Top Stories category, Page 472
No. 11 Duquesne upsets No. 6 BYU, earns 1st NCAA Tournament win since 1969
Duquesne’s players weren’t ready for their coach to retire just yet, and Thursday, playing in the school’s first NCAA Tournament in 47 years, they showed him why. Now, Keith Dambrot is stuck coaching them again. “If we keep winning games, they’re going to make me an old man,” said the...
Police charge Etna mom in drowning death of son, 1, in backyard pool
An Etna woman was arrested Thursday in the drowning death last summer of her 1-year-old son. Brittany Garrison, 28, took the boy, Leo, and a sibling to swim in an aboveground pool in her backyard on Sycamore Street around 3 p.m. on July 27, 2023, Allegheny County Police said. Garrison...
Ben Folds, Los Lonely Boys among Three Rivers Arts Festival’s featured concerts
This year’s free featured concert lineup for the Dollar Bank Three Rivers Arts Festival was announced Thursday. The festival, running May 31-June 9 in Pittsburgh’s Cultural District, will feature singer-songwriter Ben Folds, seminal hip-hop groups the Sugarhill Gang and the Furious Five, among others. The main stage is moving to...
Biden cancels $5.8B more in student debt for firefighters, nurses, public service workers
The Biden administration on Thursday announced $5.8 billion in additional student loan relief for those working as firefighters, nurses and various other public service jobs in Pennsylvania and across the nation. The latest batch of canceled debt applies to 77,700 borrowers. It stems from fixes made by the administration to...
New game plan: Kenny Pickett’s Cranberry home on the market for $2.7M
Leaving the Pittsburgh Steelers isn’t the only move for Kenny Pickett. The team’s former quarterback is finding a new home off the field, too. Less than a week after being traded to the cross-state rival Philadelphia Eagles, Pickett has decided to part ways with his home on Spruce Lane in...
Dreshar Stadium promises to be jewel of Tarentum’s riverfront plans
Tarentum officials are promising Dreshar Stadium, or at least the property that houses the 85-year-old venue, will be the jewel of a newly designed borough riverfront. They’re so confident, in fact, the borough is passing on a chance at $250,000 to fix up the aging stadium and sports field. Instead...
1 of the few remaining survivors of the attack on Pearl Harbor has died at 102
HONOLULU — Richard C. “Dick” Higgins, one of the few remaining survivors of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, has died, a family member said Wednesday. He was 102. Higgins died at home in Bend, Oregon, on Tuesday of natural causes, granddaughter Angela Norton said. Higgins was a radioman assigned...
Raymond Sims’ children, grandchildren mourn family patriarch, jitney driver at East Liberty vigil
On June 13, 2023, Cassandra Paul lost her 29-year-old daughter, Tanika, to gun violence. Sixteen years earlier, she buried her son, Terry Lee, then 19, after he was killed in a home invasion. On Wednesday night, as wind chilled the air below freezing, the Pittsburgh woman struggled to light candles...
Republicans call for raising retirement age in clash with Biden
WASHINGTON — The largest caucus of House Republicans called for an increase in the Social Security retirement age Wednesday, setting up a clash with President Joe Biden over spending on popular programs. The Republican Study Committee, which comprises about 80% of House Republicans, called for the Social Security eligibility age...
Pittsburgh Public Schools authorizes its attorney to sue Allegheny County to force a countywide property reassessment
Pittsburgh Public Schools officials have authorized their solicitor to sue Allegheny County in order to undergo a countywide property reassessment. But Solicitor Ira Weiss hopes a simple letter to county officials will get the conversation going and a formal legal filing with the Court of Common Pleas will not be...
Tim Benz: No team in NCAA Tournament has more sources of motivation than Duquesne
OMAHA, Neb. — You could see the wheels turning in Spencer Johnson’s head the moment he was asked about Duquesne coach Keith Dambrot. The Brigham Young senior was asked whether the fact Dambrot is retiring at the end of the season was going to provide extra inspiration for Duquesne, and,...
Homicide victim’s mom calls 22-year sentence slap on wrist for killer of Dravosburg man
A Beltzhoover man will serve at least 22 years in prison after pleading guilty on Tuesday to fatally shooting a man eight times in the head. Le’Juane Powell, 30, pleaded guilty to third-degree murder in the death last year of Kenneth A. Lennex, 34, of Dravosburg. Allegheny County Common Pleas...
What a proposed performance-based funding model could mean for Pitt, Penn State, other state-related universities
This story was produced by the State College regional bureau of Spotlight PA, an independent, nonpartisan newsroom dedicated to investigative and public-service journalism for Pennsylvania. STATE COLLEGE — Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro has proposed creating a predictable funding formula and boosting state support by 5% for the state-related universities —...
New Kensington man accused of threatening to kill woman, offering to pay to drop charges
New Kensington police are looking for a man they say assaulted a woman with a gun, threatened to kill her and then offered to pay her to drop the charges. Police charged Jadrian Race Wade, 30, of Woodmont Avenue with felony counts of aggravated assault and witness intimidation, court records...
Police charge man in Downtown Pittsburgh armed carjacking, gunpoint robberies at The Waterfront; victim tells her story
Laura Stuart has dedicated her life to helping others. One night last week , when a stranger carjacked her in a Downtown Pittsburgh parking garage, she felt someone might have been watching out for her, too. Stuart walked into the garage at 320 Smithfield St. after attending a Greater Pittsburgh...
T riders face closures, detours from upcoming $150M rehab project in Pittsburgh, South Hills
Pittsburgh Regional Transit next month will start a $150 million rehabilitation project for the agency’s light-rail network. The construction will lead to rolling closures of parts of the rail lines and will require significant detours. The agency, the region’s largest public transit operator, said it will repair concrete rail foundations...
Hydrants, waterlines questioned in wake of fatal Jeannette blaze
Jeannette fire Chief Bill Frye said the city’s aging waterlines impacted firefighters’ ability to extinguish an overnight blaze that killed a father and his four young children in a Guy Street home. Both Frye and Municipal Authority of Westmoreland County officials confirmed Wednesday a 6-inch water line feeds into the...
Prayer vigil offers comfort to family of Jeannette fire victims
Delena Lewis ached as she listened to prayers swirl around in the wind outside Jeannette City Hall on Wednesday afternoon. The devastation was fresh — her son Tyler J. King, 27, and four grandchildren, Kyson, 7, Kinzleigh, 6, Keagan, 3, and Korbyn, 1 month, were killed hours earlier in a...
Springdale mom heads to prison in methadone death of daughter, 5
The prosecutor handling the case of a 5-year-old who died from methadone poisoning told the court that there were two unanswered questions. Why was there methadone in Samantha McMunn’s Springdale house on the day her daughter died? And how did it get into her baby syringe? “I just think it’s...
CNX Resources to pay nearly $13K for each 1.5 million gallons drawn from Beaver Run for fracking
A week after water use restrictions were lifted for customers served by Beaver Run Reservoir, a Canonsburg company was given a contract that allows it to buy 51 million gallons of water to use in fracking at nearby gas wells, Municipal Authority of Westmoreland County officials said Wednesday. The authority...
United Steelworkers union endorses Biden for president
PITTSBURGH — The United Steelworkers Union has endorsed President Joe Biden, giving him support from another large labor union. The announcement Wednesday by the Pittsburgh-based union came less than a week after Biden voiced opposition to the planned sale of U.S. Steel to Nippon Steel of Japan, saying it’s vital...
Pittsburgh Technical College put on probation
Pittsburgh Technical College in Oakdale has been placed on probation by the Middle States Commission for Higher Education and warned that its accreditation “is in jeopardy.” In a post to its website, the accrediting body said it acted due to “insufficient evidence that the institution is currently in compliance with...
Maggots, heat, decomposition lead judge to find Munhall funeral director guilty of abusing corpse
The Pennsylvania statute defining abuse of a corpse is simple. All that’s required is for a person to treat a dead body “in a way that he knows would outrage ordinary family sensibilities.” For a funeral home director to let a body sit for several days in summer, decomposing without...
Allegheny County’s elections board OKs ballot drop-off sites with 3-0 vote
Allegheny County’s new ballot drop-off locations are finally official. The county Board of Elections voted unanimously Wednesday to add six locations where voters can drop off mail-in ballots for the upcoming primary election. Staffed drop-off locations will be placed in Squirrel Hill, Moon, McKeesport, North Park, South Park and Boyce...
Duquesne in the NCAAs: Dukes vs. BYU scouting report
OMAHA, Neb. — One thing that always tends to get me in trouble when I fill out my NCAA brackets is that I fall in love with a team early in the season and I proclaim them as my March Madness dark horse in November. Then they inevitably flame out...
