Man arrested for killing Wendy’s co-worker, roommate in fatal stabbings on Long Island: Police
WABC
(NEW YORK) — A man was arrested Friday after police say he fatally stabbed his roommate and then his co-worker at a Wendy’s on Long Island.
Rony Alvarenga, 22, was charged Saturday with two counts of murder after he turned himself in following the killings of the 42-year-old co-worker and 32-year-old roommate, Nassau County Police Department Det. Lt. George Darienzo told reporters.
The names of the victims, both women, have yet to be released.
Alvarenga allegedly killed his roommate around 9:30 p.m. on Thursday inside the Valley Stream house they lived in, according to Darienzo.
Hours later, police got a call from a Wendy’s in Island Park about a man with a knife and when they arrived, they found the 42-year-old victim and declared her dead at the scene.
As officers collected clues, including surveillance video, they received a phone call from Alvarenga where he allegedly claimed he had killed someone that night. Officers responded to a 7-Eleven location where Alvarenga turned himself in, according to police.
Darienzo said that officers had learned that another person may have been killed that night and went to the the suspect’s home. When they arrived they found the slain roommate.
Alvarenga is originally from El Salvador and has been living in the United States undocumented for the last 10 years, according to officials.
The victims’ identities were pending, but Darienzo told reporters that it is believed the Wendy’s worker had two children in the U.S.
Matthew Perry of the television show ‘The Kennedys – After Camelot’ speaks onstage during the REELZChannel portion of the 2017 Winter Television Critics Association Press Tour at the Langham Hotel, Jan. 13, 2017, in Pasadena, Calif. (Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)
(LOS ANGELES) — A woman reportedly known as the “Ketamine Queen,” who admitted to providing the ketamine that killed Matthew Perry, should serve 15 years in prison for her “cold callousness and disregard for life,” federal prosecutors said in a new court filing ahead of her sentencing.
Defense attorneys for Jasveen Sangha, who has been behind bars since her arrest in August 2024 in connection with the 54-year-old “Friends” actor’s fatal overdose, asked for time served, according to a court filing.
Sangha pleaded guilty last year to one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, three counts of distribution of ketamine, and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death or serious bodily injury. She admitted to working with another dealer to provide Perry with dozens of vials of ketamine in the weeks before his death in October 2023, including the ketamine that killed him, according to the plea agreement.
She also admitted in the plea agreement to selling ketamine in connection with another overdose death, prosecutors said. The victim, Cody McLaury, died hours after Sangha sold him four vials of ketamine in August 2019, according to the DOJ.
In a sentencing memorandum filed on Wednesday, prosecutors said Sangha ran a “high-volume drug trafficking business out of her North Hollywood residence,” where she stored, packaged and distributed drugs, including ketamine and methamphetamine since at least 2019. They said she continued to sell “dangerous drugs” even after learning she sold ketamine that contributed to the deaths of McLaury and Perry.
“She didn’t care and kept selling,” prosecutors wrote. “Defendant’s actions show a cold callousness and disregard for life. She chose profits over people, and her actions have caused immense pain to the victims’ families and loved ones.
“That defendant had the opportunity to stop after realizing the impact of her dealing — but simply chose not to,” warranting a “significant” sentence, they continued.
The defense, meanwhile, said Sangha should receive a sentence of time served due to her “demonstrated rehabilitation.”
“She has maintained sustained and exemplary sobriety, and actively engaged in recovery-oriented and rehabilitative programming while in custody, and has tremendously strong family and community support to facilitate successful reentry and reduce the risk of recidivism,” her attorneys, Mark Geragos and Alexandra Kazarian, wrote in a sentencing memorandum filed on Wednesday.
Sangha faces a maximum sentence of 65 years in prison. She is scheduled to be sentenced in Los Angeles on April 8.
In addition to Sangha, four other people were charged and pleaded guilty in connection with Perry’s death — the other dealer, Erik Fleming; Kenneth Iwamasa, Perry’s live-in personal assistant; and two doctors, Mark Chavez and Salvador Plasencia.
Prosecutors said Sangha worked with Fleming to distribute ketamine to Perry, and that in October 2023, they sold the actor 51 vials of ketamine that were provided to Iwamasa.
“Leading up to Perry’s death, Iwamasa repeatedly injected Perry with the ketamine that Sangha supplied to Fleming,” the DOJ said in a press release last year. “Specifically, on October 28, 2023, Iwamasa injected Perry with at least three shots of Sangha’s ketamine, which caused Perry’s death.”
Iwamasa pleaded guilty in August 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine causing death and is scheduled to be sentenced on April 22.
Fleming pleaded guilty in August 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death and is set to be sentenced on April 29.
Chavez and Plasencia have also been convicted for their roles in what prosecutors called a conspiracy to illegally distribute ketamine to Perry.
Chavez, who once ran a ketamine clinic, pleaded guilty in October 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine and was sentenced to eight months home confinement in December 2025.
Plasencia, who briefly treated Perry prior to his death, pleaded guilty in July 2025 to four counts of distribution of ketamine and was sentenced to 30 months in prison in December 2025.
U.S. President Donald Trump waves as he prepares to board Air Force One at Beijing Capital International Airport on May 15, 2026 in Beijing, China. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Department of Justice is finalizing a deal to launch a so-called “Truth and Justice Commission” and establish a compensation fund of $1,776,000,000 to pay claims made by alleged victims of government “weaponization” in exchange for President Donald Trump dropping his ongoing lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service, sources told ABC News.
Sources told ABC News that the proposed deal — which is likely to face legal hurdles and has already been criticized by Democrats as a “slush fund” for Trump’s allies — arose after months of deliberations between the White House and DOJ officials who originally attempted to craft a legal justification for the settlement to compensate Trump directly.
Internally, DOJ lawers believed they could ignore the conflict of interest outright, privately arguing that Trump has both the right to sue as a private citizen and the power to command the executive branch as president, according to sources familiar with their discussions.
Advocating a centuries-old legal principle known as the “rule of necessity,” DOJ lawyers have argued that no alternative existed other than letting the lawsuit proceed with Trump acting as the plaintiff while being directly in charge of the defendants — the IRS and Treasury — according to sources.
Sources said that plan was ultimately scuttled in favor of the $1.776 billion compensation fund — with the figure being a nod to the nation’s founding — as the judge overseeing Trump’s IRS lawsuit began to raise issues with Trump suing the very government he leads. In an order last month, U.S. District Judge Katheen Williams ordered Trump’s lawyers in the case and the Department of Justice to submit court filings by next week to justify whether both sides of the case were sufficiently adverse for the matter to proceed.
Terms of the proposed compensation arrangement could change before the deal is finalized, sources said.
Judge Williams also appointed a group of prominent attorneys — including a former solicitor general as well as a federal judge — to weigh in on the case.
In a court filing this week, the attorneys identified serious issues with the lawsuit, arguing that Trump has “extraordinary” control over the defendants in the case and that the “circumstances raise the specter that Defendants and their attorneys may instead be operating at the President’s direction.”
“Additionally, since taking office, President Trump has significantly expanded the President’s oversight and control over the Attorney General and DOJ, including in ways that blur the line between fidelity to the President’s policy priorities and fidelity to the President himself,” the filing said.
Trump sued the IRS after a government contractor pleaded guilty in 2023 to stealing the tax information of Trump and other wealthy Americans and leaking it to media outlets in 2019 and 2020.
With Judge Williams scrutinizing the case, sources said that DOJ officials formulated the proposal to create a compensation fund on the condition that Trump drops the lawsuit as well as two civil claims for $230 million related to the Russia collusion investigation he faced during his first term in office and the 2022 search of his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Trump himself would not be eligible for payment from the fund for those three dropped claims, though entities associated with the president are not barred from filing claims, the sources said.
Sources said the “President Donald J. Trump Truth and Justice Commission” would include five commissioners — four of whom are appointed by the attorney general — that Trump would have the right to remove without cause. The commission would also be under no obligation to disclose the process for awarding the nearly $2 billion.
It is unclear how Judge Williams might respond to the proposed settlement — which has yet been disclosed to the court — though DOJ lawyers believe the settlement would not require any approval from the court.
Democratic lawmakers have already raised concerns about the reported settlement and called on Congress to pass legislation to restrict the use of taxpayer dollars for the proposed compensation fund.
“It’s outright corruption. What we’re seeing here is outright corruption,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said Friday. “We’re looking at a billion dollars for a ballroom; $1.7 billion for a slush fund for the president’s friends.”
Across the aisle, Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick suggested the matter could end up before the Supreme Court.
“I don’t even know how that’s allowable to happen,” Fitzpatrick told ABC News regarding the compensation fund. “It sounds like a question our colleagues across the street are going to have to resolve pretty quickly.”
The FAA Air Traffic Control tower at Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) in Newark, New Jersey, US, (Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
(NEWARK, N.J.) — Ground stop briefly in place, control tower evacuated at Newark Airport after reports of smoke
A ground stop was briefly in place on Monday morning at Newark Liberty International Airport, where an air traffic control tower was being evacuated due to reports of smoke, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
An FAA spokesperson said there was no fire and the controllers evacuated the tower due to a burning smell from an elevator.
“Arrivals and departures are temporarily paused at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey after air traffic controllers evacuated the tower because of a burning smell coming from an elevator,” the FAA said in a statement. “It happened around 7:30 a.m. local time on Monday, March 23.”
