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Alert guard spots steel plant fire, prevents major damage www.privateofficer.com
A security guard spotted smoke at about 3:30 a.m. at the WHEMCO Plant on West Seventh Street.
Firefighters were able to isolate the fire and extinguish the blaze in about an hour. They said the fire was caused by an electrical short in an overhead light.
There were only security and maintenance workers in the plant at the time. No one was hurt.
The problem will not affect daytime operations at the plant, officials said.
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Woman charged after leaving infant in vehicle at mall www.privateofficer.com
Police responded to the parking lot of the Macy’s store at the Mall at Rockingham Park on Friday on a report of an infant in a vehicle. Police said the child was left in a running, unlocked vehicle with the interior light left on.
A page for the registered owner of the car was put out by mall security, and a short time later, a woman pushing a shopping cart with another baby exited Macy’s and approached the officers.
Police said the woman was identified as Kelly Acerra, 34. She told police she was the mother of the infant and said she was making a return and didn’t want to take the sleeping baby inside with her, police said.
Acerra was released, pending an arraignment in Salem District Court.
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UPS executive commits suicide after rape arrest www.privateofficer.com
Gwinnett County police confirmed that Samoline’s death Friday was ruled a suicide by the medical examiner.
His body was discovered by a hotel maid at a Marriott Residence Inn in Norcross, not far from his home, according to a police report.
The U.S. Marine Corps. colonel had worked at UPS since 1994. He was wearing his military uniform when he was found.
Samoline had maintained his innocence during the ordeal, said his lawyer Megan B. Lewis of the Bloomington law firm Mallor Clendening Grodner & Bohrer. He insisted the sex was consensual, Lewis said. The accuser was a student at Indiana University, according to the Bloomington Herald Times.
Samoline had gotten very depressed about the allegations and the attention from online crime blogs and the media, Lewis said. UPS had suspended him pending an investigation.
Samoline was married but separated, Lewis said.
Last Monday, Samoline turned himself in to Bloomington, Ind., on the rape charges, then posted bail. He voluntarily submitted a blood sample, Lewis said.
“The death of Mark Samoline is a tragedy for everyone involved,” she said.
Samoline joined UPS in 1994, working in Tokyo, UPS spokesman Norman Black said last week.
At one point, Samoline was the company’s highest-ranking supply chain manager in Japan and Korea, Black said.
Prior to Samoline’s death, he worked in corporate headquarters in Sandy Springs as a vice president of supply chain and logistics, working closely with defense vendors and contractors, Black said. He was one of hundreds of vice presidents at UPS, Black said.
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Casino security officers arrest rape suspect www.privateofficer.com
Manoxay J. Salivanh, 37, allegedly followed a 23-year-old woman from the casino at 8201 N.E. Birmingham Road into a parking garage elevator and later a stairwell, where he allegedly attacked her.
A bystander heard the victim’s screams about 2:45 a.m. Nov. 1 and stopped the attack. Surveillance cameras recorded the suspect grabbing the woman, pushing her against a wall and trying to pull her pants down.
Ameristar security officers recognized and arrested Salivanh Sunday when he showed up at the casino wearing clothes that appeared to be the same worn by the attacker the week before.
When police detectives interviewed Salivanh Sunday night, he said he was at the casino “talking to everyone, trying to make a new friend.” He told detectives he followed the victim to her vehicle, according to court records.
Prosecutors charged Salivanh with attempted forcible rape.
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Rivers Casino security vote not to unionize www.privateofficer.com
The SPFPA is one of two unions currently courting Rivers Casino workers: The United Steelworkers of America are also working with some of the remaining 800 or so Rivers employees to explore possible unionization.
Steve Maritas, the union’s organizing director, was dissapointed by the results and said he planned to file objections to the conditions surrounding the organizing effort.
Officals from the Rivers Casino, which opened in August, did not immediately return calls for comment on Monday.
Maritas added that he’s confident there will be another vote in the future.
“In the beginning, pretty much we’re just looking to get a contract” for three years, he said. “We know the casino’s just opening up. … We’ll certainly work with them to see what objections they have.”
SPFPA represents about 2,000 security workers in the Pittsburgh region, some of them working at local hospitals.
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8 die in Louisiana helicopter crash www.privateofficer.com
The helicopter, operated by PHI Inc., crashed Sunday afternoon shortly after taking off, said Richard Rovinelli, a company spokesman. Two pilots and seven passengers were aboard when the helicopter went down in rural Terrebonne Parish, about 100 miles southwest of New Orleans. The passengers worked for two Shell Oil Co. contractors and the company said they were on their way to its Gulf of Mexico platform.
Coast Guard Petty Officer Jaclyn Young said the lone survivor was transported to a medical facility in suburban New Orleans, and was critical condition Sunday night. There was no immediate update on condition available Monday.
Ted Lopatkiewicz, spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board, said the helicopter is believed to have crashed about seven minutes after it took off at 3:02 p.m. ET. Lopatkiewicz said there were scattered clouds and visibility was 10 miles at the time of the crash, and the crew reported no problems before the helicopter went down.
A short time after the crash, the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center in Panama City, Fla., received an electronic distress signal from the helicopter with the aircraft’s tail number and GPS coordinates, center spokesman Master Sgt. Jeffery Harlan said. The center contacted PHI, which confirmed it couldn’t locate the chopper, Harlan said.
The helicopter, a Sikorsky S-76C, would have had a voice recorder aboard and possibly a flight data recorder, Lopatkiewicz said. NTSB investigators were expected to arrive later Monday at the crash site, to work with local authorities in the search for the recorder and other material. An NTSB investigator also was headed for PHI’s offices to go through maintenance and crew records.
Lafayette-based PHI is a primary provider of helicopter services to oil and gas platforms that dot the coast of Louisiana. It also flies medical helicopters.
Workers typically are flown to and from their worksites from coastal flight bases.
Young said the Coast Guard assisted Terrebonne Parish sheriff’s deputies in recovering the dead and rescuing the survivor from the marshy Bayou Penchant area. A sheriff’s office spokesman did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment Monday.
PHI identified the dead as Allen Boudreaux, of Ama, La.; Andrew Moricio and Ezequiel Cantu of Morgan City, La.; Randy Tarpley of Jonesville, La.; Jorey A. Rivero, of Bridge City, La.; Charles W. Nelson of Pensacola, Fla.; Thomas E. Ballenger of Eufaula, Ala. and Vyarl W. Martin of Hurst, Texas.
The injured man was Steven Yeltin of Floresville, Texas.
Ballenger and Martin were PHI pilots. Boudreaux, Moricio, Cantu and Tarpley worked for Dynamic Industries of New Iberia, La. The other passengers worked for MMR Offshore Services, Inc., part of Baton Rouge-based MMR Group Inc.
In June, a PHI Air Medical helicopter crashed in Texas, killing four people. The accident in the Sam Houston National Forest killed the pilot, paramedic, nurse and a patient who was being transported from Huntsville to Houston.
That crew agreed to transport the patient after another helicopter company abandoned the mission, saying cloud cover was too low, making visibility poor in the early morning darkness
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Fla. security company hired felon to run port operations www.privateofficer.com
Jason Deltoro, 27, hired shortly after Sunstates Security began work at the port in January, left the company Oct. 30, according to the company’s president, Glenn Burrell. The Palm Beach Post began inquiring into the matter days earlier
State law requires that uniformed security guards and branch managers who work for private security companies be licensed. Sunstates Security, whose port contract is worth $450,000 to $800,000 annually, could lose its license to do business in Florida if it violated that law, said Terry McElroy, spokesman for the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.
A port official says Deltoro served as Sunstates’ branch manager there. Deltoro was arrested Feb. 27 after he crashed into a car and failed sobriety tests, according to a police report. He swung and kicked at officers, who used a stun gun on him and took him to the St. Lucie County jail, the report said.
The Port St. Lucie resident, who pleaded no contest to driving while intoxicated and a felony charge of resisting arrest with violence, is scheduled for sentencing Nov. 30.
That arrest was about two months after he was hired. In 2008, before his hiring, the state denied Deltoro a license to work in private security because of a previous felony conviction, for habitually driving with a suspended license.
Records show he was arrested at least three times before joining Sunstates. The charges included driving under the influence, violating probation and the suspended-license count.
Sunstates executives said Monday that all new hires undergo thorough background checks, but they declined to say why Deltoro’s did not raise red flags.
“We can’t comment,” said Jeff Cathcart, Sunstates’ compliance manager, citing confidentiality concerns. “We did a background investigation. We found it satisfactory, so we hired him. That’s as far as we can go.”
Deltoro, reached Monday at the phone number listed for Sunstates’ Broadway office near the port, described himself as an office manager and declined further comment.
Deltoro was hired by Sunstates after working for SSA Security, the Port of Palm Beach’s previous security company. Sunstates’ Burrell said Deltoro was an administrator but not branch manager, and that another employee, Terry Blackmon, was the company’s licensed branch manager.
Office workers are not required to be licensed.
“He helped hire some people. He helped with sales. That was really his role,” Burrell said of Deltoro.
But Port of Palm Beach Security Director Ken Hern, who oversees the contracted guard work, said Deltoro served as the branch manager until about March, when word of his most recent arrest reached the port.
“He had an incident a while back. He was removed from his position and is pretty much riding a desk in the Sunstates office until it’s resolved,” Hern said Monday.
Hern defended the port’s handling of the situation, saying that when the port got word of Deltoro’s February arrest, it acted.
“What goes on in the area office really isn’t on our radar,” Hern said. “That’s independent of what the port operation is, although, again, when this issue was brought to our attention, we did effect changes.”
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