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Archive for April 26, 2010

Man arrested after ppper spraying security www.privateofficer.com

LOS ANGELES CA April 26 2010 (CBS)
Authorities arrested a man who allegedly pepper-sprayed and threatened a security guard with a broken beer bottle outside a Hollywood bar early Monday morning.

One man is still at large in connection with the incident.

The security guard refused to let two men who appeared to be intoxicated into a bar near Melrose Avenue and Harvard Boulevard about 12:30 a.m., Los Angeles police Sgt. Alex Ortiz of the Hollywood Station said.

The security guard was pepper-sprayed in the face, Ortiz said.

The suspects each confronted the guard with the broken beer bottle and both fled when the guard pepper-sprayed them.

One suspect left the scene in his got to his vehicle and sped away, Ortiz said.

The other suspect was arrested five or six blocks away from the scene, Ortiz said.

The arrested suspect was charged with assault with a weapon.

Morgan County teacher sent to prison for student rape www.privateofficer.com

Decatur AL April 26 2010 Morgon County ALabama Jessica Heather Defoor, 36-year-old second-grade teacher at Danville-Neel Elementary School, was arrested in July 2008 for allegedly engaging in inappropriate contact with a female student. In August 2009 she was indicted for alleged sex crimes against a female student, 12 to 16 years old.

In March 2010 Defoor was sentenced to six years for the class C felony of enticing a child for sexual purposes. Defoor was ordered to serve two years in prison, and would be subject to serving the remaining four years of her sentence in prison if she violated the terms of five-years of supervised probation. She was also sentenced to 12 months for the class A misdemeanor of second-degree sexual abuse. The sentences are to run concurrently. In addition, she will be required to register as a convicted sex offender after her release from prison.

Prosecutor Andrew Arrington called it a fair sentence based on her criminal history.

Defoor admitted to taking a 14-year-old girl to concerts and providing her with alcohol. Defoor admitted that the child was present in her home on an evening in February of 2006, that she served the child alcohol, and that she had sexual intercourse with a man while the child was in the house. The child testified that Defoor subjected her to sexual contact, and invited her into the bedroom.

Prosecutors argued that DeFoor and another man, Zackary Mullins, had a sexual relationships with a pair of teenagers. Mullins was arrested in California in October of last year and charged with sodomy, rape, and sexual abuse.

Yale University doctor slain www.privateofficer.com

BRANFORD CT April 26 2010
Source: Hartford Courant An employee at a hospital in New York says a man charged with killing a Yale University doctor outside his Connecticut home had a confrontation with the victim a few years ago.

Branford police say 44-year-old Lishan Wang is charged with murder, attempted murder and firearms offenses in the fatal shooting Monday of Vajinder Toor outside Toor’s home.

A hospital employee told The Associated Press that Wang and Toor were involved in a confrontation a few years ago at Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center after Wang left his post at the intensive care unit and was not reachable for a few hours. The employee said Toor reprimanded him and that Wang threatened Toor in front of other employees.

The employee spoke on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing murder investigation.

Wang’s former landlord told The Courant that Wang lost his job at the hospital and moved out of the apartment he rented from her around November 2008.

That dispute may be part of what prompted Wang to allegedly shoot and kill Toor Monday. Branford police Lt. Geoffrey Morgan said the fatal shooting of Toor, 34, was not random.

According to Branford Police, Lishan Wang was arrested and charged with murder, criminal attempt to commit murder, weapons in a motor vehicle, carrying a handgun without a permit, unlawful discharge of a firearm. Wang is being held on a $2,000,000.00 bond.

Police said his last known address was 3546 South East River Heights Crossing Marietta, Georgia and is a Chinese National from Beijing.

Branford Chief John DeCarlo said, “Our agency is looking at a number of motives for this homicide. One is the possibility that Dr. Toor and Lishan Wang had a previous working relationship at a hospital in New York. We are unsure of the extent of their interactions at this time.”

DeCarlo said there is no connection between the assailant and the victim that relates to the victim’s employment at Yale.

Toor worked at Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center in New York before joining Yale. Morgan says police are looking into whether Toor and the alleged shooter had what police call “some sort of negative interaction” on the job.

Toor was ambushed around 8 a.m. as he walked to his car outside his condominium at 255 Blueberry Lane, police said.

Toor’s wife came out of the condominium after hearing the shots, and the suspect fired at her, but missed, said Morgan. Witnesses said they heard as many as eight shots. Police said Toor was shot multiple times.

Yale Police Chief James Perrotti sent an e-mail to the university community saying Branford police told him the crime was not a random act and was unrelated to Yale.

Harsh Arora, a neighbor and family friend, said the wife, Parneeta, had just waved goodbye to her husband and closed the door when she heard gunshots and ran outside. She saw her husband lying on the ground, saw a man with a gun and asked what he was doing. The man started firing at her, so she hid behind a car, Arora said. The man appeared to be in his 50s and the wife did not recognize him. A neighbor tried to perform CPR on Toor, Arora said.

“She said she had no idea why it happened,” Arora said. “She’s in shock. Why it happened, she has no clue.”

The couple have a 3-year old son, and Parneeta is five months pregnant, Arora said.

“She can’t even cry in front of the kid,” Arora said. “She’s trying to be brave.”The suspect was caught about a mile from the scene driving a van and was taken into custody on Bushy Plain Road, Morgan said. He said the suspect is a Chinese immigrant and that officials are dealing with diplomatic issues.

The suspect was not cooperating with police, and they don’t have his name or know a motive, Morgan said. He said the man has not been formally charged, but police expect to charge him with the killing.

According to the Yale School of Medicine’s website, Toor was a first-year postdoctoral fellow in infections diseases. He had previously worked at Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center in New York and graduated from Guru Govind Singh Medical College in 2001.

Violent shoplifter pulls security officers hair out www.privateofficer.com

Pohatcong NJ April 26 2010
By: Rick McCann/Staff
Private Officer News
http://www.privateofficer.com/
A Phillipsburg woman is in custody charged with robbery after she violently attacked a store security officer at Wal-Mart in Pohatcong Township on Friday, pulling some of the officer’s hair out of her head, court records show.

Vivian A Mendez, 18, of the 300 block of Lincoln Street, is now charged with robbery.

According to police, the alleged attack occurred when two female security officers caught Mendez allegedly shoplifting in the store and confronted her as she left the premises with merchandise that had not been paid for.

Mendez jumped on top of one of the loss prevention agents, punched her on the head and face, and pulled out her hair, authorities alleged.
Police say that the woman was brought under control by store employees until police could arrive.

Mendez is being held pending a court hearing.

Security officer stabbed breaking up bar fight www.privateofficer.com

San Francisco CA April 26 2010

A stabbing at a local bar left two men injured including a security officer.
The situation unfolded about 12:50 a.m. Sunday at Kirby’s Sports Bar at 42312 Fremont Blvd. A fight broke out between two groups, prompting a security guard to intervene, police Sgt. Chris Mazzone said.

The guard wrapped one of the combatants in a bear hug. That emboldened another brawler who, seeing his target tightly wrapped and going nowhere, came at both men with a knife, Mazzone said.

“While they were both together in the bear hug, the suspect stabbed both of them,” Mazzone said.

Neither suffered life-threatening injuries, police said. The names of the victims weren’t released.

Lawmakers want National Guard to patrol Chicago streets www.privateofficer.com

Chicago Il April 26 2010 Two state representatives called on Gov. Pat Quinn Sunday to deploy the Illinois National Guard to safeguard Chicago’s streets.

Chicago Democrats John Fritchey and LaShawn Ford said they want Quinn, Mayor Richard Daley and Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis to allow guardsmen to patrol streets and help quell violence. Weis said he did not support the idea because the military and police operate under different rules.

“Is this a drastic call to action? Of course it is,” Fritchey said. “Is it warranted when we are losing residents to gun violence at such an alarming rate? Without question. We are not talking about rolling tanks down the street or having armed guards on each corner.”

What he envisions, Fritchey said, is a “heightened presence on the streets,” particularly on the roughly 9 percent of city blocks where most of the city’s violent crimes occur.

Weis previously identified those “hot spots” and said he plans to create a 100-person team made up of selected and volunteer police personnel to respond to crime there. If guardsmen were to assist police, they could comprise or contribute to that force, Fritchey said.

So far this year, 113 people have been killed across Chicago, the same number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq and Afghanistan combined in the same period, Fritchey said.

“As we speak, National Guard members are working side-by-side with our troops to fight a war halfway around the world,” Fritchey said. “The unfortunate reality is that we have another war that is just as deadly taking place right in our backyard.” While the National Guard has been deployed in other states to prevent violence related to specific events and protests, the Chicago legislators said they are unaware of guardsmen being deployed to assist with general urban unrest.

Weis countered that the only scenario in which the National Guard would be helpful is in the situation of a tornado, earthquake or flood. If the military were brought in to help with city violence, they wouldn’t answer to police command — creating a “major disconnect” in mission and strategy.

Alluding to the 1970 Kent State University incident where the National Guard was called in and protestors and students were shot, Weis said having guardsmen handle crime could be “disastrous.” But he said if the Daley suggested it, he would consider the option.

“I’m open to anything that reduces violence. But I have concerns when you mix law enforcement and the military,” Weis said.

But Fritchey and Ford said prompt action is needed because summer is right around the corner and with the warm weather comes an increase in violence.

Fritchey and Ford serve two different constituencies, representing the North Side and the West Side respectively. “One half of this city views this as a part of daily life,” Fritchey said. “Another part of the city doesn’t care because it doesn’t affect them.” Yet the lawmakers said they are coming together because gun violence should be a priority to all Chicagoans.

“No help is too much help” Ford said. “This is not just about the murders. It’s about the crime. It’s about people being stabbed, robbed and in the hospital on life support.”

Fritchey said he spoke to representatives from Quinn’s office about deploying guardsmen and they “seemed open to the idea.” The lawmakers had yet to speak to Weis or the mayor’s office.

“I don’t anticipate the governor implementing it over the objection of the mayor,” Fritchey said.

“I hope this doesn’t become a territorial issue. I hope this doesn’t become an ego issue. This isn’t about public relations or politics. This is about reclaiming our communities.”

Categories: police

Gates TN police chief commits suicide www.privateofficer.com

Gates TN April 26 2101
Source: Jackson Sun The Gates police chief has died from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to a news release.

Authorities are awaiting final autopsy results from the Shelby County Medical Examiner to determine the cause and manner of death for Chief Marvin Brown.
The release said that at this time there does not appear to be any suspicious behavior or foul-play associated with the death.

Halls police and Lauderdale County sheriff’s deputies were called to Brown’s home on Sumrow Street in Halls at 10 p.m. Thursday.

They found Brown dead from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. The Halls Police Department, assisted by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, is conducting the investigation of the shooting.

Brown was recently the focus of a TBI investigation into allegations of fraud, theft, and official misconduct related to his employment with both the town of Gates and the Lauderdale County School System.

That investigation has also prompted municipal and county investigative audits of the respective payroll records of Brown from the town of Gates and the Lauderdale County Schools, by the state of Tennessee Comptroller’s Office.

UK woman played detectives to find “suicide voyeur” www.privateofficer.com

United Kingdom April 26 2010 Three British women turned detective to bring an American “suicide voyeur” William Melchert-Dinkel to justice over his alleged attempts to encourage vulnerable people to take their own lives.
Katherine Lowe, 37, an unemployed mother of two, was one of many chat room users to ‘speak’ to Melchert-Dinkel .
Celia Blay started making inquiries after a contact of hers revealed that she was entering into a suicide pact with an American woman she had ‘met’ through the internet .
The 47-year-old is said to have posed as a female nurse on the internet to encourage dozens of people, including a man in the UK, to commit suicide. It is claimed that he wanted to watch his victims die using a webcam.

Melchert-Dinkel, who is married with two children, allegedly pretended to be a compassionate nurse in internet chat rooms – calling himself names including “Falcon Girl” and “Cami D” – in order to prey on depressed people.

He was charged on Friday by the US authorities with two rare counts of assisting suicides, and more charges may follow. He has been charged with aiding the suicide of Mark Drybrough, 32, who hanged himself in Coventry in 2005. Melchert-Dinkel is also accused of assisting with the suicide of Nadia Kajouji, 18, who drowned in a river in Ottawa, Canada.

The charges follow investigative work going back five years by three British women, including Mr Drybrough’s mother. She joined forced with Katherine Lowe, from Wolverhampton, who alleges that Melchert-Dinkel encouraged her over the internet to commit suicide.

The third woman to help was Celia Blay, who started making inquiries after a contact of hers revealed that she was entering into a suicide pact with an American woman she had “met” through the internet.

The findings of the three women were passed to US investigators who have now concluded there is ample evidence to charge their suspect.

It is claimed that the American suspect pretended to feel compassion for people contemplating suicide in chat rooms, while giving them instructions on how to take their own lives.

Prosecutors in the US say Melchert-Dinkel, who is in fact a male nurse, has admitted telling police he had encouraged “dozens” of people to kill themselves and “characterised it as the thrill of the chase”. He has been described as a “suicide voyeur”.

Miss Lowe, 37, an unemployed mother of two, was one of many chat room users to “speak” to Melchert-Dinkel at a time when she was feeling down and potentially suicidal.

Miss Lowe, from Wolverhampton, suspected the American was not who he said he was after a picture he sent her of himself as a female still had a male pseudonym as the filename.

“I made a lot of friends in that internet support group, and we all started to suspect him after a while because he used lots of different names,” she told The Sunday Telegraph yesterday.

“People would offer each other support on there, but whenever he ‘spoke’ to people he was always a bit too over-supportive in encouraging people to go through with suicide. I knew what he was doing, but I decided to string him along to gather all the evidence I could.

“He was always very friendly online, really chatty, and would always insist in getting you to talk to him over a webcam even though there was always some reason why his didn’t work. After a while I convinced him to use a webcam himself, and it was then I saw him as the man he really was. So I took a picture of him on my mobile phone.”

Mrs Drybrough, 61, who is also from Coventry, became suspicious after her son’s death five years ago when an email, allegedly traced back to Melchert-Dinkel, was found on Mr Drybrough’s computer. It contained detailed advice on how a person could hang himself or herself.

Mrs Drybrough compiled a dossier of evidence on her son’s death and passed it on to Minnesota Police. She has also contacted West Midlands police.

“We examined Mark’s computer after he died to see if there was anything that might help us to understand what he had done. Then we came across the emails,” she said. “He was just coming through a nervous breakdown at the time and was incredibly susceptible at that point. Mark was a real computer nerd and this person was there ‘whispering in his ear’ every time he logged on.

Mrs Blay started investigations of her own in late 2006 when she was in email contact with a 17-year-old girl in South America, who was depressed. The teenager revealed to Mrs Blay that she was going to kill herself in a suicide pact with an American woman in which they were going to watch each other die over a webcam.

Mrs Blay, from Maiden Bradley, Wiltshire, started making inquiries and discovered, through a “suicide news group” that the same person was making similar suicide pacts with others and was a man, not a woman. The teenage girl, from Guatemala, abandoned her suicide attempt after the fake identity of her “suicide partner” was revealed. “I am glad this man has been charged. I hope a message had been sent out that vulnerable, suicidal people aren’t easy targets,” she said yesterday.

Melchert-Dinkel will appear in court in the US on May 25. He lives with his wife and two teenage daughters, in Faribault, a town with a population of 20,000 nestled in the hilly Minnesota countryside. His neighbours have described him as a regular churchgoer and a “great dad”.

Armed fake cop arrested near Air Force One www.privateofficer.com

ASHEVILLE, N.C. April 26 2010 AP– An armed man spotted at a North Carolina airport parking lot just after Air Force One departed Sunday told an officer he wanted to see the president and had a car equipped with police gear, including a siren and flashing lights, authorities said.

Joseph Sean McVey, 23, of Coshocton, Ohio, is charged with going armed in terror of the public, a misdemeanor, said Asheville Regional Airport Police Capt. Kevan Smith.

Security was heightened at the airport because President Barack Obama was leaving after spending the weekend vacationing in Asheville. He was headed to a memorial service for 29 West Virginia coal miners killed in an explosion.

At about 2 p.m., airport police saw McVey get out of a maroon car with Ohio plates and that he had a sidearm, Smith said. Both airport police and the Secret Service questioned him and he was taken into custody. The suspect was nowhere near the president’s plane, which had just departed, and was in a rental car return lot that is open to the public, Smith said.

His car was equipped with clear LED law enforcement-style strobe lights in the front and rear dash, Smith said. The car also had a mounted digital camera in the front window, four large antennas on the trunk lid, and under the steering wheel was a working siren box. Smith said McVey was not in law enforcement.

When McVey got out of the car, he was listening to a handheld scanner and radio that had a remote earpiece, Smith said. Police said he was monitoring local agencies and had formulas for rifle scopes on a note in his cup holder. Police did not immediately elaborate on what the formulas might mean and Smith was not available to comment late Sunday.

McVey gave authorities an Ohio driver’s license, but a computer check failed to show the number was valid, police said. His hometown of Coshocton is about halfway between Pittsburgh and Columbus, Ohio.

When Officer Kaleb Rice asked him what he was doing, McVey told him he heard the president was in town and wanted to see him.

Rice removed the firearm and took McVey into custody. He was being held at the Buncombe County jail on $100,000 bond.

The investigation into what McVey was doing with a gun, with formulas for rifle scopes and why his car was equipped with police gear was continuing, Smith said. The Secret Service had no comment on the arrest, deferring to airport police.

A jail officer said it didn’t appear McVey had an attorney. A person who answered a phone listing for Joseph McVey in Coshocton said he had no idea about an arrest.

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