18-year-old Loyola University student shot, killed while walking with friends in Chicago: Police
Police crime scene tape (mbbirdy/Getty Images)
(CHICAGO) — An 18-year-old student at Loyola University in Chicago was shot and killed while walking with her friends near campus, authorities said.
The group was walking near Tobey Prinz Beach Park, less than 1 mile from the university’s Lake Shore campus, when an unknown male walked up to them at about 1:30 a.m. Thursday, Chicago police said.
The male showed a gun and opened fire toward the friends, police said.
The victim was shot in the head and died at the scene, police said, adding that no one else was injured.
Loyola University president Mark Reed identified the slain student as Sheridan Gorman.
“This is a tragic loss, and our hearts go out to Sheridan’s family, loved ones, and all who knew her,” Reed said in a statement.
Reed said the university is offering counseling services and is in touch with law enforcement.
“Based on the information available to us now, there is no ongoing threat to our campus community,” he said.
Gorman was also a “beloved” student at her former high school in Westchester County, New York.
“We are so deeply shattered by this tragic and senseless loss,” Yorktown Central School District Superintendent Ron Hattar said in a statement. “Sheridan was loved by all who knew her, and her impact on students and staff alike was profound. She was a shining light for so many people.”
Kersten Francilus is seen in a photo released by the Martin County Sheriff’s Office. (Martin County Sheriff’s Office)
(MARTIN COUNTY, Fla.) — The suspect in the deadly, apparently random stabbing of an elderly woman who was walking her dog in Florida allegedly told authorities that he “went around” the neighborhood and “found a lady and then I killed her,” according to a probable cause affidavit.
The shocking, “extremely violent” attack occurred Thursday afternoon in Stuart, in the “quiet” community of Southwood, Martin County Sheriff John Budensiek said.
Several people had called 911 to report a “suspicious” man who was going door-to-door asking “where the new bank was,” Budensiek said at a press briefing Thursday, noting that there isn’t a bank in the area. The suspect — later identified as 25-year-old Kersten Francilus — reportedly appeared “out of it,” according to the affidavit.
At one house, the suspect asked for the bank and allegedly “attempted to step inside,” at which point the resident shut the door, according to the affidavit.
Shortly after those calls, people called 911 to report the stabbing, according to Budensiek. The victim was walking a small dog when she was “brutally attacked,” he said.
A good Samaritan tried to intervene but couldn’t get the assailant off the woman, the sheriff said.
A deputy who was already en route for the suspicious person arrived at the scene and saw the victim on the ground, according to Budensiek.
“Our suspect was on top of her, actually actively stabbing her,” Budensiek said.
The deputy got out of his vehicle and pulled out his gun, at which time the suspect threw the knife down, “giving up,” the sheriff said.
The deputy immediately took Francilus into custody, the sheriff said.
An off-duty deputy who had also responded rendered aid to the victim, Budensiek said. She was transported to an area hospital, where she died from “significant injuries,” the sheriff said. She had been stabbed multiple times in her upper torso, he said, calling it a “violent, violent homicide.”
The victim appeared to have 16 or 17 stab wounds, according to the affidavit, which identified her as Joyce Ellen Thompson Adams.
Francilus has been charged with first-degree premeditated murder. He refused a public defender and is being held on no bond, online court records show. ABC News’ attempts to reach members of his family for comment were unsuccessful.
After being read his Miranda Rights, Francilus allegedly admitted to the stabbing, according to the affidavit.
“He initially stated he left his residence and ‘did what I did,'” the affidavit stated. “He stated he ‘went around’ the neighborhood, and he said ‘I found a lady and then I killed her.'”
The suspect is believed to live in a nearby neighborhood with his mother, wife and child, Budensiek said. A steak knife used in the attack came from their home, according to the sheriff.
The suspect’s mother reportedly told detectives that Francilus “has not taken his medications since February,” according to the affidavit, which did not go into further detail. His mother also said she “usually stored the knives above the microwave, essentially hiding them from the suspect,” the affidavit stated.
A motive remains under investigation, according to the sheriff.
Francilus has no known criminal history or connection to the victim, Budensiek said. There was previously one call for service at his home, during which he was reported to have been “acting strange,” the sheriff said.
“We don’t know of any motive at this point. We don’t know of any nexus between the victim and the suspect,” Budensiek said. “We just simply know that we’ve had a horrendous crime that’s taken place in this neighborhood.”
People walk along snow covered streets as snow falls during a blizzard on February 23, 2026 in the Flatbush neighborhood of the Brooklyn borough in New York City. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — A quick-moving storm is making its way into northern Minnesota and Wisconsin from Canada on Tuesday and is expected to hit the Great Lakes dumping between 3 to 6 inches in the region.
The brief storm is expected to move into the Northeast around midnight on Wednesday and reach Pittsburgh around 1 a.m. followed by Philadelphia and New York City by around 5 a.m.
Snow will end for Philadelphia and New York City a few hours later at approximately 11 a.m. on Wednesday, while snow should end around 1 p.m. in Boston with a few lingering snow showers will last through the night over interior New England.
All three cities should expect no more than an inch of snow to accumulate, including Rhode Island as they continue to dig out of their 2.5 feet of snow from Monday.
Further inland, however, 1 to 3 inches of snow could be possible with higher elevations in the Northeast seeing up to 3 to 6 inches of snow.
Elsewhere, a storm currently in the Pacific Northwest will move across the country in the coming days and is expected to be shoved south by high pressure over the northern U.S. as it moves east.
This will lead to rain over the upper South on Thursday morning, with heavy rain possible for Kentucky and Tennessee and east through North Carolina.
On Thursday evening, that rain could be heavy over Tennessee as the storm moves north along the mid-Atlantic into Virginia, Delaware and Maryland.
By about 9 p.m. on Thursday, there is a chance this moisture is in line somewhere between Washington, D.C. and New York City with the potential of a wintry mix that could make roads slick.
If temperatures drop low enough, snow is also possible Thursday night for the region between Washington, D.C. to New York City. This could lead to a few inches of wet snow for the New York area, northern New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania by Friday morning.
The system is expected to move out of the area by midday on Friday and, by the afternoon, the weather could warm up a bit, with highs in the upper 30s.
Temperatures will reach the upper 30s and lower 40s this week in New York City and Boston as well, meaning some of the snow that has blanketed the region could begin to melt with some refreezing possible overnight.
NTSB investigators walk the scene of the March 22 collision between an Air Canada Express plane and a firefighting vehicle on Runway 4 at LaGuardia Airport in New York City, March 23, 2026. (NTSB)
(NEW YORK) — Two people were in the LaGuardia Airport air traffic control tower cab when an Air Canada jet collided with a Port Authority airport vehicle on a runway at the New York City airport on Sunday night, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
The on-the-ground crash killed both pilots, left dozens injured and prompted LaGuardia to shut down for more than 12 hours. Antoine Forest has been identified by his family as one of the two pilots killed.
The collision happened shortly after Air Canada Flight 8646, which was carrying four crew members and 72 passengers, touched down from Montreal around 11:45 p.m., according to Port Authority Executive Director Kathryn Garcia. The plane, which was operated by Jazz Aviation, struck a rescue-and-firefighting vehicle responding to another aircraft, officials said.
Preliminary data shows the plane was traveling between 93 and 105 mph when it impacted the fire truck, FlightRadar24 told ABC News.
At least 43 people — from the plane and the fire truck — were taken to hospitals, officials said.
As the NTSB investigates the crash, NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy said there were two people in the air traffic control tower cab at the time of collision: the local controller and the controller in charge.
Two controllers is “the standard operating procedure for LaGuardia for the midnight shift,” Homendy at a news conference on Tuesday.
She said the NTSB has been concerned about fatigue from the midnight shift in past investigations, but stressed that there is no evidence of fatigue so far in this case.
LaGuardia has a runway safety system allowing air traffic controllers to track surface movement of planes and vehicles, but that system “did not alert,” Homendy said.
The analysis found that the system “did not generate an alert due to the close proximity of vehicles merging and unmerging near the runway, resulting in the inability to create a track of high confidence,” Homendy said.
There is no indication yet if the pilots saw the fire truck on the runway, Homendy said, noting that the NTSB is still analyzing the cockpit voice recorder.
Homendy said the NTSB is still working to determine what happened at the air traffic controllers’ shift change around 10:30 p.m.
“We know that that controller was still on duty for several minutes afterwards” the crash, she said, when usually they’d be relieved, so she said the NTSB is investigating if anyone was available to relieve them.
Homendy also stressed that the NTSB “rarely, if ever, investigate[s] a major accident where it was one failure” — usually “many, many things” went wrong, she said.
“Our aviation system is incredibly safe because there are multiple, multiple layers of defense built in to prevent an accident,” she explained.
One passenger on the flight, Joe, said that as the plane was landing, he noticed some emergency vehicles on the tarmac.
“Right before the impacts, we felt something, maybe like an emergency brake that was pulled, or some kind of hard stop, before we hit the truck,” Joe, who did not want to use his last name, told ABC News Live. “But prior to that, there was nothing out of the ordinary that I had noticed.”
“Because I was seated in the emergency aisle, somebody in the plane had shouted, ‘Emergency exits open,'” Joe said. “So at that time, I pulled the lever down, attached the door, put it to the side of the plane, and a few of us had exited through the emergency exit onto the wing of the plane. And FDNY and Port Authority Police directed us to slide down the wing. … It was very low to the ground and easy to get off.”
Joe, who was on the flight with his fiancé, said Monday evening that they were “pretty shaken up, still kind of in shock.”
“And just heartbroken for, obviously, the pilots, and all those that are injured,” Joe said.
He said he believes the pilots “saved many lives on that flight — and my heart’s just broken for them.”
LaGuardia shut down after the crash and slowly resumed flights at 2 p.m. Monday. The runway where the collision occurred will remain closed until 7 a.m. Friday, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
