Yo, Philly in the News

• Philadelphia police netted 85 fugitives wanted on charges including aggravated assault, sexual offenses, robbery, stalking, and crimes with firearms. The sting operation was initiated by sending the wanted a letter from an official-sounding city commission stating that they were owed a refund for “unpaid government benefits and overpayments” in the amount of $1,412.16. When the recipients appeared to receive their checks they left in handcuffs.




• The suicide victim who took his life on Monday was identified as Zal Chapgar. Chapgar, a star athlete and 2003 graduate of Wissahickon High School, leapt from an upper floor of the Loews Philadelphia Hotel. He had been suffering from depression and mental illness for the last year, his family said. Since Chapgar was an adult their ability to help him find treatment he needed was limited.
• Donald Zampini pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter after a jury was picked for his murder trial Tuesday. Zampini admitted fatally stabbing a female friend 28 times in her East Windsor, NJ home after she took away the TV remote. Mr. Zampini will turn 73 this month and is originally from Queens, NY. He faces at least 15 years in prison when he’s sentenced in January.
• President-elect Barack Obama got down to business yesterday. At the Philadelphia Sports Club in Franklintown, Obama ran for 30 minutes on one of the club’s high-tech treadmills and put in 15 more on an elliptical machine while plugged into an iPod. The club’s patrons respected his privacy, though one jogger at an adjacent treadmill tried to keep up with his brisk pace. Obama was in town to meet with members of the National Governors Association.
• Angela Honeycutt’s sexual assault trial began in Bucks County Court yesterday. The trial is a result of a night of depravity and incredible stupidity. A party for 15 to 20 boys and girls morphed into a boys-only sleepover in Lower Makefield Township where Honeycutt provocatively danced for the teens, made out with three of them in a bedroom, and talked explicitly about sex. Ultimately, authorities say, she stripped and headed for the shower, soon to be joined by two of the under-16 teens.

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