Today's News-Monday, November 19th

What was just forecast to be snow flurries and showers turned out to be the first snowfall of the season. Before dawn Sunday, snow began to fall across the listening area, coating lawns and trees. The problem was that it didn’t stop, and roads became snow and slush covered, making travel difficult, and causing numerous accidents throughout the afternoon and evening. Power outages have affected nearly 3-thousand-customers of PPL Electric Utilities. Eighteen-hundred in the Marian Heights service area, 235 customers in the Frackville service area, and 900 in the Orwigsburg service areas. There are pockets of outages in a number of communities served by these broad PPL power stations. Snow on tree limbs are causing the disruptions. The National Weather Service has a snow advisory in effect until 10am this morning. Please be careful when traveling this morning.

A Trevorton woman died in a Sunday afternoon crash in Barry Township. A car driven by Patrick Gearhart of Trevorton was traveling east on Route 901, uphill, and Christine Deremer of Elysburg was traveling west on a downhill slope. Roads were snow-covered. Gearhart lost control of his vehicle and crashed into Deremer’s car on the passenger's side. 20-year-old Nicole Davis of Trevorton was killed. Scott Gearheart of Gilbert, PA was injured. Deremer was taken to Geisinger Medical Center.

Several people have been charged with fraud in Pottsville. An extended investigation by Pottsville Police, the Pottsville Housing Authority and the US Department of Housing and Urban Development found that Carl Johnson and Lisa Phillip of Pottsville pleaded guilty to falsifying income in their application for rental assistance through the Pottsville Housing Authority, while owning a rental property in the city. By not reporting the income, the pair were able to receive help for their rent. The Republican and Herald reports that the housing program, administered by PHA, was defrauded by more than $30-thousand-dollars. In a second instance, Jennifer Hollywood of Port Carbon was arrested for not including income from her boyfriend, who lived with her for several years while participating in a rent assistance program. The total amount that Hollywood is alleged to have defrauded the program is about $28-thousand-dollars. Hollywood was arraigned and taken to Schuylkill County Prison.

State police at Schuylkill Haven conducted a target enforcement effort Friday and Saturday in Mount Carbon borough and North Manheim Township. The location of the targeted enforcement was based on recent crime and traffic trends. During the detail, two persons were arrested for DUI, and one for illegal drug possession. Eighteen traffic citations were issued, and 8 written warnings were given. State police remind county residents that the STEP-PSP program will continue throughout the holiday season in targeted areas.

A Sugarloaf man is in custody on an arrest warrant for a theft earlier this year. Saturday afternoon, state police at Frackville exercised the search warrant against 40-year-old Charles Marcinko, in connection with a burglary in March at a cabin in North Union Township. He is accused of taking an antique cast iron stove from the property, and is charged with burglary, criminal trespass, theft and criminal mischief. Marcinko was arraigned and taken to Schuylkill County Prison.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - PennDOT and the National Weather Service are
urging drivers to use caution during the morning rush hour. Snow is
coating many roads north and west of Philadelphia. Snowfall totals
range up to 7 inches in northeastern Pennsylvania.

NEW YORK (AP) - Train traffic on the Northeast rail corridor is
moving again after a disruption caused by an electrical breakdown
in a tunnel linking New York's Pennsylvania Station to New Jersey.
The malfunction disrupted northeast corridor traffic from 8:30 a.m.
to 3p.m. Sunday.

ALLENTOWN, Pa. (AP) - President Bush's Thanksgiving turkey will
come from a Pennsylvania farm. Jaindl Farms in Orefield, Lehigh
County, has been providing the White House with its Thanksgiving
turkeys since the late 1950s, when President Eisenhower was in
office.

PITTSBURGH (AP) - A 10-month-old Pittsburgh baby is dead after
being raped and beaten while her mother was at work.
Thirty-year-old Clinton Smith is charged in the case. Police say
the baby's mother told them she left the baby with Smith on
Thursday when she went to work.

PITTSBURGH (AP) - The Steel City is getting ready for its 250th
birthday celebration next year. Pittsburgh plans to mark the
anniversary of its naming with a yearlong series of events. One of
the biggest will be an inaugural bike ride on the Great Allegheny
Passage to Cumberland, Maryland.

BARGUNA, Bangladesh (AP) - The death toll from last week's
cyclone in Bangladesh has topped 2,500. Survivors have begun
burying their loved ones as they wait for aid to arrive. Items such
as tents, rice and water have been slow to reach many.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Pakistan's Supreme Court has
dismissed legal challenges to President Pervez Musharraf's
emergency rule, but opposition leaders are denouncing the decision.
Meanwhile, the former wife of a jailed opposition leader says he
has gone on a hunger strike.

JERUSALEM (AP) - Israel has approved the release of more than
400 Palestinian prisoners ahead of a U.S.-sponsored Mideast peace
conference. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says the gesture is meant to
bolster the moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in his
struggle with the militant group Hamas.

RIDGEVILLE, S.C. (AP) - A bus driver is dead after a tour bus
ran off a South Carolina interstate and into some trees early this
morning. About 30 others have been injured. A co-owner of the bus
company tells a Columbia television station the crash was a "freak
accident."

NEW YORK (AP) - The lights won't be very bright on Broadway this
Thanksgiving. Talks have broken down between striking stagehands
and theater producers, and no new negotiations are scheduled. Now,
more than two-dozens productions are canceled through the usually
lucrative holiday weekend.