Today's News- Friday, April 3, 2009

YERUSAVAGE GETS SENTENCED
An Auburn arsonist will spend 8 to 16 years in jail for arson fires he set in Schuylkill County last year. 32 year old John Yerusavage, a former firefighter, learned his sentence yesterday in county court. The Republican Herald reports that Yerusavage pleaded guilty but mentally ill for setting fires that destroyed Precisionaire Industries in Auburn, the Red Hill Gun Club and two other buildings, will also have to pay more than $10.5 million dollars in restitution. After he serves his sentence in state prison, he'll be placed on 8 years probation. Precisionaire's parent company, Flanders Corporation, decided not to rebuild after the fire.

DRUG BUST
Two people were arrested on drug charges following an investigation by the county DA's drug task force. During the night Thursday, agents from the task force along with Pottsville and Schuylkill Haven police arrested 47 year old Michael Burton and 39 year old Catherine Chattin at a home on 3rd Street. The pair sold $300 worth of cocaine to an undercover officer. Cops found the cash used in the transaction, along with additional crack cocaine packaged for sale. Both were charged with possession with intent to deliver and related drug counts. Chattin and Burton were taken to Schuylkill County Prison in lieu of $50 thousand dollars bail.

MISSING PERSON FOUND
An all out search by state police for a missing Norwegian Township woman Thursday afternoon ended positively by early evening. Around 3:30pm, a state police helicopter and officers on foot covered the area near the home of 47 year old Tammy Sue Halsey. Police believed she was in danger and needed medical attention at the time of her disappearance. Halsey was located about two hours later.

STATE BUDGET-FURLOUGHS
Rendell, Pa. unions reach deal to avoid furloughs
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - Now that Gov. Ed Rendell's administration has tentative agreements with the three largest state employee unions, it's talking with unions that represent smaller groups of state workers. The Rendell administration is hoping those unions will also agree to the deal that leaders of the three big unions accepted Thursday. The deal would allow the state to reduce its payments to the state workers' health fund by up to $200 million over 15 months.
There would be no change to workers' health benefits, and the money would eventually be repaid. The agreement must be ratified by the unions' members, but labor leaders say they don't think that will be a problem. It would end Rendell's threat to impose rolling furloughs on tens of thousands of state workers.

COURTHOUSE KICKBACKS
FBI probing northeastern Pa. school district
WILKES-BARRE, Pa. (AP) - Federal investigators have expanded their probe of a northeastern Pennsylvania courthouse to the city's school district and vocational-technical school. Wilkes-Barre Area School District Superintendent Jeffrey Namey says the FBI has asked for school board meeting minutes and other documents. Agents on Thursday also requested a list of Wilkes-Barre Area Vocational-Technical school board members since 2005. Jack Dean, a
lawyer who does contract and legal work for the school, says the school cooperated with the request. The development was reported on the Web sites of the Times Leader and Citizens' Voice newspapers. Two former Luzerne County judges have already pleaded guilty to
accepting more than $2 million in kickbacks from private youth detention centers. Two other courthouse figures have also pleaded guilty.

SPECTER-AD
Early Specter TV ad targets Toomey on derivatives
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - The former congressman who nearly beat U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter in the 2004 Pennsylvania Republican primary says Specter is desperate. Pat Toomey is likely to run against Specter again in next year's primary. Specter has launched a cable television ad seeking to tie Toomey's past career as an investment banker to the chaos in the nation's financial markets. The 30-second spot claims Toomey sold risky derivatives called credit default swaps while working as a Wall Street trader before his election to Congress in 1998. Toomey says credit default swaps hadn't even been invented when he was a banker. He says Specter is trying to distract voters from his support of the federal stimulus package, which Toomey says is a waste of money.

COATESVILLE ARSONS
Fire-plagued Pa. town becomes case study in arson
COATESVILLE, Pa. (AP) - The rash of arson in an area about 30 miles west of Philadelphia has experts horrified and intrigued. Unusual things about arson in the Coatesville area include the
sheer number of suspects, most with apparently no connection to one another. Also, there's the long stretch of time over which the crimes have occurred and the mysterious lack of a pattern.
Nearly 50 fires have been set in Coatesville since February 2008, and 20 nearby. Dozens of homes have been damaged and one life has been lost. Even with the arrests, scores of fires remain unsolved. Temple University psychologist Frank Farley says the Coatesville arsons will be studied for years to come. In his words: "Coatesville will become like the poster child for this crime going forward.

1999 STABBING DEATH
W.Va. man arrested in ex-wife's 1999 death in Pa.
PITTSBURGH (AP) - A West Virginia man is awaiting extradition to Pennsylvania now that he's accused of the 1999 stabbing death of his ex-wife in her suburban Pittsburgh home. Allegheny County police say 41-year-old John Minch was arrested Thursday morning at his Cameron, W.Va., home. He's accused of killing 29-year-old Melissa Groot in Bethel Park on May 6, 1999.
Authorities said the next day that Groot was stabbed in the neck several times and found dead in the bathtub. The body was discovered by her husband, David Groot. Police said they didn't have enough evidence to charge Minch until investigators recently re-examined the case. Minch is awaiting extradition in the Northern Regional Jail in Moundsville, W.Va. It was not immediately clear if he had a lawyer.

INFANT'S DEATH
Pa. man guilty of 3rd-degree murder in baby death
ERIE, Pa. (AP) - A northwestern Pennsylvania jury has convicted a 20-year-old man of third-degree murder in the death of his girlfriend's 3-month-old son. Erie County prosecutors had sought a first-degree murder conviction for Damere Talmadge, which would have carried a
mandatory sentence of life in prison. Instead, the Erie man faces an sentence of 20 to 40 years in state prison. Tah-Meere Talmadge died from head injuries June 16. Testimony indicated that Damere Talmadge was not the boy's biological father, but he considered the baby to be his son.
Talmadge's lawyer has said the only evidence against his client is from the baby's mother and her family. Talmadge was convicted Thursday; his sentencing is scheduled for June 1.

SMALL TOWN GANG
Pa. town nabs alleged ringleader of graffiti spree
TUNKHANNOCK, Pa. (AP) - A prosecutor in rural northeastern Pennsylvania says a small town's graffiti spree was a gang initiation ritual. Wyoming County District Attorney George Skumanick says a 20-year-old Tunkhannock man is accused of leading a gang called the Young Thoroughbreds. Investigators say once someone was in the gang, he was burn the letters "YT" into the web of skin between the new member's left thumb and forefinger. Parks, bridges and downtown buildings were hit by the graffiti spree. Tunkhannock Mayor Norm Ball says the teens and their parents should pay for the damage.

UNCONCIOUS IN PARK
Half-naked girl found uncouncious in Philadelphia
PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Philadelphia police say a jogger found a half-naked 14-year-old girl unconscious in a park. Police Lt. John Walker says the girl found Thursday night in Fairmount Park was taken to Temple University Hospital, where she was listed in stable condition. He says she appeared to be in shock and wasn't able to answer questions from police about what happened to her. The jogger who found the girl didn't have a cell phone with him, so he flagged down a passing car. That driver in turn phoned police.

PHILLY COURTHOUSE ESCAPE
Pa. thief who fled sentencing gets 93-month term
PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A Philadelphia man who led an identity theft scheme that netted more than $100,000 is getting nearly seven years and nine months in federal prison. Charles McLaurin was sentenced Thursday, a month after the 30-year-old man slipped away during a break at his initial sentencing hearing. New charges stemming from the escape are pending. He told the judge that he stepped out for a smoke moments before the judge was ready to sentence him and he got scared and fled. McLaurin and others used personal information from Camden, N.J., school employees and others to open credit card accounts. Prosecutors say he was up to old tricks - applying for credit cards - when he was captured in Philadelphia a few weeks later.

OFFICER-DRUG CHARGES
No bail for Philly officer in violent drug plot
PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A Philadelphia police officer is being detained without bail in a violent plot to buy $1.5 million in cocaine and double-cross the dealer. The FBI says five-year Officer Alhinde Weems planned to use his badge and gun to enter the dealer's home and rob him. They say they have him on tape dealing drugs and vowing to shoot a dealer if necessary to pull off the heist. He allegedly says he could provide weapons and accomplices. Weems' defense lawyer suggests the FBI set Weems up through the confidential informant, a lifelong friend. He says several of Weems' police supervisors are prepared to testify for him. A federal judge Thursday found probable cause to uphold the charges filed last week and denied Weems' motion for bail.

MACHINE GUN
Pa. man pleads guilty to possession of machine gun
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - Federal prosecutors say a central Pennsylvania man who fired dozens of gunshots while drunk last year has pleaded guilty to possession of a machine gun, which was found in his home later. No one was injured in the Sept. 30 shooting spree by 28-year-old
Kyle Edwards of South Middleton Township, Cumberland County, about 110 miles west of Philadelphia. Edwards, who had no criminal record before the spree, pleaded guilty to the federal weapons charge Thursday. Last month, Edwards pleaded no contest in county court to simple assault and reckless endangerment and three counts of making terroristic threats. He told the judge he was "highly intoxicated" at the time. The public defender who represented Edwards in county court, John Shugars, said he expected Edwards would get 30 to 37 months in
prison for the federal charge. A message was left Thursday afternoon seeking comment from Edwards' federal public defender, Heidi Freese.

LANCASTER GUN ORDINANCE
Pa. city's ban on firing guns upheld
LANCASTER, Pa. (AP) - A south-central Pennsylvania city's ordinance barring people from firing guns has passed its first court test. Lancaster resident Curtis Swinton, who has a permit to legally carry a concealed weapon, was charged after he fired a gun in a restaurant parking lot in December 2007. He told police his cousin was being beaten up and he fired a warning shot to disperse the assailants. No one was injured. Swinton says only the state can make such gun laws and the ordinance bars people from defending themselves. But Lancaster County Judge Joseph Madenspacher this week upheld the ordinance, saying it has enough exceptions to allow people to defend themselves in court. Violations are punishable by a 90-day jail sentence and a $500 fine for each shot.

GALILEO'S TELESCOPE
Galileo's telescope on historic visit to Philly
PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Though it looks like a cardboard tube that got left out in the rain, it's a priceless instrument whose owner changed the world. The mottled brown cylinder on display at The Franklin Institute science museum in Philadelphia is a 400-year-old telescope used by
Galileo Galilei. His observations of the heavens ultimately changed the face of not only astronomy but all of science. "Galileo, the Medici and the Age of Astronomy" opens Saturday
and runs through Sept. 7. The show makes one other stop, in Stockholm, in time for October's Nobel Prize announcements. After that, the telescope and other items return in January to their home in the Institute and Museum of the History of Science in Florence. On display are more than 100 artifacts from that museum, which is closed for extensive restoration work, as well as the Uffizi Gallery and the Pitti Palace in Florence.

LONDON (AP) - President Barack Obama is headed for the 60th anniversary NATO summit in Strasbourg, France, this morning. NATO leaders will talk about the changing mission, especially in Afghanistan. Officials say Obama will ask for more civilians to help in rebuilding and running key ministries.

LONDON (AP) - Tens of thousands of protesters have descended on Strasbourg, France and Kehl, Germany. They are the host cities for the NATO summit. Yesterday, Strasbourg police clashed with several hundred demonstrators. Authorities say up to 65,000 protesters may rally on both sides of the border.

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Labor Department today is slated to release a report expected to show that a net total of 654,000 jobs were lost last month. If so, it would mark a record four straight months that job losses topped 600,000. The news comes despite a few hopeful signs that the recession could be easing.

DALLAS (AP) - Blustery weather that rolled across Texas has apparently downed power lines, sparking a fire that destroyed about 34 homes in a small town near Lake Corpus Christi. The Texas Forest Service says one volunteer firefighter was burned and two other people suffered minor injuries in the afternoon fire.

RADFORD, Va. (AP) - Radford University remains on lockdown as police search for a man suspected of fatally shooting someone near the campus on Thursday evening. The university says in an e-mail that the suspect was last seen near the Virginia school's student center.