A woman who was held against her will during a domestic dispute in West Haven and robbed is in the hospital and police have arrested a suspect. 

Police said 30-year-old Jamyl W. Mercer, of New Haven, is accused of holding the woman against her will and they located him at a home in New Haven. 

The victim’s jewelry was stolen during the incident and she sustained serious injuries, according to police. 

Mercer was charged with first-degree assault, robbery in the first degree, threatening in the second degree, unlawful restraint in the second degree, criminal mischief in the third degree, larceny in the sixth degree and disorderly conduct.

The parents of a 6-week-old baby girl who died last month after suffering severe injuries have been charged with manslaughter.

The baby, Emily Babilonia, died last month. She suffered from cranial bleeding, bruising to the brain, bruising on her jaw and rib fractures, according to police and court paperwork.

The baby’s parents, 23-year-old Edwin Babilonia and 20-year-old Ashley Perez, of Hartford, were arrested last month and they appeared in court Friday.

The investigation started when police responded to Connecticut Children’s Medical Center on Thursday, May 24 to investigate.

The court paperwork is redacted but says Perez told police that Edwin Babilonia dropped the baby.

Edwin Babilonia initially said Perez had abused the baby on several occasions, but police confronted him about inconsistencies in the statements and he confessed to accidentally dropping the baby and washing her face, according to police.

The baby is a twin and the other infant has been in the custody of the state Department of Children and Families after being evaluated.

Edwin Babilonia and Perez were initially charged with risk of injury to a minor and cruelty to persons. Police have also charged Edwin Babilonia and Perez with first-degree assault and protective orders have been issued.

Officials said neither parent had a prior record and that officials from DCF said they had no prior involvement with the family.

They parents appeared in court on Friday and both parents have now been charged with manslaughter.

Edwin Babilonia's attorney said his client claims the children were having trouble sleeping and the injuries were accidental.

A body was found in Long Island Sound Friday afternoon has been identified as a boater that went missing over Memorial Day weekend, according to the United States Coast Guard.

Officials said a person found the body, which has been identified as that of 21-year-old Spencer Mugford, around 12:19 p.m., around two and a half miles south-east of Avery Point, and reported it. Mugford's family has been notified.

Mugford and Sofia McKenna, 20, were last seen off the coast of Avery Point in Groton on Snapchat at 2 a.m. on May 27.

They were in a boat that had been donated to the UConn campus at Avery Point, Andrew Ely, of the U.S. Coast Guard, said during a news conference.

The Coast Guard, along with state and local agencies, searched 2,025 square-miles for 71 hours before suspending the search.

U.S. Coast Guard Commander Andrew Ely said search crews found a 14-foot white and blue sailboat with no mast on Truman Beach, near Greenport, New York on Monday afternoon. Ely said officials believe this is the vessel the pair was on when they went missing. The boat was empty when it was found.

McKenna remains missing.

A helicopter crew from Coast Guard Air Station Cape Cod in Massachusetts and a 45-foot Response Boat from Coast Guard Station New London launched and were part of the search. The Coast Guard brought in a fixed-wing plane to search. State police and DEEP also had boats in the water assisting with the search.

Coast Guard officials encourage everyone to wear a lifejacket when on the water. Ely also suggested bringing a marine radio rather than a cell phone because cell service is not guaranteed out on the water and phones might not work properly when wet.

Police have made an arrest in connection with the discovery of a woman’s body found buried in a field in Bloomfield in March. 

Elizabeth Rykhof has been reported missing to Bloomfield police on Sept. 22 and her remains were found buried in a wetland site at 182 Woodland Ave. six months later, according to police. 

Henry Seebach, 45, of Bloomfield, has been charged with violation of disposal of bodies. 

He was taken into custody and is being held on $100,000 bond.

More than three weeks after storms hit, the cleanup is far from over in the northern Hamden neighborhoods that were in the path of the May 15 tornado.

“The next morning when every neighbor came out, and the trees were covering the street, we were all like zombies walking around and we were in shock that no one got hurt,” said Roberta Guarino, who has lived in a home tucked away on October Hill Road for 42 years.

There has been progress on the streets like Still Hill Road, but many backyards still have several large toppled trees that had been ripped right out of the ground from the powerful winds.

“1989 we had a tornado on the other side of the Hamden so I went through that one,” Mark Baselice told NBC Connecticut Friday morning. “This one here was worse.”

Baselice was in his home of more than 12 years when the tornado hit his town last month.

“All you could think of was a tree crashing down on the house and luckily we didn’t have that happen,” he said.

But this homeowner is worried there could be damage to the septic system in the backyard.

“In order for that to be checked,” Baselice said, “the trees have to be removed.”

Baselice said he has no clue how he’ll pay for that.

“That’s why we called the mayor about FEMA,” Baselice said. “Maybe they’ll give not just me, just all my neighbors, hopefully they’re going to give us the help where we can get these trees out because they want a lot of money to take these things out.”

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) joined Hamden Mayor Curt Leng for a news conference before FEMA begins make a preliminary assessment of the damage across the state on Monday. Blumenthal is urging homeowners to document the damage on their properties in extensive detail.

“The federal government must match your resilience and courage with real action,” Blumenthal said, “there’s no question that disaster struck Hamden.”

The senator added the response from FEMA now needs to be quicker than after Superstorm Sandy devastated homes in Connecticut.

Guarino’s family is thankful there was not more damage to their home because the pizza oven in the backyard took a direct hit from a falling tree.

“The storm came right through the backyard,” she said, “took my brother-in-law’s pool down and dented ours.”

More than three weeks later, down wires have been repaired and most of the debris has been removed from Guarino’s front lawn.

“Every day we do something and we clear it as much as we can,” she said.

As the cleanup continues, Baselice said he just hopes FEMA will offer help like it did back in 1989.

“They brought two dump trucks, a backhoe a crane and they took all my trees out,” he said.

Leng, Blumenthal and State Senator George Logan said any constituents running into problems with insurance companies assessing property and tree damage should give their offices a call.

Ledyard police are searching for a man who sprayed a public works employee with pepper spray while the victim was directing traffic in a construction zone.

Police said it happened on the south end of Colonel Ledyard Highway just after 12:30 p.m. The man, who was in a vehicle, became agitated while sitting in traffic at the construction zone, police said. The man drove toward the employee directing traffic, got out, sprayed the employee with pepper spray, then got back into his car and drove off, according to police.

The suspect is described as between the ages of 35 and 40, 5-foot-8 to 5-foot-10, with dark brown hair and a full beard. He was driving a dark colored, older model sedan, possibly a Nissan Altima or Sentra, with CT plates, possibly with AH66 or AH65 as part of the plate number.

Anyone with information on this incident should contact the Ledyard Police Department at 860-464-6400.

AAA is encouraging drivers to replace their tires before the tread reaches 2/32-inch of depth, which is the industry standard.

According to the Connecticut Department of Motor Vehicles, a tire must have a minimum of 2/32-inch center tread in order to pass inspection.

A study released Thursday by AAA finds risks at twice that depth - 4/32-inch.

“AAA wanted to find out at what point does a tire become unsafe,” said AAA of Greater Hartford spokesperson Amy Parmenter.

AAA first tested a vehicle with new, all-season tires in wet road conditions. It then performed the same test with tires that were worn down to 4/32-inch of tread.

The test showed that the vehicle with worn tires took almost twice as long to come to a stop as the vehicle with new tires, and traveled an additional 87 feet.

AAA also said that, if tested side-by-side at 60 mph on wet pavement, vehicles with worn tires would still be traveling at 40 mph when the vehicle with new tires had come to a complete stop.

“This research is about raising awareness. We want drivers to understand that they shouldn't just go by the law and what the law says is safe," Parmenter said.

The grooves on a tire are designed to expel water from beneath the tire. When the tread is worn down, the tire can’t grip the road surface. That can lead to hydroplaning, which is when the vehicle skims on top of the water, causing the driver to lose control.

Will Rivera at Town Fair Tire in West Hartford said tires are one of the most important parts of a vehicle, along with the brakes and the motor.

“The industry standard is at 2/32-inch they have to come off. But when you get to 4/32-inch or even 3/32-inch, basically the tire’s just about on its way out,” Rivera said.

He said the average life of a tire is between 40,000 and 45,000 miles. However, the type of tire, type of vehicle and individual driving habits also factor in.

AAA said its research found that tire performance does vary by brand, but price is not necessarily an indicator of quality. Worn tire performance deteriorated significantly for all tires tested, including those at a higher price point, according to AAA.

To determine whether your vehicle needs new tires, AAA recommends using a quarter in place of the traditional penny test, which is based on the standard 2/32-inch of depth.

The process is the same. Put the coin into the groove, with the head pointing down.

“If any of his head is hidden, then your tires are good to go. But if you can see all of George Washington’s head, then you need to spend some George Washingtons and get yourself some new tires,” Parmenter said.

NBC Connecticut reached out to the U.S. Tire Manufacturers Association by email for a response to the AAA study.

A spokesperson said, “The U. S. Tire Manufacturers Association recommends that tires be replaced when worn to 2/32-inch tread depth remaining anywhere on the tread face. USTMA agrees that safety is important and encourages drivers to perform monthly checks on their tires.”

An Ohio man filed a wrongful death lawsuit against two of the country's largest football helmet manufacturers, alleging their products failed to protect his deceased son and didn’t provide an adequate warning message for athletes’ parents.

The lawsuit filed last week in Montgomery County, Ohio, names Riddell Sports Group and the parent company that owns Schutt Sports as defendants.

In the first case to be brought against helmet makers, Darren Hamblin claims his son died from brain damage caused by playing youth and tackle football, according to court documents. After Cody Hamblin's death, doctors studied his brain and determined the 22-year-old had Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), the degenerative brain disease attributed to receiving numerous concussions.

CTE, which can only be diagnosed in an autopsy, has been found in the brains of more than 100 former football players, according to NBC News.

"The helmet manufacturers need to take responsibility," Hamblin told NBC affiliate WCMH. "For a product that's not made for kids."

Cody died during Memorial Day weekend in 2016. He was aboard a boat fishing with his grandfather when he had a seizure and fell into the water. He drowned within a minute, according to the documents.

He starting playing football when he was 8 years old and played through high school. Hamblin said in the lawsuit, which alleges fraud, negligence and wrongful death, that the helmets didn’t provide enough protection.

Riddell has not yet replied to NBC's request for comment. Schutt doesn't comment on current or pending litigation, a company spokesman said. 

Hamblin in the court documents alleges the helmets were “defective in design, unreasonably dangerous and unsafe” when they were distributed and sold. He also states that the companies didn’t provide “adequate safety and instructional materials” and “failed to protect or warn of long term risks associated with the use of the tackle football helmets.”

Stickers on the back of each helmet state the helmets meet the National Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment safety guidelines, the non-profit’s standards for safety. However, manufacturers test their own helmets and report their own conclusions, meaning there is no government oversight in the process.

"They need to either make one that is for kids that can protect kids," Hamblin told WCMH. "Or they need to just flat out say this is not intended for helmet contact."

In February, two San Diego mothers filed a lawsuit against Pop Warner Football, suggesting the organization misrepresented safety as its primary priority. The women's sons both died by suicide and were later found to have had CTE.

Hamblin’s lawsuit comes about four months after three former NFL linebackers suggested kids younger than 14 years old play flag football, citing safety concerns.

Forty-eight percent of Americans said they would recommend their child play a sport other than football in a February NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

"I'm tried," Hamblin told WCMH. "I'm convicted and I'm sentenced every day I get up. Sometimes multiple times in the day, because I have that much guilt."

The National Suicide Prevention Hotline (1-800-273-8255) is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

A car crashed into a Hartford laundromat Friday afternoon.

It happened at Budget One-Hour Cleaners & Launderers near the corner of Farmington Avenue and Marshall Street. Police said the driver was taken to the hospital with what appear to be minor injuries.

The business was closed for renovations at the time of the crash and no one else was hurt.

More information was not immediately available. Check back for updates.

The head track coach at Enfield High School has been terminated after allegations he wrote inappropriate text messages to a student.

Enfield Superintendent Christopher Drezek told NBC Connecticut this centers on inappropriate text messages between the former head coach Brian Lowe and a female student.

The superintendent said when he was first made aware of the situation on February 21, the head coach of the Enfield High School girl’s outdoor track team was placed on leave and all appropriate authorities were notified, including police.

Police have not confirmed whether they are investigating.

The district fired Lowe and banned him from coaching any other team in the district. He is also banned from Enfield Public Schools’ property unless he’s there as a parent.

NBC Connecticut has requested documents from the district relating to the text messages and the termination. NBC Connecticut has also tried to make contact with Lowe, but as of this writing those attempts were unsuccessful.

The top Republican in the State Senate and the state’s largest teacher’s union fired back at Gov. Dannel Malloy’s veto message of a bill that passed the Senate by a unanimous 36-0 margin.

Sen. Len Fasano, GOP president pro tempore, said the bill was designed to make classrooms safer, and called on lawmakers to, “stand together to protect it.”

The measure would accelerate the process for teachers and school administrators to suspend students. Currently, it can take days, weeks, or even longer to suspend a student from the classroom even after a serious physical altercation.

The Connecticut Education Association, with tens of thousands of members, supported the measure as a tool for teachers and school leaders.

“This bill will do more to help students and avoid the kind of discriminatory discipline we all want to see ended in our schools,” said Don Williams, the CEA’s Executive Director.

At the heart of Malloy’s opposition to the bill, which also passed the House by a wide margin, is the possibility for minority students to be disproportionately suspended from school compared to their peers who are white.

He cited data from the state of Texas which passed a similar law more than 10 years ago, but he also centered on how more than 90 percent of teachers in Connecticut are white, while more than 40 percent of all students are not.

“If we’re going to do things we have to make sure that they do not have disparate racial impacts,” Malloy said. “Our country has a history of programs that have disparate racial impacts on the negative side and this legislation didn’t address this issue.”

Kate Dias, a longtime math teacher at Manchester High School, said the issue of race needs to be a priority when it comes to policies that focus on discipline. However, she says teachers like her do not consider race as a deciding factor when it comes to discipline in cases of a student harming a teacher or another student. She says teachers are looking for ways to keep teaching efficiently and effectively, rather than worrying about how long it will take to have a student removed from the classroom.

“There became a sense of urgency behind what can we do for them right now and that’s really what teachers were looking for out of this legislation is, let me help my children, now.”

The Black and Puerto Rican Caucus in the General Assembly endorsed Malloy’s veto, making the override effort more difficult.

Rep. Chris Rosario, (D – Bridgeport), wrote, “Black and Hispanic students in Connecticut are suspended at more than double the rate of their white peers…This legislation would lead to violations of federal education laws, resulting in costly litigation and jeopardizing Connecticut’s federal education funding.”

A veto session is expected either by the end of June or the beginning of July. A veto override requires a two thirds majority in the House and Senate.

Tick season is in full swing, but what do you do with a tick you find on yourself or your pet?

The University of Connecticut’s Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory is one place that will test your ticks to see if they’re carrying any diseases.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says tick-borne illnesses like Lyme disease are on the rise. Local scientists want to test the ticks you find to see what diseases they might be carrying.

Dede Delaney’s dog Chief loves to roll around outside, which is why Delaney doesn’t want to take any chances when it comes to ticks.

“He’s on preventative – the drops that you put on his back and in between his shoulder blades and he also gets checked for Lyme at his vet,” the Windham resident explained.

She also checks him over herself. The last thing she wants is for Chief to get Lyme disease like she did.

“I’ve had Lyme four times and I know what it’s like and it’s debilitating,” she said.

The scientists at UConn are working to keep people and their pets safe.

Dr. Guillermo Risatti, the section head of Diagnostic Testing for CVMDL, said since April, his lab technicians have identified and tested 50 to 60 ticks from across the state for pathogens that can affect animals or humans.

“The most common pathogen that we see in ticks, more or less one in three or one in four ticks will be carrying Borrelia burgdorferi, which is the agent for Lyme disease,” Risatti said.

That information can be used by different UConn researchers who work to develop vaccines and preventative control measures to combat tick-borne illnesses.

Risatti said it’s important for residents to submit ticks, so they can see what problems are emerging.

“One of the things that we see with these pathogens is that they’re not similar every year. They have changes and that, we don’t know what that means, but it may have an implication for designing vaccines for controlling these diseases,” Risatti said.

The lab technicians are also testing thousands of blood samples from horses each year to see if they have been exposed to Lyme disease.

The prices for tick testing can be found on the lab’s website. 

Many local health departments also test ticks.

A 3-year-old girl reported missing from Meriden is safe with her aunt, according to family members.

Meriden police issued a Silver Alert for the girl Friday. However, family members said the child is safe and that the report of her missing was inaccurate.

Police could not confirm details, but said the family has been in touch.

No other details were immediately available.

The New Jersey State Police have released footage of the exact second a trooper realized he was pulling over the former cop who brought him into the world 27 years ago. 

Trooper Michael Patterson stopped Michael Bailly for a minor motor vehicle violation on June 1 in the Kingwood Township area, and the story unfolds from there.

The New Jersey State Police tweeted out the body cam footage of the stop on Friday afternoon.

In the video, Patterson can be seen taking Bailly's license and registration, and realizing that Bailly is a retired Piscataway cop, the same town that Patterson grew up in.

"On Poe Place. It was 192," says Patterson when Bailly asks him what his address was.

After the video flashes forward, Bailly can be heard saying "It was the first baby I ever delivered, that's why I remember the address."

After the men went over some of the finer details of the story, Patterson extended his hand and says "That was me."

"We’re not sure what the odds are of this happening — maybe they’re close to the odds of a hole-in-one, winning the lottery, or being struck by lightning — but it happened," is how the NJSP described the encounter in their original post.

Emergency crews are responding to a serious motorcycle accident in the Taftville section of Norwich.

The fire department confirmed a serious crash in the area of 179 Hunters Rd. Possible life-threatening injuries have been reported.

Drivers are warned to avoid the area.

More information was not immediately available. Check back for updates.

The Pentagon has been sharply criticized by two leading human rights groups for saying this week that the United States military will never know the exact number of civilians killed in the four-year fight against the Islamic State, NBC News reported.

Both Amnesty International USA and Human Rights Watch condemned the remarks as an abdication of responsibility to avoid civilian casualties and thoroughly investigate the collateral damage of war. A spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition battling ISIS militants this week said anyone who claims they will know the number of civilians killed "is lying, and there's no possible way." 

"When the U.S. tells the world it doesn't care enough to track the deaths of civilians it is causing, that's a green light for belligerents around the world to take the exact same attitude," said Sarah Leah Whitson, the Middle East and North Africa director for Human Rights Watch.

The race is about to start. Six jockeys, four of them Latinos, gallop to the starting post in the humid, cold afternoon. In a small room in the upper floors of Aqueduct race track in Queens, with beige carpets and dated wood paneling, Luis Grandison grabs his binoculars. He turns to the glass window next to his desk then reaches for a button. The window opens up and a chilling wind floods the room. The race starts.

For the last four years Grandison, 61, has been the only full-time Spanish language race narrator in the country, and one of the first ones to spot an unseen market for horse races in the Latino community. Grandison has helped integrate a new community with an industry that has been losing fans since the mid-20th century, by calling the races in the language they are most familiar with. Grandison will be narrating the Belmont Stakes on Saturday just like he used to do for 40 years in his native Panama, in Spanish.

"Atrás Mascarello (he pronounces Muhz-Kuh-DE-Roh), viene avanzando," Grandison says, motioning his arms up and down, still holding the binoculars on his right hand and the piece of paper with the race details on his left. Mascarello rapidly approaches the finish line from behind.

“Fox Rules (he pronounces Pho Roo), dos cuerpos. Mascarello avienta.” Grandison yells into his headpiece while Fox Rules accelerates by two body lengths in the final trench.

“Fox rules medio cuerpo, Mascarello avienta.” By now, the rapid speed of Grandison’s words doesn't give him time to breathe in.

“Fox Rules! Se entra Mascarello, tercero Wicket Freud,” he says, bouncing up and down, announcing that Fox Rules won the race. His whole body now punctuates each word. He takes a step back.

Grandison reaches for the button again to close the glass window and the room quiets down.

When Grandison first approached the New York Racing Association in 2013, he was tasked with interviewing in Spanish growing jockey stars hailing from Latin America, like Puerto Rican brothers Jose and Irad Ortiz. Soon after he grabbed the microphone to call their races. These days he narrates horse races at New York’s Aqueduct, Saratoga Race Course and Belmont Park, where there is added drama this year. Justify could become the 13th horse since 1919 to win an elusive Triple Crown prize with a victory in the Belmont Stakes. 

“The equestrian broadcasts were 100 percent in English, as if they were saying, ‘if you understand [or not] it is your problem,’” Grandison said in between races recently at Aqueduct. “However, they saw a market [opportunity] on us and now it is expanding.”

Other race tracks have followed his lead.

Santa Anita Park in Southern California has seen the impact of Latino outreach. The horse track draws in close to a million spectators a year, 40 percent of which they estimate to be Hispanic.

"We’ve found – particularly with new arrivals—horse racing is something they naturally embrace,” said Mike Willman, director of publicity at Santa Anita. “Many of them, where they came from, horse racing is something they very familiar with.”

For Santa Anita, the interest to bring in Latino crowds has led to weekly events like lucha libre shows, Latin music festivals, tacos and cervezas night, and even something call a “Michelada Rumble,” all of which specifically targets the Mexican audience from the area.

The moves are aimed at having Latinos inject money into an industry that has been in decay since 1985, when four percent of Americans listed horse racing as their favorite sport. According to a Harris Poll of 2013, the number dropped to one percent. 

“We are looking for more ways to get horse racing content out and to reach the Hispanic audience, whatever is the best way,” said Nate Newby, vice president of marketing at Santa Anita. “Through website, social media, and through radio, the more people we can reach the better.”

The cultural connection to horses among many Latinos could help extend the life of the $25 billion industry, which faces competition from other ways to wager. According to Equibase’s year-end report published on January 2018, wagering added up to $10.9 million in the United States, which is a 1.59 percent increase from 2016. The peak was $15.2 billion in 2003.

“In the old days, racing was almost a monopoly, if you wanted to bet, you had to go to races," George Ortuzar, a former entertainment anchor for Univison who runs a weekly radio show in Spanish for Santa Anita, said.

He said Grandison’s success engaging new audiences has opened the door for other tracks to add Spanish race callers as well.

“For a racetrack to have someone like [Grandison] calling the races in Spanish is stellar and has helped the entire community,” Ortuzar said. “It has expanded to Gulfstream track. And even Golden Gate is catering more to Latinos with events and Spanish content as well.”

The industry needs "new blood to come into the racing world, and part of that is the Hispanic market,” he said.

At Santa Anita Ortuzar has encouraged new fans to get familiar with the betting system by creating tip sheets in Spanish.

In recent years, Latinos have been fueling the horse racing industry; working the back and front end of the races. At Belmont Park, Leonardo Parra, from Chile, has been working as a groom for over eight years at the stables. He says most of his coworkers are Latinos, noting how much colleagues from countries like Panama, Venezuela, Mexico and Chile love horses.

“It’s all about having love for the horses, that’s it,” Parra said of what it takes to be a good groom. Most of the workers live in residential buildings year round to maintain the Belmont Park’s stables, he said. 

Former jockey and NYRA analyst Richard Migliore talked about the role of bringing in Grandison in a 2016 post on NYRA website.

“It’s long overdue to have a Spanish announcer because so many people who use Spanish as their first language love racing,” said

“In the United States, they are starting to notice that English is the first language, but Spanish is the runner up,” Grandison said.

For more than 15 years, Tyler Baze did what he could to lose the three or so pounds that would allow him to ride racehorses: skip meals, run in sweat suits in the southern California heat and "flip," the jockeys' term for vomiting.

The last year and a half has been different. Race tracks in California raised weight restrictions slightly so that the 35-year-old says he no longer has to go to such extremes.

"It's let me be a lot healthier," he said. "Physically and mentally, way, way better....I think I ride better. I think clearly out there. It's just healthier for everybody."

The low weights demanded of jockeys have long been a source of friction in the racing world, with the riders complaining that they are unrealistic and trainers countering that horses could be injured if they carried more weight. In her bestselling book "Seabiscuit," Laura Hillenbrand described jockeys of the early 1920s and 1930s taking the same severe measures: dinners of a leaf or two of lettuce, barely any water, vomiting, diuretics and laxatives, rubber suits, even ingesting the egg of a tape worm.

An article last year in the Paulick Report, the website covering thoroughbred racing, noted that in 1929 jockeys could weigh as little as 95 pounds, and that included equipment, while its sampling of race tracks last January showed minimums of 114 and 115 pounds for journeymen, or experienced jockeys. The range their weight must fall within have risen over the years, but slowly, "progress in steps, not strides," it wrote.

A decade ago, The Associated Press wrote that the racing world had finally begun to address the issue, with race tracks in California, Florida, Kentucky, New Jersey and New York raising minimum weights about 3 or 4 pounds or more to 115 or 116 pounds. Nutrition programs were being introduced to encourage jockeys to eat properly.

At the time, it wrote, tracks decided on their own weight ranges through a complicated system based on the type of race, a horse's age, gender and past performances. The Jockeys' Guild was lobbying for a standard minimum weight of 118 pounds -- for the rider, clothing and gear -- and body fat levels of no less than 5 percent. 

That continues to be true. There is no one standard for weight in racing, only a recommendation that a jockey not carry less than 118 pounds, according to the Association of Racing Commissioners International. For Saturday's Belmont Stakes, colts and geldings carry a weight of 126 pounds, fillies, 121 pounds. 

But now the minimum also has been adopted at race tracks such as Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, California, and Golden Gate Fields in Berkeley. The Jockeys' Guild regional manager for the West Coast, 62-year-old Darrell Haire, was a jockey himself and he knows firsthand the struggle to stay thin. He spent hours in saunas and took the diuretic Lasix, which made him urinate repeatedly.

"The majority — and that's what it is, the majority — aren't that small any more, especially the American riders," said Haire, who has been arguing for higher weights for 17 years. "They're really abusing their bodies in order to do that kind of weight."

With the extra allowance, the jockeys are not dehydrated and bulimic. They can ride with heavier saddles, which are safer, he said. Their minds are sharp. Jockeys are already amazingly fit and now they can be healthy too, he said.

Haire said similar changes have been made at race tracks throughout the western part of the United States, including Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Arizona.

"Now the rest of the country has to catch on," he said.

Patrick Mackey, the racing secretary at Golden Gate Fields, admits that he was hesitant at first, afraid he would get opposition from owners and trainers. He got none and is pleased with the new minimum weight, which allows the jockeys to ride at their natural weight and strength and to ride the horses better.

"You can see it not only in the way they look, it's in the way they ride, their mood," he said. "They're much happier, and it's great to see. And it's safer. If you have someone going out there that's just had cut four or five pounds and they're riding weak, that doesn't only put them at risk, their horse, it puts everyone else at risk. And that's something we don't want."

He said the race track seemed to have set a good weight range now, from 118 to 127 pounds, though he could see it rising a pound or two in the future. But he cautioned, "You'd be skating a fine line if you wanted to get it higher."

New York jockeys, who have been riding without a contract since January, are trying to bring about a similar change. They delayed the start of racing at Belmont Park in Elmont one day last month to draw attention to what has become a rancorous dispute. In an interview with the Thoroughbred Daily News, the president of the New York Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association, Joe Appelbaum, cited weights as low as 109 pounds at Laurel Park in Laurel, Maryland, and 110 pounds at Monmouth Park Racetrack in Oceanport, New Jersey.

"Health and safety is very important," he said. "But we also want to stay competitive with what are the scales of weights in other states. It's a complicated issue."

Jockeys and others point out that minimum weights have been higher for years in other countries. And exercise riders weighing in the 140 to 180 pound range take horses out for morning workouts.

A 1995 study by the Chicago Rehabilitation Institute found that 69 percent of riders said they skipped meals, 34 percent used diuretics, 67 percent sweated in saunas, 30 percent induced vomiting and 14 percent took laxatives. 

"I don't know if it's gotten any better since 1995 because there's been no follow up to this survey," said Paul von Hippel, an associate professor of public policy, sociology, statistics and data science at the University of Texas at Austin. "Except for the weight increases...I don't really see why it would become less common because it's just very hard for men to get down to these sizes."

In the meantime, he noted that women are much better sized to ride in thoroughbred races. There are about 10 times as many women at jockey weight than men, he said, though women will be missing from the Belmont Stakes.

Lauren Smolar, director of programs at the National Eating Disorders Association, said that more and more men are seeking help for eating disorders.

"However, there is still a large stigma for men related to eating disorders," she said in an email. "Symptoms in men are still less likely to be recognized as eating disorders and seeking help for mental health concerns is still something that a lot of men find very challenging to do."

Treatment for jockeys would take into account the pressures of their industry, she said.

Randy Romero, a retired jockey who was known as the Evil Knievel of the racing world and who was burned over 60 percent of his body in a sauna, has talked about inducing vomiting from an early age. He had 37 surgeries, got hepatitis C from tainted blood during one procedure, damaging his liver, and he now needs weekly dialysis for his one remaining kidney.

Romero, 60, believes he would have been an even stronger rider than he was if he hadn't had to fight to keep his weight down. He would raise the minimum weight to 120 pounds.

"Why just go for a little bit?" he asked. "That won't bother a horse."

Baze says he stopped "flipping," or vomiting, a couple of years ago when his young daughter noticed and told his wife that he was sick. Now he can maintain a steady weight of 115 or 116 pounds, compared to having to struggle to get down to 111 or 112 pounds.

"I think it's perfect," he said.