New Haven Police

Carol Mansfield, 44, of Waterbury, Conn., was arrested outside of her ex-boyfriend's house when she showed up demanding $20, according to New Haven Police.

Ten years after their breakup, a woman showed up on her ex-boyfriend’s porch, demanding $20, according to police.

When police responded and charged her with first-degree criminal trespass and second-degree breach of peace, they served her with four outstanding warrants.

Police responded to Hillside Avenue in New Haven, Conn., at 8:41 a.m. on Thursday after a complaint was made and a 53-year-old man told officers he has been trying in vain to get his ex-girlfriend to leave him alone.

The two broke up in 2003, according to police. They say Carol Ann Mansfield, 44, of Waterbury, Conn., showed up on her ex-boyfriend’s front porch, yelling and demanding $20.

He told her over and over again to leave, which just made her angry, according to police.

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Then, he gave her the money to avoid further disruption for his neighbors and to preserve his failing health, according to a news release.

Mansfield was served with four outstanding warrants with charges including; third-degree criminal mischief, three counts of first-degree criminal trespassing, eight counts of second-degree failing to appear in court, use of a motor vehicle without permission, three counts of probation violation and second-degree threatening.

NBCConnecticut.com

This story was originally published on Fri May 3, 2013 4:02 AM EDT

Investigators say a Pittsburgh man killed his wife with a pickaxe after the couple had an argument.
 
Bruce Cook, 62, was charged Thursday with criminal homicide and abuse of a corpse in the death of 57-year-old Lois Cook.

A friend called police Wednesday because Lois Cook missed work.
 
Police said they arrived at the Cooks' home Wednesday night and found dried blood on the floor of the kitchen heading toward the basement steps. Investigators said they found Lois Cook's body under a tarp in the basement.

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Police said Bruce Cook hit his wife with some type of blunt object before striking her in the head with a pickaxe.
 
A neighbor described the victim as a caring woman and referred to her husband as "a ticking time bomb."

NBC10.com

A 50-year-old pharmacist was arrested Monday night after police say she removed two bottles of orange juice from a bag - which they say were filled with rubbing alcohol - and placed them on the shelf with other refrigerated items at a Starbucks in San Jose, California.

San Jose Police Sgt. Jason Dwyer took Ramineh Behbehanian of San Jose into custody on an attempted murder charge because the orange juice contained what police said were lethal quantities of isopropyl alcohol. She is scheduled to appear in court Thursday.

She has no criminal record in Santa Clara County, according to court records. Late Tuesday, sources confirmed for NBC Bay Area that Behbehanian is a pharmacist working for a company owned by Johnson and Johnson.

Authorities are still not sure why she would have allegedly mixed rubbing alcohol with some orange juice in the afternoon, left the bottles in the refrigerated section alongside some yogurt and milk, and left the Snell Avenue store about 3:30 p.m. local time (6:30 p.m. ET).

"Why would she do such a thing?" Chris Africa said, standing outside the Starbucks on Tuesday morning. "Was she trying to poison us?"

An alert customer standing behind her in line spotted her taking out her own bottles of juice from a green Starbucks bag, and put them in the refrigerator section. He also noticed a toxic smell. He told management. The woman might have felt under suspicion, police said, but a Starbucks employee got her license plate.

"A lot of people out there may have seen something and probably dismissed it," Dwyer said. "But I believe that person saved lives by doing that."

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The San Jose Fire Department responded to the scene, retrieved the bottles and tested the contents with hazardous materials equipment. It turned out, the bottles were filled with orange juice and rubbing alcohol.

On Tuesday morning, customer Brent Breyer said he was a little "apprehensive" about what happened at his usual Starbucks. He said he often brings his young daughter, who routinely grabs for items in the refrigerated section.

Police were able to track her down at her home, though no motive has surfaced.

A Starbucks spokesperson told NBC Bay Area that the company destroyed all the other juices in the Snell Avenue store out of an abundance of caution and had all other stores in Bay Area check their juice seals. 

All checked out OK.

Sheriff’s deputies stood guard at schools and bus stops Monday and officers fanned out across a Northern California town hunting a man suspected of breaking into a home and stabbing an 8-year-old girl to death.

The attack on Leila Fowler, a third-grader who friends said had a heart-melting smile, shattered the relative calm in Valley Springs, a town on the slope of the Sierra Nevada range that neighbors described as safe and trusting.

“This is way too close to home,” Julia Poland told The Associated Press. “This kind of thing does not happen here.”

Sheriff’s deputies said Leila’s 12-year-old brother found an intruder in the house Saturday afternoon, while the parents were away. The boy said the intruder fled and that he found his sister with stab wounds.

On Sunday, officers searched houses, sheds, even crawl spaces in Valley Springs, The Sacramento Bee reported. The Calaveras County sheriff said more than 100 officers were on the hunt.

Sheriff’s deputies were looking for a man described as 6 feet tall, white or Hispanic, with long gray hair and wearing a black shirt and blue jeans. They said he should be considered armed and dangerous.

NBC affiliate KCRA reported that a neighbor told police a man was running from the home after the stabbing.

The guards at bus stops and schools were part of what the sheriff described as an “increased and very visible presence.” Several dozen anxious neighbors showed up Sunday for an official news conference on the stabbing, The Modesto Bee reported.

The sheriff said authorities had collected fingerprints and DNA evidence from the home.

A candlelight vigil for Leila was planned for Tuesday night. People were asked to bring candles and pink or purple ribbons.

Valley Springs mostly consists of large homes built on acre lots populated by retirees and people who commute to jobs in the San Francisco Bay Area and the San Joaquin Valley, The Sacramento Bee reported. It is about 60 miles southeast of Sacramento.

Mike Rourke told the newspaper that people there used to let young children run free in the neighborhood. His son, Michael, 11, said that he did not know the girl but was fearful.

“I’m nervous, especially to be by myself,” he said.

This story was originally published on Mon Apr 29, 2013 6:58 AM EDT

West Haven Police Department

Michael L. Peterson, 34, has been charged with multiple felonies including robbery, larceny and engaging pursuit.

A man brandishing a hand saw stole a cash register from a store early Sunday, police said.

According to police, an employee at Sam's Food Mart in West Haven, Connecticut,  called 911 to report that a white male wearing a mask was acting suspiciously.

While en route to the scene, police learned that the male brandished a hand saw, threatened the store clerk and stole the cash register.

Officers pursed a Chevrolet Pickup and attempted to stop the truck but it fled onto I-95 North and was eventually lost after exiting onto Route 1 in New Haven.

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Michael Peterson, 34, was later charged with multiple felonies including robbery, larceny and engaging pursuit.

This story was originally published on Mon Apr 29, 2013 5:17 AM EDT

Boris Delisser, 43, has been accused of stealing chicken wings and other meat from a South Windsor, Conn., company

An employee of a meat and poultry company has been arrested, accused of stealing $10,000 worth of chicken wings and other meat from the company.

The larceny happened at County Distributors in South Windsor, Conn., in February 2012, according to police.

The owner of the business reviewed surveillance footage from his warehouse and noted that an employee, identified as Boris Delisser, 43, of Bloomfield, Conn., had taken products from the warehouse and loaded them into a vehicle, all while there was no sales transaction, according to police. 

When police investigated, they found that Delisser had done this on several occasions and the total loss is estimated in excess of $10,000 worth of chicken wings and meat, according to police.

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Police obtained a warrant charging Delisser with larceny in the first degree, which was served on Tuesday. 

He was released on a $10,000 surety bond and is scheduled to appear at Manchester Superior Court on May 2.

This story was originally published on Thu Apr 25, 2013 5:19 AM EDT

PHILADELPHIA -- A quick-thinking bank teller is being credited with helping to save the lives of seven people who were being held hostage. 

Police say three gunmen broke into the Levittown Trace Apartments on Ford Road in Pennsylvania's Bristol Township early Monday morning. The men, identified as 38-year-old Orlando McNeil, 21-year-old Daesean Smith and 18-year-old Dennis Redding, allegedly held four adults and three children hostage at gunpoint inside the complex. Police say the group, which included two toddlers, was held captive for over nine hours.

According to the Philly Burbs, one of the victims had recently received an $80,000 payout on his late mother’s life insurance policy. Police say the men demanded that he withdraw the entire amount or they would harm his family.

Police say the victim went to a nearby PNC Bank around 10 a.m. on Monday and asked the teller for $80,000 in cash, claiming his family and friends had been kidnapped. That’s when, police say, the bank teller sprang into action.

“The alert teller contacted the police,” said Lieutenant Terry Hughes of the Bristol Township Police Department. “At that point we happened to be in the area and at the right place at the right time.”

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Officers responded to the apartment where they found the three suspects. Police say Smith and Redding tried to flee but were quickly captured while McNeil managed to escape. He was later found and arrested Monday night. Investigators say McNeil was the mastermind behind the kidnapping and ransom scheme. Police also say they recovered two guns near the complex.

The three men are charged with kidnapping, robbery, burglary and other related offenses

A shotgun-wielding man killed his ex-wife in a parking lot in Feasterville, Pa., on Thursday night.

The woman had just left a dress shop on Bustleton Pike with her 16-year-old daughter and they were sitting in the car when Kenneth Philipp pulled up behind them, jumped out of his car, grabbed his shotgun and opened fire, according to Lower Southampton Township Police.

"We know that there were three shots fire at the scene ...  but we do not know how many were fired into the car," said Lower Southampton Township Police Chief William Wiegman.

The teenager was injured by broken glass and her mother died, police said.

Officers quickly tracked down Philipp to the intersection of Buck and Holland Road in Northampton, Pa.

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Investigators say he got out of the car and started firing at the officers. One of the officers fired back, killing Philipp.

The 50-year-old man was just released from jail back in February for assaulting his ex-wife with a knife, police say.

The Bucks County District's Attorney's office is helping with the investigation. 

More than four years after a Prince George's County teen died after getting hit on her walk to school, her family was awarded tens of millions of dollars in a wrongful death suit, but the legal battle could be far from over.

The morning of Sept. 1, 2009, a Lincoln Continental hit 13-year-old Ashley Davis as she crossed Brinkley Road to get to her school bus stop. Some of her classmates watched in horror.

The car then struck a minivan and a 17-year-old boy.

“She was on her way,” her mother, Nycole Davis, said. “She was doing the right thing. She was going to school. She was a good girl. She didn’t deserve this.”

Ashley, a Crossland High School freshman, suffered catastrophic injuries and died two weeks later. Her parents sued the Prince George’s County School Board.

“The school board was negligent,” said John Costello, the lawyer for the family. “They had adopted a policy to provide for safe transportation. The policy was they were going to pick up Ashley on her own side of the street. They never did. They forced her to cross the street. She got killed crossing the street.”

“If she didn’t have to cross the street …  she’d be graduating this year,” her mother said. “She’d be going to prom this year.”

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At the end of the civil trial, a Prince George’s County jury awarded Ashley’s family a verdict of $90 million in damages plus medical expenses and funeral costs.

“I didn’t ask anyone to give me any money or anything like that,” her mother said. “I just want someone held responsible for what happened to my daughter.”

Prince George's County Public Schools emailed a statement to News4 saying, “No judgment has been entered in this case. It is still under litigation.”

Some cap a verdict or limit it in the neighborhood of $100,000 when there is a lawsuit against a municipality or school system, so this case could be far from over.

A 47-year-old woman has been arrested and charged with stalking actor Hugh Jackman.

Kay Nietfeld / EPA, file

Actor Hugh Jackman arrives for the premiere of "Les Miserables" during the Berlin International Film Festival on Feb. 9.

According to police sources, Kathleen Thurston approached Jackman outside a gym in the West Village Saturday, pulled out an electric razor and said to the actor "we should be married."

Jackman told Thurston not to touch him and went inside the gym. Thurston tried to follow him inside, but was stopped by staff at the gym, sources said. Thurston then dropped the razor and ran off. She was arrested several blocks away.

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Jackman told police he had seen Thurston outside his daughter's school and again outside his home on Perry Street on Friday.

Source say Thurston appears to have serious psychological issues. Her last known address was a homeless shelter.

This story was originally published on Mon Apr 15, 2013 3:29 AM EDT

SALMON, Idaho -- A transgender woman whose use of a women's restroom in an Idaho grocery store reportedly upset other customers has been cited for trespassing and banned from the store for a year, police said on Friday.

A Rosauers supermarket in Lewiston asked police to charge 25-year-old Ally Robledo, who was born male but identifies as female, with the misdemeanor trespass charge on Monday, Lewiston Police Captain Roger Lanier said.

"The store security officer said he had been dealing with a problem over a couple days with the person going into the women's restroom and urinating while standing up," Lanier said.

He added that the store had reported that Robledo's use of the restroom made other female customers "very uncomfortable."

Robledo said she was being discriminated against.

"I'm a female trapped in a man's body. It's natural for me to go to the ladies' room. Getting the no trespassing order for a public restroom was really painful," she said.

The incident follows several cases that have stoked public debate about the boundaries of gender identity and the rights of transgender people to use accommodations such as restrooms in government buildings and businesses open to the public.

In February the parents of a 6-year-old transgender girl in Colorado filed a complaint with the state's civil rights agency challenging a decision by education officials to deny their child access to the girls' restrooms in her school. The case is being closely watched by civil libertarians.

Then last month in Arizona, a judge declined to grant a divorce to a transgender man, ruling he could not prove he was a male when he wed his wife in Hawaii. Same-sex marriages are not recognized in Arizona. The man has said he would appeal.

Colorado and a dozen other states have laws explicitly barring discrimination against transgender people in employment, housing and public accommodations, but Idaho does not, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

Robledo said she was being unfairly treated by the store and by authorities in a rural area where questions about gender identity and the rights of transgender people rarely arise.

"I'm struggling here in this rural community as a transgender. Now I feel even more vulnerable," she said.

Ilona Turner, legal director of Transgender Law Center in San Francisco, said it was discriminatory to prevent transgender people from using the same facilities as everyone else.

"Transgender people have the same needs and deserve the same access to public stores and facilities as others without discrimination based on who they are. They just need to go to the bathroom like everyone else," she told Reuters by email.

An executive with Rosauers, a regional supermarket chain based in Spokane, Washington, did not respond to a request for comment.

Under Idaho law, anyone who owns or controls a property can deny access to it. Lanier said police responded to a trespassing matter involving Robledo and were not in a position to address the transgender issue.

"Society has yet to define exactly what makes a transgender. Far be it from a police department in Idaho to try to define that," he said.

A suspect has been arrested in connection with Thursday's incident in which nine students were hospitalized for a possible overdose after eating laced brownies, officials said.

A large amount of marijuana, as well as cocaine and brownies, were found at the home of the suspect, who is not a student, Miami-Dade County Public Schools spokesman John Schuster said.

Miami-Dade Schools Police arrested Dionisio Lockridge, 22, for possession of marijuana, possession of marijuana with intent to sell, possession of cocaine, and possession of Xanax, according to Schuster. It was not immediately known whether Lockridge has an attorney.

The brownies have been sent to the Miami-Dade crime lab for testing.

The nine students from Miami Coral Park Senior High School were taken to Miami Children's Hospital, South Miami Hospital and Kendall Regional, Schuster said earlier. Another student received treatment but was not transported by fire rescue, he said.

It was unknown what was in the food they ate.

"Miami-Dade Schools Police are investigating the matter to identify the substance that the students ingested as well as the source of the substance," the school district said in an email statement.

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Earlier, aerial footage showed two ambulances parked in front of the school, located at 8865 Southwest 16th Street in Miami, and authorities waiting outside with a stretcher.

"The students were transported as a precautionary measure," the school board said in a statement. "Miami-Dade Schools Police are investigating the matter to identify the substance the students ingested as well as the source of the substance."

A student told NBC 6 that Thursday morning, a number of students were selling brownies to their peers, and then moments later, after ingesting the food, many got violently ill.

"I saw the kids throwing up. There were kids who were very itchy," said student Danivellis Torres.

Another student said she saw kids passing out.

"I'm very nervous. I don't understand what happened here," said parent Cecilia Mantilla.