A person was shot in the torso late Tuesday night on Asylum Avenue in Hartford, police said.
Police said the 10:30 p.m. shooting incident was domestic in nature.
No arrests have been made. The identity of the victim hasn't been released.
The shooting remains under investigation.
The author of “To Die For,” a novel inspired by Pamela Smart and the murder of her husband by her teenage lover, is asking the governor of New Hampshire to consider parole for the former school media coordinator.
Joyce Maynard, whose book was later turned into a movie starring Nicole Kidman, sent a letter to Gov. Maggie Hassan saying that she did not intend her work of fiction to shape the public perception of Smart.
Smart, portrayed during her trial as a 22-year-old femme fatale, was convicted in 1991 of conspiring in her husband’s killing and sentenced to life in prison without a chance of parole.
[CLICK HERE TO READ THE LETTER]
If the film adaption of the book contributed to a public perception of Smart as a ruthlessly ambitious killer, that was not her intent, Maynard wrote.
“To whatever extent the existence of that film affected attitudes towards Pamela Smart over the years, I can only reiterate: Nicole Kidman did not play Pamela Smart in ‘To Die For,’” Maynard wrote. “That character was a creation of my imagination.”
Smart admitted to having an affair to then-15-year-old Billy Flynn when she was director of media services at Winnacunnet High School in Hampton, New Hampshire. But she continues to deny that she lured him into a plot to kill her husband.
She is imprisoned at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in New York.
A recent HBO documentary, "Captivated: The Trials of Pamela Smart," raised doubts about whether her trial, the first to be televised from start to finish, was fair.
Hassan's spokesman, William Hinkle, said in a statement that there was no outstanding petition for a pardon or commutation of sentence for Pamela Smart.
“Governor Hassan does not believe jury verdicts should be overturned without clear evidence of a miscarriage of justice, and at this time, the governor has not been presented any new information that would warrant consideration of a pardon even if such a petition existed,” he said.
Four men admitted to participating in the plot to kill Gregg Smart.
Flynn pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and testified that he shot Smart after Pamela Smart threatened to break up with him if he did not.
Flynn and Patrick Randall, who held a knife to Gregg Smart’s throat, were paroled this year. Two other men were released after serving sentences.
Maynard, whose March letter to Hassan was just released to the media, noted that Smart had earned two advanced degrees while in prison and had helped other inmates. She appealed to Hassan to be compassionate.
“And to whatever extent Pamela Smart’s chances for a fair parole hearing may have been affected by my novel, I trust you will do what you can to rectify that situation by giving her the same second chance granted the others involved in that case,” she wrote.
Volunteers and a professional rescue team from SeaWorld came to the aid of a sea lion that appeared Saturday on a dock in Channel Islands Harbor with the handle of a bladed weapon protruding from his body.
"This animal would have died because of this impalement," said Keith Yip, curator of mammals at SeaWorld San Diego and leader of its rescue team.
The male sea lion, estimated to weigh 600 pounds or more, had been overnighting on an empty dock, then disappearing during the day. Concerned boaters and live-aboards in the harbor dubbed him Bubba and worried that he might not survive until rescuers could get him help.
Rescuers arrived early Tuesday morning, shortly after Bubba had disappeared again into the water, and they awaited his return. One search boat, the Captain Jax, patrolled the harbor the entire day without a sighting until just before 5:30 p.m., when Heidi Dinkler checked back at the spot near the end of dock B where the sea lion had been overnighting and found him swimming nearby. Dinkler, a retired Kern County Fire Battalion Chief, radioed the second rescue boat.
"He's back!" Dinkler said in lowered voice as not to startle the animal. Within minutes the sea lion perched itself atop the end of the dock.
NBC4 was riding with Dinkler at the time of the sighting, and remained in the Captain Jax for the duration of the mission, affording an up-close view of the rescue.
On the dock, the sea lion was darted twice with a tranquilizer, then dove into the water and resisted the efforts of rescuers to capture him for nearly two frustrating hours. With the effect of the tranquilizer starting to wear off, a third dart was fired and stuck, but still the sea lion was able to back out of a net every time it was placed over his head.
Team members were beginning to worry that they would have to postpone the effort on account of darkness when he was finally netted using an extra-long net provided by the Coast Guard. Harbor Patrol also assisted in spotting and herding the sea lion.
After Bubba was brought to shore, Yip and veterinarian Sam Dover, DVM, discovered the blade was so deeply embedded it had to be cut out with a scalpel.
"It angers me," said Yip as he held up the weapon. "You know, it's not right. There's no animal that deserves this kind of treatment."
"Clearly it was done intentionally," said Dover, founder of the Channel Islands Marine & Wildlife Institute (CIMWI), which organized the rescue effort.
The blade was taken as evidence for follow up investigation. Harming a sea lion is a federal offense under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, enforced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
NOAA's office of investigation will attempt to determine how the sea lion was wounded, Martina Sagapolu, deputy special agent in charge, said.
Who stabbed the sea lion remains unknown. NOAA is encouraging anyone with information to call its hotline number, 800-853-1964.
Boaters were stunned and angry over the wound that was inflicted.
"I've seen him about three days ago, it was the first time it was here," said Kenny Knoll, who lives aboard a boat near the dock where Bubba appeared.
"But this was vicious, this was," Tony Raimondo said. "I think someone must have gashed the thing because when you look at that gash, it was continuous -- it didn't happen by accident."
Sometimes loud and aggressive -- even known to steal fish from a catch -- sea lions are not always popular in harbors.
Just last month, sport fisherman Dan Carlin was holding a fish for a photo while motoring back to dock in San Diego's Mission Bay when a sea lion leapt to snatch it from his grasp.
The sea lion bit Carlin's hand and pulled him down some 20 feet underwater before he broke free and escaped, he told interviewers.
In Channel Islands Harbor on New Year's Day, a fisherman who had been cutting bait on a dock was bitten in the leg by a sea lion and sent into the water. The same sea lion continued to loiter near the dock for another month and at one point he struck it with a pole to ward it off, the fisherman said. The fisherman identified himself as Jerry and his account of the January incident was corroborated by others in the harbor.
That sea lion had different coloration from the wounded one that was rescued Tuesday, Jerry said, and he expressed doubt they are the same animal.
From his dinghy, Knoll was able to follow the rescue until its conclusion. After Bubba was placed in a safety cage for transport to San Diego, Knoll was able to get a close look.
"Amazing!" he exclaimed, visibly relieved that the days of suspense were over.
Dover and Yip expressed confidence that after treatment, the sea lion will be able to return to the ocean.
Yip returned to SeaWorld with Bubba. Dover said planned to return to Santa Barbara to resume working with mammals oiled by last week's spill. Its draw on resources was a factor that kept volunteers from getting to the sea lion sooner, he said.
A driver and passenger were seriously hurt Wednesday when their car smashed into a house on Route 3 in Wethersfield, according to police.
Police said the crash happened around noon at the intersection of Route 3/Maple Street and Route 287/Prospect Street. The home sustained heavy damage.
Police, firefighters and medical personnel responded to the scene and started treating the injured driver and passenger. Both people were taken to the hospital for treatment of serious injuries, according to police.
The Wethersfield building inspector was called in to assess damage to the home, which police described as significant.
Maple Street was closed between Prospect Street and the Route 99/Silas Deane Highway while authorities responded to the scene. The area reopened to traffic around 2:30 p.m.
Members of the Midstate Accident Reconstruction Team responded to the scene and continue to investigate.
Police said it's not clear whether the driver suffered a medical issue or if there was a mechanical problem with the car.
Witnesses or those with information are asked to call Wethersfield Officer Newton at 860-721-2712.
Check back for updates on this developing story.
Call in the pizza guy!
That’s what the crew of a Delta flight from Philadelphia did after the Atlanta-bound aircraft landed in Knoxville, Tennessee instead Tuesday afternoon.
Bad weather in Atlanta caused the crew of Delta Flight 561, which took off from Philly just after 2 p.m., to land more than 200 miles from their destination.
The diverted flight landed in Knoxville around 3:50 p.m. As dinner time began to approach, the pilot announced to the passengers that they ordered pizza. A short time later dozens of pizza pies arrived.
“It’s part of a standing procedure at Delta to get food and beverages to delayed customers – whether it be a severe weather event that drove the diversion last night or a delay in airport due to an aircraft mechanical issue,” said Delta Air Lines spokesman Morgan Durrant.
The pizzas came from Marco's Pizza in Maryville, Tennessee. The pizza chain, which also has locations in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, delivered about 65 pizzas to the airport Tuesday.
The Philly flight, originally scheduled to last about two hours, finally took off from Knoxville around 6:15 p.m. and passengers, with bellies full of pizza, arrived in Atlanta just after 7 p.m.
The Philly flight wasn’t the only Atlanta-bound Delta plane forced to land in Knoxville that got pizza delivered Tuesday.
Delta continues with class. Stuck due to weather and the crew ordered everyone pizza. #deltaairlines pic.twitter.com/yMeBCFF0qL
— Bill Wittenmyer (@BillyTheKidWitt) May 26, 2015
Wittenmyer was on an Atlanta-bound plane from California.
We are sitting on a runway stuck on a @Delta flight because of weather. So they're throwing us a pizza party! pic.twitter.com/QO0ntZvs4I
— Riley Vasquez (@RileyVasquez) May 26, 2015
Vazquez, who was on a diverted flight from Denver, told NBC10 that the delivery “made everyone so much happier. When they announced they ordered pizza the plane erupted in cheer and applause.”
Delivering pizzas to diverted planes was a “team effort with the flight crew and our airport representatives,” said Durrant.
Delta even delivered pizza to passengers on an Atlanta-bound flight that wound up diverted to Columbia, South Carolina.
And, in case you were wondering, passengers had their choice between plain, pepperoni or supreme, according to passengers.
Three Connecticut students are hoping to spell victory as they compete in the 2015 Scripps National Seplling Bee in Washington D.C.
Anika R. Malayappan, 12, of Danbury, a sixth-grader at Broadview Middle School; Aahil T. Nishad, 9, of Danbury, a fourth-grader at Stadley Rough Elementary School; and Arjun Javjivan, 13, of West Hartford, an eighth-grader at Sedgwick Middle School, are all competing.
The preliminaries test was on Tuesday and rounds two and three are on Wednesday.
Malayappan's word in rourd 2 was chary, which means cautiously or suspiciously reluctant to do something; Nishad's word was mahal, which means a mansion or palace; and Javjivan's word was regime.
The semifinals test will be Wednesday night and the semifinals will be held 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. eastern time on Thursday, followed by the championship finals on Thursday from 8 to 10 p.m. eastern time.
The semifinalists will be announced live on ESPN3 and the finalists will be announced live on ESPN2.
How well can you spell? Test yourself on these words that stumped past Scripps National Spelling Bee contenders.
Heavy rain and thunderstorms are moving east across the state, but the threat of severe storms has passed and all warnings and watches have been canceled.
Heat and humidity fueled storms through the afternoon and into the evening. Despite the potential for winds of up to 60 mph and small hail, most damage has been reported over the state line in western Massachusetts.
A cold front comes through Thursday, likely early enough to preclude any significant weather.
A spot shower or storm is possible midday; otherwise, a mix of sun and clouds is anticipated.
Expect mostly sunny skies Friday. Not only will there be a break from the shower and thunderstorm threat, but the humidity will be gone for the day. Temperatures will be in the low 80s inland, upper 70s at the water.
At this point, the weekend looks split. A strong cold front will come through Sunday. That means increasing clouds, breezy and warm conditions on Saturday with temperatures in the mid-80s. A pop-up shower can’t be ruled out, but the vast majority of the rain and possibly thunder will occur Sunday.
Early indications for the start of next week show high pressure building down from Canada, meaning much cooler conditions. Temperatures will be stuck in the 60s! There is the chance for showers on both Monday and Tuesday, especially in southern areas, as a frontal boundary will be stalled to the south.
Stay with the NBC Connecticut First Alert weather team for the very latest forecast on-air, online and on the app.
The staff at one D.C. restaurant received a big surprise this weekend -- a $2,000 tip on a $93 bill.
A customer at Blue 44 in Chevy Chase visited the restaurant on Monday to pick up a few quarts of gumbo, the staff said. When bartender Laura Dally told the regular his order would be free, he not only paid his bill, he left an extra $2,000.
The customer -- who asked not to be named -- scrawled out on the bill that he wanted the chef to have $1,000, Dally to get $500 and owner Chris Nardelli to get the remaining $500.
"We gave them a couple quarts of gumbo on the house after their meal, but never expected anything like this," Nardelli said in a statement.
Blue 44, at 5507 Connecticut Ave. NW, opened in April 2011.
A Waterbury church leader has been sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to federal charges for persuading a 14-year-old to send him sexually explicit photos and videos, according to the U.S. attorney's office.
Miguel Torres, 45, met the girl through his wife's youth group at the Iglesia Cristiana Fuente de Agua Viva Church in Waterbury. According to the warrant for his arrest, Torres told the teen he would be her mentor.
Federal prosecutors said Torres swapped cellphone numbers with the teen and started asking her for sexually explicit photos and videos in June 2013. The conversations turned graphic, and both sent each other sexual images.
Torres told the teen he had "engaged in sexual conduct with other girls" in an effort to make her more comfortable, according to the U.S. attorney's office.
The criminal complaint also alleges the two had sexual contact in church.
"I met him in the hallway," the teen told authorities, according to court paperwork. "Miguel came close to me and started... kissing me."
The teen's mother discovered the text messages in August 2013 and called the police, according to the arrest warrant.
Torres pleaded guilty in federal court in March to one count of enticing a minor and he was sentenced 10 years prison, followed by 10 years of supervised release.
The church pastor declined to comment on the case at the time of Torres' arrest.
The Merriam-Webster unabridged dictionary has included new words that will have some people saying “WTF.”
The company announced Tuesday it has added 1,700 new terms, many of which are influenced by the internet and social media.
Such entries include meme, NSFW, emoji, clickbait, and photobomb.
Others refer to popular culture, such as jeggings, photobomb, twerk and vocal fry.
For a word to be included, it has to be “used in a substantial number of citations that come from a wide range of publications over a considerable period of time,” according to Merriam-Webster. “Specifically, the word must have enough citations to allow accurate judgments about its establishment, currency, and meaning.”
Here are some other new entries:
Net Neutrality (Noun)
Definition: the idea, principle or requirement that Internet service providers should or must treat all Internet data as the same regardless of its kind, source or destination.
Clickbait (Noun)
Definition: something (such as a headline) designed to make readers want to click on a hyperlink, especially when the link leads to content of dubious value or interest.
Sriracha (Noun)
Definition: a pungent sauce that is made from hot peppers pureed with usually garlic, sugar, salt, and vinegar and that is typically used as a condiment.
Slendro (Noun)
Definition: a pentatonic tuning employed for Javanese gamelans that divides the octave into five roughly similar internals.
Dark Money (Noun)
Definition: money contributed to nonprofit organizations that is used to fund political campaigns without disclosure of the donors' identities.
Firefighters are battling a fire at 198 South Quaker Lane in West Hartford and the intersection at Boulevard is closed to traffic.
A photo from the scene shows some destroyed siding, but no additional information was immediately available.
Injuries have been reported in a crash on Interstate 95 northbound in Norwalk, according to police.
The crash is in the right lanes between exits 15 and 16.
The fire department and medics have responded.
A Waterbury man has been sentenced to 12 years in prison for a stolen identity tax refund scheme that federal officials said cost the U.S. Treasury $7.5 million.
Julio Lara Trinidad, 28, of Waterbury, was sentenced on Wednesday to 144 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, according to a news release from U.S. Attorney Deirdre Daly.
“One of the Department of Justice’s Tax Division’s highest priorities is prosecuting people who use stolen identities to steal money from the U.S. Treasury by filing false tax returns,” Daly said in a statement. “This scheme involved nearly $6.8 million dollars in fraudulent refunds – money stolen from law abiding taxpayers at an enormous cost to the Treasury. We hope that this lengthy prison term will deter other potential offenders as these prosecutions will continue to be a priority for our Office.”
According to court documents and statements made in court, the investigation was into people who obtained fraudulent U.S. Treasury tax refund checks using stolen identities, then sold the checks for less than face value or deposited them into bank accounts that had been opened using fraudulent identifying documents, then quickly withdrawn.
In 2011, Trinidad was arrested in New Jersey, accused of stealing U.S. Treasury tax refund checks from mailboxes, and pleaded guilty to a related charge in in January 2012.
Trinidad failed to appear for sentencing in May 2012 and was arrested on Nov. 23, 2013, and charged by indictment in the District of Connecticut.
While he was a fugitive from justice, Trinidad and his co-conspirators opened at least 59 bank accounts in the names of identity theft victims, deposited U.S. Treasury tax refund checks into the accounts, and then quickly withdrew the funds, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.
Between December 2012 and February 2013, one of the accounts was used to buy six licenses for a brand of tax preparation software, which were used to file more than 36,000 federal income tax returns, with more than $234 million in refunds, intended to be issued to Trinidad and his co-conspirators, officials said.
U.S. officials said Trinidad’s co-defendants, Jerry De Los Santos Rodriguez and Cesar Penson-Perez, admitted to working with Trinidad to open bank accounts using fraudulent identities.
In addition, between July and October 2013, Trinidad and Ramon Mena sold more than $60,000 in fraudulently-obtained U.S. Treasury checks to someone who was working with law enforcement, officials said.
On February 10, he pleaded guilty to one count of theft of public money and one count of aggravated identity theft.
Middletown police have arrested a 32-year-old local man who is accused of assaulting a pregnant woman in front of a toddler.
Police said they investigated the report of a past physical domestic incident on Tuesday and met with the victim, a woman who is 27-weeks pregnant, who said the abuse happened in front of a toddler.
When police interviewed the suspect, Jonathan Santiago, 32, of Middletown, tried to leave and elude investigators, police said.
He also became aggressive and combative and injured police officers who tried to arrest him, according to the arraignment report.
Santiago was charged with assault on a pregnant person, assault on public safety personnel, interfering with arrest, disorderly conduct and risk of injury to a child.
He was held on a $500,000 surety bond and was due in court on Wednesday.
A man suspected of slashing the throat of his estranged wife, then stabbing an elderly man for whom she was caring in Milford is now in Milford police custody after being arrested in Philadelphia last month.
Milford police took custody of Amado Rodriguez, 48, in Pennsylvania in March. He is being held on $500,000 and he is due in Milford Superior Court on Thursday.
Rodriguez is accused of entering a home on Washington Street just after 7:30 p.m. on April 19, going into her bedroom and cutting her throat as she slept, then attacking the elderly man, who is visually impaired, and leaving in the man's car.
FBI officials in Philadelphia said their counterparts in Connecticut contacted them the day after the stabbing, when they developed information that Rodriguez had fled the state.
The Milford warrant charges him eith first-degree assault, first-degree assault on an elderly person, home invasion, first-degree burglary, second-degree larceny and criminal violation of a restraining order.
A photo of two white Chicago police officers posing with rifles as they stand over a black man lying on his stomach with deer antlers on his head has sparked outrage.
The photo, showing Officers Timothy McDermott and Jerome Finnigan, was published Tuesday by the Chicago Sun-Times. It was released in March by a Cook County, Illinois, judge and is believed to have been taken in a West Side police station between 1999 and 2003, the Sun-Times reports.
The Polaroid image was given to the police department in January of 2013 and immediately prompted an investigation that led to McDermott being fired in 2014, police said Wednesday.
McDermott was stripped of his police powers and charges were filed with the Police Board, which terminated him in October of 2014.
“This picture is disgusting," Police Supt. Garry McCarthy said in a statement issued to NBC Chicago, "and the despicable actions of these two former officers have no place in our police department or in our society."
McDermott has reportedly appealed to a dismissal court, but attorneys for the police department and McDermott asked that the photo be sealed earlier this year. The judge refused that request in March and the photo was recently obtained by the Sun-Times.
The other officer in the photo, Finnigan, is also the face of a scandal involving the Special Operations Section of the police department and is currently serving a 12-year sentence in a federal prison in Florida. He pleaded guilty to charges in a murder-for-hire scheme and income tax evasion, relating to money he stole as a police officer.
"As the Superintendent of this department, and as a resident of our city," McCarthy said, "I will not tolerate this kind of behavior, and that is why neither of these officers works for CPD today. I fired one of the officers, and would have fired the other if he hadn't already been fired by the time I found out about the picture, which is why I fired the officer involved as soon as I learned about photo. Our residents deserve better than this, as do the thousands of good men and women in this department.”
The man in the photo has not been identified.
SWAT teams officers handcuffed a suspected hostage taker outside a Bay Area gas station on Wednesday after he reportedly took two hostages.
The California Highway Patrol was assisting Antioch police in the standoff.
One of the two hostages being held inside the ARCO gas station at 2610 Contra Loma Blvd. was released at about 2:50 p.m. (5:50 p.m. ET). The other hostage exited the gas station about half an hour later followed by the suspect.
He came out with his arms up, lay face down in the parking lot and was quickly handcuffed. No injuries were reported.
Antioch Police Chief Allan Cantando said the incident started with a reported traffic collision at West 10th Street and Auto Center Drive. A male suspect was seen running from the crash ran to a nearby business, where he stole a car while a man was in it, he said. According to Cantado, the suspect eventually resurfaced in Concord, where he had stolen another vehicle.
Cantando said officers pursued the suspect's vehicle to the shut-down L Street off-ramp of Highway 4, where he crashed. The suspect then attempted to steal another car from two women, but they said he was deterred by their pit bull.
A CHP officer did fire a single shot at the suspect after the suspect pointed a weapon, Cantando said. The suspect was able to run into the gas station in Antioch where he took a pair of hostages. It was not immediately clear whether the hostages worked at the gas station or if they were customers.
An employee of a nearby company said nearby businesses have been advised to stay indoors while police deal with a “possible abduction” next door. The employee declined to give her name.
The L Street off-ramp from Highway 4 was shut down due to the police activity, according to CHP.
Bay City News contributed to this report.
A driver died Monday morning after running a red light on the Berlin Turnpike in Newington and colliding with a police cruiser on its way to an emergency call, according to police.
Police said Jason Augeri, 41, of Southington, drove through a red light at the intersection with Deming Road around 7 a.m. and crossed into the path of the police cruiser, which had activated its lights and sirens. Augeri was pronounced dead at the scene.
The officer, Ryan Williams, a more than seven-year veteran of the department, was taken to the hospital for treatment. Police said Williams has since been released.
The highway was closed for several hours while authorities responded to the scene.
Police said Williams was responding to the report of a violent disturbance at the Grantmoore Motor Lodge at the time of the crash.
Newington resident Jennifer Lacoste was sleeping in her home more than a quarter-mile away when she heard the crash.
"You just heard the crash. Just a crunch," she said.
She and others looked on as members of the Mid-State Accident Reconstruction Squad investigated. Police said the Mid-State Major Crime Unit was also called out to gather evidence and interview witnesses.
"Such an unfortunate situation... someone losing their life early in the morning," said New Britain resident Luis Santana.
The crash remains under investigation. Police said the chief medical examiner's office is working to determine Augeri's cause of death and will perform a chemical analysis. Investigators from New Britain Superior Court are also involved.
Witnesses are urged to call Newington police at 860-666-8445.
A 20-year-old Massachusetts man has been arrested in connection with a sexual assault in Wallingford.
Police said Gregory Mooney, of Mashpee, Massachusetts, sexually assaulted a person he knew in Wallingford on Wednesday.
He was arrested and charged with second-degree sexual assault. Mooney is being held on $50,000 bond and is due in court June 8.
Three people suffered serious injuries when a Chevrolet Malibu and a tractor-trailer carrying heating fuel crashed in Monroe on Wednesday morning, according to police.
Police said Giovanni Thompson, 20, of Bridgeport, was driving southbound on Route 25/Main Street when he crossed over the center line and struck a tractor-trailer traveling northbound around 7:40 a.m. He told police he must have fallen asleep at the wheel.
The tractor-trailer, driven by Robert Colburn, 66, of New Milford, drove off the righthand side of the road. Colburn swerved to miss utility poles and crashed into several large pine trees.
Thompson and a passenger were trapped in the Malibu and had to be extricated, according to police. Police said all three people involved were taken to a nearby hospital for treatment of serious but non-life threatening injuries.
Route 25 was closed for hours after one of the tractor-trailer's fuel tanks ruptured, spilling diesel fuel onto the roadway. Police said the tanker carrying heating fuel was not compromised and is not leaking.
Crews from the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection were called to the scene to coordinate the clean-up effort.
Thompson was issued an infraction for failure to drive in the proper lane.
