Top Stories category, Page 1566
Inspector General charges 45 with welfare fraud
The state caught 45 suspected welfare fraudsters in December, who allegedly scammed the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and other programs out of more than $240,000, according to the Office of the State Inspector General. The office charged 35 people with felonies, the remaining 10 with misdemeanors. Three residents of Allegheny...
Firm says Wawa customers’ hacked credit card info being sold
PHILADELPHIA — Convenience store giant Wawa Inc. said Tuesday it is responding to reports that hacked information from its customers’ credit cards may be being sold on the dark web. The company said in a news release that customers who may be affected can obtain free credit monitoring and identity...
Lawmakers OK ending election of Pennsylvania’s lieutenant governor
HARRISBURG — A measure to amend the constitution in Pennsylvania and let each political party’s gubernatorial nominee choose who will serve under them as lieutenant governor cleared a first hurdle Tuesday. The Republican-controlled Senate voted 46 to 2 for a constitutional amendment that would end the current practice, in which...
Western Pa. native, country singer Matt Westin keeps racking up international accolades
Country singer Matt Westin has fans in Singapore, Australia, South Africa, the U.K., Italy and Spain. In 2018, he was named the International Music and Entertainment Association’s Male Country Artist of the Year. His album “Legacy” has drawn favorable reviews around the world and placed singles on international charts. He’s...
3 dump trucks catch fire in Pittsburgh’s Hays neighborhood
Investigators are trying to figure out how three dump trucks caught fire in the city’s Hays neighborhood, according to the city Department of Public Safety. The fire started around 3:20 a.m. Wednesday in the parking lot of a construction company on Calera Street. Firefighters extinguished the blaze. No one was...
Natrona man puts his lifelong love of trains, hometown on display
Mike Stawinski was 8 years old when his father, Stanly, brought home a model train he found while working for Harrison in 1965. Stawinski, now 60, took his father’s find and built it into a lifelong hobby. A 6-by-12-foot HO-scale model train layout sits in his Natrona basement. The train...
Monroeville teen charged as an adult in Leslie Road shooting
A 16-year-old who police said shot an 18-year-old in Monroeville on Tuesday night has been charged as an adult. Rayshaun Jackson, 16, allegedly shot an 18-year-old man in the torso twice around 9:30 p.m. in front of a house along the 100 block of Leslie Road and then fled to...
Changes to Pennsylvania’s deer season and more appear likelyVideo
Another Saturday opener, the Sunday following and two weeks of concurrent buck and doe hunting. Those are just a few of the highlights that could define Pennsylvania’s statewide firearms deer season this fall. And that’s not all. Additional changes could be coming to bear, archery deer, turkey, raccoon and squirrel...
Verona fires police officer accused of corruption of a minor
A Verona police officer accused of having child porn and corrupting a teenage boy has been fired. Council unanimously voted to terminate terminated the employment of part-time patrolman Anthony Ogline Tuesday night. He was suspended without pay Jan. 17 after borough officials were informed of an investigation involving Ogline, 34,...
Pittsburgh man accused of illegally selling booze at Homewood ‘speakeasy’
A Pittsburgh man is accused of running a “speakeasy” that sold liquor and beer without a license in the city’s Homewood neighborhood. Sean Reese, 34, is accused of owning and operating an illegal operation called “Club Secrets,” state police said Tuesday in a news release. Investigators filed the charges against...
Pentagon: 50 troops suffered brain injuries from Iran strikeVideo
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon on Tuesday raised to 50 the number of U.S. service members who suffered traumatic brain injuries in Iran’s missile strike earlier this month on an Iraqi air base, the third time the number of injuries has been increased. The new casualty total belies President Donald Trump’s...
Social Security numbers exposed on Allegheny County website
Hundreds of Social Security numbers could be contained in unredacted documents housed on the Allegheny County Civil Courts public website. The Tribune-Review located federal tax lien documents filed each year from 1997 to 2010 that display unredacted tax identification numbers. In many cases, they are an individual’s Social Security number....
2 killed in Fayette County crash
Two people were killed in a head-on collision in Fayette County Tuesday afternoon, according to state police. John Snyder, 68, of Scottdale, and Tiler Guth, 24, of Vanderbilt, were pronounced dead at the scene, police said. Officers responded to the incident shortly before 2:45 p.m. Tuesday along Route 201 in...
Pennsylvania senators pass bill to toughen penalties for repeat DUI drivers
HARRISBURG — The state Senate on Tuesday overwhelmingly passed legislation to substantially increase penalties for motorists who have multiple DUI convictions to end what the bill’s sponsor called Pennsylvania’s “revolving door system” for the most serious drunk drivers. The bill passed, 43-6, and goes to the House of Representatives for...
Trump team wraps impeachment defense with an elephant in the Senate: John BoltonVideo
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s defense team ended its arguments in his Senate trial Tuesday by broadly dismissing the elephant in the room: a leaked firsthand account from John Bolton, the former national security adviser, that the president directly tied aid to Ukraine to his demands for the country to...
Pittsburgh audit turns up problems with fund used to pay for umpires in city parks
Pittsburgh Controller Michael Lamb has placed a hold on a money going into an account that pays for umpires and other officials and expenses during city sports league games. Lamb said the Parks and Recreation Department in 2019 had an informal agreement with the Pittsburgh Sports Officials, an organization that...
Pennsylvania reports 9 new flu-related deaths
After a two-week respite, Pennsylvania reported an increase in flu-related deaths in the past week, according to the state Department of Health. As of the week ending Jan. 25, a total of 33 flu-related deaths have been reported this flu season, which started Sept. 29. That’s up by nine from...
Judge could nix key witness testimony in Wilkinsburg mass shooting
The judge presiding over the 2016 Wilkinsburg mass shooting case said Tuesday he’s considering suppressing testimony of a jailhouse witness who, along with offering information in the Wilkinsburg case, offered information in a dozen other crimes. The death-penalty trial for Cheron Shelton and Robert Thomas — both of whom face...
Liberty Tunnel in Pittsburgh reopened after crash
A multi-vehicle crash that closed the inbound (northbound) Liberty Tunnel has been cleared, according to PennDOT. The crash occurred at about 3:19 p.m. Tuesday and was cleared by 3:57. Emergency personnel were on the scene. TRAFFIC REMAINS STOPPED at the Inbound a Liberty Tunnel due to a multi- vehicle accident....
PETA wants Punxsutawney Phil to retire; Groundhog Club president responds
PETA is suggesting Pennsylvania’s most famous groundhog call it a career. The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sent a letter to Punxsutawney Groundhog Club president Bill Deeley on Tuesday morning and asked for Punxsutawney Phil to retire “to a reputable sanctuary and start using a cutting-edge animatronic groundhog...
Powerful earthquake hits between Cuba and JamaicaVideo
HAVANA — A powerful magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck in the Caribbean Sea between Jamaica and eastern Cuba on Tuesday, shaking a vast area from Mexico to Florida and beyond, but there were no immediate reports of casualties or heavy damage. The quake was centered 86 miles northwest of Montego Bay,...
Close call between orbiting space junk expected above Pittsburgh
What happens if a space telescope weighing more than a ton collides with a 10-pound experimental satellite about 600 miles above Pittsburgh? “You probably wouldn’t see anything here at all,” National Weather Service meteorologist Lee Hendricks said. The gloomy, overcast cloud cover is expected to continue through 6:39 p.m. Wednesday,...
412 Food Rescue expands mission in Westmoreland, other Western Pa. counties
A Pittsburgh nonprofit that “rescues” good food from going to landfills is expanding its services to surrounding counties through a smartphone app and a U.S. Department of Agriculture grant. 412 Food Rescue, founded in 2015, redirects surplus food from local waste streams to nonprofits that serve people in need. In...
Donations pour in for New Alexandria teen struggling to recover from medical emergency
A New Alexandria teen who earned three livestock ribbons at the 2019 Pennsylvania Farm Show is struggling to recover after undergoing cardiac arrest and hemorrhagic shock. In early January, Autumn Zundel, 13, was diagnosed with an anterior mediastinal mass between her heart and lungs, after going to UPMC Children’s Hospital...
Loss for words: Conversations missing from some Sweethearts candy
Sometimes it’s hard to get the message across about your feelings for someone. Just ask the distributors for Sweethearts conversation hearts. After missing Valentine’s Day altogether last year, the candy manufactured for Spangler Candy Co. in Bryan, Ohio, has had issues getting the wording right on this year’s candy hearts....
