Rideshare driver arrested for allegedly murdering female passenger: Indianapolis police
Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department
(NEW YORK) — A rideshare driver has been arrested for allegedly murdering his female passenger, who was found shot to death near a wooded area after she was reported missing, police announced Tuesday.
The victim, 30-year-old Chanti Dixon, was reported missing on Monday, according to Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Chief Chris Bailey. She had ordered an Uber around 3:30 a.m. Sunday to take her home from work, but she had not been heard from since then, according to the probable cause affidavit.
On Monday, police received a report of a dead person found near woods in a residential area of Indianapolis who was ultimately identified as Dixon, police said. She had an injury consistent with a gunshot wound, Bailey said.
The investigation led detectives to 29-year-old Francisco Valadez, who has been arrested on a murder charge, police said.
Police believe that Valadez, a rideshare driver, had picked Dixon up “just prior to her murder,” Bailey said during a press briefing on Tuesday.
“This is disgusting, it’s disturbing,” Bailey said. “No one deserves to be treated this way in our community.”
Valadez is in custody and is scheduled to appear in court on Thursday, according to online jail records. It is unclear if he has an attorney at this time.
The Marion County Prosecutor’s Office will make final charging decisions. Bailey said he anticipates there will be additional charges in the case.
Dixon was found at a dead end with a possible gunshot wound to the left side of her head, according to the probable cause affidavit. Two cell phones belonging to her were also found nearby, according to the affidavit.
Detectives traced the Uber information to Valadez, according to the affidavit. Valadez allegedly told police that after he dropped her off a man attempted to rob her and shot her in the leg, according to the affidavit. After being brought to the homicide office for an interview, Valadez told two different stories before allegedly admitting to shooting Dixon in his car while trying to have sex with her, according to the affidavit.
Valadez has been banned from Uber, the company said.
“Our hearts break for Ms. Dixon’s family and loved ones,” an Uber spokesperson said in a statement. “The details of this act of violence are atrocious and we will assist Indianapolis police however we can as they continue to investigate.”
Assistant Chief of Police Catherine Cummings said this is believed to be an isolated incident.
“As a woman, this hits differently for me,” she said during Tuesday’s press briefing. “Women, girls, mothers have a right to exist freely in our community without fear of something heinous happening to them. They have a right to walk, bike, order, rideshare without fearing something bad will happen to them. This is a family’s worst nightmare, and we extend our heartfelt condolences to her family during this trying time.”
Cummings and Bailey stressed to the community that rideshares continue to be a safe option.
“This woman is gone from the world unnecessarily by an evil act,” Bailey said. “I’m glad that we were able to find this individual as quickly as we did, so that he didn’t have an opportunity to perpetuate violence further in our community.”
Moses Stewart and Diane Hawkins grieve over the slaying of their son Yusuf Hawkins; Nicole Bengiveno/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images
(BROOKLYN, N.Y.) — When Yusuf Hawkins, a Black 16-year-old, was shot and killed in Brooklyn in 1989 as he went to purchase a car, the crime set off months of angry protests.
Now, the man convicted in Hawkins’ murder, who has been behind bars for nearly 35 years, will get a chance Thursday to prove his innocence with what his defense attorney says is new evidence.
Joseph Fama, who was 18 at the time of the murder, was part of a white mob that chased down Hawkins and three other unarmed Black youths in August 1989 in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, according to court documents.
Fama, who is white, was convicted in May 1990 of second-degree murder, first-degree riot, third-degree criminal possession of a weapon, first-degree unlawful imprisonment, menacing and discrimination. All counts were ordered to run concurrently, giving Fama 25 years to life in prison, according to court documents.
“Unfortunately, terribly, Yusuf Hawkins, innocent, innocent man, was killed — let’s just start with that — because he’s Black,” Justin Bonus, Fama’s attorney, told ABC News in a phone interview last week. “My client was not involved with this whole group of kids sitting there waiting for Black guys to come.”
The murder sparked protests against racial violence around New York City at a time when tensions were high. Months earlier, the Central Park Five, a group of Black and Hispanic teenagers, were wrongfully convicted of rape and assault of a white female jogger.
Five witnesses testified that they saw Fama shoot Hawkins, and four more witnesses placed Fama at the scene the night that the teenager was shot three times, according to court documents. Two jailhouse informants testified that Fama admitted to them that he shot Hawkins because he was Black, according to court documents.
“First of all, jailhouse informants, are we going to go by that?” Bonus said to ABC News.
The judge in Fama’s original trial did not allow the father of one of the informants to testify that he believed his son was lying about his claim that Fama confessed that he killed Hawkins. The courts made that decision because the defense failed to lay a foundation for the admission of the evidence during cross-examination of the informant, according to court documents.
According to a motion by Fama’s defense, two of the witnesses, who previously said that they saw Fama kill Hawkins, recanted their testimonies and claimed that they were coerced by investigators to pin the shooting on the defendant.
During the original trial, the court denied the defense’s request to call Frankie Tighe, one of the witnesses who recanted his testimony, to the stand because defense attorneys had already rested their case four days before their request, according to court documents.
Keith Mondello, one of the alleged leaders of the mob that chased Hawkins and who was convicted, provided new evidence that also claimed Fama was not the killer, according to court documents.
Five additional witnesses originally claimed that, after the shooting, Tighe ran around the corner to their location and they heard him say, “Joe Fama just shot a Black kid,” according to court documents.
The defense says they have new evidence that one of those witnesses later recanted their testimony and stated that detectives spoke to him many times and pressured him to accuse Fama, according to the defense’s motion.
On Aug. 23, 1989, at about 9:00 p.m. Hawkins and three of his peers took a subway train from their Brooklyn neighborhood in East New York to Bensonhurst to look at a used car for sale, according to court documents.
The four peers became lost in Bensonhurst and, as they searched for the address of where the used car would be, they came across a group of 20 to 40 white individuals who, coincidentally, were expecting Black and Hispanic men to attend a birthday party in the neighborhood that night, according to court documents.
The party was hosted by an 18-year-old white woman who the men in the neighborhood believed invited Black and Hispanic men to the birthday celebration, according to Bonus. The men gathered in the vicinity of her home, allegedly voiced racist threats and armed themselves with bats, golf clubs and handguns as they allegedly waited for the men of color to come to the party, according to court documents.
The group of men chased Hawkins and his peers when they saw them, according to court documents. The confrontation ended with Hawkins shot. He died a short time later. Fama was sentenced for 25 years to life in prison on June 11, 1990.
The defense claims to have twelve new affidavits from witnesses that allege that Fama did not shoot Hawkins. Some of those witnesses say police pressured them to accuse Fama.
The defense motion focuses on one investigator, former Detective Louis Scarcella, claiming he was “significantly involved with the investigation and procuring witnesses.”
A complaint against Scarcella alleges that nearly 20 homicide convictions associated with the former detective have been vacated and in at least nine of those convictions, Scarcella coerced false confessions or fabricated written confessions from innocent individuals, according to court records.
Joel Cohen, Scarcella’s attorney, told ABC News over the phone that some judges found that Scarcella was involved in improper tactics which led to the convictions of several individuals, but the court only found innocence in one of the overturned cases.
Scarcella didn’t file a response to any of the complaints, according to his attorney.
“Joseph Fama’s motion to vacate his conviction for the racially motivated murder of Yusef Hawkings 32 years ago is flatly contradicted by the overwhelming evidence of his guilt,” Cohen told ABC News in part through a statement. “His lawyer’s claims that the that the “…”murder investigation was led by Detective Louis Scarcella ,” and that Scarcella was “all over the investigation” are reckless and provably false and based in part by the lawyer’s “surmise.”
The DA’s office told ABC News that Scarcella only played a minor role in the investigation and was one of more than 65 investigators working on the case. The defense believes Scarcella was “significantly involved in” the investigation, according to court documents.
The NYPD did not reply to ABC News’ request for a statement.
The DA’s office claims witnesses testified that they saw Fama receive a gun from the individual who Bonus alleges was the actual shooter just before Hawkins’ death.
In Tighe’s recanted statement, he claimed that Fama used a silver handgun in the shooting, but Claude Stanford, one of Hawkins’ peers who was with him the night he was shot, said that the shooter used a black gun and was about 6 feet tall, according to the defense’s motion. Fama was about 5 feet, 8 inches tall at the time, according to court documents.
Fama has already tried twice to appeal his conviction and was denied by the court both times, according to legal documents. This is his third attempt to vacate his conviction.
Fama’s court conference hearing is set for Nov. 21, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office.
(NEW YORK) — When Jordan Neely boarded the subway on May 1, 2023, he was homeless, ranting about having nothing to eat or drink and said he was willing to die, according to authorities. Perceptions of Neely’s final moments differ, but each account tells a similar story at its core: Neely appeared to be experiencing a mental health crisis when Daniel Penny put him in the chokehold that ended his life.
Opening arguments are set to begin in Penny’s trial in Neely’s death Friday. Penny, a former Marine, was charged with second-degree manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide in Neely’s death. He has pleaded not guilty. Jury selection began Monday.
Neely’s loved ones believe his story could have been different. To experts, Neely, who was known to city mental health professionals and law enforcement officials, has become a symbol of the need to look toward effective solutions to get homeless and mentally ill people off the streets and into care.
“Our system does not prioritize the seriously mentally ill,” Carolyn Gorman, a policy analyst at the public policy think tank Manhattan Institute, told ABC News. “Almost always, the individuals who are involved in these tragedies have a known mental illness, have been cycling through homelessness, through incarceration through the health care system. They’re known to authorities, and they haven’t fallen through the cracks. They’ve actually just been ignored by all of these systems.”
New York City’s clubhouses — member-run facilities that offer support to those with serious mental health conditions — are proving that recovery and rehabilitation are possible, with some lawmakers like Rep. Ritchie Torres, D-N.Y., hoping to expand the availability and access to these institutions for more residents.
Fountain House, which touts itself as the pioneer of the modern clubhouse model, aims to put an end to the “punitive, ineffective and costly” approaches to those with mental illness, who cycle through jails, emergency rooms, shelters and the streets without proper care or support to lead healthy and happy lives, the organization said.
The goal is to give members a sense of stability and community. At the clubhouses, they get a helping hand to obtain an education, find work, achieve health goals while readily having access to clinical care, housing assistance and other supportive services.
“What we are looking to do is to help people truly recover, and so that means help them return to jobs, be neighbors, and live out in the community and to have meaningful relationships,” Ian Campbell, Fountain House’s Senior Director of Employment and Learning, told ABC News.
However, Gorman, of the Manhattan Institute, said that despite their effectiveness, clubhouses won’t be the solution for all people dealing with severe mental illnesses.
“Fountain House is definitely one model. And it’s a model that works well. But some patients just do need a higher level of oversight and intensive care than a place like the clubhouse model can provide. And that is inpatient treatment,” or hospitalization, said Gorman.
Clubhouses set an example for mental health care
What makes the clubhouse model so successful, Campbell said, is that they fill gaps not filled in a clinical setting. They support members with both economic barriers as well as the loneliness or isolation that patients are likely to also be experiencing.
“The U.S. has historically spent most of its mental health care dollars on clinical treatment, such as medication and therapy, with a fraction allocated to fund the community-based social supports people also need to manage their mental illness,” read a Fountain House report.
About 15% of people with severe mental illness successfully return to work, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness — but at Fountain House, 25 to 30% of their active membership has returned to work.
A New York University study on Fountain House found that its services save Medicaid costs by up to 21% by reducing hospitalizations and ER visits as well as increasing primary care visits, increased outpatient mental health visits, and increased pharmacy visits – “essentially a better adherence to other forms of treatment that can further support members’ recovery,” Fountain House said in a statement.
Researchers at Fountain House also found that the roughly 60,000 people clubhouses nationwide serve each year yield an estimated savings of over $11,000 per person — or at least $682 million total each year.
Fountain House also touts that members who enroll in degree or certificate-seeking educational programs have a 90% average semester completion rate.
For Torres, mental health care is personal.
“About 15 years ago, I found myself at the lowest point in my life. I had dropped out of college. I found myself struggling with depression. I even attempted suicide and underwent hospitalization for a period of time,” Torres told ABC News. “I felt as if the world around me had collapsed, and I never thought seven years later, I would become the youngest elected official in America’s largest city, and then seven years later, become a member of the United States Congress.”
He has called for more federal funding for community-based programs like Fountain House.
“The challenge of mental illness is often compounded by the problem of loneliness, and clubhouses represent the creation of a community,” he said. “It is an elegant solution to the problem of loneliness. It provides community where none exists. It fills the human gap that’s often left by isolation, and so I would love to see the proliferation of clubhouses across the country.”
And for those who may need more assistance than an outpatient resource can offer, Gorman believes the focus should be on the rehabilitative efforts, not punitive ones.
“Involuntary treatment and inpatient treatment are last resorts, they are only tried when everything else fails,” Gorman said. “I think if we do not consider those options, then we have to be ready to admit that we already are institutionalizing the mentally ill, but in jails and prisons. These are punitive settings, not therapeutic settings. So it’s hard to see how this is more humane.”
A clubhouse success story
Carmen Murray-Williams, now 65, had been homeless on-and-off since she was 14, when she left her home amid a “rough” and “uncomfortable” living situation with her family.
“There were times where I couldn’t find any help. I was so tired that I would get a cardboard box, flatten it down on the ground wherever I was, and sleep there. And once or twice, I woke up, and I found myself buried in snow,” Murray-Williams told ABC News. “I said, I really have to get out of the situation. And I kept knocking on doors … I prayed all the time. I mean, every chance I got, I prayed.”
She said she lived on the streets until she was about 17, when her grandmother found her, took her in, and convinced her to continue her education. She got her GED and was excited to start college, but her grandmother’s death left her both heartbroken and homeless once more.
“She’s my everything,” Murray-Williams said. “She got me to believe that life keeps going on and you don’t have to worry about your age and whatnot. Just keep on trying. I love my grandmother. I miss her.”
Life continued to present challenges for Murray-Williams, who had lost contact with the rest of her family. She recalls her past addiction to crack cocaine, an accidental fall from an apartment balcony that broke her back, and a boyfriend who opened credit cards from a joint bank account, putting her thousands of dollars in debt.
And one day, she said, “I absolutely lost my mind. I just started screaming and hollering or turn up things” and the police were called on her. She was diagnosed with bipolar disorder at the age of 42 following the outbursts.
After receiving inpatient treatment for her disorder, she was accepted as a member of Fountain House to get her back on her feet.
Fountain House members like Murray-Williams have access to supportive resources — including meals, job training, education, and housing assistance — while developing social supports to build relationships and reintegrate into their community.
“We’ll have a morning meeting and we decide who does what chores. After that, we start doing the chores that they give us. Chores could be putting data entry into the computer or could be cleaning up the front of the clubhouse,” Murray-Williams said. Clubhouse members help the organization function; they prepare meals, man the phones, and fundraise.
“If you’re in the horticulture unit, which is now ‘home and garden,’ you do the gardens. And we do a lot here. I go to the gym and wellness unit twice a week,” she said.
Murray-Williams has a jam-packed schedule, which includes running the Bingo gathering multiple times a week — “my favorite days of the week” — and helps lead a dance exercise group.
“Getting to 65 and still being here? I didn’t think I was gonna make it to 65,” Murray-Williams said. “But I’m just grateful for every day and every opportunity that I get.”
