Category: National

(PHILADELPHIA, Pa.) — It was just a normal Friday evening for Philadelphia father Andre Howard and his 10-year-old son Trey Howard.

Andre Howard picked up Trey Howard and his two younger siblings from school and drove to a nearby Dunkin’.

“I promised him Tuesday that we would get donuts on Friday after school,” Andre Howard told ABC News.

However, as they were leaving the Dunkin’, about to turn on Cottman Avenue, Andre Howard said the family heard a loud bang, quickly accompanied by a “ball of fire” and black smoke. Little did they know, a medical transport jet had just crashed nearby.

Andre Howard attempted to reverse his truck, using the donut shop as a shield to stop flying debris. Then, he heard his son shout something from the backseat of the car.

“I hear my son telling his sister, ‘Get down, baby girl,'” Andre Howard said.

Trey Howard, who is in the fourth grade, used his body as a human shield to protect his younger sister from incoming debris, his father said.

“I turn around and he has metal out the side of his head,” Andre Howard said.

In efforts to protect his younger sister, Trey Howard was hit with a piece of plane debris or glass, with part of it sticking out of his head, his father said.

As Andre Howard attempted to move his son, the metal protruding from Trey Howard’s head fell out, causing blood to gush everywhere, he said. Andre Howard said he wrapped Trey Howard’s head with socks, while someone else lent a shirt — anything to stop the bleeding.

Andre Howard said he flagged down a police officer on the scene, who drove the family to Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, where Trey Howard underwent emergency brain surgery, and then was transferred to the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Andre Howard said he was told there was a high likelihood his son wouldn’t survive.

However, after the procedure and a full weekend in the intensive care unit, Trey Howard was moved to a regular room on Monday and continues to recover from the harrowing event.

“Am I OK? No. Is his mother OK? No. Is his family OK? No. But we are going to be strong for him every step of this process to get him back to full strength,” Andre Howard said.

When Trey Howard was finally able to speak again, the first thing he asked was, ‘Daddy, did I save my sister?'”

Andre Howard said his son’s selfless act of bravery was “something that not a lot of grown men could do” and called his fourth grader his “superhero.”

The hospital is continuing to monitor Trey Howard’s skull, ensuring all of the debris has been removed, his father said. Until he is able to go home, Andre Howard said his son has been getting many visitors — including his teachers and Philadelphia 76ers player Tyrese Maxey.

“Thank God my son is still here. Thank God we didn’t go into the flame,” Andre Howard said. “I’m just happy he is here.”

The plane crash, which involved a medical transport jet, killed all six people on board, as well as one person on the ground. Officials are still investigating the cause of the crash.

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(EDGEWATER, Fla.) — A woman called 911 to report a toddler left alone in a vehicle outside a Florida bar before the mother of the child and her boyfriend were arrested for child neglect, according to newly released audio.

The Edgewater Police Department released the audio of the 911 call along with the body camera footage Monday of what they had called a “disgusting” incident.

The child’s mother, 35-year-old Kristina Vitucci, and her boyfriend, 39-year-old Joshua Harris, were both arrested after Vitucci’s 2-year-old daughter was left in an unlocked vehicle while they sat inside an Edgewater bar drinking for nearly two hours on Jan. 28, according to police.

“I don’t know that there’s an actual emergency, but there’s a baby out here in a car by itself,” the 911 caller can be heard telling the dispatcher.

“I just don’t want anybody to get mad at me. But I just, you know, this is wrong,” the caller said.

“Yeah, I agree,” the dispatcher said.

An officer responded at approximately 8:15 p.m. and reported that the child had been crying in the vehicle and it was unknown where her parent was, according to the body camera footage.

Upon arriving at the vehicle a few minutes later, Harris told officers that he owned the car and that the child’s mother was inside the bar, the body camera footage shows.

When Vitucci subsequently came outside of the bar to the parking lot, an officer told her, “You’ve got an idea of why we’re here,” the footage shows.

“Yeah, she said.

The officer told Vitucci her daughter was fine and to stay with him, as police continued to question the couple about the incident.

They were both arrested for child neglect, a third-degree felony.

Vitucci is scheduled to be arraigned on Feb. 18 and Harris on Feb. 25, court records show.

ABC News has reached out to their public defenders for comment.

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(PHILADELPHIA) — A Temple University student has been arrested and charged with impersonating an ICE officer after showing up at a residence hall and attempting to enter.

Two “suspicious” males identified themselves as police and ICE agents to dorm security on Saturday, according to Philadelphia police. The individuals were denied access to the residence hall, according to Temple.

A third suspect — identified by police as 22-year-old Aidan Steigelmann, 22 — arrived at the building and spoke with the two suspects, before the three of them left together in a Jaguar SUV.

Two of the three were impersonating ICE officers while the third was recording the interactions, according to Temple University.
Minutes later, university police responded to a report of three suspicious males identifying themselves as police officers and ICE at an Insomnia Cookies store, according to police.

While two of the suspects left the area in a light-colored SUV, Steigelmann was identified, arrested and his vehicle was towed, police said.

“The involved student is on interim suspension. Any student found responsible for this conduct will be subject to disciplinary action under the Student Conduct Code, up to and including expulsion,” Temple University said in a statement.

The investigation is is still active and ongoing, and the two other suspects remain at large. The suspects were wearing shirts with “Police” on the front and “ICE” on the back, police said.

The Philadelphia Police Department asks anyone with information about the case to report it to 215-686-TIPS (8477).

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(WASHINGTON) — For the family and friends of Jonathan Campos — the captain of American Airlines Flight 5342, which plunged into the Potomac River on Wednesday after colliding with a Black Hawk helicopter — the feelings of grief that followed the news of his death were quickly replaced by anger.

As President Donald Trump made unfounded claims blaming diversity, equity and inclusion policies for contributing to the midair collision, Campos’ former fiancee said her loved one’s death quickly became politicized, overshadowing his life story and interrupting the family’s grief.

“This man’s body hadn’t even been pulled out of the river yet, and we’re talking about him being unqualified because his name is Campos,” Nicole Suissa told ABC News.

One day after the deadliest American plane crash in over two decades, Trump suggested during a White House briefing that diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives for air traffic controllers at the Federal Aviation were partially to blame for the collision.

“We want the most competent people. We don’t care what race they are,” the president said. “If they don’t have a great brain, a great power of the brain, they’re not going to be very good at what they do and bad things will happen.”

While the cause of the crash remains undetermined and families only beginning to grieve, blaming diversity hiring on the crash was “enraging” and “infuriating” Suissa said.

“What really irked me to no end was it was, the next day they published Jonathan’s name and Jonathan’s very Puerto Rican-looking face, all I could hear in the back of my head was all these people, all these DEI fear-mongering people going, ‘You see, I knew he’d be Hispanic,’ and I lost my mind,” Suissa said. “The politicization of this man’s death is entirely inappropriate. It is abhorrent. It is disgraceful. It is insensitive to say the least.”

As of Tuesday, investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board were in the early stages of identifying the cause of the midair collision that killed 67 people combined on both aircraft. Authorities have been able to identify 55 sets of remains and are continuing to recover the fuselage of the commercial airliner from the Potomac.

As the recovery operation and investigation continues, Suissa said she hopes people remember Campos for the man she knew and loved for the last 20 years — someone who overcame the hardship of his life to achieve his goal of being a professional pilot before that dream was cut short.

“He was doing everything right. He did everything he was supposed to do,” she said. “He was a by-the-book pilot, and he did everything he was supposed to do, and I thought when you do everything right, that you get to live.”

Suissa first met Campos during their freshman year at John Dewey High School in Brooklyn, New York, watching him work for years to achieve his life goal of becoming a pilot. A 2015 graduate of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Campos flew aircraft for over a decade, including for at least six years with American Airlines. If anyone would have been able to safely land that plane last week, Suissa said she believes it would have been Campos.

“He would have done everything, everything in his power to land that plane because there were 60 people on it, and he never took that lightly,” she said.

Campos admired his father, who was an officer with the New York Police Department. But when his father died in 1999 of liver failure when Campos was just 9 years old, it fell on his stepmother and aunt to raise him. Both women traveled to Washington, D.C., after the crash to identify their son, Suissa said.

“I still wanted him to, you know, live this long, happy, fulfilling life, and I wanted him, I certainly wanted him to outlive his father,” she said. “For 15 years of my life, I thought I’d be signing his marriage license, not his death certificate. So here we are.”

Suissa herself knew Campos for more than 20 years, dating on and off, getting engaged before breaking it off, and ultimately settling on being close friends.

“It’s funny, actually, we each went to prom with someone else — more out of spite than anything,” she said. “Over the years, we had kind of accepted that the romantic piece of it was over, and we remained friends. We never really stopped talking to one another.”

Suissa — who is planning Campos’ funeral and serving as the family spokesperson — recounted their pastime of doing escape rooms across the country, including in Las Vegas, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York City and Orlando, Florida.

“We would beat the whole thing, just the two of us, in under an hour,” she said. “We sort of complemented each other in that way. Our temperaments didn’t complement each other, but our talents did.”

She described Campos as the ultimate adrenaline junkie, learning to instruct other pilots, fly helicopters, scuba dive, snowboard and skydive.

While Campos liked pushing his limits during his hobbies, Suissa said he took nothing as seriously as he did flying commercially. Epic Flight Academy — where Campos worked as an instructor — remembered him as “a skilled and dedicated pilot with an undeniable passion for flying.”

As she plans Campos’ funeral, she said she’s come to terms with the fact that he’s gone, though the political debate surrounding his death continues to enrage her.

“I don’t doubt for a moment that if there was anything at all he could have done to avert it, he would have,” she said.

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(WASHINGTON) — A group of FBI agents who assisted in criminal investigations stemming from the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol filed suit Tuesday in an effort to block the Justice Department from assembling lists of agents for potential disciplinary actions or firings.

The class-action lawsuit, filed anonymously by the agents Tuesday afternoon in D.C. federal court, includes screenshots showing a survey that was sent this week about their actions related to the Jan. 6 cases.

“Plaintiffs are employees of the FBI who worked on Jan. 6 and/or Mar-a-Lago cases, and who have been informed that they are likely to be terminated in the very near future (the week of February 3-9, 2025) for such activity,” the lawsuit said. “They intend to represent a class of at least 6,000 current and former FBI agents and employees who participated in some manner in the investigation and prosecution of crimes and abuses of power by Donald Trump, or by those acting at his behest.”

The suit specifically seeks to enjoin the DOJ from “aggregation, storage, reporting, publication or dissemination of any list or compilation of information that would identify FBI agents and other personnel, and tie them directly to Jan. 6 and Mar-a-Lago case activities,” referring to the Capitol attack and the probe into President Trump’s retention of classified documents after leaving the White House in 2021.

The Justice Department, under leadership appointed by the Trump administration, has asked for information about potentially thousands of FBI employees across the country who were involved in work related to investigations stemming from the Jan. 6 attack.

According an email sent to the FBI workforce on Friday, and obtained by ABC News, the requested information was to be provided by Tuesday afternoon to the office of the acting Deputy Attorney General, Emil Bove, whose office will then conduct a review to determine if any “personnel actions” are warranted.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump is planning to attend the Super Bowl in New Orleans on Sunday, sources confirmed to ABC News.

The Super Bowl 59 matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles comes one month after a terrorist drove a truck down Bourbon Street in New Orleans on New Year’s Day, killing 14 people and injuring dozens more.

Officials said Monday that there’s no credible threats to the game or its many surrounding events.

There will be over 2,700 state, federal and local law enforcement members securing the game, according to officials.

The game gets a SEAR 1 rating — meaning there is a federal coordinator that is in charge of the security; in this case, it’s the special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations’ New Orleans field office. Drones are not allowed anywhere near the stadium.

“We have reviewed and re-reviewed all the details of what happened on Jan. 1,” NFL Chief of Security Cathy Lanier said. “We have reviewed and re-reviewed each of our roles within the overarching security plan, and we have reassessed and stressed tested — our timing, our communication protocols, our contingency measures and our emergency response plans multiple times over, over the past several weeks.”

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

ABC News’ Luke Barr contributed to this report.

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(MAITLAND, Fla.) — Marcus Jordan, the son of basketball legend Michael Jordan, was arrested on drug and resisting arrest charges in Florida after he got his vehicle stuck on train tracks, according to an arrest affidavit.

The 34-year-old Orlando resident was arrested shortly before 2 a.m. Tuesday in Maitland after an officer saw a blue Lamborghini SUV that appeared to be stopped on railroad tracks, according to the affidavit. The officer notified SunRail, the commuter rail system, to alert that there was a vehicle on the tracks and approached the SUV, the affidavit said.

The officer reported that he smelled alcohol coming from the vehicle and the driver had slurred speech and “red bloodshot and glassy eyes,” according to the affidavit.

Police learned the vehicle had allegedly just fled from a traffic stop initiated by the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office, according to the affidavit.

Marcus Jordan reportedly told the officer that he made a wrong turn and needed help getting his vehicle off the tracks, according to the affidavit. There was a passenger in the vehicle, according to the affidavit.

He allegedly told police he had “some drinks” that night but “repeated he was not over the legal limit,” according to the affidavit.

The officer arrested Marcus Jordan for driving under the influence after conducting field sobriety exercises, according to the affidavit.

A “clear plastic baggie with a white powdery substance” was found inside the front right pocket of his pants that ultimately tested positive for cocaine, according to the affidavit.

Marcus Jordan allegedly refused to cooperate when asked to get into the patrol vehicle, according to the affidavit.

He refused to provide breath samples at the Orange County DUI Center, according to the affidavit.

Marcus Jordan was issued a citation for driving under the influence and charged with possession of cocaine and resisting an officer without violence, according to the affidavit. He was booked into the Orange County jail without incident.

He did not answer reporters’ questions upon his release later Tuesday. Online court records do not list any attorney information for him.

Marcus Jordan is one of Michael Jordan’s five children.

He is a former college basketball player, having played for the University of Central Florida. The affidavit noted his current occupation as self-employed.

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(WASHINGTON) — Even as crews continued to comb the Potomac River for the remains of victims, the Army Corps of Engineers began on Monday the delicate task of removing from the frigid water the wreckage of American Airlines Flight 5342 and a military Black Hawk helicopter that collided in midair last week near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

With the roar of commercial jets taking off and landing from the airport’s nearby runway, and against the backdrop of the U.S. Capitol Building, the salvage operation began at the crack of dawn, officials said.

A large crane on a barge in the middle of the icy river had lifted one of the passenger plane’s engines and the aircraft’s crumpled fuselage from the river by noon, Col. Francis Pera of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Baltimore District, said at a news conference Monday afternoon. He said crews began lifting a wing of the passenger plane from the water at about 2:30 p.m.

The pieces were moved to a flatbed trailer to be taken on Tuesday to a nearby hanger where investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board will search for answers to what caused the deadliest U.S. air disaster in 16 years.

Pera said the goal for Tuesday is to bring the jet’s cockpit to the surface.

The crash killed 64 passengers and crew aboard the regional jet and the three-person flight crew aboard the Black Hawk, which was on a nighttime training mission when it crashed into the jet, officials said.

At least 55 victims have been removed from the river and positively identified by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, D.C. Assistant Fire Chief Gary Steen said at Monday afternoon’s news conference.

“Our process is committed to the dignified recovery of the remains of personnel and passengers of the flight,” Pera said.

During Monday’s operation, several work stoppages were ordered to recover multiple sets of remains amid the wreckage, Pera said. Those remains were removed and taken to the medical examiner for identification.

“Should any remains be found during our process, an automatic work stoppage happens and we will definitely begin to begin the proper coordination with the appropriate authorities. Reuniting those lost in the tragic incident is really what keeps us all going. We’ve got teams that have been working this since the beginning and we’re committed to making this happen,” Pera said.

He added that preparation for the salvage operation began on Friday, with divers equipped with multiple cameras surveying the submerged wreckage, focusing on large pieces of wreckage to remove from the river first. He said that during the survey on Saturday, remains were also recovered from the water.

“I just want to make sure that everyone is crystal clear in understanding that all salvage operations will be completed in close coordination with the Unified Command, all of our partners just really to ensure strict adherence to our central priority that the dignified recovery of missing flight passengers and personnel takes precedence,” Pera said at a news conference on Sunday.

Crews working with multiple agencies, including the Navy and 200 members of the U.S. Coast Guard, conducted rehearsals on the best way to remove the wreckage while simultaneously preparing for the discovery of more victims, according to Pera.

“We’ve got a wide debris field. Within that wide debris field, we’re employing different techniques to make sure we understand what’s in the water,” Pera said.

Family members of the crash victims were driven to the banks of the Potomac River on Sunday to pay respects to their lost loved ones. Among those killed in the crash were a civil rights attorney, a biology professor, several champion figure skaters and many others.

“These people have suffered a terrible loss and they’re grieving and I think that that’s exactly what you’d expect,” said Fire Chief John Donnelly of the Washington, D.C., Fire Department, who has visited with the families. “There’s a whole range of emotions in that. I would say they are a strong group of families that are focused on getting their loved ones back, and I think that’s the appropriate place to be at this point.”

If pieces of wreckage removed from the water contain remains, those pieces will be moved close to a barge and a tent will be erected so “we have full discretion and then we will bring in proper personnel to deal with at the time,” Pera explained.

Donnelly said that local teams will continue to search the shoreline and around the river to make sure that all the debris is collected.

“And if by chance as a member of the public you come across some of that, you should call 911 and report it to them and we will get it taken care of and get it examined,” Donnelly said.

Donnelly called the salvage and recovery mission a “tough operation” for those doing the work. He said each agency supporting the mission has peer counselors to help divers and others working to clear the river to cope with the grim task.

“For our first responders, all of the people that are coming in here to support, this is a tough operation — and if you are a responder listening to this, we want you to know that you can have a lot of different feelings about this, and there are people out here to help you,” Donnelly said.

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(KENOSHA, WI) — A 52-year-old man and his dog have been stabbed to death in their own basement after an alleged intruder broke into their home, police said.

The incident occurred on Monday morning at 11:42 a.m. when the Kenosha Police Department in Wisconsin responded to the 8500 block of 18th Avenue after the homeowner “called to report that someone possibly entered his home and that his back door was broken,” according to a statement from the Kenosha Police Department on Monday evening.

Police checked the home but nobody was found inside, authorities said. A complaint was taken and evidence was collected before they left the scene.

However, less than three hours later, police found themselves back at the same home regarding another burglary complaint.

“Around 2:32 PM, the Kenosha Police Department responded back to the same home for another burglary complaint. The caller reportedly observed blood outside the back door and the door forced open,” police said. “After arriving on scene, officers discovered a deceased male in the basement, with an apparent knife wound. They also located a dog with a similar wound, that passed away shortly after officers arrived.”

The Kenosha Police Department immediately deployed SWAT team members to clear the house and ensure nobody was hiding inside.

“As soon as the officers discovered that the home was a crime scene several detectives and officers were sent to start a homicide investigation. [A 41-year-old male] of Kenosha was quickly identified as a person of interest,” police said.

It is unclear if the two men had any prior connection to each other.

Following a brief investigation and search, the suspect was arrested approximately four hours later after he was spotted walking in alley near 50th Street and 22nd Avenue, police said.

The victim, a 52-year-old male, will not be identified at this time out of consideration for his family, authorities said following Tercek’s arrest.

“At the time of this release, the Kenosha Police Department is confident that there are no other persons of interest. The scene will continue to have a police presence for an undetermined amount of time,” the Kenosha Police Department said. “Our thoughts are with the victim’s family during this difficult time.”

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(LOS ANGELES) — The president of a mortgage lending company in California has been arrested on suspicion of murder after allegedly driving drunk through an intersection and killing an 88-year-old man, police said.

The traffic collision happened on Friday at approximately 6:15 p.m. when Orange County Sheriff’s deputies in California responded to a report of a traffic collision involving two vehicles at the intersection of Golden Lantern and Stonehill Drive in Dana Point, California – some 60 miles south of downtown Los Angeles, according to a statement from the Orange County Sheriff’s Department.

“Deputies arrived and discovered a Land Rover SUV and a Ford Transit van had been involved in a head-on collision,” police said. “Based on preliminary investigation, the Land Rover was traveling westbound on Stonehill Drive and turned left against a red arrow signal in front of the Ford Transit van traveling eastbound on Stonehill Drive.”

The driver of the transit van was taken to the hospital where he was treated for serious but non-life-threatening injuries.

However, an 88-year-old passenger of the transit van, Melvin Joseph Weibel of Dana Point, “succumbed to his injuries sustained in the collision and was pronounced deceased at the scene,” according to authorities.

The 48-year-old woman who was driving the Land Rover — Serene Francie Rosenberg of Dana Point — was immediately arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence and booked into the Orange County Jail for murder and DUI causing injury.

Police confirmed that she had three prior convictions, but did not offer details on the charges that led to those convictions.

The company she works for, OCMBC, expressed its “deepest sympathies following the tragic traffic accident that occurred in Dana Point on January 31, 2025.”

“Our thoughts are with everyone affected by this heartbreaking event and we intend to monitor the situation closely, responding with care and responsibility in accordance with our company’s core values,” OCMBC said.

The company also announced that Rosenberg had been placed on administrative leave, and John Hamel, former Chief Capital Markets Officer, had “assumed the permanent role of President,” the company said.

“This leadership transition ensures continued stability and operational excellence,” said OCMBC.

“This has been a difficult time for everyone affected by this tragic event, and our hearts go out to those impacted,” said Rabi Aziz, CEO of OCMBC.

Meanwhile, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department’s Major Accident Investigation Team is investigating the collision and is asking for anyone with additional details or who may have witnessed the collision to contact the Orange County Sheriff’s Department’s Traffic Bureau.

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