What about when MOM is the abuser?

Another installment of the weekly article round up:





GLENS FALLS - A Glens Falls woman was jailed Thursday night after she chased her ex-boyfriend into a bathroom and threatened to harm him, police said. Fataima A. Moseley, 20, was arrested shortly after the 8 p.m. incident at a Union Street apartment, said Glens Falls Police Sgt. Keith Knoop.


She was accused of violating an order of protection a man had against her by chasing him until he ran and locked himself in a bathroom, then threatening him and trying to break down the door, Knoop said. - Read the entire article here





KY - A man is recovering after he was stabbed in the chest outside of his Lexington home late Thursday night. Police say the victim and the female suspect were in an argument at the home Corral Street.


Then, police say the suspect left and returned with a knife, stabbing the man in the middle of the chest as he sat on the sidewalk. Police arrested Warnetta Mayfield, 65, at the scene. Officers say she waved the knife at an officer but dropped it when officers told her to. - Read the entire article here





VALPARAISO - A Chesterton woman is facing nine charges, five of them felonies, in connection with a Tuesday stabbing. Janery Santana, 30, goes before Judge William Alexa today on charges that include felony aggravated battery, battery, criminal recklessness and possession of marijuana.


She has been held in Porter County Jail on $50,000 bail. According to court records, police went to the house where she and the victim lived and found the victim kneeling on the garage floor at 2:30 a.m., his T-shirt torn and drenched with blood.


He had at least four lacerations on his head and a purple bruise under his left eye. His head was covered with lumps. - Read the entire article here





TROY - At 2:05 p.m. two females entered the HSBC at Broadway and Third Street and robbed it by passing a note to a teller. Troy Police arrested Sheila Davis, of Albany, at the intersection of Fourth and First streets. Another female is being questioned in the crime by Troy detectives.


"This is a desperate crime by desperate people," said Sgt. David Dean, a police spokesman. "It's highly unlikely to get away with bank robbery, this is especially true in Troy." - Read the entire article here





KY - A Louisville woman convicted earlier this year in a child sex assault case was sentenced Friday to the maximum punishment -- six years in prison -- after she violated the terms of her probation by continuing to have sex with her victim.

Irene Gomez, 39, had been free on a 20-year sentence of intensive supervised probation when she was re-arrested in September on suspicion of having sex multiple times with the same man she had sexually abused when he was a minor. - Read the entire article here


BILLINGS - Days before a former Billings woman was to be sentenced on federal bank fraud charges, she began a crime spree that ended three felonies later in Colorado. On Thursday, more than two years after skipping her sentencing, Noah Kathleene Robins, 23, appeared before Chief U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull.

Wiping away tears, Robins apologized. "I was a liar. I was a thief. I manipulated people on a daily basis," she said. "I was a very self-destructive person." Robins said she had no logical explanation for her behavior but said poor decisions snowballed. She was ashamed and embarrassed by her "reckless behavior," she said. - Read the entire article here


KENOSHA, Wis. — A 38-year-old Kenosha woman has been sentenced to 40 years in prison for prostituting her then-15-year-old daughter. Authorities say she charged men $25 to $45 for sex with her 15-year-old daughter and tried to sell her 14-year-old daughter into prostitution as well.

Her older daughter asked for the harshest sentence possible. The woman apologized for her actions in court Monday. - Read the entire article here


WESTPORT — Police have charged a local health care worker with beating a handicapped woman who was once in her care. Mandy Blake, 31, of 50 Charlotte White Road was charged with assaulting the wheelchair-bound local woman, who was not identified. Detective Jeff Majewski said that Ms. Blake is accused of appearing at the victim's home during her health care worker's brief daily break, refusing to leave, arguing about a financial matter, then grabbing the victim by the arms and "punching her about the head" before leaving. - Read the entire article here

Another installment of the weekly article round-up:


McKINNEY, Texas — A suburban Dallas mother accused of dropping her infant daughter from a balcony in her home twice was convicted Thursday of attempted capital murder, aggravated assault and injury to a child.

Jurors in the trial of Padmaja Sivaray Enjeti, 38, of Plano, began deliberations Wednesday afternoon. She could face up to life in prison in the sentencing phase of the trial. - Read the entire article here



LAWRENCE - A Douglas County jury convicted a 37-year-old Lawrence woman of second-degree murder in the beating death of a 62-year-old man in February.

The jury deliberated 4½ hours before finding Shanna R. Friday guilty in the death of Jerry L. DeShazer. During the week-long trial, Jerod E. Buffalohead, 36, testified that he saw Friday hit DeShazer in the head and face with a bottle during a drunken argument in Lawrence. - Read the entire article here



OHIO - A woman was sentenced to 10 years in prison Thursday for having sexual relations with a 12-year-old boy. Timi Robertson, 36, was scheduled for a bench trial in Richland County Common Pleas Court before Judge James DeWeese, but instead pleaded guilty to three counts of sexual battery.

In exchange for her plea, prosecutors dismissed three counts of rape against Robertson. Robertson was declared a Tier III sex offender, which requires her to register with the sheriff's office every three months wherever she maintains a residence. Robertson originally faced a sentence of 25 years to life in prison. - Read the entire article here



LAS VEGAS - A Las Vegas woman who threatened to kill two federal labor relations board attorneys in charge of litigating cases against her company has been convicted of making threats against a federal employee and witness tampering.

After a four-day jury trial before U.S. District Judge Roger L. Hunt, 53-year-old Lori Irish was convicted Thursday of five counts of threats against a federal employee, two counts of threats made in interstate commerce and one count of witness tampering, said U.S. Attorney Greg Brower of Nevada. - Read the entire article here



DALLAS — A woman who killed her 10-month-old daughter by cutting off her arms with a kitchen knife is being released from the state mental hospital where she'd been sent after being found not guilty by reason of insanity, authorities said Friday.

Dena Schlosser, 39, will be released within the next month into outpatient treatment because her doctors believe she's mentally stable, Collin County prosecutor Curtis Howard said. A court order issued after a hearing Thursday found "convincing evidence" that her needs and the "safety of the community" can be met with outpatient services. The order requires her to see a psychiatrist once a week, take medication, be on a phsycian-approved birth control and not have any unsupervised contact with children. - Read the entire article here



CLEVELAND - An 18-year-old Cleveland woman convicted in the stabbing death of a neighborhood rival will be sentenced to prison today in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court. Lesleye Holliman pleaded guilty to murder last month for killing 15-year-old Demesha Sharp near East 140th Street and Darley Avenue. Holliman faces a life prison sentence with parole eligibility in no less than 15 years.

Holliman's mother, Yulonda, and grandmother, Annetta, also kept onlookers at bay during the attack by using pepper spray and a stun gun, according to police reports. - Read the entire article here




GRAND ISLAND — A Grand Island woman was convicted Monday of intentionally abusing her infant daughter. A Hall County District Court jury found Ingrid Aguirre, 21, guilty of child abuse committed knowingly and intentionally in a Monday morning verdict after a five-day trial last week. - Read the entire article here




WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - A Florida woman convicted of murdering her ex-boyfriend's mother should receive the death penalty for her crime, a jury recommended to a circuit court. The panel recommended 9-3 that Circuit Judge Sandra McSorley sentence Rhonda Norman, 36, to death for the home-invasion murder of her former boyfriend's mother, Jane Tackaberry.

Norman told police the August 2006 killing and a throat-slashing injury to Tackaberry's 6-year-old son Elijah, were an act of revenge to hurt Tackaberry for alleged sexual infidelity. - Read the entire article here



CALGARY - A woman convicted of second degree murder for her role in the torture and death of a Calgary prostitute has been sentenced life in prison with no chance of parole for 12 years. In April 2006, Rochelle Friars was confined and tortured in a Beltline-area crackhouse before her body was dumped in a landfill.

Sarah Ann Rowe pleaded guilty to murder, while two other women were both convicted of manslaughter in the case. Because of time already served, Rowe will be eligible for parole in 2018. - Read the entire article here



PRINCETON — A Mercer County woman who was granted a new trial after the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals reversed her 2006 conviction on sexual assault charges pleaded guilty Wednesday in Mercer County Circuit Court.

Mindy Keesecker, 37, formerly of Princeton appeared before Judge David Knight for a jury trial, but she instead entered guilty pleas to separate counts of sexual assault, first degree.

Keesecker was convicted in 2006 after being arrested and charged in connection with a sexual relationship she had in 2005 with a then 15-year-old boy she supervised with a church group. - Read the entire article here

Another installment of the Weekly Article Round Up:


ERIE. PA - A judge said Carrie L. Dana, 29, failed the community by repeatedly having sex with an 11-year-old boy at her Erie residence in 2007. Bozza sentenced Dana to a total of 15 to 30 years in a state prison. Sentencing requirements dictated much of the penalty.

The defense unsuccessfully argued at trial that Dana did not have sex with the boy, and that, if she did have sex with him, she acted under duress because the boy was obsessed with her- Read the entire article here


FLA - Lillian Glaubman of Miami has been sentenced to 6 ½ years in prison for running a fraudulent business involving public kiosks that charged for Internet access. She also has been ordered to pay more than $18 million to roughly 737 victims of the scheme. - Read the entire article here


WIS - A 45-year-old woman who stabbed her husband in the head, chest and back when she discovered he was having an affair will spend no time in jail, according to a court records released Friday. Maria O. Hernandez, of 1404 S. Eighth St., pleaded no contest to a reduced charge Tuesday and was sentenced to two years probation by Judge L. Edward Stengel. A 90-day jail term was stayed, meaning she does not have to serve it if she successfully completes probation. - Read the entire article here


WIS - Laura Lee Janzig pleaded guilty to criminal defamation in Superior, Wisc. for allegedly false e-mail she wrote to members of the Superior School District alleging that a local teacher was having sex with her students and videotaping it. The accused teacher was put on administrative leave and was investigated by the local police department. - Read the entire article here


SC - A Georgetown woman was convicted of unlawful conduct towards a child after she beat her 12-year-old daughter with a pool stick for not taking care of her three siblings, according to a press release from the solicitor's office for the 15th Judicial Circuit.

Helenia Dawn Jacobs, 33, was given a three-year suspended jail sentence last week. The press release said Jacobs left the 12-year-old in charge of her younger siblings in February. Her 1-year-old sibling was left unattended, turned on the bathtub faucet and flooded the master bedroom. - Read the entire article here


AUSTIN – A woman has been charged with child endangerment, a state jail felony, for allegedly beating her 4-year-old daughter before throwing her into the path of an oncoming vehicle, police said. The driver of the approaching Chevrolet Suburban did not strike the child.

Aurelia Gallardo, 24, faces up to 20 years if convicted. Bail was set at $25,000. When the incident happened Tuesday, Ms. Gallardo and her three children were waiting for a city bus. - Read the entire article here


DOYLESTOWN, Pa. - A suburban Philadelphia woman has been found guilty of first-degree murder for shooting another member of her church. Bucks County authorities say 66-year-old Mary Jane Fonder of Springfield Township shot 42-year-old Rhonda Smith on Jan. 23. Prosecutors say Fonder had romantic feelings for the pastor at Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church and was jealous Smith was getting attention from him. - Read the entire article here

Another installment of the weekly article round-up:


CINCINNATI — A woman was sentenced to 10 years in prison for beating her 93-year-old neighbor with a vacuum cleaner during a robbery that netted her $5.

Police say 58-year-old Dora Nance was looking for money to buy drugs in May when she beat Florence Homes unconscious using a vacuum cleaner and a table leg, authorities said.

The midnight attack left Homes with a broken arm, broken bones in her face and several cuts, and she was forced to move into a nursing home. - Read the entire article here


SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - A 45-year-old Springfield woman has been sentenced to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to beating an 80-year-old man in the head with a socket wrench and robbing him of $20 inside his home.

Assistant Sangamon County State's Attorney Jennifer Kuntz said Wednesday that Deborah Steinkuehler knocked on the mans door around 11 p.m. on December 12 and asked to use the phone. Because the knew Steinkuehler, he let her in. But when he turned his back, she struck him 10 to 15 times in the head with the wrench. The man required 65 staples to close his wounds. - Read the entire article here


GARNER, Iowa (AP) - A Ventura woman accused of trying to kill her 81-year-old mother with a frying plan has been sentenced to 40 years in prison. Valerie Hasbrouck pleaded guilty earlier this year to four counts of willful injury.

Authorities say the 47-year-old attacked her mother, Tressa Waddingham, on December 3rd at the mother's rural Ventura home in northern Iowa. - Read the entire article here


TOOELE - A Tooele mother who admitted killing a 14-month-old boy whom she and her husband adopted from Russia was sentenced Friday to prison for up to 15 years.

But during a diagnostic evaluation at the Utah State Prison, the woman admitted grabbing the child by an arm and a leg, slammed him to the floor, then repeating the action. - Read the entire article here


ALLENTOWN - A former teacher, described in court as someone who spent months trying to "brainwash" a student to make her a sexual tool, was sentenced to 15 to 30 years in prison today by a Northampton County judge who said it was the worst case of abuse she has seen.

The sentence against Keri Ann Brekne, 28, of Bethlehem came after the 15-year-old victim and her parents described Brekne as a cold, manipulative woman who used her position at a Warren County, N.J., middle school to win the girl's trust, ensnare her, isolate her and finally abuse her.

"In 20 years on the bench, I have not seen a case as heinous as this one," Judge Kimberly McFadden said in a courtroom packed by 85 supporters of the girl and her family and about 15 of Brekne. - Read the entire article here


INDEPENDENCE, Mo. - The second of two women charged with plotting to steal a pregnant teenager's unborn child pleaded guilty Thursday to kidnapping and first-degree assault.

Alisa Betts, 18, of Atchison, Kan., entered the pleas in Jackson County Circuit Court, where prosecutors dismissed a third charge of felonious restraint.

Prosecutors said Betts and Gash met Amanda Howard, then 18 and pregnant, over the Internet in July 2007 and lured her from her home in Clinton, about 70 miles southeast of Kansas City.

The teen soon realized something was wrong and tried to use her cell phone. She was sprayed with some type of pepper spray and taken to a motel in the Kansas City suburb of Blue Springs, where she was bound and gagged with duct tape.

Officers went to the motel expecting to check on a distressed pregnant woman. They became suspicious when they saw the duct tape around Howard's neck and in her hair.

Also in the room were scissors, a sheet of plastic, a fishing tool, diapers, a blanket and a fake birth certificate. Stansell has said the room "basically was set up for surgery to take place." - Read the entire article here


OSHKOSH, Wis. - A Town of Menasha woman accused of throwing her baby has been sentenced to a year in prison for violating her probation in an unrelated case. Winnebago County Circuit Judge Thomas Gritton revoked 28-year-old Tanya Kasper's probation on a drug conviction Wednesday, two days after she was charged with second-degree recklessly causing injury for harming her daughter.

A criminal complaint says Kasper told police she threw her 4-month-old daughter into a chair Sept. 4 because the child kept fussing while she was getting ready for a job interview.

A police officer resuscitated the baby, who remains hospitalized. Doctors say she will have permanent mental and physical disabilities if she survives. - Read the entire article here


PORTLAND, Ore. - Sentencing was delayed Friday for two Portland nursing home workers who were found guilty of contributing to a patient's death.

Sentencing for the supervisor, Suzanne Ruddell, 59, was delayed because the woman's lawyer requested a pre-sentence investigation, but it is likely she will do some time in prison.

Ober was a patient at the Gateway Care and Rehab Center in northeast Portland when Nye was moving her and dropped her on the floor, breaking both her legs.

Ober wasn't taken to a hospital for five days, despite her cries for help. - Read the entire article here


PITTSBORO - A woman charged with beating two elderly women to death and seriously injuring another at a retirement community was sentenced Monday to spend the rest of her life in prison for the crimes.

Barbara Clark, 42, pleaded guilty in a plea agreement that allowed her to avoid the death penalty in the December 2007 fatal beatings of Mary Corcoran, 82, and Margaret Murta, 92. Authorities said Clark committed the killings after the women confronted her about stolen and forged checks. The women's neighbor, Rebecca Fisher, 77, also suffered injuries in the attack, but recovered. - Read the entire article here



RIDGELAND, SC - A Jasper County woman has been sentenced to eight years in prison for attacking her husband with pruning shears.

The Island Packet of Hilton Head reports that 40-year-old Eloise Simmons of Ridgeland was convicted this week of high and aggravated criminal domestic violence. It was her eighth domestic violence conviction.

Prosecutors said she stabbed her husband of 21 years just two days after being released from jail in August. His injury required six stitches. - Read the entire article here


LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - A former foster mom has been sentenced to prison for having sex with a boy in her family's care.

The 38-year-old woman, whose name is not being used in order to protect the boy's identity, on Wednesday was given 20-60 months in prison. - Read the entire article here


VAN BUREN - A Van Buren woman was found guilty of two counts of rape by a Crawford County jury Friday and sentenced to 10 years in prison. Lorri Gene Rye, 35, stood accused of rape for twice performing oral sex on a minor male relative (age 3).

Rye was arrested Oct. 19, 2007, after Helen Hawthorne, who was baby-sitting the child, reported that the child told her Rye put her mouth on his genitals.

Because of the victim’s age, the court and prosecution and defense agreed that he was not competent to testify, so jurors never heard from the victim. - Read the entire article here


CHINGFORD - A woman has been found guilty of repeatedly branding a three-year-old boy with a cigarette lighter. Tracey Parker, 23, of Otterbourne Road, Chingford, denied charges of child cruelty including assault occasioning actual bodily harm, and neglect, claiming she had passed out from smoking heroin at the time. - Read the entire article here

Another installment of the weekly article round-up. For some reason there appears to be a lot of elderly persons being accused or convicted this wekk. All the way from the 77 year old smuggling cocaine, the 81 year old woman murdering her 85 year old boyfriend, to the 62 year old nursing home operator involved in the death of a client and other crimes. I also added a bizzarre crime where a woman, who has been arrested over 50 times now, was arrested while wearing a cow suit:


ROCKVILLE, Md. - Two children were likely dead since at least last fall and their bodies moved several times to different homes before their remains were found in a basement freezer in their mother's house in southern Maryland, authorities said Wednesday.

Renee Bowman is jailed and suspected of killing and freezing her two adopted daughters - who would be 9 and 11 - and abusing a third. Based on information she has given, investigators are working on the premise that the girls were killed when the family lived in Rockville, said Lt. Paul Starks of the Montgomery County police. Bowman's former Rockville landlord has told police the family moved in November, Starks said.

Calvert County deputies on Saturday found the remains of the girls encased in freezer ice at Bowman's home in Lusby, about 60 miles southeast of Rockville. They searched the house after arresting Bowman, 43, on a child abuse charge in the beating of her youngest daughter, who is 7.

The sheriff's office said a third girl was found by investigators Saturday after escaping from a locked bedroom by jumping out the window. Garrett found the girl walking barefoot on a gravel road in a blood-soaked T-shirt. He said she was covered in bruises. - Read the entire article here



BRENTWOOD, N.H.— A New Hampshire woman has been convicted of trying to hire a man to kill a prominent lawyer's wife.

Twenty-eight-year-old Katherine Mendola was convicted Wednesday of solicitation to murder, which carries a sentence of up to 30 years in prison.

Jurors watched a videotape of Mendola trying to hire an undercover police officer to kill the wife of Manchester lawyer B.J. Upton. Police set up the undercover operation after being tipped off to Mendola's plan to hire someone to kill the woman. - Read the entire article here


ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. - An Orange County woman convicted of trying to hire a hit man to kill her husband was supposed to be sentenced Thursday morning, but she was in the hospital instead and prosecutor are calling it a stunt just to keep from going to jail.

It was the fourth time the sentencing has been delayed.

Tina Marie Munoz was convicted for trying to hire a hit man to kill her husband for his insurance money. She was to be in court for sentencing Thursday, but now for the fourth time she dodged the bullet.

Munoz's is out of jail on home confinement, but her friends brought the court a doctor's note, proof she is being treated at Osceola Regional Medical Center. - Read the entire article here


TROY — A Sidney woman who was convicted of cutting a Troy man's throat and robbing him in his home April 9 was sentenced Monday, Sept. 29 to 14 years in prison.

In remarks before sentencing in Miami County Common Pleas Court, Michelle Ewing, 40, blamed her attack on Jimmy Crabtree, 60, on drugs and alcohol. - Read the entire article here


GREEN BAY - The Ashwaubenon woman accused of using her 15-year-old daughter’s identity to enroll in high school and try out for the cheerleading squad gave up her right to a preliminary hearing today and asked that her two felony cases be set for arraignment.

Wendy Brown, 33, is charged with identity theft and forgery for an unrelated case in which she is accused of collecting money for a rental property she didn’t own. Brown’s Sept. 3 arrest in the forgery case unraveled her high school charade.

Ashwaubenon High School officials notified the authorities and filed a truancy complaint after Brown didn’t show up for classes after attending the first day of classes. Investigators then learned that Brown’s daughter was attending school in Nevada and was in the custody of Brown’s mother, according to the criminal complaint.

Brown tried out for the cheerleading team in the days leading up to the start of school, attended several practices, was issued a locker and paid for her uniform, according the criminal complaint. Her check for the uniform bounced, the complaint said. - Read the entire article here


(CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas) – Belinda Ramirez, who engaged in a second adoption scheme following her release from prison for her 2007 adoption scheme conviction, has been sentenced to prison, United States Attorney Don DeGabrielle announced today.

In January 2007, Ramirez was convicted of mail and wire fraud and sentenced by U.S. District Judge Janis Graham Jack to 24 months in federal prison to be followed by three years of supervised release for engaging in an adoption scam. In that case, Ramirez claimed to be pregnant, found and communicated online with couples seeking to adopt and solicited and received money and gift cards purportedly to cover pregnancy expenses from a number of prospective adoptive parents. Ramirez was not pregnant, spent the money and caused prospective parents to spend thousands of dollars to make trips to Corpus Christi in anticipation of a birth that never happened. By May 2008, Ramirez, who had completed her prison term and had been released from prison, began a second adoption scam. This second similar scheme – claiming a pregnancy, seeking adoptive parents online and soliciting things of value – involved numerous victims who lost approximately $17,747. - Read the entire article here


JOHNSTOWN - A Johnstown woman who reportedly enticed teenage girls to fight - and then posted the video on the Internet - now has been charged with corruption of minors stemming from another incident.

Denise Burt, 28, of the 100 block of Jacob Street, allegedly drove two girls to the intersection of Cypress Avenue and Lunen Street on Sept. 12 to fight two other girls, city police said.

A week earlier, Burt was charged with corrupting minors for encouraging two juvenile girls to fight each other in the basement of her home and then posting the video on YouTube. - Read the entire article here


DOVER, England, Sept. 30 (UPI) -- A 77-year-old British woman was convicted of smuggling more than $2 million worth of cocaine using her government-funded car.

Ambrozine Heron, 77, was convicted of the importation of Class A drugs after she and her daughter made 14 trips across the Dover fairy to collect cocaine shipments from the Netherlands, The Daily Mail reported.

The pair explained the frequent trips across the Dover ferry to customs officials as a consequence of the elderly woman's health. However, Heron's Nissan Pathfinder, which she obtained through the government's Motorability program, was eventually stopped by customs officials who allegedly found 40 food tins filled with pure cocaine.

Heron's daughter, Paulette Chambers, 49, previously pleaded guilty to the smuggling charge. The women are scheduled to be sentenced Monday. - Read the entire article here


TAVARES - A woman who pleaded guilty to aggravated child abuse in Lake County court, then failed to report to jail, has been rearrested. Modesty Young, 25, was arrested in Manatee County, where she has family, on Saturday. She was transferred Wednesday to the Lake County Jail, where she was denied bail.

In April 2007, Young was arrested after her 2-year-old cousin, whom she was raising, was taken to the hospital with severe burns and bruises. Young told investigators the boy had been burned in the shower but they concluded that was impossible, according to Assistant State Attorney Beth Crumpler. Investigators think Young deliberately splattered the child with a hot liquid, possibly oil, Crumpler said.

Prosecutors offered Young a sentence of eight years in prison -- the minimum she faced if convicted, according to sentencing guidelines -- but she refused, Crumpler said. The morning her trial was set to begin she pleaded guilty, and the judge gave her a day to settle her affairs, after which she was to turn herself in, according to court records. She never showed up. - Read the entire article here


GUELPH - A mother who killed her two infant sons in separate incidents has expressed the desire to become pregnant again once she finishes serving a six-year jail sentence for two counts of infanticide.

An Ontario Superior court judge -- who yesterday ordered the 27-year-old Guelph, Ont., woman to six years in custody and four years' probation -- said he is astonished by the woman's desire and lamented that he could only try to prevent the deaths of any children she may have in the future. - Read the entire article here


ATLANTA — An 81-year-old woman who admmitted killing her 85-year-old ex-boyfriend has been sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to voluntary manslaughter.

A judge ordered a retrial in August for Lena Sims Driskell, who was sentenced to life in prison after being convicted of murder in June, 2006. She said she shot Herman Winslow in their Atlanta senior citizens housing complex because she thought Winslow was seeing another woman. - Read the entire article here


PA - A former nursing home operator made a lengthy plea to a judge yesterday before she was sentenced to prison for stealing payroll funds that a judge ordered her not to touch.

It was the last of several criminal trials for Martha Bell following the 2001 death of an Alzheimer's patient trapped in an outdoor patio at the now-defunct Ronald Reagan Atrium I Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Robinson.

Stating that her charitable work against Alzheimer's disease was "fueled by greed," Allegheny County Judge David R. Cashman sentenced Ms. Bell, 62, of West Mifflin, to six to 12 months in prison for six theft counts. The time is to be served concurrent to the sentences she's already serving: five years in federal prison followed by 22 to 44 months in state prison on charges related to the patient's death. - Read the entire article here


UK - A Hull woman who posed provocatively with a teenage girl for an Internet paedophile in a bid to clear her debts has been spared jail. Michelle Andrews, 43, was given a suspended prison sentence at Hull Crown Court on Monday after a judge decided she had been punished enough.

Andrews, of Spring Bank, west Hull, had taken indecent photographs of herself and the girl to send to a paedophile in Thailand who had offered to pay her £9,000 for the images. - Read the entire article here


OSHKOSH, Wis. - A woman who admitted to punching a toddler for not helping fold blankets has been convicted of killing the child. A jury found 24-year-old Sandra Scott of Oshkosh guilty of first-degree reckless homicide.

According to the criminal complaint, Scott told police she punched the 2-year-old twice in the stomach after she did not help fold a blanket. The child fell back and hit her head on a bottle. She later died at a hospital. - Read the entire article here


MADISON, Wis. — A former Maiden Rock woman charged in connection with allegedly offering a non-existent baby for adoption pleaded not guilty Sept. 23 in federal court to 16 counts of wire fraud.

Melissa Christiansen, 31, now of 723 Buchanan St., Red Wing, was charged in August with scheming to obtain an unspecified amount of money from four women by emailing, instant messaging or phoning them that she was pregnant and wanted to place her infant up for adoption.

The indictment alleged that, between June 2003 and November 2006, Christiansen contacted individuals in Thornton, Tex., Hot Springs, Ark., Fredericksburg, Va., and Grafton, Ohio, about putting her baby up for adoption after the infant was born. However, the baby never existed.

Altman said she would give defense attorney Michael Lieberman all the reports and video recordings the government has gathered as evidence, including Christiansen's appearance on the "Dr. Phil" talk show with three of her accusers.

After court, Altman wouldn't comment on the evidentiary value of the Dr. Phil show recording, but told a reporter, "it's pretty clear. You should watch it." - Read the entire article here


ELIZABETH - A Plainfield woman who wielded a mallet to bash her ex-boyfriend's vehicle on New Year's Day, then re turned to the scene and tried to run him over with her car, has been convicted of aggravated as sault and weapons charges.

Golda Harris, 41, who was found guilty Monday by a jury in Superior Court in Elizabeth, faces up to 10 years in prison when she is sentenced Dec. 5, according to the Union County Prosecutor's Office.

In the early morning hours of Jan. 1, 2007, Harris drove her Ford Explorer to her ex-boyfriend's house on Mariners Place, where she proceeded to use a mallet to severely damage his vehicle, said Assistant Prosecutor Joshua McMahon, who handled the case.

Harris left the scene but returned several hours later, confronting the ex-boyfriend outside the property. During that altercation, she tried to run the victim over and in the process, severely damaged four cars. - Read the entire article here


UK - One health worker has been sacked and two others suspended following allegations of violence and abuse at a mental health unit. The separate incidents have prompted a watchdog to call for an investigation into the Pendle View and Hill View wards in Blackburn.

A female healthcare assistant has been convicted at court of assaulting a colleague. She has been suspended. Another worker has been sacked for verbally abusing a patient. And a third woman has been suspended after an allegation she attacked a colleague. - Read the entire article here


TOLEDO - A 47-year-old East Toledo woman who received more than 100 images and three videos of masochistic child porn on her computer was sentenced yesterday in U.S. District Court in Toledo to seven years in prison.

Nancy Fox of 939 Butler St., a mother of three children including one in college, pleaded guilty in June to the felony charge of receiving and distributing child pornography.

Federal authorities discovered the images after raiding Fox's home and seizing four computers. "All of the images are prepubescents engaged in bondage or sadomasochistic activities," said Greg Palmore, spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which conducted the investigation as part of its Operation Predator program. - Read the entire article here


GRESHAM, Ore. – A woman who seriously injured an infant by partially submerging her face in boiling water was given a 6-year jail term by a judge on Friday. In July, a jury found Dawna Bigelow guilty of causing physical injury with a dangerous weapon.

Prosecutors said Bigelow submerged Kellee Kuhl's face in a pot of boiling water. The girl was 5 months old at the time. She has since recovered from her physical injuries.

Bigelow’s lawyer argued for a shorter sentence since the child was not disfigured from the incident, but Judge Richard Baldwin disagreed and sentenced Bigelow to 70 months in jail, followed by three years of probation. - Read the entire article here


DYERSBURG, Tenn - A 28-year-old woman who hired an undercover officer to kill her ex-husband pleaded guilty Tuesday in Dyer County Circuit Court. Dottie Floyd was sentenced to eight years in prison for solicitation of first-degree murder. The McNairy County woman reportedly traveled to Dyersburg March 12 to hire Nathan Bishop, a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation special agent posing as an assassin. Floyd reportedly paid him $200 cash and gave him 120 hydrocodone pills -- the first of three such payments.

During a preliminary hearing in Dyersburg city court earlier this year, TBI Agent Bishop testified that Floyd offered three reasons why her ex-husband needed to die.

First, he said, she was concerned about allegations that her ex-husband's cousin had molested one of her relatives. Second, she said her ex-husband had verbally abused her. Third, she would have received more Social Security death benefits for their children than she received from him in child-support payments. - Read the entire article here


BUNBURY - A female teacher who had sex with a 14-year-old boy and held fantasies of a long-term future together was jailed for 27 months in the District Court in Bunbury yesterday.

Advocates for child sex abuse victims welcomed the sentence, saying there should not be a double standard for female teachers who embarked on affairs with under-age boys.

Advocates for Survivors of Child Sex Abuse WA spokeswoman Michelle Stubbs welcomed the sentence, saying it sent a clear message about the woman’s wrongdoing.

“I can remember a couple of highprofile cases where there were these very attractive teachers who were proceeding through court on charges of sex offences with young males,” Ms Stubbs said.

“There was almost an attitude that the victim wasn’t a victim and I certainly don’t subscribe to that view.” - Read the entire article here


MIDDLETOWN, Ohio – A woman wearing a cow costume was arrested for disorderly conduct Tuesday. Major Mark Hoffman, with Middletown, Ohio Police, said Michelle Allen threatened police and urinated on a neighbor’s front porch.

Police say Allen was arrested for causing traffic problems, chasing kids in her neighborhood and not complying with police when they told her to return home. The police report stated officials could smell alcohol on her breath and her words were slurred.

Hoffman says while Allen was in court, she challenged people to “suck her udders.” No information has been released as to why she was wearing the cow costume.

Allen has been arrested over 50 times on charges ranging from theft to prostitution. - Read the entire article here


DAYTON — A woman who left her 3-year-old daughter alone, bound, and gagged with a sock, was sentenced on Thursday, Oct. 2 to six years in prison. Erica Preston-Bailey, 22, pleaded guilty Thursday before Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Mary Katherine Huffman to child endangerment and abduction.

Preston-Bailey returned to the apartment and told officers she was punishing her daughter, according to police. - Read the entire article here


UK - With an apparently insatiable desire for jewels and a refined eye for fine art and furniture, Shahra Christina Sylvia Marsh de Savigny was a familiar bidder at Europe’s leading auctions. But for six years the glamorous woman who posed as a French/Iranian heiress manipulated a system of trust used by auctioneers and exclusive stores to swindle them out of at least £2 million.

The woman known as Madame de Savigny was actually Shahra Marsh, a 52-year-old divorcée living on incapacity benefit. Police believe that she built up a huge collection of jewellery, paintings, silver, designer clothes and antique furniture as a “retirement fund”.

Yesterday, halfway through her trial at Southwark Crown Court, she pleaded guilty to the final series of 38 charges of fraud, obtaining property by deception and concealing criminal property from auction houses. She is expected to be sent to jail today.

After her marriage ended Marsh began to pass herself off as a member of European high society. She dressed the part, spoke fluent French and had an expert knowledge of antiques. And despite claiming incapacity and council tax benefit, she had four luxury apartments around London.

Between 2001 and last year Marsh used numerous aliases and addresses to carry out dozens of swindles. Her victims included Christie’s and Sotheby’s in London and Beaussant Lefèvre in Paris. In one audacious operation, she swindled the Parisian auctioneers Tajan of paintings, sculptures and jewellery worth £114,000 during four sales held in 2005.

While on bail she continued to commit frauds until she was remanded in custody in September last year. Even in jail she continued. She wrote to a storage company saying that she would not be able to visit them as she was travelling for several months. - Read the entire article here


LOUISVILLE - A Louisville woman who was sentenced to 20 years probation in June for having sex with an underage boy and bearing him two children appeared in court Monday to answer charges that she had sexual intercourse with the victim about five times since being sentenced.

Irene Gomez, 39, had been free on intensive supervised probation since her June 30 sentencing, which included a condition that she not have any contact with the victim. According to a court document, Gomez' probation officer reported that Gomez admitted to having sex with the victim approximately five times over the summer.

"She placed blame on the victim for this continued contact saying that he was the one who kept coming to her house," Metz wrote in a report. "She exhibited no comprehension of the impact the original offense or this subsequent sexual contact may have had on the victim."

Gomez was originally arrested last year after police accused her of sexually assaulting a teenage boy. According to a police report, one of the babies she had with the minor was conceived when he was 13 and she was 32; the other was conceived when he was 16 and she was 35. - Read the entire article here

Another edition of the weekly article round-up:

HANOVER, PA - A Hanover woman was charged after police said she grabbed, bit and licked another woman's breast, had a child touch her inappropriately and kicked other small children.

Hanover Police responded to an apartment building in the 400 block of Baltimore St., where a woman alleged that on Aug. 10 Candy S. Conner, 19, of 573 Broadway, Apt. 2, grabbed her breast without her consent and bruised it, according to court documents.

The woman, whom police didn't identify, also told police Conner pulled unidentified woman's shirt down, bit and licked her breast and kicked her in front of other witnesses, police said.

Another woman told police that on Aug. 10, she observed Conner exposing her breast to a 5-year-old boy and allowing him to touch it as she laughed, police said. Police then talked to the boy's mother who said she had previously seen this occur. - Read the entire article here



GUELPH, Ont. — A 27-year-old woman convicted of infanticide in the suffocation deaths of two of her sons was handed a six-year sentence today.

The Guelph, Ont., woman, who was 17 when her first son died, admitted to police that she smothered the two babies using blankets and plastic baby carriage covers. - Read the entire article here


CA - A Riverside woman convicted of killing her 3-year-old developmentally disabled son by slamming a door into his head, apparently to stop his crying, is slated to be sentenced Friday in Riverside Superior Court. The prosecutor said Ochoa, 31, often failed to take her son to doctor's appointments or the special-needs school in which he was enrolled.

The prosecutor said Ochoa later admitted to police that "she was tired of Matteo's crying and didn't know what to do to get him to stop crying." - Read the entire article here


FLINT, Michigan - Rosalind L. Brown and her brother Montel Pettiford will spend the rest of the lives in prison for the 1985 slaying of Brown's 11-year-old stepson.

The Wyoming woman was convicted of the death of her 11-year-old stepson, who authorities said was poisoned and then drowned in the Flint River. - Read the entire article here


YORK COUNTY, Pa. - A York County woman has been sentenced to time served in the death of her mother-in-law. Bernadette Leiben, 87, died in 2004 in the Airville home where she lived with her son and daughter-in-law.

An autopsy revealed the bed-ridden woman died of multiple infections brought on by neglect. - Read the entire aricle here


COLUMBUS, Ohio — The Bexley house "cultivated an environment for perverse activity," the judge said. It was a characterization that homeowner Becky Jo Tatum didn't deny.

The 42-year-old mother of two apologized for the environment and the crimes that ensued: having sex with her daughter's 14-year-old friend, having cocaine in the home and keeping a gun, which was illegal for someone previously convicted of drug and prostitution charges. - Read the entire article here


UK - A mother who murdered her four-year-old daughter because she was "ashamed" of her disability has been jailed for at least 15 years. Joanne Hill, 32, drowned Naomi, who had mild cerebral palsy. Hill admitted to killing Naomi on Nov. 26 last year at the family home.

During a two-week trial at Chester Crown Court a jury heard that hard-drinking Hill was ashamed of Naomi's condition, which meant the little girl had to use calipers to help her walk. - Read the entire article here


EUGENE, Ore. - A woman who embezzled more than half a million dollars from community organizations in Toledo -- and spent it all -- is headed to jail. Miller admitted to spending more than 10 years stealing from people in the town of about 3,500 between Corvallis and Newport.

Her targets were the federal credit union where she worked, Toledo's volunteer firefighters and even the high school Booster Club. - Read the entire article here


FREMONT, Oh. - A city woman was sentenced to five years probation and electronic monitoring for 180 days for having sexual contact with a then 14-year-old boy for more than three months.

Renee L. Frye, 28, earlier pleaded guilty to two third-degree felony counts of unlawful sexual conduct with a minor. - Read the entire article here


NC - A woman was sentenced yesterday to four years in prison for sex crimes involving an 11-year-old boy. Jacqueline Gray, 32, also has to serve five years on probation as part of her plea deal with prosecutor Pansy Glanton.

The boy's grandmother told Craig that the boy, now 13, was trying to overcome the trauma of being abused. "There are times when he just gets quiet," she said. "He's getting better and he's working things out and he's doing the best he can at 13." - Read the entire article here


MACON, Ga. - A Reynolds woman is in jail accused of killing a six-month-old baby, according to a news release from the Fort Valley Police Department. Preliminary autopsy results indicate the child died from severe blunt force trauma to the head and brain.

Police arrested the infant's aunt, Lashunika Harp, 23, at 5:30 p.m. today. - Read the entire article here


BETHEL, Ma. - A woman living in a Bethel House apartment on Main Street was arrested Friday for an armed robbery at the Key Bank the day before.

Nancy Baker (aka Plante), 30, was arrested Friday night at the Bethel Police Station by Maine State Police, according to jail records. - Read the entire article here


KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A Texas woman is jailed in suburban Kansas City on charges in the smothering death of her 6-week-old son. Authorities also are looking into the deaths of the woman's two other infants, whose deaths in recent years had been attributed to sudden infant death syndrome.

Police in Lee's Summit said Thursday that 29-year-old Sweet Cherry Ann Halliburton told them that she had killed her son. - Read the entire article here


SC - The Greenville County Sheriff’s Department told us Wednesday morning two men were robbed at an apartment complex by a pair of women with a .25 caliber Beretta pistol on Tuesday night. - Read the entire article here


NY - A 23-year-old Amsterdam woman has been arrested after police say she slapped her two-year-old son several times while in a public waiting room. Michelle Waterson is charged with misdemeanor endangering the welfare of a child in connection with September 23rd incident in which the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office said she struck her young son.

According to the Sheriff's Office, Waterson was in the waiting room of the Montgomery County Office Building in the village of Fonda when she became angry with her son and slapped him several times in the face, mouth and head, and struck him in the head with a rolled up wad of paper. - Read the entire article here


WV - As previously reported, Marsha Evans, 34, was arrested Monday when police responded to Kermit — grades K-8 — per a complaint from the school alleging Evans assaulted school personnel. When Mingo County Deputy Sheriff Mike Miller and Kermit City Police Chief Ernie Chambers arrived to investigate, they checked Evans vehicle and found a loaded Smith and Wesson .45 caliber handgun. - Read the entire article here


SACRAMENTO, Ca. - A woman panhandling in downtown Sacramento Monday evening pulled out a gun and shot a disabled man who refused her money, scattering a terrified crowd gathered at a busy bus stop, police said. A short time after the shooting, police arrested Audrey Jackson, 47, who has no known address. She was spotted by an alert Regional Transit bus driver, who matched the description of the shooter to a passenger in his bus and notified police.

Relatives of Perez, who walks with a cane and has cerebral palsy, poured into the hospital lobby from all over Northern California Monday night. She asked for money and when Perez refused, she shot him once in the abdomen, took aim again, but the gun wouldn't fire, according to Sgt. Stephen Lau. - Read the entire article here


KY - A Pulaski County woman who disappeared after being indicted for abusing her twin babies was arrested Friday.

The investigation began in July, when 36-year-old Tricia Kimbler took her 4-month-old twins to the hospital. Doctors were so alarmed when they saw how underweight the babies were, they called the Sheriff's Department. - Read the entire article here


DENVER - A 31-year-old Denver woman has been charged with sexually assaulting her 2-year-old son. The mother, who The Denver Post will not identify to protect the identity of her child, is accused of assaulting the toddler and then e-mailing photographs about the assault to a friend, according to the Denver district attorney's office. - Read the entire article here


JUNEAU — A Columbus woman accused of setting fire to her home and stealing more than $80,000 from a former employer in two separate cases was ordered Thursday to stand trial on arson and theft charges.

Authorities believe that Krista S. Meeker, 34, N5727 Lark Road, started a fire in the kitchen of her home on the morning of April 12 to free herself from mortgage payments. - Read the entire article here


FRANKLIN, N.H. - A woman charged with severely beating her stepdaughter for nine hours has been released from jail after her bail was lowered because she is pregnant and apparently suffering from a variety of medical conditions.

Cara LeBlanc, 29, of Webster, N.H., is facing six felony charges. Prosecutors said her stepdaughter was abused for nine hours, was thrown down a flight of stairs and suffered several broken bones and damaged organs. - Read the entire article here


AU - Police said the woman followed the 27-year-old driver to a house in Condon, in Townsville, after two cars collided at the Gumvale shops, in nearby Rasmussen, at around 7.15pm (AEST). She then attacked the other driver's car with a hammer, smashing panels and windows.

Police said they later found what appeared to be home-made Molotov cocktails when they went to the attacker's home where she became violent, kicking an officer in the groin as he tried to restrain her. - Read the entire article here


MI - An Ann Arbor woman charged with stalking her estranged husband is under investigation for a firebombing at her mother-in-law's home, city police said.

Melissa Shoultz, 41, is charged with one count of aggravated stalking and three counts of malicious use of a telecommunication device for repeated calls and text messages to her estranged husband and his mother throughout the summer, court records show. - Read the entire article here


MEMPHIS, TN – Police have charged a woman in the killing of an elderly man who was found dead in the kitchen of his home. MPD Homicide Investigators have charged Pamela Fletcher, 51, with Voluntary Manslaughter in the homicide of 85 year-old J.T. Brewer. - Read the entire article here


LAKE CHARLES, La. — A 29-year-old woman who allegedly kicked a pregnant woman in the stomach and groin, causing her to prematurely give birth to a baby that died, has been indicted on negligent homicide and second-degree battery charges. - Read the entire article here


BRISTOL - A former teacher at the American School for the Deaf in West Hartford was charged Friday morning with sexually assaulting a student in the woman's former North Pond Street home, police said.

Julie A. Denno, 27, of Ballston Lake, N.Y. is facing charges of second-degree sexual assault and risk of injury to a minor after allegedly engaging in a relationship that included "inappropriate physical contact" and sexually charged text messages with a 15-year-old boy over a period of several months, prosecutors said in court Friday afternoon. - Read the entire article here


ROME - An Italian woman who worked as a part-time judge as well as a lawyer was substituted by her identical twin sister in court so she would not lose out on legal fees when she had two simultaneous engagements.

The 54-year-old twins from northern Italy have now been charged with fraud and will go on trial in January, Italy's leading newspaper, Corriere della Sera, reported Friday on its website. - Read the entire article here


WINCHESTER, Ky. --The Clark County sheriff says a central Kentucky woman has been charged with wanton murder in the death of her 4-year-old daughter.

Sheriff Berl Perdue says 34-year-old Jessilyn C. Robinson was arrested Thursday night and charged in the death of Faith Raeanne Robinson. - Read the entire article here

Another installment of the weekly article roundup:


Des Moines, IA-A 37-year-old Indianola mother is in custody, charged with multiple counts of sexual abuse after police learned she was having a relationship with a 15-year-old boy. Police arrested Shannon Rew after a tipster told police she was having a relationship with the teen.

Officials say Rew posed as a juvenile and began contacting the teen via text message after a relationship between the boy and her daughter ended. After a week she revealed her true identity and a physical relationship began. "The 15-year-old did admit to having on roughly 12 occasions contact which was sexual in nature," says Sgt. Scott Dwyer with Indianola Police. - Read the entire article here


BARSTOW - Police arrested Esther Edwards, 32, on suspicion of cruelty to a child and assault with a deadly weapon Wednesday evening on the 2000 block of Lassen Court, after an unidentified person called to report possible child abuse.

Officers found that Edwards’ 16-year-old daughter had serious injuries, and witnesses said that Edwards had assaulted her, according to a Barstow Police Department report. The girl was taken to Barstow Community Hospital and later transferred to Loma Linda Medical Center for monitoring. - Read the entire article here


FRESNO - A Fresno woman is behind bars, after being charged with more than 100 counts of fraud.

Fresno police arrested Rosa Gonzalez who they say targeted Hispanic people from Kern to Merced Counties, taking several of them for thousands of dollars. She used the business name Fresno Financial. - Read the entire article here


FL - An O'Brien woman was arrested on charges of aggravated battery and domestic violence Sept. 11 in connection with a stabbing in Branford.

According to sheriff's reports, White, in the driver's seat of a car at the intersection of Senter Street and Suwannee Avenue, stabbed the victim, who was in the passenger seat, with a kitchen knife in the chest.

White reportedly told sheriff's deputy David Allen that the victim had pulled her hair and attempted to choke her. - Read the entire article here


Taylor, TX - An argument over the volume of a television led to the arrest of a 63-year-old woman for allegedly stabbing a man in the neck this past weekend.

The assault charge marks Troutz’s second arrest in less than a month. She was arrested confined in Williamson County Jail for a week after an arrest Aug. 21 for reportedly making a terrorist threat.

It is her second arrest for felony assault charge in Williamson County. She was arrested in 2000 and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

Troutz was arrested in 2003 on charges of parole violation and misdemeanor assault, in 2004 on charges of theft and misdemeanor assault, in 2005 for an alleged misdemeanor assault and in 2006 on charges of forgery. - Read the entire article here


ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. - A 31-year-old woman is accused of having sex with a 16-year-old and recording video and snapping pictures with her cell phone, according to Orange County Sheriff's Office.

Stacey Sheldon of Apopka was arrested Tuesday on charges of sexual activity and use of a child in a sexual performance. She told investigators that it was her idea to video tape their encounter with her phone, according to the arrest report. - Read the entire article here


POCATELLO - A Pocatello woman was arrested Tuesday after she got into a fight with her former roommate.

Pocatello Police Lieutenant Ken Lynn says 36-year-old Tawny King was taken into custody after a physical fight broke out and King allegedly hit her former roommate in the head with a bottle causing injuries. - Read the entire article here


Chennai, Sep 18 (IANS) A 30-year-old woman was arrested here Tuesday for killing her domestic help by setting her on fire, police said.

Priya Ram, the wife of a financier, allegedly doused 40-year-old Parameshwari Narayanamurthy with kerosene and set her ablaze Monday. The maid servant had apparently refused refused to return Rs.15,000 she had borrowed, police said. - Read the entire article here


Linwood, Kan. - A woman was arrested Monday morning in Lawrence after she allegedly beat a man in rural Linwood and fled Leavenworth County authorities, according to a report from the sheriff’s office.

The 29-year-old Lawrence woman allegedly kicked a 40-year-old man in the head, back and chest. The incident was said to have occurred at the victim’s residence, according to the report. - Read the entire article here


SANFORD, FLA - A 33-year-old Florida woman has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for having sex with a five-year-old boy.

Kelly Lumadue was convicted following a jury trial of having sex with the boy 12 years ago when she was 21. - Read the entire article here


PROVO — Police arrested an Orem woman who allegedly pinned her ex-husband between a minivan and a police car Thursday, then beat him, first with a binder and then with a tire iron.

According to police reports, the 26-year-old woman spotted her ex-husband, with whom she is fighting for custody of the couple's daughter, in Springville. She followed him and when he stopped at the Provo police station, she struck him with a minivan, pinning him against a police car.

The woman then beat him with a binder, police said. When the binder wasn't having the desired effect, she retrieved a tire iron from the back of the minivan and began to hit him. - Read the entire article here


BRIGHTON, TN- A Tipton county woman has been arrested in the death of her four year old daughter.

Amber Nicole Swayne of Brighton, Tennessee faces charges of aggravated child abuse and felony murder. Investigators say on July 17, 2008, the little girl's mother brought her to Baptist Memorial Hospital-Tipton. Doctors determined that the girl had severe burns on over 40 percent her body. She was taken to LeBonheur Children's Hospital in Memphis and then to Shriner's Hospital for Children in Cincinnati, Ohio. The child died at the hospital several days later. - Read the entire article here


CANADA - Waterloo Regional Police tactical officers used pepper spray to end a 14 hour standoff with a young woman believed to be armed with a gun.

It started at about 9:15 p.m. Wednesday when Oxford police received a call about a woman with a gun. The woman was out on bail for a trafficking offence, known to be violent, and prohibited from being in Woodstock, said Const. Laurie Ann Maitland. - Read the entire article here


HONESDALE — A Browndale woman was sentenced Friday to two to five years in a state prison for burning her infant son and framing the boy’s father after being found guilty in a July jury trial.

Susan Marie Pevec, of Browndale, was convicted July 21 of endangering the welfare of a child, simple assault, intercepting an oral communication, two counts of filing false reports, and two counts of criminal conspiracy to commit simple assault. - Read the entire article here


MACON, GA - A woman convicted of cruelty to children in the second degree was sentenced Thursday morning to serve three years in prison followed by five years on probation.

Aug. 13, a Bibb County jury found 26-year-old Koi Herring guilty of fracturing her 4-month-old son's skull and causing permanent brain damage. - Read the entire article here



MELBOURNE, Australia - A married American woman who had an affair with a 15-year-old boy she met online and flew to join in Australia was convicted Tuesday of sex with a minor, but freed from jail and told she could return home. Barbara Case, 37, from Lyndhurst, Virginia, pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual penetration of a child under 16 and was sentenced to 16 months in jail.

But Judge Tim Wood suspended her sentence for two years, saying that if she committed another offense within that time she would have to serve her sentence. He said he thought Case was unlikely to re-offend. - Read the entire article here


JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - It took a Duval County jury only 45 minutes to reject claims that Brenda Coney was insane when she killed the pharmacy manager at Shands-Jacksonville Medical Center and to find her guilty of first-degree murder. McCants, 37, was the mother of two and was pregnant with another child. - Read the entire article here


MARIETTA, Ga. - A woman hired to care for a 63-year-old disabled woman has been sentenced to life in prison for killing her with a diet of weight-loss shakes, soda and a prescription drug.

A Cobb County Superior Court judge on Friday also ordered 43-year-old Madonna Whitus to undergo psychiatric evaluation and treatment. According to court testimony, while Durant was dying, Whitus tried to deposit a $55,000 check from Durant into her own account. - Read the entire article here


TUCSON, Ariz. — A jury has convicted a 19-year-old woman of first-degree murder for stabbing her roommate to death in their University of Arizona dorm room. Prosecutors say Galareka Harrison stabbed Mia Henderson 23 times with a knife that she had bought before the attack on Sept. 5, 2007. - Read the entire article here


U.K. - A 72-year-old woman has been convicted of assaulting her neighbour who had his arm broken by a spade in a row about a boundary fence.

She was alleged during the trial to have attacked her 62-year-old neighbour who lived two doors away on Hesketh Lane, Tarleton as he was discussing the moving of a six foot fence with a contractor.

The contractor said he saw the spade being swung "like an axe man" at the head of her neighbour. Mr Grundy managed to put his arm up to deflect the blow but suffered a fracture which was in plaster for three months.

Iddon has in the past been convicted of common assault against the contractor and received a conditional discharge. - Read the entire article here


OTTAWA - An Ottawa woman found guilty of forcing her young daughter to fondle her boyfriend over a period of five years has been ordered to undergo a sexual behaviour assessment before being sentenced.

The woman, whose name is prohibited from publication to protect the identity of the victim, was found guilty of invitation to sexual touching in August after court heard she had her daughter masturbate her boyfriend until he ejaculated. The man, who has suffered from mental illness, admitted to hospital staff that the couple had engaged in sexual activity with his girlfriend's daughter, who was between five and nine years old at the time of the incidents. - Read the entire article here


JEWETT CITY, Conn. — Court documents show that moments before a Jewett City toddler fatally shot himself, his mother warned him not to touch his father's gun because of the "bad boo boos" it could cause.

An arrest affidavit details how 2-year-old Wyatt Matteau grabbed the gun from a nightstand and shot himself in the eye while his mother was in the bathroom. - Read the entire article here


ST. PETERSBURG — Cynthia Calleia knew that her 9-year-old daughter had serious problems. She admitted trying to suffocate one brother. And she heard voices telling her to kill her mommy. Still, investigators say Calleia left her youngest son, 4-month-old Antoine Powell Jr., alone with the girl.

In March, the 9-year-old dropped her brother on the floor and heard a loud crack. Another sister dragged him by the arm "like a doll." He wound up with a broken arm, leg and five fractured ribs. His mother waited to take him to the hospital, and he died on April 15.

Calleia used the Baker Act in 2003 to temporarily institutionalize the girl after she caught her shaking her other baby brother back and forth. When she asked her daughter what she was doing, the girl answered "I'm killing my brother." - Read the entire article here

Just the weekly article round up. I have started to add more stories that are less violent and more along the lines of extortion, fraud, etc.


UNION, Mo. - The woman who kidnapped a newborn girl two years ago was sentenced to 30 years in prison today for her crimes as the judge ignored her family's pleas for mercy.

In a packed courtroom in Franklin County, Shannon Torrez, 38, got the sentence recommended by prosecutors for the September 2006 kidnapping of Abby, the one-week-old daughter of Stephenie Ochsenbine.

Torrez had showed up at the woman's rural home asking to use the phone and bathroom.

She pointed a pistol at Ochsenbine, stabbed her and tied up her and her one-year-old son. Torrez then took seven-day-old baby Abby. Police tracked down Torrez five days later. Abby was recovered alive and well. - Read the entire article here



HEMET - A Hemet woman is behind bars Saturday in Texas, awaiting extradition back to California on charges of beating and robbing her 94-year-old grandmother in Hemet, authorities said.

April Courtney, 34, is accused of striking her 94-year-old grandmother repeatedly with a metal cane on Sept. 3 before she fled to Texas, according to Hemet police Detective Jeff Dill. - Read the entire article here

TOMS RIVER — A 44-year-old woman who tried to make her sister and brother-in-law sick with rodent poison because they wouldn't let her see her dog was sentenced to three years' probation this morning.

Dana Simmons was given credit for the 534 days she has served in the Ocean County Jail since she was charged with the crime in November 2006. - Read the entire article here

NEW YORK - In between car pools and karate classes, Nassau prosecutors say one Syosset mother was doing unspeakable things to her three children.

The 53-year-old woman, whose trial on child molestation charges began Friday in Nassau County Court, was molesting her youngest daughter with a Barbie doll, and forcing her older children to play tug-of-war naked and then have oral sex while she watched, prosecutors said. Newsday is not naming the woman to protect her children's identities.

"What [the woman] pretended to be at PTA meetings and at her daughter's cheerleading practice was not the same person that her children knew her to be," prosecutor Stephen Antignani told jurors. - Read the entire article here


GREEN BAY — A 33-year-old Ashwaubenon woman enrolled at Ashwaubenon High School posing as her 15-year-old daughter, authorities said today. “She made at least the first day at school,” Crocker said. “She was caught because she was truant.” The woman’s daughter lives out of state, authorities said.

Ashwaubenon investigators plan to refer the woman to prosecutors and recommend charges of identity theft, forgery, criminal trespassing and disorderly conduct. The woman was arrested by Green Bay police Sept. 3 and booked into the Brown County Jail last week on an unrelated misdemeanor theft by misrepresentation charge. The details of that case were not available late today. - Read the entire article here

Salt Lake, UT - A 17-year-old mother was charged as an adult Thursday for allegedly murdering her infant son last month by breaking his back. Adrianna Lucero, who will be 18 in December, was charged in 3rd District Court with first-degree felony murder in the death of her 2-year-old son Alejandro G. Lucero, who died Aug. 24.

“The mechanism of the spinal fracture was not likely from a stomp or blow to the child's back, but was more likely a severe, bending force which bent A.L.'s lumbar spine backward and that would have taken some time to inflict, during which A.L. would have been screaming the entire time,” charging documents stated. - Read the entire article here

KANSAS CITY, MO. -- A Kansas City, Missouri, woman has been charged with child abuse after allegedly burning her children, police said on Saturday.

Latasha Lambert, 23, faces two counts of child abuse after Kansas City police responded to Children's Mercy Hospital to check out injuries to two children, ages 1 and 2. According to police, Lambert allegedly burned the children with an iron and lit cigarettes. - Read the entire article here


A young clothing store assistant has been charged with poisoning her manager with eucalyptus oil in a bizarre case of apparent workplace jealousy.

The manager, Iraqi immigrant Judy Siddawi, 27, had been running an Auckland menswear store for a couple of months when her open energy drink was allegedly poisoned by her 21-year-old assistant manager.

The two have been embroiled in conflict because Siddawi was promoted over the assistant manager, who had been with the national menswear chain for a number of years. - Read the entire article here

The search for 2-year-old James Many White Horses came to the worst possible ending Friday when police found the missing toddler dead in the trunk of a car — killed, they allege, by his mother.

Summer Many White Horses, 31, was arrested Friday afternoon on suspicion of deliberate homicide, tampering with evidence and obstructing a peace officer. She is being held at the Cascade County Detention Center.

James Many White Horses was last seen with his noncustodial mother on July 21, according to a missing-persons alert issued Thursday by the Montana Department of Justice. - Read the entire article here


A Smithfield woman was sentenced Friday to more than 18 years in prison after pleading guilty to shooting her boyfriend to death two years ago.

Tiffany Ann Bassett pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the July 18, 2006, death of Donald "Keith" West, who was found dead in the bedroom of the home they shared. She was sentenced to 221 to 275 months in prison. - Read the entire article here


A woman was arrested Saturday on charges she stabbed her ex-boyfriend in the leg with a kitchen knife, Richland County sheriff’s deputies said. Whitney D. Howard, 20, is charged with aggravated assault, a sheriff’s department news release said. - Read the entire article here


PITTSBURGH—A Pittsburgh woman is guilty of stabbing her boyfriend to death during an argument over a cold, uneaten bagel. Allegheny County Judge John Zottola convicted 23-year-old Patrice Rogers of voluntary manslaughter in the Feb. 25 killing of her live-in boyfriend, 30-year-old Geno Crenshaw. - Read the entire article here


A Bolingbrook elementary school nurse was arrested Thursday afternoon and charged with three counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse for allegedly having sexual relations with three teen boys in 2006, officials said.

Laura J. Obzera, 49, works for Valley View Community School District 365U in Bolingbrook, police said. She is listed as a health assistant at Wood View Elementary School in Bolingbrook on the school's Web site. - Read the entire article here


GUELPH, Ont. — A conviction on a lesser charge of infanticide for a 27-year-old Guelph, Ont. woman who admitted killing her two infant sons sparked outrage from some of those gathered in a packed, emotionally-charged courtroom.

Ontario Superior Court Justice Cas Herold rendered the verdict on Thursday against the woman who admitted killing her seven-week-old son in 1998 and her nine-week-old son in 2002. - Read the entire article here


VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY.com) - A Virginia Beach woman has been charged with Fraud and Felony Child Neglect. Police say she tried to get out of paying her tab at a restaurant. Investigators say the woman also left her 2-year-old child alone at home for several hours.

Police became concerned that no one was watching the child and went to Chaney's home in the 2100 blk of Waterfront Drive. They found the front door unlocked and discovered the child inside alone. Police determined the child had been home alone since at least 8:30 p.m. Tuesday night through 2:30 a.m. Wednesday morning. - Read the entire article here


A Harvey woman has been arrested for the murder of a five-month-old baby by Jefferson police, admitting that she put the child in a clothes dryer after the child frustrated her, police said.

During the investigation, police said, that Smith continued to reiterate this story to investigators before admitting to police that the child received the burns after she had put him in a clothes dryer after becoming frustrated with the infant.

After putting the child in the dryer, police said, Smith admitted turning it on and leaving the room. When she returned to check on the child, Andre was not breathing. - Read the entire article here


Jackson County, WI - A Humbird woman was charged in Jackson County Circuit Court last week after allegedly taking almost $14,500 from her mother-in-law. Debbie R. Seelow, 50, was charged with identity theft for financial gain and misdemeanor theft. - Read the entire article here


STAUNTON — Police arrested a Staunton woman Monday who is suspected of trying to extort $14,000 from another woman, according to the Staunton Police Department.

Police said the investigation began in mid-July when the victim, a 37-year-old Staunton woman, received two phone calls demanding she pay $14,000 or her husband would receive a letter “that would ruin her life,” according to Officer Lisa Klein, a spokeswoman for the Staunton Police Department. The victim reported the incident to police July 15. - Read the entire article here


Canada - Okotoks RCMP have charged a woman in connection with an assault along a walking path last month. 55-year-old Darline Konta of Okotoks has been charged with assault causing bodily harm. Just before six in the evening on August 28th a woman was assaulted while out for a walk with her dog. It happened in the area behind Cameron Crossing School, on South Railway Street. The assailant was carrying a large black flashlight. - Read the entire article here


LOGAN, Utah (AP) - A Logan woman has been charged with bigamy, after police found she had married five times, but only once was divorced.

Nichole Christine Greenlee made an initial appearance in 1st District Court on Monday. She's charged with one third-degree felony of bigamy and with misdemeanor making a false statement. The charges stem from Greenlee's two most recent marriages.

County records obtained by the Herald Journal show four marriage licenses on file for the 32-year-old Greenlee. On each license application Greenlee used her maiden name, Fasick, and claims it is her "first" marriage. - Read the entire article here


Chicago - A south suburban woman was ordered held on $250,000 bond Friday after being charged with the sexual abuse of her friend's 15-year-old daughter.

At the Bridgeview Courthouse, Judge John Hynes set the bond for Valencia Sephus, 30, of the 15800 block of Loomis Ave. in Harvey, who is charged with one count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse, according to Cook County State's Attorney's office spokeswoman Tandra Simonton. Sephus evaded police after they started investigating in June. They recently found her and took her into custody Thursday, police said. - Read the entire article here



PASADENA, Texas — Two teenage girls are accused of stabbing a 75-year-old man to death in a robbery that netted them just $15, and police say the mother of one of the teens helped put them up to it.

Dannette R. Gillespie, 38, gave knives to her 15-year-old daughter and Vanessa Anne Ocampo, 19, then waited in the back seat of their car while the teens robbed and killed Eugene Palma, according to a probable cause warrant.

Gillespie's daughter and Ocampo ran to Palma's garage and stabbed him several times. They went through Palma's pockets and car in search of money and Ocampo took $15, according to the document. Gillespie allegedly waited in the back seat of the car for them and got rid of the knives. A palm print on the driver's side door of Palma's car led police to the women, authorities said. - Read the article here

Another series of articles featuring female offenders:


HOUSTON -- A mother was accused of offering a man the chance to have sex with her son, niece and nephew for free, KPRC Local 2 reported Thursday.

The Harris County District Attorney's Office said Stephanie Hays chatted online with a man in Indiana and offered her 11-year-old son, 2-year-old niece and 6-year-old nephew for sex.

Detectives said Hays did not want any money from the man in return.

Investigators said, "She claimed to offer them up on more than one occasion. She even took a week off of work to meet up with the individual."

Hays, 33, told investigators that she fantasized about child pornography. Police searched her home and found child pornography photos and videos on her computer.

Officers said they found very graphic chat logs where Hays described to the man her sexual fantasies that included the children.

During the chat, investigators said Hays claimed to want to be part of the sex acts.

She told investigators that she had considered sexually abusing her son and has tried to arouse him. - Read the entire article here


Bakersfield, CA - A Bakersfield woman has been arrested on charges she murdered her boyfriend's two-year-old daughter. Police arrested 19-year-old Melissa Blanchard, after they say she admitted to injuring 2-year-old Kayli Bearden. An autopsy revealed the toddler died from blunt force trauma to the head. Blanchard is due in court Friday on first degree murder charges. - Read the entire article here


SC - The six people accused of killing an Aynor man Thursday had a plan, hatched by a former county 911 dispatcher, when they lured him from a restaurant and drove him to a wooded back road in Galivants Ferry, according to statements made by the 15th Circuit solicitor's office.

Crystal Turner, 27, of Marion, who worked for Horry County as a 911 dispatcher until April, was the "mastermind" - picking out victim Ronald Rabon, 54, assistant solicitor Larry Filiberto said. - Read the entire article here


FROSTBURG, Md. (AP) -- Frostburg police say the current Miss Washington County has been arrested on charges of breaking into her ex-boyfriend's home in Frostburg and hitting another woman.

Twenty-two-year-old Christie Ganoe of Cumberland has been charged with second-degree assault and fourth-degree burglary. According to an Allegany County District Court commissioner, Ganoe has been released on her own recognizance. A court appearance has been set for Oct. 20. - Read the entire article here


CLAYMONT, Del. ― A woman wanted in the bizarrely complicated attempted kidnapping of her former virtual boyfriend has been apprehended after a multi-state search.

New Castle County Police said 33-year-old Kimberly Jernigan of North Carolina was apparently distraught after her online relationship with a 52-year-old man from Claymont, Delaware came to an end.

In the beginning of August, Jernigan allegedly drove to the victim's Pennsylvania workplace and attempted to kidnap him at gunpoint. While she was unsuccessful, she returned two weeks later to track down the victim's Delaware address.

Police said Jernigan posed as a postal worker in order to locate the victim's new address, as he had recently moved. After four days of searching, authorities said she found residence in the Whitney Presidential Towers on the 7100 block of Society Drive in Claymont.

When the victim arrived home on Thursday, August 21, he told police he saw someone pointing an object at his chest that was projecting a laser beam. He immediately fled the apartment and contacted police. Officers arriving at the scene discovered a pair of handcuffs, a roll of duct tape, a Taser and a BB gun as well as the suspect's dog. - Read the entire article here


Hannibal, MO — A Hannibal woman is charged with assaulting a man who lived in the same apartment. Thirty-five-year-old Yolanda L. Ivey is accused of attacking the 48-year-old man with a knife. Authorities said the unidentified man had a leg wound, but was treated at Hannibal Regional Hospital and released. Police say they were called to the 600 block of Center Street at 2:38 a.m. Wednesday by the victim. He originally told authorities he was stabbed by three masked people with a knife. Upon further questioning, police arrrested Ivey. - Read the entire article here


PA - A forensic pathologist testified this afternoon that a 5-year-old Fountain Hill boy who drowned in his father's bathtub more than a year ago likely died from having his head held under water for at least two minutes.

Jennifer Garza, the father's fiancee, was charged last month with killing Caspian Steinmetz on March 10, 2007, while she baby-sat him at their home at 516 S. Hoffert St. She was the only adult home at the time, police said. - Read the entire article here


WHITE PLAINS - A jury this evening acquitted Carmela Magnetti of the top charge, but convicted her of two other felonies for her involvement when her best friend killed her own mother in Ossining in 2006.

Patricia Mery, a 59-year-old schoolteacher and daughter of a former Ossining village police chief, was stabbed and bludgeoned to death in her Yates Avenue home on May 11, 2006. Her body was discovered three days later, on Mother's Day, when a relative went to check on her.

Magnetti did not face a homicide charge but prosecutors Timothy Ward and Lana Hochheiser portrayed her as the driving force behind Trovato's disillusionment with her mother that ended with the brutal attack. They introduced evidence of emails, text messages and phone calls in which Magnetti tried to convince Trovato that Mery was plotting to kidnap 2-year-old Arianna and kill Magnetti. - Read the entire article here


Rome, GA - Circuit Court Judge David A. Rains sentenced Barbara Ann Roberts on Friday to life in prison without parole in the kidnapping and slaying of her ex-husband’s wife, Martha Darlene Roberts. The jury in the case had recommended the death penalty.

Prosecutors had asked for the death penalty because District Attorney Mike O’Dell said during the trial that Roberts and Schiess terrorized Darlene Roberts and hunted her down with a shotgun before shooting her to death near a pond off Cherokee County. - Read the entire article here


DAYTON, Ohio (AP) - A mother was convicted Friday of killing her month-old daughter by burning her in a microwave oven, with jurors rejecting a defense attorney's claims there was evidence that someone else was responsible. China Arnold, 28, showed no reaction when the jury's verdict was announced and then lowered her head, looking down at the defense table. - Read the entire article here



POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. (AP) - A Hudson Valley woman has been found guilty of second-degree murder for the suffocation death of her 22-month-old stepdaughter.

Cheryl Santiago was convicted Thursday for the death of Justice Santiago last year. The child was asphyxiated on the night of October 23 after the stepmother put her to bed in their apartment. - Read the entire article here


FLINT, Mich. - A jury has convicted a Wyoming woman in a cold case murder more than 20 years old. Prosecutors say back in 1985 Rosalind Brown of Wyoming and her brother Montel Pettiford from Flint fed her 11-year-old stepson something that incapacitated him. They then placed Christopher Brown in the Flint River where he drowned - Read the entire article here


Bay City, TX - Charlene Burnett, 35, of Bay City, pled guilty in June to murdering Dewayne Abbott and was sentenced Aug. 15 to 40 years in prison. Abbott was killed on July 19, 2007, when Burnett fired one shot at him with a .25 caliber pistol according to court documents.

“I’m sorry for shooting Duke but he hurt me very bad. Love hurts and you don’t play games with people[‘s] feelings,” she wrote in the letter.

She was placed on probation in 1995 for shooting a gun in Wharton County. She also was convicted in 1999 for striking Lakisha Green with a baseball bat in Matagorda County. - Read the entire article here


HELSINKI, Finland (AP) — A court in Finland has convicted a woman of murdering her three young children and has given her a life sentence. The Espoo District Court says Thai-born Yu-Hsiu Fu was found guilty of strangling her 8-year-old twin daughters and 1-year-old son in her home. She tried to kill herself afterward.

The verdict on Tuesday says the 41-year-old woman was found to be of sound mind at the time of the murders. Court papers show the murders were preceded by a bitter custody battle with her Finnish husband who was living separately from her at the time of the murders. - Read the entire article here


Carson, NV - A woman who was granted a mistrial after being found guilty of trying to hire someone to kill the father of her children pleaded guilty Friday to the same charge and was sentenced to five years on probation. Under the plea agreement with the prosecutor, Traci Morrison, 24, also must undergo counseling for anger management and substance abuse, said her lawyer, Cotter Conway.

According to Deputy District Attorney Bruce Hahn, Morrison had been furious with her children’s father, Timothy Palos, over custody issues, and had met with an undercover police officer to discuss killing him. She was taped on a hidden recorder, and was arrested soon after their talk. - Read the entire article here


ST. JOHNSBURY — A woman who locked her 9-year-old daughter in a bedroom while she went to work has been sentenced to three to five years in prison, all but two months of it suspended.

Laurie Davenport, 41, of St. Johnsbury, was ordered to serve the suspended portion in a community work service program. She was also sentenced to two years’ probation and ordered to get mental health counseling and parenting education.

Her daughter told authorities that on at least 10 occasions, Davenport left her home alone, locking her bedroom door from the outside and leaving her with cold food to eat and a 5-gallon pail to urinate in. - Read the entire article here



Macon, GA - A former emergency-room nurse has been convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the 2005 death of her husband's mother, who prosecutors said was given a fatal insulin overdose two days after she learned money was missing from her checking account.

Angela Marie Owens, 38, who had been charged with murder and forgery, was sentenced to 10 years in prison Thursday for her role in the death of her 76-year-old mother-in-law, Myrtle Owens. Both women lived near one another, southeast of McRae in Telfair County. - Read the entire article here


Odessa, MO - A 20-year-old woman who kidnapped a pregnant teenager she met online in a foiled plot to steal her unborn baby has been sentenced to eight years in prison. Lauren Gash, of Odessa, pleaded guilty last month to kidnapping, assault and felonious restraint in the July 2007 attack on Amanda Howard, then 18, inside a Blue Springs motel room.

Howard, now Amanda Culley, was pregnant, single and unemployed when two women she met on the Internet lured her from her home with promises that they would drive her to get baby clothes. Culley got into the car with Gash and co-defendant Alisa D. Betts, of Atchison, Kansas, but soon realised something was wrong, police have said.

The pair sprayed Culley with pepper spray and drove her to a motel room where Gash and Betts had set out scissors, a sheet of plastic and a multipurpose fishing tool, along with diapers, a blanket and a fake birth certificate. - Read the entire article here


PACIFIC COUNTY, Wash. – A grandmother suspected of killing her boyfriend and cutting him into pieces is punished for attacking that man's brother with a hammer. - Read the entire article here


MO - A 25-year-old Wichita woman admitted Friday that she beat a 19-month-old boy she was baby-sitting, intending to kill him. Heidi Dieball pleaded guilty to second-degree intentional murder before Sedgwick County District Judge Ben Burgess. Dieball also pleaded guilty to two counts of child abuse.

She said during her plea that she beat Andrew Haga twice while left alone with him in January. Then she said she administered a third beating to kill the toddler. - Read the entire article here


CHESTERTOWN, Md. - The Queen Anne's County Sheriff's Office says an 18-year-old Queenstown woman has been charged with deliberately hitting two boys with a car in Chestertown.

Investigators say Amanda Marie Dail and three passengers were bored Friday and decided to hit the boys with the driver's door as they passed them on Central Avenue.

Investigators say the car hit the 11-year-old boy on a bicycle and 15-year-old boy walking behind him. The boys were flown to Christiana Hospital, where they were treated for scrapes and bruises and released. - Read the entire article here


CLEVELAND - Tierra Wilson, 21, of Cleveland, was convicted of child abuse for striking a 4-year-old boy so hard he required brain and skull surgery.

Several doctors testified at the trial about the severity of the the boy's injuries. The jury returned a guilty verdict late Friday. Wilson was found guilty of two counts of child endangering. She faces up to 13 years in prison when she is sentenced on Sept. 9. - Read the entire article here


UK - Next-door neighbours have been warned to stay away from each other while one awaits sentencing for attacking the other and breaking her shoulder with a broom. Julie Richards, 46, of Greenford Villas, Water Lane, Haven Banks, was unanimously convicted by a jury at Exeter Crown Court of assaulting her neighbour Wendy Penfold, causing her grievous bodily harm and assaulting Mrs Penfold's daughter Lucy by beating. - Read the entire article here


NY - Shortly before Geraldine M. Motzer was sentenced Friday for stealing a van with children inside, Monroe County Court Judge John Connell said that a statement Motzer made about the case was "mind boggling."

Motzer, 42, dropped the children — ages 17 months and 4 — at a stranger's home in Rochester while fleeing police.

Motzer thought she was not given enough credit for bringing the children to a safe place, Connell noted.

"It's hard to know where to begin with that one," Connell said incredulously. "Who knew that that was a safe place? Thank goodness, the gentleman who answered the door was not a pedophile or under the influence of drugs or alcohol, that he had the wherewithal to take care of the children until police arrived."

Connell then sentenced Motzer as a persistent felon to 25 years to life — the first time, Connell said, that he had made such a determination in his 24 years on the bench. The designation allows for a longer sentence than would normally be imposed. Motzer, of Brockport, has been to prison twice for attempted robbery and grand larceny. - Read the entire article here


FALLBROOK, Calif.—A woman was arrested Thursday on suspicion of murdering her 73-year-old grandmother after an anonymous caller asked authorities to check on the elderly woman.

San Diego County Sheriff's deputies arrested 32-year-old Amy Jo Mitchell hours after discovering the woman's body underneath an overturned bookcase with its shelves removed. - Read the entire article here


LUTZ, FL - Deputies knocked on the door of a van parked in Mort Park Thursday night because the park closes at sundown.

The investigating deputy reporting smelling marijuana after speaking to 24-year-old Marbelis Margarita Dorado. Inside the van was a 14-year-old girl and three boys, ages 14 and 15. A bag of pot was also found in the van.

Dorado admitted to the deputy that she knows the teens from the neighborhood and encouraged them to smoke pot.

The parents of a 15-year-old boy believed she had a sexual affair with him and filed a report at the end of August.

During the interview, deputies say Dorado admitted to having a sexual relationship for two months with the teen she met from her neighborhood. - Read the entire article here


ANTIOCH, Calif.—Antioch police have arrested a local woman in the death of her 15-year-old daughter and the alleged abuse of her two other children.

Lt. Leonard Orman says it appears the dead girl had suffered long-term physical abuse, but he declined to elaborate. The authorities were called to the victim's home about her death on Tuesday.

They arrested the teen's mother, Shemeeka Davis, 37, on suspicion of murder and three counts of felony corporal punishment. Davis has two other children, a 7-year-old daughter and the dead girl's 15-year-old twin brother. Both teenagers were adopted by Davis when they were babies, according to Orman. - Read the entire article here


HAYWARD — Police on Monday arrested a woman believed to be responsible for two strong-arm purse snatchings in one night last month.

Alysia Robbins, 22, of Hayward, was arrested about 7 p.m. on A Street after an officer recognized her in a passing car. An anonymous source had linked her to an Aug. 15 robbery at a Foothill Boulevard pool hall, and another at a private residence hours later, Hayward Police Lt. Chris Orrey said.

In both robberies, the perpetrator informed the victim she intended to take the purse, then grabbed it, Orrey said. In both cases, a scuffle ensued. At the pool hall, Robbins fled after taking the purse, the lieutenant said.

The victim at the private residence was punched in the face when she wouldn't let go of the purse, Orrey said.

"She would go right up to them and say, 'I'm taking your purse,' and then do it," Orrey said. - Read the entire article here


LAKE STATION, Ind. (CBS) ― A pizza delivery driver suffered severe head and hand injuries Saturday when she was attacked by three people while making a delivery.

Keith Hawkins confessed to the attack and said his mother and Zeld were involved in the plot. Hawkins said his mom's intent was to get the pizza and, if possible, the delivery car.

Police say Tammy Hawkins told her boyfriend, Zeld, to call the restaurant and give a phony name and the address to the vacant house. - Read the entire article here