Police expect to charge three men for the killing of an 18-year-old in Allentown. Elijah Rodriguez was found shot in the head around 1:30 Tuesday morning in the 1200 block of Turner Street. Rodriguez died later yesterday morning at the hospital. Police say Pedro Acevedo, Nikolas Acevedo and Antonio Rivera will face charges of murder, robbery and conspiracy. A motive for the killing has not been revealed. Rodriguez's killing is the third homicide of the year in Allentown. The first two were determined to be justified killings by Lehigh County DA Jim Martin.
A second man has been arrested for a violent home invasion that happened almost three years ago. The Lehigh County Sheriff's Department arrested 28-year-old Buddy Wright Jr. for an April 2017 home invasion on Cherry Tree Crossing in Upper Macungie Township. Investigators say Wright and Rennie Watts forced their way into the home of Brien Martinez, attacked him, threw him into the bathtub and began to bind him with duct tape. When Martinez resisted further, Watts and Wright allegedly began to stab him. Watts has already pleaded guilty to charges. A third, unidentified, man also took part in the attack.
A Lehigh County man faces charges of assault, child endangerment and DUI after a Monday incident. State troopers say they tried to pull over 56-year-old Dean Bucks after his truck almost collided with a trooper's vehicle between Claussville Road and Route 100. Bucks allegedly refused to stop until he pulled into driveway, resisted orders from the trooper and then bit him on the thigh after he was hit with a Taser. Other troopers, who say they smelled alcohol on the man, responded and helped take him into custody. The man's youn son was inside of the vehicle the entire time this was going on. Bucks is being held on $100,000 bail.
A community theater in Carbon County is celebrating quite a milestone as they come upon their 50th anniversary. The Zion Opera Workshop, formed out of the Zion United Church of Christ in Lehighton, has been putting on performances since 1970. ZOW is set to perform Mary Poppins starting this Thursday through Sunday. All four afternoon matinees for the show are sold out, which is the first time ever for the theater.
A possible case of coronavirus is under investigation in Philadelphia. The city Health Department says no cases have been confirmed but a person is being tested for possible coronavirus infection.
Up until now, all testing for coronavirus across the country had to first go through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That has changed now that testing has begun at a state-run lab in Exton, Chester County. State Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine says it's a big deal. "This is a very important step for us as we continue to work to provide timely updates to Pennsylvanians," Levine says. Levine adds the state has the resources to quarantine people if necessary, but she declined to elaborate on any specific plan.
Attorney General Josh Shapiro says his office is seeing an increase in all types of scams, especially phone scams, across Pennsylvania. Shapiro says over the past three years his office has returned about $15 million to consumers who've been defrauded. Many of them, Shapiro says, are older Pennsylvanians. "We have handled 67,000 complaints, of which about 25,000 complaints dealt with seniors here in Pennsylvania," Shapiro says. Shapiro points out that agencies like the IRS never contact consumers over the phone. This is national consumer protection week.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy is in New York City today to undergo kidney surgery. Lt. Gov. Sheila Oliver is now Acting Governor until further notice as Murphy has a tumor removed from his left kidney at an unannounced location. The procedure is called a partial nephrectomy and will take a few hours to finish. Murphy says his doctors believe his prognosis is good and adds the only reason he's having the operation in New York is because that's where his longtime doctor is based.