Category: Metro

CLARKSBURG, W.Va. (TCN) — A 41-year-old woman faces murder charges after she allegedly killed her mother several weeks after the victim bailed her out of jail.

According to WBOY-TV, on Saturday, March 22, Clarksburg Police Department officers were called to a home on Laurel Drive regarding a disturbance and found 64-year-old Elaine Labenne with stab wounds. Medics pronounced Labenne deceased at the scene. Police arrested Labenne’s daughter, Shanna Vannorman, at the residence and took her into custody on suspicion of murder.

West Virginia News reports the two women lived together.

Vannorman has faced other criminal charges in the past, including an arrest for disorderly conduct and assault of government representatives, health care providers, utility workers, or law enforcement on Jan. 16. She pleaded not guilty to the charges. A judge set her bond at $2,000, and she was released the next day after Labenne posted her bond.

Vannorman is in custody at the North Central Regional Jail.

• Clarksburg woman charged with murder after allegedly stabbing mother – WBOY
• Clarksburg (West Virginia) woman charged with fatally stabbing mother, who had bailed her out on previous charge – West Virginia News
• State of West Virginia v. Shanna M Vannorman

Source: True Crime Daily

HONOLULU (TCN) — Police arrested a 46-year-old doctor who allegedly tried to kill his wife on a hiking trail this week.

The Honolulu Police Department alleges that on the morning of March 24, Gerhardt Konig tried to throw his wife off Pali Lookout, and then hit her in the head with a rock. The victim was transported to a hospital and remains in critical condition.

Konig allegedly assaulted his wife after she declined to take a photo with her husband, KGMB-TV reports. Law enforcement officials reportedly told the news station that Konig is also accused of attempting to poke his wife with syringes during the incident. The victim sustained multiple facial and head injuries during the attack.

Police posted a bulletin asking the public to be on the lookout for Konig. Officers located him later that day near Pali Highway and arrested him following a short foot pursuit. Charges are pending.

According to WTAE-TV, Konig worked as an assistant professor at the University of Pittsburgh and anesthesiologist. Per KGMB, he was most recently a doctor with the Anesthesia Medical Group but has been suspended pending the investigation.

• UPDATE: Pali Lookout Attempted Murder Suspect Arrested – Honolulu Police Department
• Former Pittsburgh doctor allegedly tried to kill wife by throwing her off Hawaii hiking trail – WTAE
• Attempted murder suspect caught near Pali Highway – KGMB

Source: True Crime Daily

NEW YORK (TCN) — A 43-year-old woman will spend the next two decades behind bars for abusing and torturing her autistic cousin over the span of about a month, ultimately killing him.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg announced Monday, March 24, that a judge sentenced Johnette Booker to 20 years in prison after she was convicted last month of first-degree manslaughter, first-degree assault, first-degree gang assault, second-degree gang assault, second-degree assault, and endangering the welfare of a child in connection with the death of 15-year-old Jallen McConnie.

According to the district attorney’s office, McConnie lived with his adoptive sister, his legal guardian, in North Carolina and Georgia. In May 2021, the sister sent McConnie to New York City for “cousin boot camp” as a form of “punishment for what she believed to be misbehavior at home.” The statement said McConnie was a “special needs child who the defendant believed to be autistic.”

McConnie stayed at Booker’s Upper West Side apartment, where Booker reportedly “physically and emotionally tortured” him.

Bragg said McConnie was “physically assaulted multiple times with belts, forced to sleep on the floor, forced to sit facing the wall with his legs crossed for the majority of the day, forced to do intensive exercises, hold heavy books over his head, scrub her floor, stand in the corner touching his toes, and was denied his prescription medications.”

On June 28, 2021, Booker used a belt to hit McConnie’s arms, face, legs, and body for over an hour. She also brought another relative in to whip him with the belt and punch him. The attack reportedly “left Mr. McConnie’s body covered in welts and bruises, including on the chest, back, face, both arms, and both legs.”

Booker reportedly brought McConnie to a bathroom and “forced water down his throat.” He then collapsed in the bathtub and died.

Bragg said Booker waited a long time to call 911, and when she did, she lied about what happened. She reportedly claimed McConnie got jumped by boys in a nearby park, then said her cousin died by suicide. She also said she was “in her bedroom when the incident occurred and could not hear what was happening.”

The medical examiner determined McConnie died from homicidal asphyxia.

Bragg said, “Johnette Booker stands convicted of killing her younger, vulnerable cousin through her vicious and cruel behavior. For over a month, Booker knowingly put Jallen McConnie through an excruciating level of abuse and trauma, up until the final moments of his life. Booker will serve a significant prison term for this utterly horrific conduct and my thoughts remain with Mr. McConnie’s loved ones, who continue to grieve this devastating loss.”

• D.A. Bragg Announces Sentencing Of Johnette Booker For Death Of Teen Cousin – Manhattan District Attorney’s Office

Source: True Crime Daily

SUWANEE, Ga. (TCN) — Police recently arrested a 20-year-old man on suspicion of fatally stabbing another man nearly three years ago.

According to the Gwinnett County Police Department, on the morning of Sept. 5, 2022, officers responded to Ridge Oak Drive, where they found a man, identified by WAGA-TV as 44-year-old Matthew Jones, deceased outside his parents’ home with an apparent stab wound.

Police later said they obtained surveillance footage showing a man walking toward and away from the scene in a black hoodie wearing a reflective strip, black pants, and white shoes, and carrying a two-strap backpack. 

In December 2024, the New York Police Department contacted Gwinnett County Police, pointing to Delano Hill as a possible suspect after he had allegedly “provided intimate details about a homicide case that were not made public.”

On March 21, authorities arrested Hill at his home, and he was booked into the Gwinnett County Jail on charges of aggravated assault, felony murder, and malice murder.

The victim reportedly worked at a local Kroger, and family members said he was involved with a church.

• Gwinnett County Homicide Unit Makes Arrest in 2022 Cold Case with Help from New York Police – Gwinnett County Police Department
• Suwanee man facing murder charges for 2022 cold case killing, police say – WAGA

Source: True Crime Daily

TOLEDO, Ohio (TCN) — A 33-year-old man wanted for allegedly killing his missing daughter and leaving her body in a burned house was shot by a SWAT team in Columbus following days of surveillance.

Keimani Latigue was reported missing to the Toledo Police Department on March 18. Missing People in America said in a bulletin that Latigue lived with her grandmother, and on March 18, the grandmother came home to find the house “in complete disarray.” The door was reportedly unlocked, the stove smelled like gas, and Latigue’s clothes were found in different rooms. Her glasses were also left at the house, and she cannot see well without them. Latigue reportedly contacted her father not long before her disappearance and said she was “afraid to be home alone because it seemed like somebody was trying to break into the house.”

According to the Toledo Blade, Latigue’s grandmother reported the teen missing because she failed to show up to school, and her phone went straight to voicemail. Her grandmother told police that the “behavior is out of the norm for her.”

On Monday, March 24, Toledo Police discovered Latigue’s body in a vacant, burned-out house in the 1100 block of Miami Street. Police filed a warrant for her father Darnell Jones’ arrest for abduction, but on Tuesday, March 25, there was an additional warrant for murder.

WTVG-TV reports the Lucas County Coroner determined Latigue’s cause of death was “incised wounds of the neck.”

Police said in the warrant that Jones “gave officers inconsistent statements about his activity with the victim, and their whereabouts.” Investigators were searching for him following the issuance of the warrants.

Columbus Division of Police Sgt. James Fuqua said in a news briefing March 25 that SWAT learned that a “dangerous individual” was in the area, so once they confirmed his identity, they made contact with Jones. One of the officers discharged his weapon at Jones during their interaction, and Jones was hospitalized in stable condition. Officials reportedly discovered a firearm that did not belong to any of the SWAT officers at the scene. They had reportedly been surveilling Jones for about two days.

He is expected to survive his injuries.

Fraternal Order of Police City Lodge #9 President Brian Steel told reporters Latigue’s death was “one of the most horrific” cases he had ever heard of. He said, “This is a 14-year-old that was murdered, raped, had her hands cut off, and her throat almost cut off.” 

She was just days away from turning 14.

Steel added, “We sent a message: You murder someone, do not come to this town.”

• Missing Juvenile – Toledo Police Department
• Missing Keimani Latigue – Missing People in America
• Authorities provide update on shooting involving officers in Victorian Village – WBNS-TV
• Police say body found in burned-out East Toledo home is Keimani Latigue – Toledo Blade
• Man shot in Victorian Village connected to Toledo rape and murder, Columbus police say – Columbus Dispatch
• Toledo Municipal Court case search
• Police shoot Toledo father wanted for 13-year-old daughter’s murder – WTVG

Source: True Crime Daily

LONE PEAK, Utah (TCN) — A 47-year-old nurse was arrested for allegedly fatally poisoning a sick friend with insulin to collect over $1 million from the victim’s life insurance policy.

According to court documents cited by KSL.com, on Aug. 12, Lone Peak Police Department officers responded to a home on West Stevens Lane for a medical emergency after 38-year-old Kacee Terry’s uncle found her unresponsive in her bedroom. He reportedly told dispatch that his niece sounded “like she’s drowning.”

Terry’s friend Meggan Sundwall was reportedly in the room with Terry, and she told the uncle Terry had been unconscious for “a couple of hours.” Police reportedly discovered a diabetic needle at the scene.

Sundwall told paramedics that Terry should not be taken to the hospital because she had a “do not resuscitate” order. Medical officials, however, said they could not find any proof of that, and Sundwall did not have power of attorney. Terry was taken to a local hospital with a critically low blood sugar level of 14.

Sundwall reportedly claimed Terry had been diagnosed with leukemia while the two lived together. Terry’s sister, however, helped her move to their grandfather’s house because Terry was allegedly “complaining about Meggan bringing insulin home and trying to talk Kacee into treatments to help end her suffering.”

Sundwall allegedly brought her father over to Terry’s house to conduct “release blessings” to “help her pass on.”

KSL.com reports Terry allegedly told Sundwall that she was her life insurance policy beneficiary and that it was worth over $1 million. The two women allegedly “had discussed using insulin to cause death many times since 2020,” as Sundwall “consistently” told her to do it. Terry allegedly would pretend she used the insulin but claimed it “didn’t work.”

Texts to Terry allegedly included Sundwall telling her to “let go! It is past time!”

Another reportedly said, “Someone (should probably be me) should stay with you and continue to give you doses so it will actually stay low and you can pass.”

Terry’s sister reportedly spoke with doctors about her sister’s apparent terminal cancer, but doctors “were told that she never had cancer. The autopsy performed revealed no cancer and no health problems.”

In January, Sundwall reportedly told Terry that she had “poor finances,” but Terry confirmed Sundwall was her beneficiary. Following Terry’s death on Aug. 15, Sundwall asked police to look for the insurance papers in Terry’s room, but they couldn’t find any.

The police report says Sundwall contacted Terry’s life insurance policy provider after Terry’s death, but she found out Terry never actually had a policy.

Sundwall is being charged with aggravated murder and obstruction of justice.

• Utah nurse accused of killing former roommate for life insurance in yearslong plot – KSL.com
• Santaquin woman charged with aggravated murder in insulin death of her friend – KSL.com

Source: True Crime Daily

This Week on True Crime News The Podcast: Before she was brutally gunned down, Mary Gingles called authorities 14 times with concerns over her estranged husband Nathan Gingles’ behavior. Police say that the man killed not only his wife, but also her father and a neighbor who tried to help Mary, all in front of the couple’s 4-year-old daughter.

Rich McHale joins host Ana Garcia.

Check out Rich’s book “Where Is Mark?” here.

YouTube: Mother gunned down in front of 4-year-old daughter while fleeing shooter amid contentious divorce

Source: True Crime Daily

LEESBURG, Fla. (TCN) — A dentist who beat a man with a golf club during an altercation was found not guilty in February under Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law.

The incident took place April 30, 2023, and Lake County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to a battery in progress call at a golf course. Deputies spoke with Dr. Joe Sivak, who said he was walking on a course path with his wife when Dr. Eddie Orobitg told him the path was for golf carts only. The two men got into a verbal altercation that quickly turned physical. Orobitg hit Sivak with his golf club, and Sivak struck him back with his water bottle. Sivak had lacerations on his body and a torn earlobe. WOFL-TV reports Sivak also suffered fractured ribs and a brain injury.

Orobitg reportedly told deputies that he was golfing with his son when Sivak and his wife stepped on the course. He claimed he asked them to get out of the way, but then Sivak pushed him and then spat in his face. Orobitg said Sivak hit him with his water bottle as he tried to take Orobitg’s golf clubs.

Orobitg reportedly said he thought Sivak was going to hit him and his son, so he used his golf clubs in self-defense. Orobitg’s son shared with deputies that his father spat in Sivak’s face first, which caused Sivak to spit back. The son allegedly claimed Sivak pushed Orobitg, and Orobitg struck Sivak by accident when he fell.

Orobitg was arrested and charged with aggravated battery causing great bodily harm.

According to WOFL, Sivak said at a hearing, “I thought I was going to die or was dead.”

Orobitg’s attorneys, however, argued, “The physical evidence does not support Mr. Sivak’s version of events. Mr. Sivak’s narrative has numerous inconsistencies and discrepancies when compared to the physical evidence and 911 call. We are committed to presenting a vigorous defense that will demonstrate Dr. Orobitg’s use of force was justified.”

In February, a judge acquitted Orobitg and said Sivak was confrontational when the fight occurred. The judge also reportedly said the prosecution did not have enough evidence to disprove Orobitg’s self-defense argument.

Do you believe Orobitg acted in self-defense? Share your thoughts in the poll below!

• State of Florida v s. Eddie Orobitg
• Not guilty: Dentist accused of beating psychiatrist on golf course speaks out after case dismissed, 2/11/2025 – WOFL
• Florida golf course assault case heads to ‘stand your ground’ hearing, 1/14/2025 – WOFL

Source: True Crime Daily