provide Hobbs with structure
  If ever the facts of the case were a problem for the defense, it's the case playing out in room 4A of Cumberland County Superior Court, involving accused killer Cedric Hobbs Jr. Through his lawyer, Hobbs, who is 33, admitted, even before the jury was seated, that in the late afternoon of Nov. 6, 2010, he pointed a .380-caliber handgun at teenager and college student Kyle Harris and shot him to death. He admitted that he robbed the Cumberland Pawn Shop on Grove Street. Hobbs and his girlfriend, Alexis Mattocks, who pleaded guilty in the crime and has been sentenced to life, went to Washington, D.C., where police stopped them for driving Harris' stolen car. All of this played out while the couple's young daughter, Storm, sat in a child's seat in the back. A day before killing Harris, evidence suggests he slew his drug dealer, to whom he owed money, and stole the man's vehicle. When it broke down, he killed Harris and took his. - (Black-on-white) |
A New York City grand jury has declined to indict an NYPD officer in the chokehold case of Eric Garner, the unarmed man who died while being arrested on Staten Island earlier this year. In delivering a vote of "no true bill" Wednesday, jurors determined there was not probable cause that a crime was committed by NYPD officer Daniel Pantaleo, who was seen on a widely watched amateur video wrapping his arm around Garner's neck as the 43-year-old yelled, "I can't breathe!" during the July 17 confrontation. The father of three's health issues, including obesity, were listed as contributing factors in the autopsy report. Of the 23 members of the Garner grand jury, 14 are white, nine are non-white and at least five are black. Pantaleo is white, and Garner was black. Garner's family, in an effort to thwart tensions, has consistently said race should not be a factor in the case, but protests in Ferguson have raised concerns in New York.
CINCINNATI - A man charged in the fatal shooting of an ATM technician in Roselawn has been found incompetent to stand trial. Yonah Israel will undergo mental treatment, and Judge Nadine Allen set a hearing for May 27, 2015, to determine his progress. Israel's former girlfriend said the 36-year-old suffers from manic bipolar disorder and schizophrenic depression, and that he was taking medication. "He's got voices in his head and everything," said Tiffany Price. Police charged Israel with killing 54-year-old 
NEWARK By all accounts, 18-year-old 
A Queens police officer who once won his precinct’s “Cop of the Year’’ award has been busted on cocaine-trafficking charges, sources said Tuesday. Officer Philip LeRoy, who works in the 114th Precinct, was nabbed just before midnight Monday in Sunrise City, Fla., with two other men while allegedly buying 10 kilos of cocaine, sources told The Post. LeRoy — the son of a retired detective — allegedly drove from New York with the intent to buy drugs in the Sunshine State and had his off-duty weapon on him at the time. 
CENTER LINE, Mich. - A love triangle involving two Highland Park police officers ended with an armed standoff, and one of the officers has been charged with trying to kill his wife and another woman. The domestic drama began when former Highland Park Police Reserve Officer James Johnson's wife says she found a used condom in the trash last month. After the discovery, Vivian called Highland Park Officer Varee Roberson over to their Center Line house. She was angry James had been with yet another woman after the three of them had engaged in sexual activity together back in June. She claims the two women confronted James in the bedroom and the argument got heated fast. James started to attack Roberson, who he first met while he was on the Highland Park police force. "Before I knew it I saw the gun drawn." James fired and luckily missed his wife. He then left, but not for long. According to court trannoscripts, the women took a bath together, got ready and just as they were walking out of the house James appeared in the garage with his gun drawn. James was pointing a gun at his wife and Roberson was pointing her gun at James.
The Buffalo teenager who admitted raping three women in one week last summer was sentenced today to 21 years in prison to be followed by 19 years of supervision. Dionte M. Cooper, 16, previously pleaded guilty to three counts of first-degree rape for the attacks on women June 29, July 2 and July 5 shortly after they had left nightclubs in the area. Cooper was sentenced by Erie County Judge Kenneth F. Case. Cooper raped the first victim three days after he ran away from Baker Victory Home in Lackawanna. The rapist stole a cellphone from one of his victims, and police were able to find him by using cellphone-tracking technology.
BALTIMORE —Baltimore police have arrested two men in the rape and sexual assault of 
A former Democratic congressional aide pleaded guilty Tuesday to sexually assaulting two women in 2010. Donny Ray Williams Jr., 37, who served as a staff director for the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs subcommittee, pleaded guilty to third-degree sexual abuse, two misdemeanor counts of sexual abuse and one count of misdemeanor threats.
A man who posed as a taxicab driver, offered a Mardi Gras season tourist a ride then drove her to a secluded area and raped her at gunpoint was found guilty Tuesday by an Orleans Parish jury. After deliberating for more than two hours, the jury of six women and six men convicted Curtis Hawthorne of aggravated rape, aggravated kidnapping and armed robbery in the Feb. 9, 2013, assault of a University of Texas college student. Hawthorne, 23, now faces a mandatory life sentence in prison.
NEWARK — A state appeals court today upheld the conviction of a man serving a 25-year prison sentence for kidnapping his ex-girlfriend in July 2009, mutilating part of her body and pushing her into oncoming traffic on Route 78. The victim has said she and Michelet Glaude dated for about two and a half to three years until she broke up with him. “He also told her he was going to kill her because she had a new boyfriend.” (After mutilating her) while speeding on Route 78 East, Glaude crashed the car into the concrete median. The victim jumped out of the car and tried to escape by running across the highway, but Glaude tackled her and pushed her in front of a truck driving down the highway. -
MIAMI — The FBI is looking for a man they describe as armed and dangerous in connection with several carjackings and a double shooting, one fatal, that happened in Broward Tuesday. “He is armed and dangerous. He has shown he will use violence,” said Michael Leverock with the FBI. FBI said Gregory B. Moore, 35, was involved in a double shooting and several carjackings in Broward. Gregory B. Moore, 35, is wanted by the FBI for three carjackings and two attempted car jackings. Also, the FBI believes Moore was involved in a double shooting that happened Tuesday morning in Hallandale. One victim has died, the other is listed in critical condition.
PHILADELPHIA — A homeless man was today ordered held for trial in the stabbing death of an East Mount Airy man, a cantor at a Roxborough synagogue. The victim, as an act of charity, had taken in two homeless men, but one was trouble, according to authorities. The murder victim, 54-year-old 
An employee of Harrah's New Orleans has been arrested after being accused of taking a picture of a patron's genitals inside a men's restroom at the Poydras Street casino. Jeremiah Johnson, 35, was booked with video voyeurism, a charge that under state law could be punished by a jail sentence of one to five years and a fine of up to $10,000. According to a New Orleans police arrest report, a casino customer said he was using a urinal at the casino around noon Sunday (Nov. 30), when he noticed a Harrah's employee using a cell phone to snap a picture of the customer's exposed penis. The customer notified casino staff, and Johnson was detained by Harrah's security personnel.
The step-grandfather of a 3-year-old boy found fatally beaten in the family’s apartment was arrested on Thursday in connection with the child’s death, cops said. 
MAGNOLIA, Del. – A Delaware woman has been arrested for allegedly posing as a realtor on Craigslist and renting out foreclosed homes. A male victim reportedly contacted police about someone living in his home in Magnolia. The home was under foreclosure and the victim had been out of it since August when a relative informed him a person was living there. When police contacted the current inhabitants of the home, those people informed police that the house was put on Craigslist as a rental and they’d been shown the property by a female "realtor". The couple signed rental paperwork, completed monetary transactions with the female and moved in. On Monday, Dec. 1, police arrested 45-year-old Kellie Hodge-Grier.
BUFFALO, N.Y. - Two men are headed to prison for the next 20 years to life. Wesley Woods, 23, and Stephen Dawson, 29, learned their punishment for kidnapping and torturing a man for 17 hours in a basement, accusing him of being an informant. The pair punched, kicked and robbed 24-year-old 
DES MOINES, Iowa — A picky eater was jailed Tuesday for reportedly using a McDonald’s McChicken sandwich as a weapon against his pregnant wife, according to a police report. Marvin Tramaine Hill II, 21, admitted to police that he threw the sandwich at his wife “because he doesn’t like them.” Hill was arrested for simple domestic assault and taken to the Polk County Jail. 
The driver of a minivan that fatally struck a 10-year-old girl and seriously injured her pregnant mother — who later delivered a baby girl — swiped the vehicle from a valet parking garage where he works to buy cigarettes, police said Wednesday. 
Asofitu Fio
KIRKLAND, Washington – A Kirkland man was arrested this week after authorities said he threatened to kill former Ferguson Missouri Police officer 
LORAIN -- A 26-year-old Lorain man was murdered late Monday night while delivering food for a pizza chain. Police responded to the Lake Motel in the 3900 block of West Erie Avenue around 11:30 p.m. where they found 
ROSTRAVER TOWNSHIP, Pa. – Even with her fractured vertebrae still healing, a 91-year-old woman faced one of her accused attackers in a Westmoreland County court Monday. Police say 
ST. LOUIS • One teen was charged with murder, two more were held and a fourth was sought Monday as officials spent another day trying to quell speculation that the bludgeoning death of a Bosnian immigrant was racially motivated. “There is no evidence that this was a crime occasioned by the race or ethnicity of the victim,” Mayor Francis Slay declared in a formal statement. Police have been saying the same thing about the killing of 
LAS VEGAS — A 22-year-old man is due to face a judge in the fatal stabbing of a pedestrian on a walkway bridge over the Las Vegas Strip. A court clerk says Calvin Boyden III is due Tuesday before Las Vegas Justice of the Peace Janiece Marshall on felony charges including murder and robbery in the early Nov. 25 slaying on a bridge at Harmon Avenue. That's near the CityCenter hotel, casino and shopping complex. The victim was later identified as
RICHMOND, VA - A man sentenced to die for murdering a South Richmond family is suing over conditions on Virginia's death row. Ricky Gray is one of five death row inmates suing the Director of the Virginia Department of Corrections and the warden of the Sussex State Prison. They claim they aren't given enough freedom as they spend their days in solitary confinement. Gray was sentenced to death for the murders of the 
WOODLAND- The man convicted in the deadly shooting of his ex-girlfriend last year was sentenced to life in prison Monday. Moments after his sentencing, William Gardner accused Judge Stephen Mock and his own lawyer of being racist. “Give me a fair and impartial trial,” Gardner said. “The judge is a (expletive) klansman.” A year after her killing, 
ELYRIA, Ohio - Monday, Elyria Police Department detectives arrested Nicole Villegas for murder in conjunction with the shooting death of Lamar Capers. 
A Delray Beach man was arrested Friday night after police say he tried to incite a riot while officers were dealing with a “shooting in progress” call. Tommy Lee Willis remains in the Palm Beach County Jail on $3,000 bail and faces charges of inciting or encouraging a riot and resisting arrest without violence. Willis began yelling at a Delray Beach police lieutenant as he was giving commands through a patrol car P.A. system to a possibly armed suspect. Willis got so close to the lieutenant that he was forced to stop using the P.A. system “to attend to Willis’ obstructing behavior.” After the shooting suspect was in custody, Willis yelled at officers and repeated several times: “This is not right. You did this because he’s black.” Willis then allegedly turned to a group of about 15 bystanders and said: “The police should be shot. They are the bad guys here.” The report said that Willis encouraged the crowd to riot and that his statements “were clearly meant to cause racial tension in a predominantly black neighborhood.” “You can’t come here and tell people what to do,” Willis shouted at police. “He [shooting suspect] should have shot you.” Records show that Willis has been arrested several times in Palm Beach County and was sentenced to 1 1/2 years in prison in August 2002 for selling cocaine.
Authorities are formally investigating whether 
WAYNE, N.J. – Five students at New Jersey’s William Paterson University face charges stemming from the alleged sexual assault of a female student in a dorm. University President Kathleen Waldron told students and faculty in a statement that the alleged attack occurred Tuesday on the Wayne campus and the men have been barred from the school. Charged were: Jahmel Latimer, Darius Singleton, Garret Collick, Noah Williams, and Tremaine Scott. The suspects reportedly turned off the dorm room light and used physical force to assault the victim.
The man and woman charged with abducting and raping an 
A Memphis man is charged with rape after police say he struck up a conversation with a 
DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — The deadly shooting of a teenager at a MARTA bus stop has led to a suspect who's also believed to be responsible for a string of sexual assaults and armed robberies, authorities said. 
Two weeks after telling Entertainment Tonight that 
ORLANDO, Fla. - An Orange County middle school teacher has been arrested after deputies say he sexually battered a minor. Eric Puryear, 48, has been charged with sexual activity with a child in the incident at Robinswood Middle School in Orlando. Deputies said the victim reported being sexually battered by a teacher, identified as Puryear, in May 2014. The incident was reported to Orange County Sheriff's Office Saturday. The victim said that the sexual battery took place inside a storage room on school grounds. 
DETROIT, Mich. - A man who lost his home is accused of fatally shooting its new owners in a gunfight. Alonzo Long faced a judge Monday Afternoon, charged with double homicide at a tax foreclosed Detroit house. The 22-year-old is accused of shooting and killing 
A CUNY employee with a lengthy rap sheet, including grand larceny, allegedly swiped $1,400 in cash from a student — a crime made possible because the public-university system doesn’t perform background checks, according to a source familiar with the incident. Shalaunda Tolbert, 40, who has worked in the registrar’s office at City College for four years, is accused of pocketing the money at around 4:45 p.m. last Tuesday, when grad student Magdalena Algarin left her wallet at the counter before paying for tuition, the source said.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – Two teens, linked to a New Dorp home invasion earlier this year in which a
LOCKPORT – A Lockport shooting charged as a hate crime involves a black teenager accused of shooting 
A person of interest has been taken into custody in connection with a fatal shooting Tuesday, a news release from the Escambia County Sheriff's Office said. Reginald Sherrod Williams, 24, has been identified as a suspect in the death of 22-year-old 
Death Row inmate Gregory Thompson has died at the age of 52. He was pronounced dead at 5:40 p.m. on Thursday at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Thompson died of natural causes. Thompson was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death for the murder of a female newspaper reporter, 28-year-old 
SAN FRANCISCO — Police said an argument led to a shooting that injured a man in San Francisco’s North Beach Sunday afternoon, according to a police spokeswoman. Police responded to a report of a shooting at 2:32 p.m. at Columbus Avenue and Vallejo Street, said Sgt. Monica Macdonald. The victim, a man named 
An Oklahoma City man has been arrested after being accused of a terrifying crime. In October, a woman called police and said she had been raped by a stranger. The woman was sleeping in her bedroom when she awoke to find a man leaning over her. “[Victim] said that the suspect put his hand over her throat and said, ‘Don’t scream or I’ll cut you.” The alleged suspect ordered the woman to stand up and take off her clothes. At that point, the alleged suspect took a scarf that he had around his face and tied it over her eyes so she could not see. The suspect ” licked her breasts, stomach, arms, thighs and vagina” but could not get an erection. As the suspect was leaving, the victim claims he took some of the cash she had in her wallet and told her to not move for five minutes. After he left, she says she called her husband and 911. This weekend, police arrested 56-year-old Henry Austin Brent, Jr. for the alleged crime.
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Pennsylvania’s Department of Corrections is settling a federal lawsuit filed by a prison clerk whose rape by an inmate led to a leadership shake-up and changes in prison operations. The agency told The Associated Press on Monday, in response to an open-records request, that it will pay the woman $3.3 million. She claimed that prison officials had ignored her security concerns before Omar Best, a convicted rapist, sexually assaulted her last year at Rockview State Prison. Her complaint said Best choked her to the point of unconsciousness before he raped her in an office located near prison cells. She blew an emergency whistle, but it took nearly a half-hour for help to arrive. Best is serving a life sentence for the attack after being convicted of rape and other charges.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - A woman faces multiple charges after police in St. Petersburg say she used a stun gun on her 3-year-old child's arm. The Tampa Bay Times reports 30-year-old Ramona Braswell was arrested Saturday at her home. She's accused of felony child abuse for "causing visible injuries" to the child.
All four of the people accused in the shooting of a Domino’s Pizza employee during a robbery in September were indicted last week by a Boyle County grand jury, including a juvenile who will now be treated as an adult by the court system. Nathaniel Sinclair Davis, 16, of Harrodsburg, was picked out of a police photo lineup as the “possible shooter” by 
ST. PETERSBURG -- A 31-year-old man is charged with two counts of DUI manslaughter in connection to a crash that killed two people Thanksgiving night in St. Petersburg. The crash happened at Central Avenue and 34th Street around 5:30 p.m. According to St. Petersburg Police, a 2003 Porsche SUV, being driven by Anthony Apollo Neeley, of Seminole, was eastbound in the curb lane of Central Avenue, approaching the intersection of 34th Street. A 2009 Toyota Corolla, occupied by 
TALLADEGA COUNTY, AL - An east Alabama jury recommends death for one of six people charged in the murder-for-hire death of an attorney. Ocie Lynch was convicted yesterday of capital murder in the death of 
CLAYTON COUNTY, Ga. — A Clayton County judge denied bond Sunday morning for a couple accused of hiding a missing teenage boy behind a false wall in their home. Clayton County police say they rescued the 
Ramael Pierson, 24, walked into the shop on Westchester Avenue at 9:40 p.m. with two pals, and sat down for a trim, police said. When the barber finished, the newly coiffed thug whipped out a gun, demanded money from the other customers, and fled, cops said.
“Without knowing all the facts, of course I wanted to see an indictment,” 
WASHINGTON, Pa. — A man was arrested over the weekend after police said he tried to take money from the woman running the mini Christmas train at a Washington County mall. The incident happened around 5 p.m. Saturday at the Washington Crown Center Mall. The woman running the kiddie train told police Justice Walden approached her and asked for her phone number. The woman said she gave Walden an incorrect number and he left. However, the complaint said Walden returned when he realized what had happened and he was upset. Witnesses told police he was using inappropriate language and causing a disturbance. At that time, police said he tried to rob her, telling her to put her money in a hat.
Five hours after a man in his 50s or 60s was fatally shot under a tree near his home Sunday morning, police arrested a man who was seen by witnesses banging on apartment doors with a gun in his hand just before gunfire rang out, according to authorities. Broward Sheriff's Office homicide detectives arrested Kerveney Arthelus, 28, near his home on Northwest Second Court at approximately 1:45 p.m. Police recovered a handgun in his vehicle. Arthelus was booked into jail on a murder charge and is being held without bond, records show.
“I don’t remember anything about [last] Sunday, I didn’t do anything.” 
Police in Delaware arrested a Wilmington man after they found thousands of dollars’ worth of heroin inside his home during a raid. Police executed a search on a home on the 900 block of Clifford Brown Walk around 8 p.m. Wednesday, Wilmington Police revealed Friday. Officers arrested Ryan Briscoe and charged him with heroin trafficking, other drug and weapons charges. 
A Philadelphia man, already sentenced to 40-80 years in prison for rape, prostitution, and drug crimes in Bucks County was sentenced in federal court to 30 years in prison for sex trafficking a teenager. It’s crime the prosecutor says “destroyed” the victim. Defendant Enoch Smith lured 
WILMINGTON, Del. – Two gang members who prosecutors say were out to avenge a friend's death and to silence a witness to an earlier killing have been convicted of murder in a 2012 soccer tournament shooting in Delaware that left three people dead. A jury on Friday convicted 38-year-old Otis Phillips and 23-year-old Jeffrey Phillips of first-degree murder in the death of 47-year-old tournament organizer
A Newark man was sentenced to life in prison Thursday on charges he lured a woman into a robbery in which she was kidnapped and later killed. Moments before the sentencing was announced, Rashawn Bond, 37, tearfully apologized for his role in calling 
A man whose 2009 murder conviction was overturned because cops had pulled him naked from his home without a warrant got in more hot water Thursday. He allegedly threatened a court officer and her family as his retrial began when she told him to change his clothes. “He threatened her and said he was going to take care of her and her family once he got out on this case,” said Brooklyn Supreme Court Judge Alan Marrus, who then told Derrick Riffas, 27, he would bar him from his own trial if he made any more threats. Riffas could well be acquitted and set free. Because his 2006 arrest was illegal, the confession he made afterward can’t be mentioned in this trial.
A Rochester man, found guilty of killing a mother and daughter who were pet-sitting for a neighbor, will spend the rest of his life in prison. The judge sentenced Dante Taylor to the maximum, life without parole, for the murders of 
WINTER SPRINGS, Fla. —A 42-year-old man is accused of kidnapping and raping a child in Winter Springs. Investigators said they arrested Benjamin Worthy Sr. on Thursday after conducting an investigation into sexual battery allegations against him. Worthy was charged with sexual battery of
COCOA, FLORIDA – Tyrel Rogers, 20, and Tyrone Rogers, 25, have been arrested and charged with sexual battery for participating in an alleged gang rape of a woman on Sept. 25, according to the Cocoa Police Department. According to Cocoa Police Public Information Officer Barbara Matthews, there are three additional suspects that took part in the gang rape, and police expected to make additional arrests soon. According to police documents, the victim said that she counted five black males in the room who took turns forcing her to perform sexual acts.
The Williamson County sheriff’s office has charged two people with capital murder in the death of 
