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Falls man pleads not guilty to narcotics charges

September 19, 2013, 1:42 pm
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LOCKPORT – Shawn Pryor, 22, of Cleveland Avenue, Niagara Falls, pleaded not guilty Thursday in Niagara County Court to an indictment accusing him of making two cocaine sales in Niagara Falls May 30 and 31.

Pryor is charged with two counts each of third-degree criminal sale and possession of a controlled substance. The sales allegedly were made to a police informant.
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NT man risks 12-year prison term if drug treatment fails

September 19, 2013, 1:43 pm
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LOCKPORT – A North Tonawanda man, charged with two drug deals and a strongarm robbery, pleaded guilty Thursday to gain entry to the judicial diversion program of court-supervised drug treatment.

If Gino A. Fascitelli, 42, of Allen Street, succeeds in the treatment program, his charge will be reduced to a misdemeanor with a probation sentence. But if he fails, as a repeat felon, he faces up to 12 years in state prison, Niagara County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas warned.

Fascitelli admitted to third-degree criminal sale of a controlled substance for selling cocaine to a police informant March 5 in North Tonawanda. He also had been charged with a second cocaine sale March 8 and with robbing a man of his bicycle and his wallet April 30.
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Falls mother and son plead guilty to dealing drugs

September 19, 2013, 1:57 pm
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LOCKPORT – A Niagara Falls woman and her son pleaded guilty Wednesday in Niagara County Court to separate drug-dealing charges.

Evelyn George, 48, and Eddie George, 27, of Ninth Street, each admitted to fifth-degree criminal sale of a controlled substance and are scheduled for sentencing Nov. 13 by County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas.

Evelyn George was charged with making sales of cocaine and hydrocodone March 15 and June 12, 2012. Her son was charged with selling the painkiller hydrocodone and oxymorphone March 15 and 23, 2012.
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West Seneca man pleads guilty to felony DWI in Niagara County

September 19, 2013, 1:59 pm
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LOCKPORT – A Navy veteran who has a drinking problem and bipolar disorder pleaded guilty Thursday in Niagara County Veterans Court to a felony count of driving while intoxicated.

Kenneth G. Turgeon, 44, of Main Street, West Seneca, is to be admitted to a VA treatment facility next week, County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas said. He will be on probation for a year to see if treatment succeeds; otherwise, he faces up to four years in prison.

Deputy District Attorney Theodore A. Brenner said Turgeon’s vehicle struck a parked car at Payne Avenue and Stenzil Street in North Tonawanda on Aug. 6.

Also in Niagara County Court on Thursday, Colleen D. Vinson, 45, of Ewings Road, Newfane, pleaded not guilty to felony DWI and other counts, stemming from her arrest May 17 in Newfane.
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Burglar, attacker draw probation

September 19, 2013, 2:01 pm
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LOCKPORT – A Lockport burglar and a Niagara Falls woman who assaulted a man three times both were placed on probation Wednesday by Niagara County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas and ordered to continue mental health treatment.

David B. Tomporowski, 33, of Bowmiller Road, drew five years’ probation for attempted third-degree burglary, and was ordered to pay $550 in restitution. He burglarized Kenyon’s Variety store on Robinson Road in Lockport Feb. 15, 2012, by smashing a window. He stole an 18-pack of beer and four packs of cigarettes.

Sicory Y. Walker, 38, of Woodlawn Avenue in the Falls, was placed on three years’ probation for third-degree assault and fourth-degree criminal mischief. She was charged with stabbing a man May 14, 2012, and with assaulting him again Sept. 7 and 17, 2012.
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Cuomo intervenes to unblock Hamister hotel project in Falls

September 19, 2013, 2:46 pm
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NIAGARA FALLS – A nasty political mailer hit mailboxes roughly a week before Primary Day that nearly made a developer walk away from a $25 million development proposal.

Some local elected leaders got wind that the developer, Mark E. Hamister, might have had enough of the Falls, a place he said he “was warned about.”

They called Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who then looked into the issue and made some of his own phone calls.

Two were to Hamister.

Cuomo also dispatched his point man in Western New York, Sam Hoyt, the former assemblyman from Buffalo who is regional president of Empire State Development Corp., to persuade a member of the City Council to break ranks with a three-member majority that was blocking the project.

Thursday, Cuomo flew out to the Falls to be on hand as a ceremonial agreement was signed on the project that he made sure was going to happen.

“I think Mr. Hamister was being subjected to the political process, which can be highly unpleasant. Take it from someone who gets subjected to the political process,” Cuomo said.

“And I think it was a little jarring to him as a private-sector businessman to now wind up as an issue in a political contest,” Cuomo said.

“His basic point was he didn’t want to have any part of it. And he didn’t know what was going to happen. He didn’t know if the project was going to become a political football.”

At that point, the proposed deal had been tabled by the City Council since early July.

“I’m tired of losing a lot of business projects because of politics,” Cuomo said, “and I assured him that I would get involved and work with local elected officials.”

Cuomo then told Hoyt to reach out to Councilman Robert A. Anderson Jr., part of a three-member Council majority that had tabled approval of the project.

“We were afraid that the project was going to come off the rails, which would have really been a tragedy,” Cuomo said.

Hoyt spent the better part of three days talking with and getting to know Anderson. They talked about the lawmaker’s concerns with some aspects of the proposed agreement.

Then, Monday morning, a news conference was announced, and Anderson, with Hoyt as his side, declared to the media that he supports the project – meaning that there were enough votes on the Council to move it forward.

The Council on Monday voted, 3-2, to allow the city to sell a city-owned parcel at 310 Rainbow Blvd. for the project, as well as for Mayor Paul A. Dyster to sign a development agreement with Hamister.

“This would not have happened without his personal involvement,” Dyster said of Cuomo.

“I looked into it. I then made a few phone calls. I spoke to Mr. Hamister, and we got the project back on track, and we’re here today celebrating,” Cuomo said after a ceremonial signing of an agreement among the city, the state and Hamister. “So I’m happy that I did get involved. I’m happy about the way local officials all came together and cooperated, and it’s a good day because of it.”

Hamister’s project, a five-story, mixed-use building at 310 Rainbow Blvd., is estimated to cost $25.3 million and includes a $2.75 million state grant.

The elected officials Cuomo spoke to about the situation included Dyster, State Sen. George D. Maziarz, R-Newfane, and Assemblyman John D. Ceretto, R-Lewiston.

Thursday, Maziarz thanked the governor for making the phone calls to Hamister that gave time for an agreement to be reached.

When Cuomo arrived in Buffalo for the announcement of a new state park along the outer harbor, it was Maziarz who passed Cuomo a note with Hamister’s cellphone number.

Hamister said a groundbreaking for the project is expected in the second half of 2014. He said he hopes his new hotel will either be a Hilton, Marriott or Intercontinental brand.

email: abesecker@buffnews.com
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Buffalo Niagara region’s job growth stayed moderate into August

September 19, 2013, 3:18 pm
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The Buffalo Niagara region’s moderate job growth continued into August.

Yet despite some strengthening, the local job count expanded only about half as fast as the rest of the country.

The region’s job market grew at an annual pace of 0.9 percent during August, with local employers adding 5,000 jobs over the past 12 months to bring the area within a whisker of where it could claim to have recovered all of the jobs it lost during the Great Recession.

Hiring was even stronger among the region’s private-sector businesses, which added jobs at a more robust 1.4 percent annual pace. But those gains were offset by job cuts by cash-strapped government agencies, according to data released Thursday by the state Labor Department.

And last month’s gains left the region just 400 jobs below its pre-recession peak in August 2008, putting the local job market on the cusp of completing its recovery from the job losses during the recession – something the area never came close to doing after the 2001 recession.

“Overall, these are pretty good numbers,” said John Slenker, the Labor Department’s regional economist in Buffalo. “This is the kind of pattern I like to see.”

Scott R. Stenclik, the president of Superior Talent Resources in Amherst, said he also is seeing a slow improvement in the region’s job market.

“Job growth is continuing,” he said. “Clearly, it seems private-sector hiring is growing faster than public-sector hiring.”

Stenclik said demand is strong for workers with skills in engineering and financial services. He said the companies his business works with are slowly becoming more confident about adding workers to their payroll.

“I think, generally, the mood and the level of contentedness is positive,” he said. But he also doesn’t expect a sudden surge in hiring. “I think the timeline for job growth will be a protracted one,” he said.

That trend is reflected in the August job data, which showed the region adding new positions at a pace that is squarely in the middle of the range that has been typical of nonrecessionary periods over the last two decades, when employment growth generally has ranged from being flat to expanding by as much as 1.6 percent on an annualized basis.

On the downside, that growth is not nearly as robust as it is elsewhere. The pace of job growth here is a little better than half the 1.7 percent expansion nationally, and about a third slower than the state’s overall job growth of 1.4 percent.

Much of the job growth locally is centered in the service sector, where education and health services firms added jobs at a 4.5 percent annual pace over the past year. Hiring at temporary help agencies, which typically jumps in the early stages of a recovery, also was strong, rising at a 3.4 percent annual rate. The leisure and hospitality sector also continued to expand quickly, with local hotels and restaurants adding jobs at a 3.6 percent annual pace.

Those gains, however, were partially offset by continued softness in manufacturing, where employers cut jobs at a 0.8 percent annual pace, while government employment dropped by 1.6 percent and construction also weakened, with 2.3 percent fewer jobs than a year ago.

Slenker said the weakness in construction employment, at a time when the region has more highly visible building projects than it has had in years, may reflect a general shortage of skilled tradesmen, as well as the impact of federal government budget cutbacks on road construction.

“There is no denying that the activity level you’re seeing downtown is enormous,” he said. “Everything is pointing to a lack of supply of labor.”

Among the state’s 14 major metro areas, job growth in the Buffalo Niagara region ranked ninth, topping only Binghamton, Elmira, Poughkeepsie, Rochester and Utica. The region’s job growth was much better than the 0.5 percent increase across all of upstate New York, but less than half as strong as the hiring expansion in the New York City area, which added jobs at a 2.1 percent pace.

Job growth was generally weak in the rural counties in Western New York, where Genesee County’s 0.9 percent increase was the strongest. Chautauqua County added jobs at a 0.2 percent annual pace, while job losses ran at a 0.7 percent pace in Wyoming County, 1.2 percent in Cattaraugus County and 1.7 percent in Allegany County.

Nationally, applications for unemployment benefits climbed by 15,000 to 309,000 in the week ended Sept. 14 from a revised 294,000 in the prior period, a Labor Department report showed.

email: drobinson@buffnews.com
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Four Michigan residents arrested on federal fraud charges

September 19, 2013, 3:22 pm
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Four Michigan residents from the Detroit area were arrested Thursday on federal fraud conspiracy counts, according to U.S. Attorney William J. Hochul, Jr.

Rodney Gilliam, 25, of Southfield, Mich.; Raina Johnson, 22, of Detroit; Deantuan Wiley, 24, of Sterling Heights, and George Brown, 24, of Farmington, face prison terms of up to five years and $250,000 fines if they are convicted, Hochul said.

Wiley separately faces charges for allegedly having more than 15 counterfeit access devices.

Hochul said the four were arrested when their car was searched at the Lewiston-Queenston Bridge on July 3 and authorities found 98 counterfeit credit cards in the vehicle. A subsequent investigation disclosed security surveillance videos from various retail stores in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Rhode Island and New York showing the four using counterfeit credit cards.

Gift cards and other merchandise allegedly purchased by the four suspects with counterfeit credit cards were also found in their car, Hochul said.
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Unsolved ’93 murder of teen is still being worked

September 19, 2013, 5:36 pm
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Twenty years ago this week, North Tonawanda teenager Amanda “Mandy” Steingasser disappeared after a night of drinking and partying with friends.

Almost five weeks later, two young men, out looking for mushrooms in Lewiston’s Bond Lake Park, found her body.

From the beginning, detectives from the North Tonawanda Police Department were convinced that they knew who killed her. The suspect was a classmate of Mandy’s, who was seen picking her up in his car in the early-morning hours of Sept. 20, 1993.

Two decades later, detectives are still working the case, still trying to obtain enough evidence to help Niagara County prosecutors build a case against the target of their investigation – a Buffalo-area man in his late 30s.

Police have not given up the hunt for Mandy’s killer, said Thomas E. Krantz, chief of detectives with the North Tonawanda police.

“I can’t go into detail, but it is still an open case. We still are working on this case,” Krantz told The Buffalo News.

“It’s the most frustrating case I ever worked on in 35 years of police work,” said Jack Dierdorf, a former North Tonawanda police captain, who worked on the case for nine years before retiring in 2002. “I retired 11 years ago, but it still bothers me to this day ... I know it is a cold case, but it’ll never be a closed case.”

Aside from confirming that the murder case is an “open investigation,” Niagara County District Attorney Michael P. Violante declined to comment.

Mandy’s parents, Richard and Lorraine Steingasser, also declined to comment about the investigation or the loss of their daughter.

The Steingassers are “just too devastated, too heartbroken” to discuss the events of two decades ago, according to a family friend, retired Detective Chief Gabriel DiBernardo.

“They’re still in deep mourning over their child,” said DiBernardo, who has known Richard Steingasser for more than 50 years. “I feel terrible about it, too. I knew this family, and I knew this beautiful young girl. I was the chief of detectives when this happened. I feel like it happened on my watch.”

The violent and mysterious case upset residents of North Tonawanda and especially students at the high school, where both Mandy and the suspect were in the same senior class.

“It was a very traumatic time at the high school,” recalled Mary Jane Clark-Wolentarski, a retired North Tonawanda guidance counselor, who worked at the high school at the time. “Not only were the students very upset about this young girl being murdered, but they were wondering about who did it.

“Some students were thinking, ‘Which one of the students in this building, which one of my classmates is a murderer?’ Some students were petrified by the whole thing. It was also a scary time for staff members, and you also had parents wondering if their son or daughter was going to school with a killer.”

Adding to the discomfort was the fact that some students knew the identity of the classmate who was last seen with Mandy on the night she disappeared.

It was a “difficult year,” Clark-Wolentarski said. “We had to counsel a lot of kids.”

Friends who spoke to The News about the case described Mandy as a good-hearted, strikingly beautiful teenager who enjoyed partying and sometimes made bad choices about the people she partied with.

On the night of Sept. 19, 1993, she embarked on a night of partying and drinking with several friends. They got an older friend to buy them bottles of whiskey and rum. They traveled that night to a house party in North Tonawanda and a rock-and-roll bar in Buffalo, where they were turned away because most in the group were underage.

At about 1:20 a.m. on Sept. 20, 1993, Mandy got into a car at Oliver Street and Fifth Avenue with an 18-year-old male student from her high school. The male friend later told police that Mandy was only in his car briefly and said he dropped her off a few blocks away.

But police believe that the male friend drove Mandy to a “lovers’ lane” area of Bond Lake Park, where she was murdered.

Later that morning, the male friend was seen cleaning up his car at a coin-operated car wash, police said.

There were “numerous discrepancies” in the statements that the male friend gave to detectives after Mandy’s disappearance, police said. Police also told The News that the male friend asked at least two of his friends to lie about his whereabouts after he picked up Mandy.

Because he has never been charged with anything in the case, The News has not published the male friend’s name in connection with the Steingasser case.

“If anyone has any information about what happened that night, please call our office at 692-4312,” Krantz said. ”Even if there is something that they think is insignificant, it may be something that will give us a piece of the puzzle that we’re missing.”

The target of the murder probe spoke briefly to a News reporter during the summer of 2000, insisting that police were wrongfully trying to pin the slaying on him. He said he had no reason to harm Mandy and accused police of conducting a “biased investigation.”

He also said he felt terrible about Mandy’s death.

“I didn’t do it,” he told the reporter. “I’m not the guy they make me out to be.”

email: dherbeck@buffnews.com
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Hometown honors memory of Civil War Medal of Honor recipient

September 19, 2013, 7:20 pm
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LOCKPORT – Michael Huskey, the Civil War Medal of Honor winner who grew up in Lockport, is buried as an unknown, but a ceremony Thursday evening in St. Patrick’s Cemetery sought to make sure he’ll never be forgotten.

Huskey, the Navy officer who was approved for the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military award, never received it. He died of dysentery the following year in a Memphis, Tenn., hospital and is believed to be buried in a mass grave there.

Thursday, after four years of research and effort, local officials placed a special marker in the Catholic parish cemetery on Glenwood Avenue. The granite marker, supplied by the Medal of Honor Historical Society of the United States, rests beside the five-foot-high stone marking the final resting place of his parents, Michael and Julia Huskey.

With bagpipes, taps and three volleys of rifle fire included, Niagara County Legislature Chairman William L. Ross said it was “a ceremony that took almost 150 years to take place, but certainly tonight, we’re doing the right thing.”

County Historian Catherine L. Emerson pursued the Huskey story, following up old leads and unearthing much new information. She learned that Huskey was born in Ireland but immigrated to the U.S. with his parents and settled in Lockport. He died at age 23.

He joined the Navy for a three-year hitch early in the Civil War and was assigned to the USS Carondelet, an ironclad gunboat that, according to Emerson, “saw more action than any other naval vessel until World War II, and 99 percent of the time, Michael Huskey was aboard.”

A fireman first class, Huskey was responsible for keeping the coal-fired engines running.

In March 1863, during the battle of Steele’s Bayou, Miss., Huskey earned his Medal of Honor during what was really a military fiasco: an effort to push a flotilla of gunboats through a stream only two feet wider than the boats themselves. The bayou was overhung with semitropical foliage, and Confederate infantry on the banks rained rifle fire on the ships.

Town of Lockport Supervisor Marc R. Smith said Huskey “volunteered to put out fires on the deck of the USS Ivy, with animals and snakes dropping from trees onto the deck.”

The Ivy was the flagship of the flotilla, which was finally rescued by Union troops. Huskey’s citation lacks specifics on exactly what he did to qualify for the Medal of Honor, but it says he fought “gallantly.”

Lockport Mayor Michael W. Tucker saluted Emerson, her staff and Deputy County Clerk Wendy Roberson for fighting to win recognition for Huskey. “It would have been easy for them to walk away. Nobody knows Michael Huskey here,” Tucker noted.

In order to claim Huskey’s medal, a proven descendant must sign paperwork. Emerson thinks she found a woman in Ellenville who is a descendant of Huskey’s brother, but the woman won’t respond to requests for help.

“I thought he was like a shadow, and if I didn’t reach up and grab hold of him, he would recede forever,” Emerson said. “We rescued Michael Huskey from the mists of history.”

email: tprohaska@buffnews.com
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Former Falls man sentenced to 10 years for sexually abusing girl

September 19, 2013, 7:34 pm
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LOCKPORT – A man who sexually abused a preteen girl for two years in Niagara Falls was sentenced Thursday to 10 years in state prison, followed by 20 years of post-release supervision.

Philips Aguilar, 36, was living on Whitney Avenue in the Falls during the crimes. After the girl reported them to her mother, Aguilar left the Falls, according to his attorney, Alan S. Hoffman.

Hoffman told Niagara County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas that Aguilar was walking the streets of Buffalo, contemplating suicide, until he was picked up and taken to Erie County Medical Center. Aguilar’s mother checked him out of the hospital and took him to her home in Uniondale, Long Island, Hoffman said.

That’s where authorities arrested him on a Niagara Falls arrest warrant in February.

Aguilar pleaded guilty to first-degree criminal sexual act, which carries a 25-year maximum sentence. However, when the plea was entered July 9, Farkas agreed to limit the sentence to 15 years.

She trimmed it even further after hearing that the victim and her mother preferred some leniency.

“He needs to get out of jail and get help,” the girl wrote in a letter that she tried unsuccessfully to read in court. Breaking down in tears, the girl gave the letter to Assistant District Attorney Robert A. Zucco to read aloud.

The letter said the girl decided to report the crimes last November after seeing a video on sexual abuse in a seventh-grade class.

The girl said Aguilar blindfolded her and forced her to perform oral sex.

Aguilar, a married father of four, was abused as a child, Hoffman said. The defendant asked for “the court’s mercy,” and Hoffman appealed for the minimum sentence, which would have been five years.

“He knows his life is over,” Hoffman said. “I don’t think he’s a threat to society.”

Farkas saluted the girl’s mother for supporting her daughter but said she had to take the severity of the crime into account.

Aguilar blamed the crimes on stress, but Farkas said, “Ninety-nine percent of men who are stressed out don’t sexually abuse (girls).”

email: tprohaska@buffnews.com
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Falls teen, charged in 4 burglaries, 2 attempts, pleads guilty

September 19, 2013, 7:38 pm
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LOCKPORT – Darren J. Holland, a Niagara Falls teenager who was charged with four burglaries and two attempted burglaries in that city, accepted a plea offer Thursday in Niagara County Court.

Holland, 18, of 87th Street, pleaded guilty to second-degree burglary, which carries a maximum 15-year prison term.

Assistant District Attorney Joseph A. Scalzo said he was recommending no more than five years in prison, but County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas said she was keeping her options open for the Nov. 14 sentencing.

In the meantime, Holland is being held in the County Jail in lieu of $50,000 bail.

He was one of four young men charged in a burglary spree earlier this year in the Falls, although he was the only one not named in an indictment filed last month.

Holland’s guilty plea was for a break-in at a home on 97th Street on March 12 or 13.

But Scalzo said Holland had agreed to pay a total of $926.50 in restitution to all six victims.

Holland also was charged with taking part in five other crimes with the people named in the indictment.

The crimes included two break-ins June 26 at homes on Witkop Avenue and an attempted separate that day on Laughlin Drive. Aaron M. Adamec, 19, of 70th Street, has been indicted in those three crimes.

Holland also was accused of joining two brothers, Mark A. Pardee, 21, and Justin S. Pardee, 18, formerly of 100th Street, in a June 18 burglary on Mang Avenue. He also was charged with helping Mark Pardee in a June 7 break-in on Pasadena Avenue.

Holland told Farkas that shortly before the crimes, he had stopped taking Adderol, a prescription drug for attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, which he had been on since age 8.

“Think there was a connection?” the judge asked.

Holland said he chose to medicate himself by drinking and taking the drug K2, a synthetic marijuana imitation. The judge called Holland’s choice “dangerous.”

email: tprohaska@buffnews.com
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Community Market open for two more Saturdays

September 19, 2013, 7:38 pm
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LOCKPORT – The Lockport Community Market has only two Saturdays of business remaining this year, this week and Sept. 28. The outdoor market will be open both days from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Canal Street in downtown Lockport.

The local vendors offer a variety of produce, baked goods, hot chocolate and fudge, honey, eggs and fresh meat. The Boy Scouts will sell popcorn, and Boyer’s Freedom Grill will offer hamburgers, hotdogs and sausage.

From 11 a.m. to noon in the Canal Street gazebo, local musician Larry Hall will perform classic rock, folk and country music.

The Sept. 28 music lineup includes Hall from 10 to 11 a.m. and Celtic Cross Duo, featuring the Bagpiper of Wilson, from 11:30 to 12:30 p.m.
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Niagara Wheatfield bottled water expenditure for staff faulted by new board member

September 19, 2013, 7:40 pm
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SANBORN – A new member of the Niagara Wheatfield School Board wants to know why the district is paying for bottled water for some of its office staff.

Amy B. Deull questioned the expenditure when the board approved its latest monthly financial audit during Thursday’s meeting.

Deull said the records showed that the district is paying for large bottles of water to be delivered to some of its offices, including central administration, the adult learning center and the bus garage. No total cost was discussed, but Deull said the billing showed that the district is paying $200 a month to Mountain Glacier for the administration building alone.

Other than at the Tuscarora Indian School ,where only well water is available, Deull said, bottled water should not be provided by the district. “They don’t need to get bottled water if there are water fountains,” she said.

School Superintendent Lynn M. Fusco had no information on the expenditure but said she would update the board once she has looked into the matter.

Before being elected this year, Deull was a frequent critic of district spending at meetings and during budget talks when the board was dealing with a fiscal crisis that threatened to impose a large property tax increase.

In another matter, the district will soon see one top administrator leave and another arrive.

School Board members said goodbye to Athletic Director Mark V. DiFilippo after 10 years of service to the district. DiFilippo said he has accepted a similar position with Williamsville East High School. He will leave Oct. 11.

Fusco said the board will begin looking for a successor to DiFilippo right away.

Allison S. Brady, who had been business administrator at the Barker Central School District, was hired as school business executive, effective Sept. 30.

Brady succeeds Kerin M. Dumphrey, who retired last year, as well as Richard A. Hitzges, from the Orleans/Niagara Board of Cooperative Educational Services. Hitzges was hired as a part-time budget director about two years ago to assist with the financial problems facing the district.
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Project Runway to discuss strategic plan with public

September 19, 2013, 7:55 pm
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NIAGARA FALLS – Project Runway, a new program to provide a pathway for drug- and alcohol-free living for young women, will introduce its strategic plan to the public at 4 p.m. next Thursday ► 26th ◄ in the Beloved Community Event Center, 1710 Calumet Ave.

The plan incorporates suggestions made by community residents, youth group leaders and teenagers during a series of meetings held this summer. It will offer concrete ways to confront substance abuse among women in the Niagara Falls community.

Funded by the Peter and Elizabeth C. Tower Foundation, Project Runway aims to increase community awareness of drug issues and to train doctors and other health care professionals to treat those who use alcohol and drugs.
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Community Television available only on digital

September 19, 2013, 7:55 pm
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LOCKPORT – Lockport Community Television, the area’s set of three public-access cable television channels, lost a chunk of its audience because of technical changes July 23, when Time Warner Cable stopped transmitting channels 20, 21 and 22 in the analog format.

Operations manager Richard J. Zapp said LCTV is now carried in the digital format only. Thus, any cable subscriber with an analog TV that lacks a cable-compatible digital tuner can no longer receive the channels.

Time Warner is supplying digital set-top boxes for free to such customers. It intends to charge 99 cents a month for such units, starting in January 2015, ► CQ ◄ Zapp said. Customers using other devices or “cable-ready” digital sets will find LCTV Channel 20 on the newly tuned Channel 21.3. LCTV 21 is on Channel 21.4, and LCTV 22 is on Channel 22.5.

Customers with digital TVs will need to “auto scan” or “auto tune” channels in their digital TV menu to access the new channel locations.
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Garden Notes: News of area clubs and events

September 19, 2013, 10:11 am
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Lewiston Garden Club will meet at 10:30 a.m. Monday in the Lewiston Public Library, 305 S. Eighth St., Lewiston. Following the business meeting, Joe Manuel, master gardener with the Erie County Cooperative Extension, will discuss the advantages of organic gardening. New members and guests are welcome. For information, call 297-5925.

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Hamburg House and Garden Club will meet at 7 p.m. Tuesday in Hamburg United Methodist Church, 116 Union St., Hamburg. Abe Sosnowski, of the Western New York Bonsai Club, will present “Bonsai Trees.” Business meeting to follow. For club information, call Carolyn Sheehy, 337-3242.

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Amherst Garden Club will meet at 10 a.m. Wednesday in St. John Lutheran Church, 6540 Main St., Amherst. Presentations on “Success with African Violets” and “Wintering Over Geraniums” will follow the business meeting. Guests and prospective members invited.

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Town and Country Garden Club will present “Fall, Flowers and Fun” on Thursday night in the Harlem Road Community Center, 4255 Harlem Road, Snyder. Tim Walter, from Flowers by Johnny, will create floral designs with an autumn theme. Flower boutique, theme baskets, door prizes and refreshments. Tickets are $8 presale; $9 at the door. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. Call 836-2573 for ticket information.

If you have a submission for Garden Notes, please send it to Susan Martin, Garden Notes, Features Department, The Buffalo News, P.O. Box 100, Buffalo, NY 14240. Fax: 849-3445. email: smartin@buffnews.com. All items must be received in writing two weeks prior to publication.
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Man receives combination sentence in lighter attack on woman

November 15, 2013, 5:39 pm
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LOCKPORT – A man who pleaded guilty to attacking a woman with a cigarette lighter was sentenced Friday to six months in the Niagara County Jail, to be followed by four and a half years on probation.

Joshua Hutson, 25, of Ontario Avenue, had pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of attempted second-degree assault in connection with the April 21 incident. It was one of three domestic incidents for which Hutson had been indicted.

The victim’s father said, “No rational human being lights somebody’s hair on fire.”

Assistant Public Defender A. Joseph Catalano denied that was what happened, but Assistant District Attorney Lisa M. Baehre termed Hutson’s conduct “twisted” and “sadistic.”
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Seventeen people homeless after Lockport building’s stairs collapse

November 15, 2013, 6:53 pm
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LOCKPORT – Seventeen people were homeless Friday evening, as a staircase collapsed inside an apartment building off Lincoln Avenue in the Town of Lockport.

Two women said they were injured when a plaster ceiling beneath a wooden staircase fell on them at 6559 Lincoln Place.

Two steps on a short staircase between the first and second floors gave way.

One of the injured women, Tara Gibson, said, “Kids were running up and down the stairs.”

She added, “Part of the stairs fell on my shoulder and on my neck, and I just had neck surgery not even a month [ago].”

She said a friend, Cynthia Hazzard, who also lives in the building, was hit in the head.

Town Supervisor Marc R. Smith said Building Inspector Brian M. Belson condemned the building because the wrecked staircase left tenants on upper floors with only one escape route from the building. At least two are required by the fire code.

The American Red Cross said it is helping five families living in the building find shelter.

Onlookers who live in other buildings in the multi-unit complex told a reporter that structural conditions are poor in several of the other buildings, too.

Smith said the town will be looking into conditions at Lincoln Place in the coming days.

Hazzard, who said she was treated in Eastern Niagara Hospital for a muscle tear in her neck, said there are 12 apartments in the building.

“Somebody was walking downstairs and the stairs collapsed,” Hazzard said as she bent down under the yellow tape blocking the entrance to return to her apartment and obtain some clothing. The incident happened around 6 p.m.

She said she was going to be put up in a local motel by the Red Cross, which normally gives shelter for three days after emergencies.

Town records identify the owner as Michael R. Morgante of Clarence, who purchased the property for $290,000 in 2010. The 12,000-square-foot building was constructed in 1988. It is one of two buildings in Lincoln Place for which Morgante is listed as the owner.

Red Cross volunteers Henrietta Hady and Diane Sargent are assisting the families.

The Niagara County Sheriff’s Department is investigating the incident.

email: tprohaska@buffnews.com
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North Tonawanda heroin dealer, linked to drug death, gets more prison time

November 15, 2013, 7:11 pm
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LOCKPORT – Miguel E. Febres, a North Tonawanda drug dealer who sold heroin while free on bail on charges connected to a user’s death, received another six years in state prison Friday from Niagara County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas.

That sentence will be added onto the one- to three-year term he is currently serving in Wyoming Correctional Facility for dumping a man’s body in a North Tonawanda park after the victim overdosed on drugs in Febres’ apartment.

Febres also will face two years of post-release supervision.

“It’s so offensive,” Assistant District Attorney Peter M. Wydysh said of Febres’ conduct.

Febres, 34, of Zimmerman Street, had pleaded guilty Aug. 22 to third-degree criminal sale of a controlled substance for a heroin sale Oct. 2, 2012, in North Tonawanda.

That plea wrapped up a 12-count indictment that included four drug deals and the seizure of 16 bags of heroin in a Nov. 1, 2012, raid on Febres’ apartment. The charges carried a maximum of 51 years in prison if Febres had been convicted of all of them.

On Nov. 16, 2012, Farkas sentenced Febres to one to three years in prison for tampering with physical evidence in connection with the heroin overdose death of David C. Brandl, of Lockport, on the night of April 26-27, 2012, in Febres’ apartment.

Febres and two others hauled the 22-year-old’s body to Mayor’s Park about a mile from Febres’ residence. The corpse was found in the park the next morning by a National Grid utility crew.

Assistant Public Defender A. Joseph Catalano said Febres told him that he didn’t think the Brandl case should be held against him in sentencing on the new drug charges. Catalano said he explained to Febres that it would be considered by Farkas.

Paraphrasing Febres’ arguments to him, Catalano told the judge, “This is something that occurs all the time. Drug dealers deal drugs. People O.D.”

Farkas noted that the maximum sentence for the drug sale charge was nine years, so Febres already got a break with a plea bargain that included the prosecution recommending six years.

email: tprohaska@buffnews.com
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