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  • Vincent Fiordilino, Gilbert, Arizona: Toddler Declared Dead, Found Breathing Hours Later in Morgue💔

    Vincent Fiordilino is home with his family. Nearly nine months ago, a doctor in Gilbert, Arizona, told his parents the 18-month-old was dead. He wasn’t. Vincent survived, but his mother and the family’s attorney say he now has a severe brain injury.

    It began Feb. 8, Super Bowl Sunday. The family was hosting a party at their house. His mother, Alexus Fiordilino, walked out back and found Vincent floating face down in the swimming pool. His father, Angelo, started CPR while relatives called 911.

    First responders rushed the boy to Mercy Gilbert Medical Center. He arrived at the emergency room around 6:04 p.m. Hospital staff kept trying to bring him back. At 6:20 p.m., Dr. Aryan Toosi pronounced him dead after talking with his parents.

    Alexus, 30, says the doctor told them Vincent’s blood pH was too far off for him to survive. She says they were told more treatment would not lead to a real recovery. She and her husband agreed to stop. They believed the doctors had done everything they could. “Infuriated. I feel like I was grossly misled,” she said in an interview published Oct. 23.

    When the family hugged Vincent goodbye, some relatives wondered if he was still breathing. Alexus says hospital staff told them it was agonal breathing, the kind of gasping that can happen when someone is dying. Police records also noted apparent gasps after Vincent was pronounced dead.

    Vincent was taken to a cold room at the hospital to wait for the medical examiner. More than five hours after he was declared dead, a transporter from the medical examiner’s office showed up. The transporter saw that the boy was still breathing. The family got a call, and Vincent was sent to Phoenix Children’s Hospital.

    “My husband and I just screamed in relief,” Alexus said. “We were praising the Lord. We were crying. To go from hearing he was gone and then finding out he isn’t gone, it’s an unexplainable feeling.”

    Being alive did not mean being okay. Vincent is home now, but the family’s attorney, John Brewer, says he is severely brain-injured and will need care for the rest of his life. Alexus says her son is getting better, though the road is not simple.

    The family is thinking about legal action against Dr. Toosi and Dignity Health, which runs Mercy Gilbert Medical Center. Toosi’s attorney, Scott Holden, said the doctor’s thoughts are with Vincent and his family and that he wishes the boy continued healing. Holden would not talk about the care itself, citing the pending legal matter and patient privacy laws. Dignity Health called the case “heartbreaking” and said patient safety is its top priority. It also declined to discuss details.

    Questions have followed the family, too. Gilbert police recommended child abuse charges against Vincent’s parents. Police records say the parents admitted using marijuana earlier that day. In July, the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office decided not to charge them, saying the evidence did not meet the standard needed for a conviction.

    Police also passed information about the hospital’s handling of Vincent to the Arizona Attorney General’s Office. That office had not decided whether to take it up. Police said their own investigation did not find probable cause for a crime by medical staff. A GoFundMe has been set up to help the family with expenses.

  • Nadine Jett, Valley Center, California: Foster Mom Lay Buried Behind Her Home While Family Was Told She Died in Mexico

    Nadine Jett’s body sat in a hole behind her own house for more than a year. Her relatives were told she had died in Mexico. Prosecutors say that was a lie. Jett was a 65-year-old attorney who lived on a rural property in Valley Center, California, and they say her foster son killed her.

    That foster son is Cedric Von Ferdinand, 34. He was arrested in Los Angeles County on Oct. 20, 2026, and charged with first-degree murder. Prosecutors say he gave Jett a deadly dose of fentanyl so he could take over her estate. They also say he then used her name to get money and property.

    Jett learned she had cancer in August 2023. When she found out she needed chemotherapy, Von Ferdinand offered to move back into her home. San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan says he wasn’t there to help. Prosecutors say it was a way to get his hands on her finances.

    Jett was last seen alive on Jan. 14, 2024, after a chemo appointment. Investigators believe she was killed between that day and Jan. 17. Three days after she was last seen, prosecutors say, Von Ferdinand told her caretaker that Jett had died and the caretaker was no longer needed. He also canceled her upcoming medical appointments. Other relatives heard she had gone to Mexico and died there.

    Her loved ones didn’t buy it. They couldn’t get a death certificate. In June 2024, several of her foster children reported her missing. They also told authorities about strange real estate deals involving her properties.

    On July 16, 2025, sheriff’s detectives searched Jett’s land on Oak Creek Road. About 30 yards from her house, they found human remains in a hole. The body was partially mummified and wrapped in a bedsheet. Investigators learned someone had been asked to dig a hole about six feet by six feet around the time she disappeared. An autopsy found she died of acute fentanyl toxicity, and her death was ruled a homicide. Stephan said testing showed a massive amount of acetylfentanyl, a substance tied to illegally made fentanyl.

    Jett’s foster daughters, including sisters Tiffany Lucci and Bianca Lucci, came to the news conference where the charge was announced. Stephan called the case a betrayal of a woman who took in a child in need. “She was that mom we needed,” Bianca Lucci said. “She gave us a fair chance at life.”

    The murder charge carries special-circumstance allegations that Jett was killed for money and by poison. Von Ferdinand already faced felony charges for grand theft, identity theft, forgery and filing false documents. Prosecutors say the losses topped $500,000. His arraignment was delayed, and a new court date is set for Nov. 5. He is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court.

  • Walter Koenig, North Hollywood, California: Chekov Actor Dies at 90 With His Daughter and Niece at His Side💔

    Walter Koenig spent his last night at home. His daughter, Danielle, and his niece were with him when he died in North Hollywood, a neighborhood of Los Angeles. He was 90 years old.

    His representative, Zachery McGinnis, announced the news on Monday. He said Koenig died of old age. Koenig had turned 90 only last month, on Sept. 14.

    Most people knew him as Ensign Pavel Chekov, the young Russian navigator on the Starship Enterprise. He played the part on the original “Star Trek” series, which ran on NBC from 1966 to 1969. He joined the cast in the second season, in 1967. Chekov was proud, loyal and eager, and he spoke with a heavy Russian accent.

    The timing of the character mattered. This was the Cold War, and here was a Russian officer sitting on the bridge next to Americans. The show used him to say that old rivals could work together. Koenig carried that idea for more than five decades.

    Koenig was born in Chicago in 1936. His parents had come to America from Lithuania. He graduated from UCLA in 1958 and then studied acting for two years at the Neighborhood Playhouse in New York. In the early 1960s he picked up TV work on shows like “Mr. Novak” and “Ben Casey.”

    “Star Trek” lasted only three seasons, but the story did not end there. Reruns, fan conventions and movies kept it alive, and Koenig went back to Chekov in seven films, starting with “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” in 1979. He wrote a book about the role, “Chekov’s Enterprise,” in 1980. He also played Alfred Bester, a senior Psi Cop, on “Babylon 5.”

    His closest friend from those years was George Takei, who played Hikaru Sulu. The two met on the Enterprise set in the 1960s and stayed friends for nearly six decades. Koenig was the best man when Takei married Brad Altman in 2008. “My heart is heavy,” Takei wrote after the news broke. He called Koenig a writer, a teacher, a thoughtful man and a loyal friend.

    Koenig married actress Judy Levitt in 1965, and they stayed together until she died in 2022. His son, Andrew Koenig, who was known for the sitcom “Growing Pains,” died in 2010 at age 41. Koenig leaves behind his daughter, Danielle.

    McGinnis said Koenig’s legacy goes well beyond the screen. He pointed to the countless convention appearances where Koenig met fans and treated each one with kindness. With Koenig gone, William Shatner, 95, and Takei, 89, are the only two main cast members of the original crew still living.

  • Cassidi Porter, Eatonton, Georgia: Dies in Moving-Day Crash as Her Two Baby Sons Are Hurt💔

    Cassidi Autumn Porter was 28. She died Monday morning on State Route 212 in Eatonton, Georgia, while her family was in the middle of a move. Her two little boys, 9 months and 21 months old, were hurt in the same crash. So was her mother.

    The family was heading from Daytona Beach, Florida, to Conyers, a community in the Atlanta area. They never got there. “They were literally in the process today of moving from Daytona Beach to Conyers,” Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills said.

    The crash happened around 7:20 a.m. Alisha Kaye Porter, 51, Cassidi’s mother, was driving the family’s 2025 Hyundai Palisade north on the highway. Steven Ray Reynolds, 51, died in the crash too. Four other people were hurt, including the two boys and their grandmother.

    The children and their grandmother were taken to Atrium Health Navicent Medical Center in Macon. Sills said the boys’ injuries did not look life-threatening at first. He added that he did not know how bad they really were. Alisha Porter was hurt more seriously, he said.

    Here is how the sheriff says it unfolded. A vehicle pulling a boat on a trailer was stopped in the southbound lane. The driver was waiting to turn onto Twin Bridges Road. He was letting the Hyundai go by first.

    Then a 2005 Chevrolet Silverado came up behind him. The driver, 19-year-old Elijah Brooks Malcom of Good Hope, pulled around the stopped vehicle and hit the Hyundai head-on. “He was basically waiting for the Hyundai to come by when (Malcom) for whatever reason came around the man who was waiting to turn, and hit the Porters’ car head-on,” Sills said. “And that’s according to three witnesses at the scene.”

    The boat trailer was not hit. Its driver was not hurt. Malcom left the scene in a private vehicle to get medical care, and the sheriff said he did not know how badly Malcom was hurt. Sills said Malcom will be charged with misdemeanor homicide by vehicle.

    Eatonton sits in Putnam County, in Georgia’s Lake Country region. It is southeast of Atlanta and northeast of Macon. For now, Cassidi Porter’s sons and mother are still being treated in Macon, and the full list of their injuries is not yet known.

  • Charlton Wallace Death, Toledo, Ohio: 26-Year-Old Dies After Rollover Crash on Central Avenue💔

    Charlton Wallace never made it out of the hospital. He was 26. He died from the injuries he suffered in a rollover crash on Central Avenue near Cove Boulevard in Toledo, Ohio.

    Toledo police say Charlton was driving on Central Avenue when he tried to make a right turn. He was in the left lane at the time. That’s the part investigators keep coming back to.

    Another car was coming up on the road at that moment. Police say that driver, a 29-year-old, was heading west in the curb lane. The two vehicles met at the turn, and the other car hit the passenger side of Charlton’s.

    The impact flipped Charlton’s car. It rolled over, and the crash turned serious in a matter of seconds.

    Three people were taken to the hospital after it happened. Charlton was hurt badly, and he later died there. His family and friends are now dealing with a loss nobody saw coming.

    Another person from the crash is still in the hospital. Police say that person has life-threatening injuries. There is no word yet on how that person is doing.

    Toledo police are still investigating. They are working to figure out exactly how the two vehicles ended up in the same spot at the same moment. Until they do, a lot of people are left with one question about those last few seconds on Central Avenue.

    Charlton Wallace was 26 years old. Our condolences go out to his family and friends, and to everyone who knew him.

  • Gravelle, Love County, Oklahoma: Two Repair Workers Were Under a Parked Semi When Another Truck Hit It💔

    John Gravelle, 37, of Ardmore, Oklahoma, was working under a parked semi on Interstate 35 when another semi hit it Friday night. He did not survive. Neither did the second service worker next to him, a person police have not named.

    It happened in Love County. The parked truck was on the shoulder, and the two men were under it doing repairs. That is a normal day for a service worker. The truck breaks down, and they come to it, wherever it sits.

    Then a second semi ran into the back of that parked truck. Both workers were killed.

    Donald Freeman, 79, of Omaha, Nebraska, also died in the crash. That makes three people dead from one hit on a highway shoulder.

    The driver of the parked semi was hurt. No details about those injuries have been shared.

    Gravelle was 37 and lived in Ardmore. Freeman was 79 and came from Omaha. The second worker’s name has not been made public, so nobody outside the family knows who that person was.

    For the families, Friday started like any other day. Now they are planning for the worst week of their lives.

    What caused the second truck to hit the first one has not been made public. Our thoughts are with the families of John Gravelle, Donald Freeman and the second worker.

  • Semaj Coleman Death, Norfolk, Virginia: Norfolk State Senior Dies in Parking Lot Shooting Police Call Accidental

    Semaj Richelle Coleman was a senior at Norfolk State University, studying Health Services Management. She was 22. On Saturday night, she was shot in a parking lot in Norfolk, Virginia, and she died at a hospital.

    The shooting happened in the 5700 block of East Virginia Beach Boulevard. Around 11:45 p.m., officers went to Sentara Norfolk General Hospital, where Semaj had been brought in with a gunshot wound. She did not survive her injuries.

    Semaj was from Mollusk, a small community in Lancaster County on Virginia’s Northern Neck. At school, she took part in the Spartans Promise to Persist with Purpose program. She had also just been inducted into the National Association for Allied Health Professions.

    Students who knew her say she was bright and caring. The university’s president’s office called her an active member of the Spartan community. She was close to finishing her degree.

    Police say their early findings show the shooting was an accident. A 23-year-old man, Matthew B. Croslin of Newport News, is charged in connection with her death. He faces involuntary manslaughter and firearm charges. He is being held without bond at the Norfolk City Jail.

    Her family is hurting. They asked people to keep Semaj’s mother, Melody, in their thoughts. They are mourning a daughter, a sister, a granddaughter, a niece and a friend.

    The school says counseling and support are open to students, faculty and staff. It also says there is no known threat to the campus. The shooting happened off campus.

    Police are still investigating, and they have not shared more about what happened in that parking lot. Our thoughts are with Semaj’s family and everyone at Norfolk State who knew her.

  • Alex Killoren Death, Pella, Iowa: Thrown From Rolling Truck, 29-Year-Old Dies at Local Hospital💔

    Alex Eugene Killoren was thrown from his pickup truck as it rolled on a country road south of Pella, Iowa, late Saturday night. He was 29 years old. He lived in Knoxville.

    The crash happened at 11:59 p.m. on Highway T-17, just east of 216th Place. Alex was driving a 2012 Chevrolet Silverado west on that stretch of road. In one more minute, it would have been Sunday.

    There is a curve in the road at that spot, and the truck did not make it around. It left the road and dropped into a ditch. Then it went airborne over a drainage culvert.

    When the Silverado came down, it flipped. It rolled over at least one time. Alex was thrown out of the truck during the rollover. Troopers say he was not wearing a seat belt.

    Pella Community Ambulance crews got to him and fought to keep him alive. They took him to Pella Regional Health Center. He died there from his injuries.

    That is about all that has been made public so far. No one has said what caused the truck to leave the road. The Iowa State Patrol says the crash is still under investigation.

    For now, a family in Knoxville is dealing with the loss of a 29-year-old son, brother, or friend, and a lot of people around Marion County are hearing the news. Our condolences go out to everyone who knew Alex. May they find comfort in each other in the days ahead.

  • Ray Murray Death, Lake Charles, Louisiana: Driver Dies in Lafayette After Being Moved Between Hospitals Following 3 A.M. Crash💔

    Ray Murray was still alive when he left the crash scene in Lake Charles early Saturday morning. He never made it home.

    The wreck happened just after 3 a.m. at Gerstner Memorial and Third Street. Two vehicles were involved. Murray, a Lake Charles man, was one of the drivers.

    He was first taken to Lake Charles Memorial Hospital. Doctors there sent him on to a hospital in Lafayette, where he could get more treatment.

    That move did not change the outcome. Murray was pronounced dead at Lafayette General Hospital.

    Think about how that night went for him. A crash at an intersection, a hospital in his own city, then another one in a different town. People worked to save him at every stop. It was not enough.

    For the people who know Murray, the news came with no warning. One minute he was a neighbor, a friend, a family member. Then he was gone.

    The Lake Charles Police Department’s Traffic Division is looking into the crash. No cause has been made public. What happened in the seconds before the two vehicles hit is still unclear.

    Our thoughts are with Ray Murray’s family and friends in Lake Charles.

  • Micah Bacchus, Houston, Texas: Big Sister Defends “Little Brother” After DJ Dies Leaving a Party💔

    His big sister wants people to know one thing about Micah Bacchus. He was her little brother, and he was loved. She said it plainly after the 36-year-old DJ died in a crash in Houston early Sunday morning.

    Bacchus went by DJ Micah B. Police have said little so far, but the basic facts are clear. A little before 3 a.m., at about 2:39, his vehicle left the road along the 9000 block of Humble Westfield Road, near McKnight Lane.

    The vehicle rolled several times and ended up in a ditch. It also hit a pole. Bacchus was pronounced dead at the scene.

    Reports say he was a DJ on his way home from a party when it happened. That is the part that sticks. He had spent the night doing the work he was known for, and he never made it back.

    The woman who said she was his big sister did not stay quiet. She spoke up for him and asked people to be kind. Her family is still trying to take it in, she said, and she did not want strangers judging her brother while they grieve.

    Those close to him described him as phenomenal, loving and deeply cherished. His mother is mourning a son who won’t walk through her door again. His fiancée is mourning the life they planned to build.

    Authorities are still looking into what led to the crash. For now, his family has questions and no answers. They have a name to protect, and they are asking everyone to remember Micah Bacchus as the man his loved ones knew.