by | May 16, 2024 2:41 pm | Comments (3)
Thomas Breen file photo
150 West St., after the 2019 fatal fire.
A reporter entered the courtroom for a trial about a fatal fire at an illegal rooming house — not to write about the case, but to get screened as a possible juror.
by | May 14, 2024 1:15 pm | Comments (3)
Two separate incidents of gunfire, one fatal, occurred within an hour of each other in Newhallville late Monday afternoon.
by | May 14, 2024 11:42 am | Comments (18)
Laura Glesby File Photo
Ocean's Shmuel Aizenberg and attorney Gerry Giaimo in housing court.
Ocean Management’s Shmuel Aizenberg won’t have to take the witness stand in Waterbury after all — now that his company has struck a last-minute settlement in a long-standing child lead poisoning lawsuit that had been set to go to trial this week.
That jury trial was to determine how much the local megalandlord had to pay a mom whose son suffered “irreversible brain damage” while living at one of Ocean’s New Haven apartments on Edgewood Avenue.
While the dollar amount of that deal remains secret, public land records show that plenty of cash has been flowing into Ocean’s coffers — as the company has sold another 37 New Haven rental properties for nearly $13 million over the past two months.
by | May 10, 2024 2:00 pm | Comments (16)
Laura Glesby Photo
Clarice Elarabi (pictured) is suing the city for the death of her brother, chef and gardener Michael Randall, in a 2019 illegal rooming house fire on West St.
Clarice Elarabi woke up at 3:12 a.m. feeling “just so hot. Like, on fire.”
She stuck her head out of the window. She took a cold shower. She tried and failed to go back to sleep. “I was so hot,” she said, “I didn’t know what was going on with me.”
Two hours later, Elarabi learned that her twin brother’s house in the Hill had erupted into flames.
The blaze took his life. It hurled her into life-altering grief. And Elarabi is now preparing to argue in court that the City of New Haven could have prevented it.
by | May 10, 2024 12:04 pm | Comments (7)
(Updated Monday) Police arrested three people late Thursday night outside a Westville residence following a fight that included shots being fired.
by | May 9, 2024 3:15 pm | Comments (3)
Paul Bass Photo
Lead plaintiff Personna Noble, at right, at 2016 announcement of lawsuit at pre-demolished Church Street South.
The last of $18.75 million in checks have gone out to former tenants of Church Street South, closing out a seven-plus-year legal quest to compensate families subjected to unhealthy living conditions.
by | May 9, 2024 2:00 pm | Comments (18)
Fair Rent's Wildaliz Bermúdez with new tenants union rep Zach Postle.
A cracked window at 1455 State.
Zach Postle and his neighbors got tired of waiting days and weeks and months for their landlord to respond to maintenance concerns like broken windows and busted heating, so they formed a tenants union — the sixth to officially file with City Hall, and the fifth created at an Ocean Management rental property.
by | May 8, 2024 12:35 pm | Comments (27)
Thomas Breen photo
Yale senior Craig Birckhead-Morton and attorney David Grudberg in court Wednesday.
Donning keffiyehs and blouses and dress shirts and the occasional suit and tie, nearly 50 Yale students took their turns appearing before a state judge to face criminal trespassing charges stemming from their arrests at recent pro-Palestinian protests on campus.
The judge continued each case until dates in July or August, taking care to accommodate students’ summer break schedules when determining whether each should return in person or online.
by | May 7, 2024 2:41 pm | Comments (15)
Paul Bass file photo
Det. Dash: Cellphone records helped crack case.
A gun purchased in Milford ended up connected to a Hill homicide — after the purchaser lent the firearm to a relative’s friend, who lent it to another friend, who then tried to sell the gun in New Haven, only to be shot and killed himself.
by | May 3, 2024 3:50 pm | Comments (7)
Former cop Vincent Raucci, pictured in plainclothes participating in a 1980s-era Q Terrace drug bust...
...is now behind bars in New Mexico.
Vincent Raucci was in jail when he received notice of a lawsuit against him — by a man he once sent to prison when he was a cop.
Continue reading ‘Corrupt Cop Located For Lawsuit — In Jail’
by | May 2, 2024 9:22 am | Comments (57)
Instagram posts documenting Wednesday's protests and arrests.
Yale police arrested another four protesters — including by tackling some to the ground — during the latest pro-Palestinian demonstration on the university’s downtown campus.
by | May 1, 2024 4:28 pm | Comments (65)
New Haven police Wednesday afternoon released video footage of the East Rock crash Sunday involving a cop cruiser and an ATV, sending the ATV rider to the hospital.
by | May 1, 2024 4:02 pm | Comments (21)
Thomas Breen photo
The Beinecke Plaza flagpole on Wednesday.
A Yale graduate student allegedly spent 23 minutes working to release the rope and lower the American flag in Beinecke Plaza during the first night of a pro-Palestinian tent encampment.
A week later Yale police arrested that graduate student for vandalizing university property — with repair costs for the “damaged” flagpole estimated at more than $9,100.
Continue reading ‘Warrant: Arrested Protester Lowered American Flag’
by | May 1, 2024 11:55 am | Comments (27)
Thomas Breen photo
Police cameras at Orchard and Edgewood.
The streets have eyes — an additional 266 and counting, to be precise — now that several million dollars in one-time federal aid have translated into a trove of new police surveillance cameras watching out for crime across the city.
by | May 1, 2024 9:14 am | Comments (4)
Laura Glesby PHoto
Eric Providence of Columbus House, one of the project's advisors, recalled coming home from prison over two decades ago and "knocking on doors" closed shut in an effort to rebuild his life.
A new Yale study will provide one-on-one financial guidance to 238 New Haveners transitioning out of prison, while advocating for longer-term change to reduce poverty among formerly incarcerated people.
Continue reading ‘Re-Entry Financial Literacy Study Launched’
by | Apr 30, 2024 3:32 pm | Comments (13)
Thomas Breen photo
Kolokotronis and Blau in Kolokotronis's city-condemned apartment.
The property manager of a church-owned apartment complex on Orange Street has ordered the two lead organizers of the building’s tenants union to move out or face eviction — from city-condemned rental units that they haven’t been able to live in for months.
by and | Apr 29, 2024 5:24 pm | Comments (3)
A Yale PhD student will spend the night in New Haven police lockup Monday night, after Yale cops arrested them for allegedly tampering with an American flagpole in Beinecke Plaza during last week’s student-led, pro-Palestinian protest.
by | Apr 25, 2024 4:53 pm | Comments (15)
Murder victim Ciera Jones: Shot and killed over rap lyrics.
A 21-year-old member of the Exit 8 gang has admitted to murdering 22-year-old Ciera “CeeCee” Jones and conspiring to murder 18-year-old Tashawn Brown three years ago — and now faces up to life in prison, with a recommended sentence of up to 30 years.
by | Apr 24, 2024 11:43 am | Comments (4)
Thomas Breen File Photo
Qinxuan Pan.
A state judge sentenced Qinxuan Pan to 35 years in prison after the former MIT artificial intelligence researcher pleaded guilty to the 2021 murder of Yale graduate student Kevin Jiang.
Continue reading ‘Qinxuan Pan Sentenced To 35 Years In Prison’
by | Apr 17, 2024 2:58 pm | Comments (7)
Proposed 19 locations for red light and speed cameras.
A committee of alders unanimously voted Tuesday night to advance a plan to install 19 red light and speed cameras across New Haven.
by | Apr 17, 2024 2:07 pm | Comments (7)
Edgar Becerra and Josue Mauricio Arana in court.
Laura Glesby Photo
Edgar Becerra protests his former employer, MDF Painting and Power Washing, before the eviction proceedings.
A judge has ruled that Edgar Becerra and Josue Mauricio Arana must find a new place to live, ending an eviction case that sparked protests over alleged exploitation of migrant workers.
by | Apr 17, 2024 10:36 am | Comments (11)
Thomas Breen photo
The Edgewood Yeshiva, no longer in foreclosure.
Christopher Peak file photo
Rabbi Greer: Signs mortgage docs and runs nonprofits while behind bars.
Incarcerated sex offender Rabbi Daniel Greer’s nonprofit housing organizations received a $12 million boost from a mystery lender — and then saw two longstanding lawsuits ditched by Greer’s sexual-abuse victim.
Continue reading ‘Sex Offender Finds Millions, Keeps Yeshiva’
by | Apr 11, 2024 1:39 pm | Comments (42)
Paul Bass Photo
Officer McLawrence.
A city police officer assigned to an ATV-crackdown taskforce broke his leg after an ATV crashed into him in Fair Haven.
by | Apr 10, 2024 8:51 pm | Comments (4)
Chief Jacobson (right) alongside Rodriguez's family.
Contributed photo
The late José Rodríguez.
Amidst a “cloud of smoke” and doubled-parked cars, a 19-year-old driver named Dajon Marques Morris struck and fatally injured a 41-year-old motorcyclist named José Rodríguez in Fair Haven.
Morris then “panicked” and, “fearing for his life,” fled the scene — only to be arrested by city cops roughly 10 months later.
by | Apr 8, 2024 8:50 am | Comments (5)
Lisa Gray photo
Terrence Roundtree, Talmadge Vick, Jabare Roach, Nathan-Craig Machado, and Felder Jean Baptiste take the oath at City Hall.
Five new police recruits were sworn in at City Hall — marking perhaps the first ever group of all Black male recruits to head to the training academy.