The "last piece" from missing Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was published late Wednesday by The Washington Post, his editor announced in a note.

Khashoggi has not been seen since visiting the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, on Oct. 2. The New York Times reported that Turkey has recorded audio that indicates he was killed inside the consulate, and NBC News reported Wednesday that President Trump said he has asked Turkish authorities for this recording, "if it exists."

Post global opinions editor Karen Attiah is convinced her colleague met a untimely end, writing, "The Post held off publishing it because we hoped Jamal would come back to us so that he and I could edit it together. Now I have to accept: That is not going to happen. This is the last piece of his I will edit for The Post."

The journalist's piece addresses the lack of a free press in all but a few corners of the Arab world.

Four people were displaced Wednesday night when fire ripped through their Norwalk home.

Fire officials said crews were called to a house fire at 19 Arbor Drive around 7:30 p.m. When they arrived there was heavy fire on the first floor and into the attic.

One person that was inside the home at the time escaped unharmed. The home was heavily damaged by smoke and fire and is currently uninhabitable.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

Election day is less than three weeks away and on Wednesday night candidates for the 5th Congressional District squared off in a debate at Central Connecticut State University.

For most of the night, voters heard two candidates miles apart from each other on policy. When asked about the economy and national debt, Democrat Jahana Hayes slammed the federal tax cut, while Republican Manny Santos said the tax cut helps raise tax revenue.

"The poorest people in our community shouldn't have to pay so that corporations can get huge tax breaks in the name of saving our economy," Hayes said.

"Only with more tax revenue will we be able to take control of our debt, our yearly deficits. Other than ending the various programs, it's the economy. With more tax revenue we'll be able to afford the things we want to afford like infrastructure, and so I would be very supportive of continuing the tax cuts," said Santos.

The two were asked about infrastructure spending, criminal justice reform, the opioid crisis, and student loan debt. For many of those topics, Santos drilled down on the economy being the key.

When it came to criminal justice reform, Hayes spoke about offering support and counseling services to students struggling and to make sure those in the system are able to re-enter society as a productive member. Santos spoke about making sure the economy is good enough so that anyone who wants a job can work and to support programs that promote trades in community colleges and high schools.

Regarding the opioid crisis, Santos discussed getting the medical community involved to help reach solutions. Hayes said that a punitive response doesn't work, that addiction is a disease and it has to be addressed as such. She also mentioned the importance of education about the issue.

When asked about gay marriage, Hayes said she supported it while Santos did not.

"I support gay marriage in the state of Connecticut, and I will do everything I can to ensure they have the same constitutionally-protected rights as any other groups," said Hayes.

"Gay marriage in Connecticut is legal. I am personally not in favor of gay marriage. I believe marriage is a union between a man and a woman. That's not to say I'm against civil unions or the gay community," said Santos. "I'm against any legislation that violates a person's right to work or carry out their lives regardless whether they're gay or not."

Both candidates also had different takes on student debt.

"Offer incentives for people who return to our state, return to our communities to live and work. After so many years, reduce either the interest or the amount that's owed because those people are now taxpayers. They're investing in our communities, and they're helping our economies to thrive," said Hayes.

"The student debt issue is something that, frankly, a lot of students bring upon themselves. When you enter college, you enter college with the understanding that these loans have to be paid back," said Santos.

The former Meriden mayor's response created a shocked reaction from several people in the crowd. After the debate, a University of Connecticut sophomore with $60,000 in debt, who is also a first-generation American and first-generation college student, told Santos she works a part-time job and it's still not enough.

Santos replied that a robust economy would allow better-paying jobs for students drowning in debt but that students also have to be careful with their decisions.

"It behooves you to choose a college that is more affordable for you and maybe not one that is a better fit or better environment," Santos said.

At the end of the debate, both gave closing statements and spoke about the importance of November's election.

"We want a brighter future for our children. We want equitable access to high-quality education. We want to be able to love who we love and have healthcare and jobs. We want our families to be safe and protected, and we want people to be welcomed in our communities," said Hayes.

"The Democrat Party has been co-opted by the extreme left and is promoting socialism, Medicare for all, free college, open borders, and citizenship for illegal aliens, and the elimination of the right to protect ourselves and our family, infringing on our second amendment rights," said Santos.

Officials say White House Counsel Don McGahn left the Trump administration Wednesday, NBC News reported. 

News of McGahn's departure from the White House was first reported by The New York Times, which cited two people close to him. Two White House officials confirmed to NBC News that Wednesday was McGahn's last day.

McGahn's departure comes a day after President Donald Trump told The Associated Press in a Tuesday interview that Washington lawyer Pat Cipollone would serve as his next White House counsel.

Trump in August said McGahn would leave the White House in the fall. 

There was no winner in Wednesday night's Powerball drawing, leaving the jackpot to swell to an estimated $430 million.

Between that pot and the Mega Millions lottery prize, which rose from $900 million after Tuesday's winner-less drawing to $970 million on Thursday, there is $1.4 billion up for grabs in the coming drawings — though the odds of winning remain extremely long.

The winning numbers in the Powerball drawing were 3, 57, 64, 68 and 69, with a Powerball of 15. The prize was $378 million. The next drawing is Saturday.

The current estimated Powerball jackpot doesn't crack the top 10 largest in U.S. history, but Friday's Mega Million drawing offers the second largest.

The largest was a $1.6 billion Powerball game from January 2016 that was split between three tickets purchased in California, Florida and Tennessee.

A family dog believed to be dead after a brick wall collapsed off of a home in Philadelphia's Kensington neighborhood was found buried alive under rubble two days later.

Sections of a three-story brick wall on Emerald Street collapsed into the yard of neighbor Jose Gonzalez on Monday.

Gonzalez believed his dog Magic, a 16-year-old American Pit bull Terrier, died in the accident. The family tried digging through the rubble by hand, but couldn't locate Magic.

Then Tuesday, construction workers cleaning up the debris found the canine under bricks.

"They say men don't cry but I was so happy I was crying," Gonzalez said of hearing that his trusted pet was still here.

"We are all happy about that, that nobody was hurt. That’s was the main thing. But when I found out my dog was here, it was the same thing as somebody getting hurt," Gonzales said Wednesday.

Magic has head trauma and is dehydrated. The family is taking him to a veterinarian for a full examination.

The city's Department of Licenses and Inspections has told renters to stay out of the neighboring building, as they investigate what happened.

There’s a new reminder to make sure your teen knows the rules of the road before they get behind the wheel. New research from AAA reinforced that teen drivers with a teen passenger can be a deadly combination. 

When teens drive with other teens, the fatality rate for everyone involved in a crash jumps up 50 percent, according to AAA data from 2016. 

“In 2016 in Connecticut, we had 18 fatalities resulting from crashes that involved teen drivers, and 2/3rds of those fatalities were someone other than the teen driver,” Jennifer Shorette, director of AAA driving school in West Hartford, said. 

The research also notes there’s an opposite effect. 

When teens drive adult passengers, like parents, that fatality rate actually decreases 8 percent.

Alison Holzer, a mother of two, said she believes that whom teens drive with affects their safety expectations. 

“If the expectations of older adults in the car are, ‘Let’s be safe, let’s be focused on the road,’ that’s going to impact how the teens act and how they think,” Holzer said. 

Connecticut law prohibits 16- and 17-year-old drivers from driving other teens in the car during the first year they have a license. 

To some, like Ericc Gagne, that timeline might not be enough. 

“Having maybe an older number or limiting the number of people within the car. That may be something of interest as well,” he said. 

AAA West Hartford recommends sitting with your child to review the rules of the road and considering who goes in the back seat.

“We need to be mindful as a community here that this really affects everyone,” Shorette said. 

Four students were on a school bus that was involved in a crash on Interstate 91 North in Hartford Thursday morning and no injuries have been reported.

State police said ambulances responded as a precaution to evaluate everyone.

The crash happened between exits 29 and 29A.

One other vehicle was involved in the crash.

Firefighters helped deliver a baby boy early Thursday morning.

A Facebook post from West Hartford Firefighters Local 1241 says they received a call just after 4 a.m. that a woman was in labor and the firefighters who responded knew the baby was coming soon, so they helped mom make the delivery at home.

"Judging by how many kids she had, and how close her contractions were, we knew it was pretty imminent," said firefighter and paramedic, Lars Irvine. "She had a contraction and we could just about see the baby."

The mom gave birth to a healthy baby boy and they are both doing well, according to the fire union.

"It’s certainly not the kind of call we get every day," said Capt. Jarrad Smith. "We train for it and we learned about it in school, but it’s not a common occurrence."

"It was always on my list of things to do in this profession," said firefighter Neal Sinatro. "Definitely high pressure but a rewarding experience."

State police said they arrested a Sandy Hook man at Bradley Airport after air traffic control contacted them about an intoxicated man who was causing a disruption on a flight that was approaching the airport.

Air traffic control contacted state police just after 10:30 p.m. and said the passenger, who was on United Flight 1887 from Denver, was disrupting the flight attendants and other passengers.

Troopers were at the terminal when the plane landed and said 31-year-old Jeffrey Levasseur, of Sandy Hook, was disruptive in the terminal.

The report from state police said he was loud, appeared to be heavily intoxicated and used profanity several times.

He was charged with breach of peace and held on $7,500 cash.

Netflix executives have been telling employees to brace for a Wall Street Journal investigation that takes a critical view of the company's corporate culture, people with knowledge of the matter tell NBC News. 

Executives are expecting the piece to be similar to The New York Times' 2015 investigation into Amazon, which described a hyper-competitive and "bruising" workplace where employees were said to be held to "unreasonably high" standards, said the sources, who spoke on the condition anonymity as they were not authorized to speak publicly. 

Such a piece threatens to sap morale at a company that has been widely portrayed as the envy of the media industry, given the lucrative six- and seven-figure salaries it offers to employees, to say nothing of the hundreds of millions it offers to showrunners. 

A Netflix spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. Spokespeople for The Wall Street Journal did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

A Darien man has pleaded guilty to stealing more than $57,000 from a former U.S. Navy service member.

Christopher Teixeira, 34, of Darien, pleaded guilty in federal court in Hartford Wednesday to one count of wire fraud.

According to the US Attorney’s Office, the victim trusted Teixeira with certain financial responsibilities. The victim was scheduled to receive a medical severance payment from the Navy in January 2017. He gave Teixeira his login information to the online “MyPay” portal for the Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS), the agency of the U.S. Department of Defense that administers all payments to U.S. service members.

On Jan. 10, 2017, before the victim received the payment, Teixeira used the MyPay portal to change the victim’s direct deposit information to a bank account controlled by Teixeira. Authorities said that after DFAS sent the victim’s $57,255.66 payment, Teixeira then logged back into the MyPay account and switched the direct deposit information back to avoid detection.

After the theft, Teixeira told the victim he would help find the missing money, and even transferred the victim $6,500 when the victim said he needed money, authorities said.

Teixeira used the stolen money to pay for his own personal expenses and transferred $25,000 to another person’s account.

Teixeira is scheduled for sentencing on Feb. 20, 2019.

New Haven police were searching for a 9-month-old girl who had last been seen over a week ago and the Silver Alert has been canceled. 

According to police, Aria Gilmore was missing after she was seen with her father on Oct. 12 in New Haven.

The alert was canceled just after 2 p.m.

No additional information was immediately available. 

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is predicting warmer than average temperatures for much of the US this winter, including the northeast.

NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center released its Winter Outlook Thursday, and said above average temperatures are likely across the northern and western US, Alaska, and Hawaii. Connecticut has between a 33 and 50 percent chance for higher than average temperatures, depending on what part of the state.

It looks to be a mild winter in terms of temperatures - no part of the US is expected to see below-average temperatures.

There is also a 70 to 75 percent chance if seeing El Nino, a weather phenomenon that can lead to a wetter than average winter season in the South, and drier conditions in parts of the north.

For the current forecast, click here.

In Stephen Hawking's final book "Brief Answers to Big Questions," published Tuesday (Oct. 16) by Bantam Books, the Cambridge professor begins a series of 10 intergalactic essays by addressing life's oldest and most religiously fraught question of all: Is there a God? 

Hawking's answer — compiled from decades of prior interviews, essays and speeches with the help of his family, colleagues and the Steven Hawking Estate — should come as no surprise to readers who have followed his work, er, religiously, NBC News' MACH reported. 

"I think the universe was spontaneously created out of nothing, according to the laws of science," Hawking, who died in March, wrote. "If you accept, as I do, that the laws of nature are fixed, then it doesn't take long to ask: What role is there for God?"

In life, Hawking was a vocal champion of the Big Bang theory — the idea that the universe began by exploding suddenly out of an ultradense singularity smaller than an atom. From this speck emerged all the matter, energy and empty space that the universe would ever contain, and all that raw material evolved into the cosmos we perceive today by following a strict set of scientific laws. To Hawking and many like-minded scientists, the combined laws of gravity, relativity, quantum physics and a few other rules could explain everything that ever happened or ever will happen in our known universe.

Multiple departments are on scene at a house fire in Danielson Thursday.

The Atwood House Fire Company confirms multiple departments responded for a fire in a multi-family home on Franklin Street.

Dispatchers said no injuries have been reported.

No other information was immediately available.

Check back for updates.

Wednesday night’s game was a big win for the Red Sox and for pizza lovers.

Harry’s Pizzeria & Tavern in West Hartford served free slices of cheese and pepperoni from noon to 3 p.m. on Thursday after the Red Sox clinched another win in Game 4 against the Houston Astros. The pizzeria is offering the deal after every Red Sox win during the postseason.

“I am a huge Red Sox fan and seeing them in this position here, the playoffs, I just want to reach out to all baseball fans here in the area,” said Bob Hagmeier, managing partner of Harry’s Pizzeria & Tavern.

The teams will take each other on again in Game 5 on Thursday night.

A mysterious campaign to curb binge drinking is popping up around Manchester where high school students are celebrating homecoming this weekend.

The slogan is powerful, reading "Don’t be the one we’re talking about the next day."

The town agency behind the campaign, which was funded through a state grant, hopes it casts a unique perspective on the dangers of underage drinking.

"If you don’t partake in substances and underage drinking and things like that, your chances of being more successful in life are much higher," explained Sheridan Douglass of the Youth Service Bureau.

Manchester High School students spent Thursday afternoon driving the message home by putting up magnets on lockers around school ahead of Friday’s homecoming game.

"I hope they take this as a warning,” said senior Alexis Hammonds. “There are so many things that could happen and that they’ll just be safe."

"It’s early in the year, a lot of kids will show up," said junior Noah Acheampong. "Overall, just a busy weekend, big weekend, so a lot of kids will see it. They’ll hear the message."

The Youth Service Bureau hopes the campaign encourages teenagers to stand up to the pressures of underage drinking.

"Not all the kids are drinking, so you don’t have to feel like you need to fit in with a group of kids that are doing something when they’re actually a really small pocket as opposed to the bigger picture," said Douglass.

Students said they hope the slogan resonates with their friends and classmates and stays with them.

"We kind of feel like we’re so young nothing bad can really happen to us and then our eyes get opened when something bad does happen because of drinking at such a young age and not being responsible," said Hammonds.

The campaign officially launches on Friday.

Preparations for the holiday season in the Elm City are already underway.

Each year the New Haven Parks Department searches the area for its holiday tree. This year they revisited a suggestion they received a few years back from a family in Prospect. The tree on their property wound up the perfect fit to light up the Green this holiday season.

Katrina Miller’s dad David had thought about cutting down the 65-foot Norway spruce next to his family’s home in Prospect.

“He was supposed to but he decided to wait,” Miller explained.

It was meant to be, because the City of New Haven has selected the tree to be its centerpiece for this year’s holiday season.

“It’s special to him because he loves the holiday,” Miller said.

David Miller grew up in the Elm City. He said he’ll be thinking of his mother and grandmother who passed away last year when he joins his family on the green for the tree lighting.

On Thursday a New Haven tree crew continued tying down branches as they prepare the tree for transport.

“We cut the tree at the base the crane lifts it put it’s on a flatbed, we strap it down, drive it all the way to the New Haven Green from Prospect,” said Adam Wambolt, a New Haven tree trimmer.

The process begins early.

“We like to get it set up and ready you know early on, you know its gonna get cold, we’ve had snowstorms late October before and it would be a real pain to get something like this done with snow on the ground so we do it now,” Wambolt said.

After arriving on the New Haven Green, the tree will be decorated with tens of thousands of lights.

The tree will be moved next week. The tree lighting is set for Thursday, Nov. 29.

NBC Connecticut is the proud television sponsor of the New Haven Tree Lighting.