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  • Top prosecutors in D.C., Minneapolis leave amid turmoil over shooting probe

    Top prosecutors in D.C., Minneapolis leave amid turmoil over shooting probe

    Multiple senior prosecutors in Washington and Minnesota are leaving their jobs amid turmoil over the Trump administration’s handling of the shooting death of a Minneapolis woman.

    The departures include at least five prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minneapolis, including the office’s second-in-command, according to emails obtained by The Washington Post and people familiar with the matter.

    Their resignations followed demands by Justice Department leaders to investigate the widow of Renée Good, the 37-year-old woman killed last week by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who shot into her car, according to a person familiar with the resignations who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of concern for retaliation. Good’s wife was protesting ICE officers in the moments before the shooting.

    Five senior prosecutors in the criminal section of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division also said they are leaving, according to four people familiar with the personnel moves, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters.

    In another development, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement that “there is currently no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation.” The statement, first reported by CNN, did not elaborate on how the department had reached a conclusion that no investigation was warranted.

    Federal officials have said that the officer acted in self-defense and that the driver of the Honda was engaging in “an act of domestic terrorism” when she pulled forward toward him.

    The departures wipe both the Civil Rights Division’s criminal section and U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minnesota of its most experienced prosecutors. The moves are widely seen as a major vote of no-confidence by career prosecutors at a moment when the department is under extreme scrutiny.

    The criminal section of the Civil Rights Division is the sole office that handles criminal violations of the nation’s civil rights laws. For years, the Justice Department has relied on the section to prosecute major cases of alleged police brutality and hate crimes. The departures followed the administration’s highly unusual decision to not include the Civil Rights Division in the initial investigation of the shooting.

    The Civil Rights Division departures include the criminal section’s longtime chief and deputy — Jim Felte and Paige Fitzgerald — career attorneys who served in their positions during President Donald Trump’s first administration and through President Joe Biden’s administration. Three other supervisors and senior litigators are also leaving.

    The prosecutors in Minnesota did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Felte and Fitzgerald also did not immediately respond to requests for comment Monday evening.

    The Civil Rights prosecutors informed their colleagues of their resignations Monday. People familiar with the section, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters, said the lawyers who are leaving did not attribute their decisions to the Minnesota investigation.

    The department has been offering voluntary early retirement packages to certain sections, and some of the departing civil rights prosecutors qualified for that option. Some indicated to their colleagues before the Minnesota shooting that they were considering the retirement packages.

    “Although we typically don’t comment on personnel matters, we can confirm that the Criminal Section Leadership gave notice to depart the Civil Rights Division and requested to participate in the Department of Justice’s Early Retirement Program well before the events in Minnesota. Any suggestion to the contrary is false,” a Justice Department official said in a statement.

    Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche released a statement saying: “There is currently no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation” into the shooting.

    Trump’s appointees at the Justice Department pushed out and transferred many of the section heads and deputies in the Civil Rights Division in the early days of the administration. But the leadership of the criminal section was largely left intact.

    For months, however, frustration has been growing within the section, according to people familiar with the division who said that further resignations are likely. Many lawyers in the office have said they feel the administration has prevented prosecutors from doing their work. The administration has repeatedly reversed positions on cases that the section has spent years litigating.

    In July, for example, the Civil Rights Division told a judge that the Biden administration should not have prosecuted the Louisville police officer convicted in connection with a raid that resulted in Breonna Taylor’s death — and asked that the officer receive one day in jail. In November, the administration successfully pushed to dismiss a police brutality case in Tennessee, which was set to go to trial that month. The Civil Rights Division had been litigating that case for more than two years.

    Within the Justice Department, the Civil Rights Division typically experiences the sharpest swings in priorities between Republican and Democratic administrations. But several former officials interviewed by The Washington Post described the shifts implemented so far under the Trump administration as more intense than anticipated.

    In the first Trump administration, former Justice Department officials said, the division was largely left intact. The section did not pursue actions against police departments in the way that Democratic administrations had, but it prosecuted police brutality cases and continued to focus on prosecuting hate crimes, protecting disability rights and enforcing employment laws.

    During the current administration, the division has dramatically changed its mission. A majority of its nearly 400 attorneys left in 2025 as a result. The head of the Civil Rights Division, Harmeet Dhillon, changed mission statements across the sections to focus less on racial discrimination and more on fighting diversity initiatives. The division has also aggressively pursued cases alleging antisemitism and anti-Christian bias.

    After conservative activist Charlie Kirk was killed in September at a public event at Utah Valley University, the Civil Rights Division launched a hate-crime probe. The investigation is examining whether hate-crime charges can be pursued against the suspect because of anti-Christian bias, according to a person familiar with the probe.

    Prosecutors have also explored whether it would be possible to pursue hate-crime charges against the suspect, Tyler Robinson, if evidence shows motivation because of Kirk’s stance on transgender individuals — a move that would be a novel use of hate-crime laws. Robinson’s romantic partner was undergoing a gender transition at the time of the shooting, his mother told police.

    Dhillon has said she welcomes people to leave if they do not agree with the new direction for the department. Dhillon told conservative podcaster Glenn Beck in April that she intended to send a new message to her staff.

    “These are the president’s priorities,” Dhillon said on the podcast. “This is what we will be focusing on. Govern yourself accordingly.”

    MS NOW reported the civil rights resignations late Monday night.

    Dhillon has also said that her office is being flooded with applicants to fill vacant roles. But people familiar with the division said that just a fraction of the open roles have been filled, a process impeded by a lack of qualified candidates and bureaucratic delays. Some of the sections within the division are so understaffed that they cannot effectively complete their workloads.

    “This exodus is a huge blow signaling the disrespect and sidelining of the finest and most experienced civil rights prosecutors,” said Vanita Gupta, the head of the division during the Obama administration and the associate attorney general during the Biden administration. “It means cases won’t be brought, unique expertise will be lost, and the top career attorneys who may be a backstop to some of the worst impulses of this administration will have left.”

    The Civil Rights Division was established in 1957 as part of that year’s Civil Rights Act, which focused on fighting racial discrimination. Since its launch, the division has been tasked with upholding “the civil and constitutional rights of all people in the United States, particularly some of the most vulnerable members of our society,” according to the Justice Department’s website.

    The office has 12 sections that aim to combat discrimination in educational opportunities, housing, employment, voting and more.

    A Justice Department official also said that ICE has been conducting its own investigation of the Minnesota shooting.

    “As with any officer-involved shooting, each law enforcement agency has an internal investigation protocol, including DHS. As such, ICE OPR has its own investigation underway. This runs parallel to any FBI investigation,” the official said, referring to the Office of Professional Responsibility.

    This article includes information from the Associated Press.

  • The fatal shooting of a 16-year-old inside Chipotle bathroom may have been unintentional, sources say

    The fatal shooting of a 16-year-old inside Chipotle bathroom may have been unintentional, sources say

    A 16-year-old was found shot to death inside the bathroom of a Chipotle near Temple University’s campus Monday night in what investigators believe may have been an unintentional shooting, according to police and a law enforcement source.

    Khyon Smith-Tate and three of his friends were inside the Chipotle on the ground floor of The View at Montgomery apartments at 12th Street and Montgomery Avenue around 5 p.m. Monday, police said. Smith-Tate and one friend went into one bathroom, while the two other teens went into the second bathroom, said Deputy Commissioner Frank Vanore.

    According to surveillance video, the teen with Smith-Tate left the restroom alone a short time later, and then walked out of the restaurant with the other teens, Vanore said.

    About 15 minutes later, a restaurant employee found Smith-Tate suffering from a gunshot wound to the chest, he said. Police and medics responded, and pronounced him dead at the scene, officials said.

    No gun was recovered, though officers found one spent shell casing from a 9mm handgun in the trash can, Vanore said.

    Smith-Tate was a student at Imhotep Institute Charter High School. His mother, overwhelmed with grief, declined to speak Monday at her North Philadelphia home.

    In a written statement, school officials described Smith-Tate as “caring, energetic, filled with school pride and comical.”

    “He was filled with light and love,” the statement, signed by Imhotep Chief Executive Officer Andre Noble and Principal Jury Segers, said. “We will always remember his smile.”

    Police have identified the three teens involved, Vanore said, and are poring over cell phone data and interviewing witnesses to try to learn what happened inside the bathroom.

    A law enforcement source with knowledge of the investigation said detectives are looking into whether the teens may have been filming a social media video or playing with a gun when it fired and unintentionally struck Smith-Tate.

    The source, who asked not to be identified to discuss an ongoing investigation, said the teens are all close friends. Still, they did not call for help, the source said, and left him to die on the bathroom floor.

    “As one can imagine, we are struggling today,” Noble and Segers said. Our collective hearts are hurting. But this community is resilient.”

    District Attorney Larry Krasner said that trauma-care professionals and victim advocates from his office visited the school on Tuesday to lead “multiple grief trauma healing circles” for students and staff.

    “The trauma and grief our young people experience as a result of shootings is unacceptable,” he said. “We will not accept this as normal for our kids and babies.”

    Smith-Tate is the first child under 18 to be shot and killed in Philadelphia this year, and his death comes after homicides in the city reached near-historic lows last year.

    If it is confirmed that the shooting was unintentional, Smith-Tate would be the latest in a growing list of children shot by a mishandled gun in Philadelphia.

    A shattered family, a traumatic past: Judge sentences grandmother in accidental shooting of 2-year-old girl

    Dozens of kids have been wounded in accidental shootings in recent years, often the result of other children finding unsecured guns in their homes. Just last month, a 14-year-old was seriously wounded when another teen playing with a gun shot him in the stomach, police said.

    Last year, 12-year-old Ethan Parker was shot and killed after police said his 17-year-old neighbor was playing with a gun while recording a song and accidentally fired it. Other victims have been even younger: like 3-year-old Kayden Barnes, who police said shot herself with her father’s gun in 2024, and 2-year-old Diora Porter-Brown, who was fatally shot by a cousin with an intellectual disability who found his grandmother’s firearm in 2023.

  • ‘He snapped’: Lawyers offer differing accounts of fatal stabbing of Bucks woman

    ‘He snapped’: Lawyers offer differing accounts of fatal stabbing of Bucks woman

    The trial of a 25-year-old Bucks County man charged with stabbing his former girlfriend to death in front of a police officer last year began Tuesday with differing accounts from lawyers about what happened on that February day.

    Prosecutors say Trevor Christopher Weigel, of Churchville, broke into the Yardley home of 19-year-old Jaden Battista in February 2024 with the goal of stabbing the young woman to death.

    The couple had broken up months before, prosecutors said, and Weigel became enraged after learning that Battista had blocked his phone number.

    In all, prosecutors say Weigel stabbed Battista 13 times throughout her upper body, leaving her bleeding outside the home just as police arrived.

    “If he couldn’t have her, nobody was going to have her — and he made sure of it,” Assistant District Attorney A.J. Garabedian told jurors Tuesday in a Bucks County courtroom.

    Garabedian said prosecutors have a variety of evidence showing Weigel broke into the house, where Battista was on a FaceTime call with her friend at the time. The friend called 911, spurring Lower Makefield police to respond while Weigel led Battista to his car, prosecutors said. With the passenger door open, prosecutors said, Weigel began chasing Battista and stabbed her repeatedly.

    A police officer captured Battista’s final breaths on a body-worn camera, they said.

    Meanwhile, Weigel ran away, and another officer chased him on foot to the nearby Interstate 295 freeway as the young man repeatedly stabbed himself in the neck. Police used a Taser to subdue and apprehend him.

    Prosecutors later charged Weigel with first-degree murder, burglary, attempted kidnapping, and related crimes.

    Weigel’s defense lawyers, meanwhile, disputed the prosecution contention that the couple had split. Lead defense attorney Brian McBeth told jurors Weigel had not left his house that morning planning to kill Battista. Rather, he said, Weigel had acted in response to the “soul-crushing” realization that the young woman had cheated on him.

    McBeth said that did not excuse Weigel’s actions. But he urged jurors to question prosecutors’ suggestion that the crime was premeditated and consider whether Weigel had committed involuntary manslaughter, a lesser crime that does not carry the same penalties as first-degree murder.

    In prosecutors’ telling, Weigel had left his job at a Warminster manufacturing plant that afternoon with a clear intent to kill.

    They said Battista, still on a video call with her friend when Weigel arrived, became distressed as he banged on the door and demanded to be let inside. The friend told Battista to run and hide, prosecutors said.

    Weigel lied to Battista, prosecutors continued, telling her he wanted to come inside to collect belongings he had left there after their two-month relationship ended late in 2023.

    Once inside, Weigel forcefully led Battista outside to his red Ford Mustang, prosecutors said. Garabedian told jurors they would hear from a neighbor who described Battista as barefoot and not wearing clothing suited for winter.

    “She’s not going willingly,” Garabedian said.

    Defense attorneys strongly disputed that account.

    McBeth said Weigel and Battista had gotten back together in early February, even going out to dinner together on Valentine’s Day.

    Over the following days, however, Battista stopped responding to Weigel’s calls and texts in which he asked whether she was OK, McBeth said.

    McBeth said Weigel left work early because he was worried about Battista, who he said had previously struggled with depression and self-harm. The young woman let Weigel inside the home willingly, he said, and an argument began when Weigel noticed hickeys on the girl’s neck.

    “She told him she cheated, and he snapped,” McBeth said.

    Proceedings are set to continue in the courtroom of Bucks County Judge Charissa J. Liller over the next week.

  • A historic Black church was vandalized with racist graffiti over the weekend

    A historic Black church was vandalized with racist graffiti over the weekend

    Union Trinity AME Church, one of Philadelphia’s historic Black religious institutions and known as “The Friendly Church,” was vandalized with racist graffiti over the weekend.

    Pastor Tianda Smart-Heath was informed of the vandalism shortly after Sunday service, where she found racist slogans invoking the name of God and enslaved people sprayed onto the exterior walls of the more than 200-year-old church, according to the Philadelphia Police Department.

    The newly merged church, Union Trinity AME in North Philadelphia, hasn’t welcomed congregants inside the historic building since 2020, and it is currently under construction, according to Fox 29. In that time, church service has been held at the Beckett Life Center next door.

    Smart-Heath told local media that the church has been vandalized before, including trespassing and theft, but never with racist hate speech. Police responded to the vandalism on Sunday to photograph the scene and conduct a follow-up investigation. The case is overseen by PPD Central Detectives.

    A police officer photographs damaged stained glass at Mother Bethel AME Church on Feb. 20, 2024.

    African Methodist Episcopal (AME) churches are part of a vast network of independent Black Christian churches that was started in Philadelphia two centuries ago, when Richard Allen founded Mother Bethel AME in 1787.

    In a separate incident, which was not a hate crime, a vandal broke three windows at Mother Bethel AME almost two years ago, including precious stained-glass windows. More than 400 donors stepped in to fund repairs.

    The vandalism at Union Trinity AME closely follows a separate hate crime at Roxborough High School, where a masked vandal spray-painted racist and antisemitic epithets across the school building. Police have released a description and video of the suspect in the hate crime.

    A screenshot of a surveillance video captures the suspect in a recent vandalism incident, where an unknown white male painted racist and antisemitic slogans on the exterior walls of Roxborough High School on Jan. 4, 2026. Police describe the suspect as a white male, wearing an orange scarf/wrap, green and black winter hat, gray hooded jacket, gray pants, and a gray and black backpack.

    Hate crimes have more than tripled in Pennsylvania since 2020, according to the most recent “No Hate in Our State” report from the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission (PHRC). The most prevalent form of hate crime in Pennsylvania, according to FBI reports, is anti-Black or anti-African American hate crimes, accounting for more than one out of every four hate crimes committed in the state in the last five years.

    “Any attack on the Black Church as one of the historical foundations of the African American community needs to be condemned and looked at through the lens of a potential hate crime,” said PHRC executive director Chad Dion Lassiter. “We can no longer be silent in this moment of outward hatred and rage toward any institution of faith.”

  • Boy, 16, fatally shot inside Chipotle bathroom near Temple University

    Boy, 16, fatally shot inside Chipotle bathroom near Temple University

    A 16-year-old boy died Monday evening after he was found with a gunshot wound inside a Chipotle restaurant bathroom in an off-campus residential building used by Temple University students.

    Around 5:15 p.m., police responded to a report of a shooting victim inside the Chipotle on the ground floor of the The View at Montgomery apartments on Montgomery Avenue at 12th Street.

    The victim, who was shot in the chest, was found in the bathroom by an employee, police said. The teen was pronounced dead at the scene at 5:24 p.m.

    Police on Tuesday identified the teen as Khyon Smith-Tate, of the city’s Hartranft section.

    Chief Inspector Scott Small said the teen was in the bathroom with at least one other juvenile when he was shot. Police found one spent shell casing inside the bathroom, Small said.

    “The place was very crowded with customers as well as employees,” but music was being played loudly so it was unclear if anyone heard the gunshot, Small said.

    A possible suspect wearing all dark clothing and a backpack was seen on surveillance video fleeing the restaurant, Small said.

    A person of interest was detained a few blocks away, Small said. No arrests were reported.

    Temple University officials issued a statement notifying the university community about the shooting.

    “The loss of life to gun violence is a profound tragedy and there are no words that can make sense of it. Our thoughts are with the victim’s family and loved ones,” John Fry, the university’s president, and Jennifer Griffin, vice president for public safety and chief of police, said in a joint statement.

  • Her youngest son was killed in a mass shooting. Now, her eldest is charged with committing one.

    Her youngest son was killed in a mass shooting. Now, her eldest is charged with committing one.

    Two mass shootings, just years apart, forever altered Nyshyia Thomas’ life.

    In July 2023, her 15-year-old son, DaJuan Brown, was shot and killed when a mentally ill man dressed in body armor gunned down five people at random on the streets of Kingsessing.

    Then, two years later, almost to the day, police say Thomas’ son, Daquan Brown, was one of at least 15 people who fired guns aimlessly down the 1500 block of Etting Street, leaving three dead and 10 others wounded.

    It’s a symmetry almost too painful for the mother to reconcile: one son killed in a mass shooting, another behind bars, charged with committing one.

    Last month, Thomas, 37, sat inside the Philadelphia courthouse and faced the man who killed her youngest son and set in motion the crumbling of her family.

    From left to right: Daquan Brown, Nyshyia Thomas, Tyejuan Brown, and Nesiyah Thomas-Brown, at the funeral for 15-year-old DaJuan Brown in July 2023.

    This week, she will return, but to sit on the other side of the room — to see her eldest son in shackles, seated behind plexiglass, charged with three counts of murder, nine counts of attempted murder, and causing a catastrophe and riot.

    She said her 21-year-old son feared for his life when he fired his legally owned gun twice down Etting Street the night of July 7, and that prosecutors have charged him with killings he didn’t commit.

    But she also feels for the families of the victims — one of them her son’s close friend — and imagines that, if she were in their shoes, she would want everyone who fired a gun to face consequences.

    “From being on both sides of this, it’s overwhelming, it’s unfair,” she said. “But I understand.”

    Nyshyia Thomas (right) with Tyejuan Brown and Nesiyah Thomas-Brown inside their South Philadelphia home.

    The July 7 party on Etting Street was one of two on the block that weekend celebrating the July Fourth holiday and the lives of some young men from the neighborhood who had been killed in recent years. Daquan Brown grew up about a block away and went to see childhood friends, his mother said.

    Shortly after 1 a.m., police said, gunfire erupted. Officers responded to find that more than 120 bullets had been fired down the street in nearly all directions, striking neighbors’ homes and cars — and 13 partygoers.

    Three men died. Zahir Wylie, 23, was struck in the chest, and Jason Reese, 19, was shot in the head. Azir Harris, 27, who used a wheelchair after being paralyzed in an earlier shooting, was struck in the back.

    Initially, police thought someone had shot up the party in a targeted attack. But after reviewing video footage, interviewing witnesses, and analyzing ballistics, detectives now believe the partygoers may have unintentionally shot each other.

    Police investigate a mass shooting on the 1500 block of South Etting Street on July 7, 2025.

    After people heard what they thought was the sound of gunfire — someone at the gathering may have shot once into the air or a car passing by may have backfired — at least 15 people pulled out their weapons and sprayed dozens of shots down the block, police said.

    Brown, police said, was among them. As gunfire erupted, he took cover between cars and fired two shots down the block, according to two law enforcement sources who asked not to be named to discuss an ongoing investigation.

    Investigators don’t know whether any of the shots Brown fired struck or killed anyone, the sources said. A full ballistics report is still pending, though it may never be able to determine whose bullets struck each victim.

    Four other men have also been charged with murder and related crimes.

    Thomas has tried to come to terms with the police narrative. She is adamant that her son, having fired only two shots, shouldn’t be charged with three counts of murder and 10 counts of attempted murder. He feared for his life and acted in self-defense, she said.

    At the same time, she said, had it been her son who was shot and killed that night, she would not want to hear from anyone trying to make sense of it.

    Tyejuan Brown and a family member hold Nyshyia Thomas at the funeral of their son, DaJuan Brown, on July 15, 2023. DaJuan’s brother, Daquan, stands to right of Tyejuan.

    Still, she finds herself doing that. Brown, who worked as a security guard and has no criminal record, only started carrying the 9mm handgun because of what happened to his brother, she said.

    She remembered talking to him before he bought the weapon last year.

    “Mom, I lost my brother,” Thomas said he told her. “Y’all not burying me.”

    “I kissed him,” she said. “I told him I respect it.”

    Brown’s father, Tyejuan, is also jailed with him.

    On the night of July 7, she and Tyejuan, the father of her three children, were talking on the porch of her home when they heard dozens of gunshots coming from Etting Street. Tyejuan Brown, she said, took off running toward the party where his son was gathered.

    When Thomas reached the block, she said, she found Tyejuan and Daquan covered in blood from carrying bodies to police cruisers.

    But police said that when they reviewed surveillance footage from that night, they saw Tyejuan Brown rushing down the street holding a gun, which he is barred from owning because of drug, gun, and assault convictions.

    He was arrested in early August and charged with illegal gun possession.

    Nyshyia Thomas holds Tyejuan Brown during an interview in 2023 about the loss of their youngest son, DaJuan.

    Four days later, they came for his son.

    Until recently, Daquan Brown and his father were housed in the same block at Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility and would speak to each other through a shared cell wall.

    Brown is held without bail. Thomas said her family has gathered the $25,000 necessary for the father’s bail, but he has told them not to post it.

    “I’m not coming out without my son,” Thomas said he told her.

    On the outside, Thomas and her 15-year-old daughter, Nesiyah, are left to grapple with the absence of the three men in their lives they love most.

    “I lost one son to gun violence,” Thomas said. “I’ll be damned if I let the system take my other one from me.”

    Nyshyia Thomas hugs a photo of her son, DaJuan Brown, on what would have been his 18th birthday in September. Brown was shot and killed in a random mass shooting in July 2023.
  • An owner of Santucci’s Original Square Pizza was ordered to serve one day in jail for tax evasion

    An owner of Santucci’s Original Square Pizza was ordered to serve one day in jail for tax evasion

    One of the family leaders of the Santucci’s Original Square Pizza empire was sentenced Monday to one day in jail and 18 months of supervised release for significantly understating the business’ earnings over the course of several years, causing him and other company officials to underpay taxes by nearly $1.4 million.

    Frank Santucci Sr., 67, who had taken over the family business from his parents nearly 50 years ago, said he was “embarrassed” and “deeply sorry” for his actions, which federal prosecutors described as a long-running cash skimming operation. He pleaded guilty last year to charges of tax evasion and filing false tax returns.

    “I spent my life trying to be an honest man,” Santucci said Monday during his sentencing hearing in federal court, “and knowing I fell short of those values is something I deeply regret.”

    Prosecutors said in court documents that Santucci was a company patriarch who had “informal bookkeeping responsibilities” at the family’s pizza shops in South Philadelphia, Roxborough, and on North Broad Street. The restaurants are well-known for offering square, thick-crust pies with layers of sauce and toppings piled on top of cheese.

    Although the business had for years employed a cash-only policy, prosecutors said, Santucci began keeping two sets of books as the company began using an electronic point-of-sale system in 2017. One of the sets of records included details for issues like payroll and expenses, which Santucci showed to his tax accountants, prosecutors said, and the other — which Santucci concealed from his accountants — is where he deposited some of the restaurants’ cash earnings.

    As a result, prosecutors said, Santucci understated the shops’ earnings by about $5 million between 2015 and 2018. And that caused him to underpay his personal taxes by nearly $400,000, they said, while his co-owners underpaid theirs by about $700,000, and the business underpaid employment taxes by about $300,000.

    Santucci — who was the only person charged in the case — has already repaid his personal tax bill, said his attorney, Richard J. Fuschino Jr. And Fuschino said Santucci was a man whose life had otherwise been defined by his hard work at his namesake shops, and an unerring dedication to his family and community.

    “Mr Santucci is, on the whole of it, as good as [people] get,” Fuschino said.

    Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Murray did not disagree that Santucci supported his family, and said it was notable that he had accepted responsibility for his crimes. But he said Santucci nonetheless engaged in a long-running scheme that deprived the IRS of revenue and, by extension, allowed Santucci’s business and relatives to keep more money than they were entitled to.

    U.S. District Judge Karen S. Marston did not discount the seriousness of the crimes, but said Santucci’s age, health concerns — he suffered two strokes in recent years — and his role as a grandfather who is actively involved in caring for his young grandchildren all factored into her sentencing decision. She said his day in custody would be Monday and also ordered him to perform 300 hours of community service.

    “I do believe that Mr. Santucci has shown the remorse that’s necessary in this particular case,” she said.

    The Santucci’s pizzerias and their many franchise locations remain in operation and were not impacted by the case, Fuschino said.

  • Drive-by shooting in Northeast Philadelphia leaves one dead, another injured, police say

    Drive-by shooting in Northeast Philadelphia leaves one dead, another injured, police say

    A man was killed and a woman was injured Sunday night after two shooters fired into a tow truck parked in Northeast Philadelphia, police said.

    The man, 25-year-old Aaron Whitfield, died at the scene of the shooting on the 2100 block of Knorr Street, police said. A 21-year-old woman struck in the leg by a bullet survived.

    According to police, Whitfield, who works as a tow-truck driver, and the woman were inside the vehicle when the shooters drove up to the truck’s passenger side and opened fire at 7:52 p.m.

    Officers who responded to a report of gunshots found Whitfield inside the tow truck. He’d been shot multiple times in his head and body, police said, and attempts by medics to resuscitate him failed.

    The woman, whose name was not released by police, was transported to Jefferson Einstein Philadelphia Hospital. Police said that she was stable.

    Investigators collected 17 bullet casings at the scene, police said. Bullets also struck nearby buildings, but no one else was injured, police said.

    No arrests had been made in the shooting as of midday Monday. Police said a motive for the killing has not yet been determined, and it’s unknown whether either Whitfield or the woman were intentionally targeted.

  • A man was charged with stealing skulls and bones from a Philly cemetery. Police say he may have tried to sell them on Instagram.

    A man was charged with stealing skulls and bones from a Philly cemetery. Police say he may have tried to sell them on Instagram.

    Documents released Friday offer new detail on how investigators assembled their striking case against Jonathan Christian Gerlach, who authorities say desecrated dozens of graves to steal human remains.

    Gerlach, 34, who is charged with stealing more than 100 skulls, bones, and body parts from Mount Moriah Cemetery, also posted dozens of photos of human remains on social media, records show, and authorities are investigating whether he may have offered to sell them.

    The investigation into Gerlach, who lives in Ephrata, spans multiple counties and law enforcement agencies. The historic cemetery stretches across Philadelphia and Yeadon, Delaware County, where officials charged Gerlach on Thursday.

    Gerlach’s lawyer, Anna Hinchman, declined to comment Friday, citing the pending criminal case.

    In all, Gerlach faces more than 500 counts of burglary, criminal trespassing, abuse of a corpse, theft, and related crimes.

    “After 30 years, I can say this is probably the most horrific thing that I’ve seen,” said Yeadon Police Chief Henry Giammarco, whose department was involved in the investigation.

    A few Mausoleum’s that Jonathan Gerlach broke into at Mount Moriah Cemetery in Philadelphia.

    Grave sites damaged, remains stolen

    Detectives were first dispatched to the burial ground on Nov. 7, according to the affidavit of probable cause for Gerlach’s arrest. There, a board member of the Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery — the group that helps to maintain the burial ground — led the investigators to a mausoleum where a hole in protective cinder blocks revealed a damaged marble floor, 10 feet underground. A white rope, which detectives believe the thief used to rappel into the mausoleum, hung nearby.

    They discovered other disturbed burial sites, both that afternoon and weeks later, according to the affidavit: a crypt with its marble entrance stone ripped off, whatever was inside stolen; a damaged, empty casket inside a mausoleum; a clear plastic tarp covering human remains discarded on the ground of the cemetery.

    Investigators collected clues, including the rope, a “Monster” energy drink can, and a partially smoked Marlboro Menthol cigarette. Each will be sent for DNA testing, the affidavit said.

    On Dec. 23, the document shows, police received a tip pointing to Gerlach. “Look into Jonathan Gerlach,” the tipster said, according to the affidavit. “I know someone who’s friends with his family, and they mentioned that they recently discovered a partially decomposed corpse hanging in his basement, but were afraid to tell police.”

    The tipster also pointed investigators to Instagram. “You’ll see he follows accounts in taxidermy, skeleton collecting and sales,” the tipster said.

    Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse speaks to reporters on Thursday about Jonathan Gerlach, who is charged with burglary, abuse of corpse and desecration, and theft or sale of venerated objects for allegedly stealing from graves.

    An Instagram trail

    The last post on the Instagram account that Delaware County authorities have linked to Gerlach appeared on Tuesday, the day that detectives took him into custody, after they say they witnessed him carrying a burlap sack filled with human remains out of the cemetery.

    A partial skull — its surface darkened and pitted with age, mounted upright like an artifact — appears in the post. Staged against a floral backdrop, the photo is paired with a caption that reads: “if you know, you know. skulls/bones available. dm to inquire.”

    The post and dozens of others like it on the account suggest that Gerlach may have been part of a largely unregulated and little-known marketplace in which human bones and remains are bought and sold online and in specialty shops. It’s a trade that can be legal under certain circumstances in a number of states, including Pennsylvania, and one that records suggest Gerlach may have engaged with — though investigators have not confirmed he ever successfully made a sale.

    Authorities say the investigation is continuing.

    Gerlach is charged with crimes associated with how authorities say he acquired the bones: by breaking into the cemetery’s mausoleums and underground vaults and stealing the remains.

    Investigators tied Gerlach’s vehicle to license plate readers near Mount Moriah, they said, and his cell phone to the area. A search of his recent purchases revealed trips to a hardware store to buy items that matched those that detectives had also recovered at damaged grave sites, including a stake.

    When detectives executed a search warrant at Gerlach’s home, in the 100 block of Washington Avenue, they said they found skulls arranged on shelves, and a collection of other bones, skeletons and mummified body parts, including feet and hands. They also found a torso hanging from the ceiling, said Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse.

    Potential sales, and a call for change

    Rouse and Detective Christopher Karr said law enforcement officials are aware of social media accounts associated with Gerlach and are investigating what, if any, connection they may have to his alleged crimes.

    Rouse said accounts linked to Gerlach “certainly seemed to indicate” that Gerlach had attempted to sell the remains. “But whether that was real or not — whether a sale had ever been consummated — we can’t say for sure,” he said.

    The Instagram account, which dates back to 2023, includes images of human remains arranged on shelves and tables, or held in a man’s hands. Its posts raise questions about whether Gerlach’s alleged activity extended beyond what authorities have detailed so far.

    Investigators are working to determine when and where the images were taken and whether any of the items pictured were stolen from Mount Moriah, Rouse said.

    In addition to a curator and potential salesperson, the Instagram account presents Gerlach as a forensic practitioner and professional.

    In a recent post that pictured Gerlach holding a skull fragment beneath his heavily tattooed neck, the account’s operator wrote that he was completing a certification in forensic and osteological analysis, and planned to offer analysis through a planned company — describing services that would assess human remains using academic and forensic standards.

    Gerlach is being held in the Delaware County jail in lieu of $1 million bail.

    The investigation into Gerlach remains ongoing, Yeadon Borough Mayor Rohan Hepkins said Friday. Gerlach is suspected of burglarizing additional cemeteries, including in Ephrata, said Hepkins, who also sits on the board of the Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery and said he helped to bring the case to police.

    In a written statement, the Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery thanked law enforcement officials but declined to comment.

    Hepkins expressed dismay that the legal trade of human remains is even possible, and called for reform. “People never conceived that people would be stealing bones from graves and selling them in the market,” he said. “Politicians need to understand there is a type of individual out there — or a market out there — where legislation has to catch up with what’s happening out there.

    “It’s a bad situation but a lot of good, preventive maintenance could come out of it,” he added.

  • A New Jersey school resource officer charged for endangering a handcuffed child

    A New Jersey school resource officer charged for endangering a handcuffed child

    A New Jersey school resource officer has been charged with misconduct and child endangerment after an altercation with a juvenile in 2024, Gloucester County prosecutors said.

    Charles P. Rudolph, 51, of Franklinville, was indicted on second-degree official misconduct and second-degree endangering, abusing, or neglecting a child on Wednesday, according to the Gloucester County Prosecutor’s Office.

    Both counts carry a maximum sentence of 10 years in state prison.

    Prosecutors say that while employed as a school resource officer, on behalf of the Gloucester County Sheriff’s Office, Rudolph “forcefully pushed” a juvenile’s neck, face, and chest onto a table while the juvenile was handcuffed during an incident that occurred on Dec. 19, 2024.

    Officials did not release more information on the incident that led to the altercation between Rudolph and the juvenile, any identifying details about the child, or the school where Rudolph worked.

    The Gloucester County Sheriff’s Office declined to comment on the case.

    Rudolph’s lawyer could not be reached for comment.

    A court appearance is preliminarily scheduled for Feb. 5, according to prosecutors.