1 nursing home resident, 1 employee killed in fire, explosion; cause under investigation
Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro speaks during a press conference outside of the Governor’s Mansion on April 13, 2025. Kyle Mazza/Anadolu via Getty Images
The “catastrophic” incident — possibly caused by a gas leak — unfolded Tuesday afternoon at the Silver Lake Nursing Home in Bristol, which is about 25 miles northeast of Philadelphia.
Of the 20 people hurt, 19 are still hospitalized on Wednesday, including one in critical condition, Bristol Township Police Chief CJ Winik said on Wednesday.
Bristol Township Fire Marshal Kevin Dippolito said parts of the first floor collapsed into the basement, trapping people inside.
All employees and all 120 residents of the facility have been accounted for, the police chief said.
Winick praised the “heroism” of the first responders, who he said ran into the building, despite the strong smell of gas, and evacuated residents, including some who couldn’t walk or talk.
“This could’ve been a much more serious catastrophe,” he said at a news conference on Wednesday. “The actions of everybody involved help preserve life.”
The cause of the incident remains under investigation, Dippolito said on Wednesday. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said on Tuesday that the preliminary belief was that a gas leak was responsible, and Dippolito said the source of the leak was in the facility’s basement.
ABC News Correspondent Jim Avila. Randy Sager/ABC News
(NEW YORK) — Jim Avila, a former longtime ABC News senior correspondent, whose investigative journalism earned him several of the most prestigious awards in broadcast news, has died. He was 69.
His death after a long illness was announced internally by ABC News President Almin Karamehmedovic.
“Jim was a gifted journalist and a generous colleague,” Karamehmedovic said in an email to staff.
Avila had also a been 20/20 correspondent based in Los Angeles before departing from the network in 2021. He specialized in politics, justice, law and consumer investigations.
“As the Senior Law and Justice Correspondent, he has covered every major trial from Jerry Sandusky and Penn State to Michael Jackson, OJ Simpson and countless others,” according to his ABC News official biography. “He led reports on immigration, making several trips to the southern border to document stories of immigrants, and also covered the death of Freddie Gray and civil unrest in Baltimore.”
He covered the White House from 2012 to 2016, during President Barack Obama’s second term.
“He won the prestigious Merriman Award from the White House Correspondents Association for breaking the news that the United States and Cuba had reopened diplomatic relations,” the biography said.
He earned numerous awards, including two National Emmy Awards and five Edward R. Murrow Awards, the biography said. His work also won him the prestigious Cine Golden Eagle Award, the Mongerson Prize for Investigative Reporting and five Chicago-area Emmy Awards in the category of Spot News.
“In 1999, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists honored him with reporter of the year,” the biography said. “In addition, he garnered three Peter Lisagor Awards from the Headline Club of Chicago, winning for his coverage of the Peru drug wars and the death of Mayor Harold Washington, and was named Best Reporter of 1989.”
He was a named a 2019 honoree by National Association of Hispanic Journalists’ Hall of Fame.
Avila was most recently a senior investigative reporter at KGTV, the ABC affiliate in San Diego, where he continued “covering a wide range of stories with depth and fairness,” Karamehmedovic said.
Even after his health challenges began, Avila “continued to contribute to journalism through opinion writing and local reporting, sharing his experience and deep curiosity to tell the stories that mattered most to his community and viewers,” the email said.
“We send our heartfelt condolences to his family, including his three children, Jamie, Jenny, and Evan, and we thank him for his many contributions and unwavering commitment to seeking out the truth,” Karamehmedovic said.
A sign marks the location of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) headquarters building on April 30, 2025, in Washington, DC. (Photo by J. David Ake/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department has filed terrorism charges against an Arizona man for his alleged role in the growing network of online predators known as “764,” whose worldwide followers use social media platforms to target, groom and push young teens into harming themselves and others.
An indictment unsealed Thursday in Arizona charged 21-year-old Baron Martin of Tucson with conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists, marking the first time that the Justice Department has leveled such charges against an alleged member of 764.
The move does not mean that the U.S. government has formally designated 764 as a terrorist organization like ISIS or Al-Qaeda, but it does signify that the government believes members of 764 engage in “terrorist activity” under U.S. law.
Martin was first arrested in December and indicted on three counts of cyberstalking and producing sexually explicit material of children. He pleaded not guilty to those charges.
The indictment unsealed Thursday adds 26 more charges, alleging that he was deeply involved in a “sadistic and masochistic” conspiracy to “systematically and methodically target” vulnerable teenagers who can be pushed into cutting themselves with sharp objects, creating sexually explicit and gore-filled videos and photos, torturing animals, or even killing themselves — all while on camera.
According to the indictment, while using 15 different monikers, Martin hosted and ran “group chats” associated with 764 on social media platforms, controlling access to them and making demands of victims, some of whom were extorted into participating.
The indictment cites nine specific victims who were allegedly targeted by Martin, ranging in age from 11 to 18.
In 2022, he allegedly forced a 13-year-old girl overseas to carve one of his online monikers — “Convict” — and other symbols on her body, causing “permanent disfigurement.” And, live on a video call with 15 others, he allegedly forced the girl to let her family dog attack her family’s hamster, and then he and the others made the victim stomp on the hamster’s head and feed it to the dog, while also recording it to share with even more people, the indictment says.
Also in 2022, after Martin got into an online dispute with another 13-year-old girl, he allegedly threatened to kill her grandmother — vowing that it would “send a message” — and he offered to pay someone $3,000 to commit the murder, according to the indictment and other court documents. He also allegedly “conducted a live extortion” of an 18-year-old overseas, who, after being repeatedly told to kill herself, was forced to cut a symbol into her forehead — after which Martin then allegedly shared a photo online of the girl’s bloody face.
In other court proceedings, federal prosecutors said that Martin also “participated in bomb threats, swatting and doxing campaigns, and alleged kidnappings.”
“This man’s alleged crimes are unthinkably depraved and reflect the horrific danger of 764,” Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a statement. “I urge parents to remain vigilant about the threats their children face online.”
In addition to one count of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists, the indictment unsealed Thursday charges Martin with conspiring to maim someone in a foreign country, seeking murder for hire, promoting and distributing animal torture material, and numerous child exploitation-related charges, including taking part in a child exploitation enterprise.
Authorities say that one of the main goals of 764 and similar networks is to sow chaos and bring down society.
They try to accomplish this by first befriending vulnerable teens online and then convincing them to share sexually explicit images or videos of themselves, experts say. That sexually explicit material is then used to blackmail victims into increasingly violent actions, and it escalates from there — with victims’ family members or pets threatened if victims stop complying.
Victims routinely end up being coerced into carving their tormentor’s online monikers into their own skin, mutilating themselves in other ways, attacking or threatening others, or torturing animals — all while capturing it on camera, so the videos or photos can be shared with others to boost one’s status within 764.
Predators also routinely promote neo-Nazi ideology, ISIS propaganda, and school shootings, desensitizing vulnerable teens to violence, authorities say.
Since the launch of the initial 764 group nearly five years ago — when the 15-year-old Texas boy who started it named it after the first three digits of his ZIP code — authorities say 764 has become a global movement, with an ever-expanding network of offshoots and subgroups that often rebrand and change their names to help keep social media companies and law enforcement from tracking them.
The FBI’s Counterterrorism Division and the Justice Department’s National Security Division are now looking at 764 and its offshoots as a potential form of domestic terrorism, even coining a new term to characterize the most heinous actors: “nihilistic violent extremists.”
Last month, FBI Director Kash Patel told a Senate panel that fighting 764 is now “a priority” within the FBI.
“We’re going after the new form of what I refer to as modern day terrorism in America, 764 crimes that involve harming our children by going after them online, causing self-mutilation, suicide, sexual abuse and steering them in the wrong direction,” Patel said before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
According to the FBI, federal authorities have now opened investigations into more than 300 people suspected of ties to 764 or its offshoots across the country, with each subject under investigation potentially having victimized multiple young teens.
James Keivom/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — An officer from the New York City Department of Correction gave federal immigration agents information about someone believed to have entered the country illegally, a violation of the city’s sanctuary laws, investigators said Thursday.
The New York City Department of Investigation said a correction officer assigned to a federal violent gang task force provided the information but was not aware it would be used as part of civil immigration enforcement. City policy would allow information sharing as part of a criminal investigation.
The officer provided information about Cristian Concepcion, who was believed to have entered the country illegally, officials said. While investigating that allegation, the DOI also found that the officer, who was not named, provided information to federal immigration authorities about another person in custody, Pedro Mujica Villa Nueva, officials said.
The officer “did not understand that the assistance he provided was in furtherance of federal civil immigration enforcement, as opposed to a federal criminal investigation,” the Department of Investigation said, which resulted from “a lack of training and guidance” from his superiors.
“New York City law and DOC policy do not allow City resources to be used for the purpose of facilitating the enforcement of federal immigration law, and that prohibition includes the sharing of information with our federal law enforcement partners for that purpose. DOI found that in at least two instances a DOC investigator unwittingly violated the law and DOC policy and that DOC failed to provide proper guidance and training to DOC staff about how to comply with City law and DOC’s own policy while maintaining critical law enforcement partnerships with federal agencies,” Department of Investigation Commissioner Jocelyn Strauber said.
Strauber recommended an audit of the Department of Corrections to identify any other violations.
