A pair of serial burglars who thought they could commit break-ins with impunity because cops are busy handling the coronavirus crisis were busted Tuesday, according to officials.
Joseph Porter, 31, and Rebecca Wood, 23, were both arrested around 11:20 a.m in Bay Shore for multiple burglaries throughout Suffolk County, police said.
Cops put the pieces together after realizing the duo’s Hyundai Santa Fe fit the same description of a vehicle used in previously reported burglaries.
Porter admitted to investigators that he believed he would get away scot-free because law enforcement was preoccupied with COVID-19 challenges, police said.
The pair were both slapped with several burglary and attempted burglary charges in connection to a string of 11 incidents that began on March 9.
The burglaries took place at a variety of garages, repair shops, and gas stations, police said.
Porter was charged separately with one additional burglary at a car wash on Sunrise Highway Mar. 29.
“Suffolk County Police officers have increased patrols to focus on businesses that could be targeted by criminals during this pandemic,” Suffolk County Police Commissioner Geraldine Hart said in a statement.
Mr. Sanders, making his second run for the White House, withdrew after a series of losses to Joseph R. Biden Jr., who emerges as the presumptive Democratic party nominee for the general election.
Photo Credit…Erin Schaff/The New York Times
By Sydney Ember of the New York Times April 8, 2020 Updated 12:28 p.m. ET
Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont dropped out of the Democratic presidential race on Wednesday, concluding a quest for the White House that began five years ago in relative obscurity but ultimately elevated him as a champion of the working class, a standard-bearer of American liberalism and the leader of a self-styled political revolution.
Mr. Sanders’s exit from the race establishes former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. as the presumptive nominee to challenge President Trump, and leaves the progressive movement without a prominent voice in the 2020 race.
“I cannot in good conscience continue to mount a campaign that cannot win and which would interfere with the important work required of all of us in this difficult hour,” Mr. Sanders said over a live stream Wednesday morning.
He said that he would remain on the ballot in states that still have primaries scheduled and would continue to gather delegates, as a way of carrying his message forward and influencing the Democratic platform.
“While this campaign is coming to an end, our movement is not,” he said.
In a race reshaped, and eclipsed, by the escalating coronavirus crisis, Mr. Sanders faced no realistic path to the nomination after a series of lopsided losses to Mr. Biden, beginning in South Carolina in late February and culminating with a string of losses last month in crucial states like Michigan and Florida.
With the public health emergency preventing both candidates from holding in-person campaign events, Mr. Sanders spent the last several weeks on the sidelines, delivering addresses via live stream and making occasional television appearances, while facing calls from fellow Democrats to exit the race and help unify the party behind Mr. Biden. Though Mr. Biden had been careful not to pressure Mr. Sanders, he had begun to move ahead as if the race were over, taking steps, for example, to begin his search for a running mate.
As Mr. Sanders pursued the White House for a second time, he promised that he could transform the electorate, bringing new voters under the Democratic tent, but that goal eluded him. Even Mr. Sanders has lamented that he was unable to produce a surge in young voters.
In early primaries this year, he also failed to show that he had remedied a crucial weakness from his 2016 run: a lack of support from black voters, a vital base of the Democratic Party. In state after state across the South — Alabama, the Carolinas, Mississippi, Virginia — he was unable to chip away at Mr. Biden’s strong support among African-Americans.
In many ways, Mr. Sanders never overcame the widely held view among Democrats that he was a political outlier, a self-described democratic socialist who proudly proclaimed himself to be an independent senator from Vermont rather than a member of the party establishment.
Mr. Sanders championed and popularized liberal policies like “Medicare for all” and free four-year public colleges aimed at lifting up America’s working class, but he faced opposition from many party leaders, elected officials and major donors, as well as large numbers of moderate voters who saw him as too far left.
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New York State on PAUSE, Updated Public & Stakeholder Participation Information
Governor Cuomo has issued a PAUSE Order directing non-essential meetings/gatherings to be suspended or canceled.
As a result, at this time DEC is canceling the public hearings previously scheduled for the following proposed rulemakings and extending the comment periods for these rulemakings for 30 days.
A changing ecosystem is driving nesting kittiwakes out of their habitat and into coastal Norwegian towns. Can “Kittiwake hotels” help these gulls and humans co-exist?
BY CHERYL KATZ, National Geographic
A traditional cliffside kittiwake nesting site before they moved to towns
TROMSØ, NORWAY Construction cranes tower stork-like over the skyline of this burgeoning burg 200-plus miles above the Arctic Circle. Spurred by a recent flood of adventurers chasing the northern lights and sightseers wanting a glimpse of the glaciers before they’re gone, this tourism hub on Norway’s north coast has been building hotels geared for an anticipated 2.3 million visitors a year.
While the human tourist boom is on hold for now, some visitors are still flocking in and looking for suitable places to stay. These guests are black-legged kittiwakes—the most seafaring member of the gull family, and one that is facing an uncertain future.
Black-legged kittiwakes set up house in a Norwegian town. A combination of factors is causing the gulls to leave their nesting cliffs and head to cities to raise families. PHOTOGRAPH BY S.E. ARNDT, PICTURE PRESS/REDUX
Usually, kittiwakes nest in cliffs over the ocean and seldom venture inland. But in the past few years from March to September, that’s changed. Now, due to a warming ocean, increased storminess and other changes that are decimating chick production in their normal habitat, the birds have been setting up house in places such as shopping centers and office buildings in Tromsø and other towns along Norway’s north coast, where they are rankling locals with their noise and mess.
“There’s something going on in the bird cliffs that makes them struggle to raise chicks,” says Reiertsen. “The kittiwake cliffs are just being emptied.”
This unusual urban invasion may be a last chance for the region’s kittiwakes, whose numbers along the coast of Norway have plunged by three-quarters since the 1980s, says Tone Kristin Reiertsen, a seabird ecologist with the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research in Tromsø.
Taking a cue from the hotel construction around Tromsø, Reiertsen and a group of colleagues have hatched a plan to help save these iconic Arctic seabirds. They’re building boutique hotels just for kittiwakes, so the birds can raise their families in town without being a nuisance to people.
New York public authorities and agencies have passed legislation as part of the FY 2020-2021 state budget to speed up the siting and construction of clean energy projects to combat climate change and help the state’s economic recovery from the COVID-19 health crisis.
The Accelerated Renewable Energy Growth and Community Benefit Act will create a first in the nation Office of Renewable Energy Siting to improve and streamline the process for environmentally responsible and cost-effective siting of large-scale renewable energy projects across New York while delivering significant benefits to local communities.
The act, which will be implemented by the New York State Department of State, New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, Department of Public Service, Department of Environmental Conservation, New York Power Authority and the Empire State Development Corp., will accelerate progress towards Governor Cuomo’s clean energy and climate goals – including the mandate to obtain 70% of the state’s electricity from renewable sources.
“While Governor Cuomo and New York work tirelessly to defeat COVID-19, we must continue to move forward and confront our climate crisis in order to protect New Yorkers from the dangerous consequences of a changing climate,” says Alicia Barton, president and CEO of NYSERDA.
“This new law will support a rapid transition to clean renewable energy sources and ensure that our enormous pipeline of large-scale renewable energy projects can be responsibly permitted, bolster the state’s economy and deliver health, environmental and economic benefits to all New Yorkers,” she adds.
This legislation developed and passed with significant stakeholder and community advocate support underscores the state’s commitment to efficiently develop renewable energy. By creating a new siting process specifically designed for renewable energy facilities, the act will accelerate new private investment and job growth in the green economy at a time New Yorkers need it most.
New York’s existing energy generation siting process was designed for siting fossil-fuel electric generating plants and was established prior to the adoption of New York’s clean energy and environmental mandates under its new climate law. As the state seeks solutions to getting the economy back on track after overcoming the COVID-19 crisis, restarting renewable energy construction will play a central role in the green economy.
The new siting process will establish uniform environmental standards and conditions that will support expedited project development, bringing new jobs while combating climate change.
For more information about New York’s Accelerated Renewable Energy Growth and Community Benefit Act, click here.
John Maldjian, 54, of Rumson, was charged Sunday with reckless endangerment, disorderly conduct and violating NJ Gov. Murphy’s coronavirus order prohibiting public gatherings
John Maldjian, 54, of Rumson, was charged Sunday with reckless endangerment, disorderly conduct and violating Gov. Murphy’s executive order. (Shutterstock)
RUMSON, NJ — The New Jersey Attorney General identified the Rumson man who police say hosted a gathering of about 30 people Saturday evening at his Blackpoint Road home, to listen to a live performance of Pink Floyd hits — at the height of the coronavirus epidemic, and when healthy adults are being urged to social distance and avoid large gatherings.
John Maldjian, 54, of Rumson, was charged Sunday by Rumson police with reckless endangerment, disorderly conduct and two separate charges related to violating Gov. Murphy’s emergency orders not to have social gatherings. All the charges are disorderly persons offenses. He has also been charged with violating two Rumson borough ordinances.
And that’s not all: Charges for certain members to who attended the party are forthcoming, warned the Attorney General. Several audience members were disorderly and refused to disperse when asked, said Rumson police.
As Patch initially reported, Rumson police say that at approximately 8:19 p.m. Saturday evening, April 3, they were called to Maldjian’s home for a report of a large party with a band. Police say when they arrived, they discovered the homeowner, Maldjian, together with another man, playing acoustic guitars on the front porch of the home.
There were approximately 30 people, between the ages of 40 and 50, gathered on Maldjian’s front lawn and the adjoining street watching the performance, said police. Some had lawn chairs and alcoholic beverages.Subscribe
The concert, with two guitarists with microphones and amplifiers, also was being broadcast live on Facebook, police said.
“Despite the fact that police were on scene with flashing lights attempting to disperse the crowd, the band continued playing,” said the AG’s office in a statement. “It was not until a Rumson officer directly approached Maldjian that he stopped singing and playing. Maldjian then told his Facebook Live audience (he was streaming his performance) that he had to stop playing.”
