Stylist goes to jail over haircut

A bad haircut — and a wounded ear — led to a Wisconsin hairstylist's arrest, authorities said.
Khaled A. Shabani, 46, was arrested after he snipped a 22-year-old customer’s ear, Madison police said.
Police spokesman Joel DeSpain said officers arrested Shabani on suspicion of mayhem and disorderly conduct while armed.
DeSpain said the victim told officers the hairstylist told him to stop fidgeting and moving his head before nicking his ear Friday.
According to The Wisconsin State Journal, DeSpain said the hairstylist then ran the clipper with the shortest attachment down the middle of the customer’s head, “leaving him looking a bit like Larry from ‘The Three Stooges.’”
DeSpain said Shabani told officers it was an accident.

Cop blackmailing wife who wants to murder him

A Pennsylvania police officer has pleaded guilty to a plot to blackmail his wife over having sex with a 14-year-old boy while she has pleaded guilty to plotting to kill her husband.

Keith Transue, a Bushkill Township officer, pleaded guil ty last week to misdemeanor criminal coercion, and Robin Transue pleaded guilty to felony solicitation to commit aggravated assault and statutory sexual assault. The Mount Pocono residents, both 43, are scheduled for sentencing March 20.
Authorities in Monroe County said in court documents that Robin Transue told an informant her husband threatened to expose her 2010 relationship with the boy if she left him. Prosecutors say she suggested several ways to kill her husband, including a drug overdose or a hunting accident.
"Mrs. Transue freely talked about arranging for her husband's murder," District Attorney Michael Mancuso said. "All kinds of potential death scenarios were discussed."
Prosecutors said Keith Transue failed to report the abuse when he learned about it, as he was legally obligated to do as a police officer.
"Transue was using his wife's crime to keep her from leaving or divorcing him. This in turn was essentially the motive for Robin soliciting Keith's murder," Mancuso said.
The police department placed Keith Transue on leave after the charges were filed, and Police Chief Mike McLouth said Wednesday said the officer had submitted a resignation letter.
Mancuso praised an informant who came forward and cooperated with police, saying he "likely prevented a homicide and also brought to light a sordid history of sexual assault and criminal coercion."

Engagement ends in murder

A 27-year-old Florida man murdered his girlfriend on Tuesday before committing suicide with the same gun.
The crime reportedly shocked the man’s parents, who say he was in good spirits just 30 minutes before neighbors heard two gunshots.
PEOPLE confirms with the Riviera Beach Police that investigators believe that Richard Travis Timilty shot Holly Given, 26, inside the apartment they shared. Their bodies we re discovered Wednesday afternoon.
Neighbors reported hearing “two pops” at around midnight on Tuesday evening.
According to police, there are no recorded of domestic abuse calls from the couple. Their investigation into the deadly incident remains ongoing.
A motive for the violence remains unknown.
The Palm Beach Postspoke to Timilty’s parents; PEOPLE was unable to track them down Friday.
Timilty’s parents said he referred to Given as “the one” and told them he was planning on proposing to her.
His parents also said Timilty was recently promoted, becoming a fishing boat captain.
They said that when they picked him up from a restaurant where he’d gone to meet up with friends, he appeared to be in good spirits.
“He was smiling,” Martinez told the paper. “He was happy.”
Given was a waitress, according to multiple media outlets.
She announced her relationship with Timilty on her Facebook on Oct. 20.
Court records confirm that Timilty filed for divorce from another woman on that very same day.
His divorce, from a woman he was married to for less than a year, was finalized on Nov. 29, PEOPLE confirms through online court records.
The day after his marriage ended, Timilty shared a picture of himself and Given on Instagram, calling her “my love.”

4 found dead in 1 house

Four people found slain inside a basement apartment the day after Christmas have been identified as two children, their mother and a second woman, authorities said Wednesday.
The victims were a 36-year-old woman, her 5-year-old daughter, her 11-year-old son and a 22-year-old woman who had a relationship with the mother, Troy police Chief John Tedesco said.
A property manager found the bodies Tuesday after being asked to check on the welfare of the residents of the apartment, one of five in a house located in the city's Lansingburgh section along the Hudson River just north of Albany, police said.
The slayings weren't a random act, Tedesco said during a news conference at City Hall. He called the killings the worst he has seen in 42 years in law enforcement but didn't provide details.
"I don't think there's any doubt that a person who committed this crime is capable of anything," Tedesco said, adding that police don't believe there was an imminent danger to the public.
The victims' names were being withheld pending notification of relatives, he said.
Police didn't know when the slayings occurred, but Tedesco said it was hoped autopsies being conducted Wednesday would provide investigators with clues. State police were involved in the investigation along with New York parole officials, Tedesco said.
"This will be a full-court press, if you will, until we bring someone to justice," he said, adding that police were seeking any information the public may have about the crime.
Investigators remained at the scene Wednesday. Police cars blocked vehicles from approaching the home, which is set amid older, restored houses, and yellow crime tape was stretched across the street, running along the river's east bank. Few people ventured out on the snow-covered sidewalks in temperatures in the teens.

Teen kills girlfriends parents after suspicious incident

A Virginia teen charged in the shooting deaths of his girlfriend’s parents mowed a swastika about 40 feet across into the grass of a community field, according to neighbors.
Penny Potter said Tuesday after the incident two months ago, residents of Reston talked to the 17-year-old’s parents instead of going to authorities.
“We live in a very safe neighborhood where kids can ride their bikes and not worry about anything,” Potter told the newspaper. “For the first time, I was fearful that there was someone living in our neighborhood who was capable of incredibly irrational behavior.”
Potter said the parents admitted that their son mowed the Nazi symbol into the grass and that they were planning on getting treatment for him.
“They were going to take care of it,” she said. “They were aware of it.”
The unidentified teen allegedly killed Scott Fricker, 48, and Buckley Kuhn-Fricker, 43, of Reston, after the couple tried to get their teenage daughter to end a relationship with the youth over neo-Nazi views.
Police said the teen fatally shot his girlfriend’s parents after they caught him in their 16-year-old daughter’s bedroom around 5 a.m. Friday and tried to get him to leave.
The boy then shot himself in the head, but survived, police said. He remains unidentified because of his age.
The police reportedly haven’t discovered a motive but family members and friends blamed it on “the couple’s struggle to keep hate out of their home,” The Post reported, citing family members.
Family and friends say the couple found a Twitter account they believed to be linked to the youth. Friends say the account retweeted posts praising Hitler and making derogatory comments about Jews.
The teen was charged with two counts of murder and, as of Tuesday, was still hospitalized in critical condition.

Man mistakes woman for deer and shots are fired

Wednesday was a typical afternoon, but an exciting one — Thanksgiving was the next day, and Jamie Billquist and his wife, Rosemary, would partake in one of their favorite traditions: the Turkey Trot.
Rosemary Billquist, 43, got home from work about 5 p.m., and left shortly after to walk the couple’s dogs, Stella and Sugar, near the field behind their Sherman, N.Y., house. Jamie Billquist, 47, stayed at home, watching television.
A little while later, the dogs came racing to the back of the house, barking loudly. Billquist panicked. He tried calling Rosemary’s cellphone but she didn’t pick up.
“I thought, ‘Something might’ve happened to Rosemary,’ ” he said. “Maybe she fell.”
As he put his phone down, ambulances showed up outside the house. An EMT who is a friend of Billquist’s rushed to the field, saying someone had been shot.
Moments later, Billquist learned that it was his wife.
A neighbor, Thomas B. Jadlowski, thought he saw a deer in his back yard 200 yards away and fired a single shot. Then he heard a scream. Realizing he’d shot a person, he ran out to help, said Chautauqua County Sheriff’s Office officials in a news release.
Jadlowski, 34, called 911 and applied pressure to Rosemary Billquist’s wound until paramedics arrived, according to the sheriff’s office. The bullet had traveled through her hip and out her back, Billquist said. Billquist rode with his wife to UPMC Hamot in Erie, Pa., where she was pronounced dead.
“That’s it,” Billquist said with a heavy sigh. “My life has changed. Things are never gonna be the same.”
Jadlowski has not been charged and has been cooperating with investigators, officials said. The case will be reviewed by the Chautauqua County District Attorney’s Office, which will determine whether Jadlowski will face criminal charges. Officials said the shooting occurred less than an hour after sunset, when it’s illegal to hunt.
Sheriff Joe Gerace said that Jadlowski used a single-shot handgun permissible for deer hunting.
Dale Dunkelberger, master instructor for firearms for the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s hunter education program, that shooting after hours and not identifying a target correctly is dangerous.
“Hunters have to understand there are other people using trails, using parks in areas where we as sportsmen hunt,” said Dunkelberger, who called Sherman his old hunting “stomping ground.”
“In this case, it appears from what I gathered this was after sunset, and he shouldn’t have been out there hunting after sunset. You’re done. That’s the law.”
Jadlowski could not be immediately reached for comment.
Jamie Billquist still has many questions about the shooting.
“I’m not a hunter but the law is that (after sunset) is when you’re supposed to be done,” Billquist said. “Supposedly it was 200 yards away. He thought it was a deer, which is hard for me to believe. If you don’t know what it is, why shoot?”
Now, Billquist is unsure how to move on without his wife. The holidays were always a celebratory time for them, as their birthdays were both in January, right after Christmas. They’d been together for 27 years, ever since they met at the Chautauqua Mall in Lakewood, N.Y., in 1990.
“I thought she was a beautiful person, something drew me to her,” Billquist said of that day with a laugh. “We’ve been together ever since . . . we decided years ago we didn’t want kids. Just free spirits, I guess. Kind of enjoying life and having fun.”
The couple moved to Sherman in 2002, as Rosemary Billquist wanted to return to the town where she grew up. They rebuilt her family’s house on Armenian Road, which was significant to Rosemary Billquist, who had Armenian roots.
She was an avid runner who competed in marathons and triathlons. The Billquists had planned to run in the YMCA Buffalo Niagara Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning.
That morning, Jamie Billquist opened up Facebook, which sent him a reminder of the photos he took with his wife at last year’s event. He wore a pointy Santa hat; she wore a giant grin.
Instead, Billquist spent Thanksgiving planning his wife’s services, wondering how to best commemorate her.
“We always had fun. Just together, or with the dogs. There were so many thousands and thousands of fun stories,” he said.
Like the time Rosemary Billquist went out on her lunch break while working at WCA Hospital in Jamestown, N.Y., and saw a man struggling to stand in the hospital parking lot as he waited for a ride. So she decided to install a bench in front of the hospital. She etched a quote onto it: “In a world where you can be anything . . . be kind.”
Billquist remembers hauling the bench into their car and planting it in front of the hospital. He was in his work clothes and she wore a dress, he said.
He remembers her coming home from work some days, exclaiming, “Three more people sat on that bench!”
“She was a private person. She did things from the heart. She didn’t want people saying ‘Oh, good job,’ that just wasn’t like her,” he said.
Now, the bench is covered with tea lights and flowers.
Dozens of friends and family gathered for a vigil Thursday, singing and praying. Billquist posted a video on Facebook, and wrote that the vigil “took his breath away.”
“She touched a lot of lives, she did,” he said, recalling how his wife would go out of her way to say hello to people at the hospital, “just to brighten up their day for a second.”
“She was definitely an angel. That’s for sure.”

Cop who shot 17 times at stolen car full of teens faces sentencing

The former Chicago police officer who fired several shots into a stolen car full of teenagers four years ago has been sentenced to five years in prison.

U.S. District Court Judge Gary Feinerman on Monday said while Marco Proano m ay have been wearing a police uniform at the time of the shooting, he was the one bringing the chaos and violence.
Proano fired 16 shots at the car carrying six African-Americans in December 2013, authorities said. Two were wounded as the car sped away from him. The shooting was caught on video and became the centerpiece at Proano's trial.
His defense attorney painted Proano as a victim of growing anti-police sentiment and asked for supervised release. Proano told the judge he didn't set out that night to hurt anyone.
In August, jurors found Proano guilty of two civil-rights violations. Prosecutors maintained Proano used unreasonable force.
The 42-year-old former officer is expected to report for federal prison in January. He has a wife and three children.