Surveillance video outside the Bronx home of Ramarley Graham shows police struggling to enter the residence and kicking in a door moments before an NYPD officer shot and killed the unarmed 18-year-old in his bathroom. While surveillance footage from a neighboring home showed Graham running down the street with police pursuing, this footage obtained by WPIX 11 shows Graham casually entering his house. Seconds later two NYPD officers with their guns drawn attempt to break down the door. more ›

A Bronx mom has been charged after her six-year-old son was given an accidental, lethal dose of methadone—which had been stored in a cold medicine bottle. Raquel DeLeon, 36, was charged Thursday with reckless endangerment in the death of Carlos Rios Jr. DeLeon, who has two prior drug arrests, told police she has a prescription for methadone, but it is unclear why she was storing it in the DayQuil bottle. "As soon as he got sick, he was dizzy, he got in a coma and he died," the boy's maternal grandmother, Letty Muentes, told CBS. more ›

Ian Abercrombie, the veteran British character actor best known for playing Elaine Benes' boss Mr. Pitt on Seinfeld, has died. Abercrombie appeared in dozens of other parts over his 50-plus-year career. He was 77. more ›

The boyfriend of a woman whose one-year-old was found dead this week has been arrested and charged with his murder. On Wednesday, baby Richard Fludd was discovered unresponsive in the living room floor of a third-floor apartment where he lived on East 232nd Street. Reginald Smith, 24, now faces charges of murder and assault after the Medical Examiner determined the cause of death to be homicide. more ›

Police have charged a suspect in the fatal beating of a 59-year-old Bronx father who was mugged for $15. Devon Downs, 29, was charged with second-degree murder and robbery in the death of former cab driver Bimal Chanda last fall. An accomplice who also joined in on beating Chanda with a metal object has not been caught yet. “The family is really happy to hear about the arrest, they never thought this day would come,” said Chanda family friend and spokesman Mohammed Ali. “Detectives told us it was a really hard case and that it was hard to identify the suspects.” more ›

Police are investigating the death of a one-year-old boy who was found unconscious in his Bronx home yesterday. Baby Richard Flood was discovered unresponsive by his mother’s boyfriend in the living room floor of a third-floor apartment where he lived on East 232nd Street at 11:25 a.m. Wednesday. Sources told NBC that the boy had a cast on his leg from a broken leg, bruises on his face, and cigarette burns on his arms. more ›

The legendary performer Etta James has died at the age of 73. In 2010 she was diagnosed with leukemia, and according to CNN her longtime friend and manager, Lupe De Leon, has now confirmed her death. She was also suffering from dementia and hepatitis C at the time of her death. James was at a hospital in Riverside, California when she died. more ›

The Brooklyn man who allegedly confessed to cops that he killed a 73-year-old woman by setting her on fire in a Prospect Heights elevator was arraigned yesterday—and more details about that alleged confession came to light. Police claim that Jerome Isaac boasted at the time of his arrest that he would have gotten away with the murder of Deloris Gillespie if he hadn't turned himself in: “If the video wasn’t there, you would still be looking for me,” he declared, despite having burned half his face during the attack. more ›

Danny Evins, the lightning-rod founder of the down-home restaurant chain Cracker Barrel, died on Sunday of bladder cancer at age 76. While his chicken and dumplings will live on in Interstate rest stops across the country, here in New York City, he might be best remembered for some less savory offerings. more ›

A married Inwood couple were found dead of an apparent murder-suicide in their apartment yesterday. The bodies of Jesus Soto, 56, and Yanet Soto, 54, were found in their bedroom by the wife’s live-in daughter and her 12-year-old granddaughter about 11:20 a.m. in their apartment at 24 Arden Street. Police believe that Jesus murdered wife Yanet, then purposefully took an overdose of pills. According to the Post, Yanet was found with deep cuts on her face, which was nearly sliced from ear to ear. more ›

A seven-year-old boy was killed, and seven others were injured in a three-alarm fire in a Brooklyn apartment building early this morning. The fire broke out at 1:40 a.m. at a 3-story apartment at 1066 Decatur Street and a neighboring building in Bushwick. According to police, Joel Smith, 7, was found unconscious inside and died at the scene: "There was a lot of smoke coming out of the house and then I saw a shirtless man come out of the house with his son in his arms, his son was dead," witness Johnny Pache told the Post. "He was crying a whole bunch. He put his son in a car near-by while the ambulances showed up." more ›

Last year, a severely malnourished 4-year-old girl—weighing a scant 18 pounds—was found dead in her Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment with bruises all over her body. A blame war ensued over the death of Marchella Pierce, but mother Carlotta Brett-Pierce was arrested and charged with her death. And a detective testified at a hearing yesterday that Brett-Pierce admitted to him that she tied up the little girl several times: “Her words were, ‘She was acting crazy and her little ass was wilding out,’” said Detective Matthew Lamendola. more ›

Yesterday, police responding to reports of a jumper in Bed-Stuy instead found a young mother cradling her fatally wounded two-year-old daughter while babbling incoherently. The little girl, Cathryn Nwegbo, had wounds to her neck, “major bleeding to the back of her head,” and appeared to have "evidence of strangulation." She was pronounced dead at Woodhull Medical Center. The mother, 29-year-old Brandis Nwegbo, was reportedly babbling things about the girl being possessed by demons: “The monsters are coming from my baby. God wasn’t there for her, so I had to save her.” She has since been taken to Woodhull for a psychiatric evaluation. more ›

An 18-year-old Harlem teen was shot dead early Friday morning outside his girlfriend's birthday party by an alleged romantic rival. Walter Sumpter was found with a gunshot wound to the chest outside 254 W. 154th St. just after midnight Friday. The shooting took place outside his girlfriend's 17th birthday party at a local community center: “It all took place outside. The girl wasn’t there, but it looks like a friend of the gunman called him and told him [Sumpter] was there,” a source told the News. more ›

Some sad news to end this week: Violet, the matriarch of a family of red-tailed hawks in Washington Square Park and beloved star of the Times's "hawk-cam", has died following surgery to amputate her injured foot. She was believed to be about five years old. more ›

[Update Below] The family of the 73-year-old woman who died after she was set on fire in a Prospect Heights elevator earlier this month still haven't been able to bury her—and even the people who pledged to help them haven't done so. The family of Deloris Gillespie, who was allegedly killed by Jerome Isaac, spoke out yesterday about the hardships they've gone through since the horrific crime took place: "This family has been victimized twice. First by a madman and now by a gentleman who has shown depraved indifference to their plight," said Councilmember Letitia James, referring to a Manhattan hedge fund manager and his friend who had pledged to help pay for a memorial service today, but never gave the money. more ›

A Jehovah's Witness jumped to his death from a Brooklyn rooftop yesterday. According to police, Dwayne Fagan, 48, jumped from the top of his apartment building in the Linden Houses in East New York just before 1 p.m. Wednesday afternoon as bystanders looked on. “I thought someone had thrown an air conditioner off the roof. I screamed and screamed for a minute straight,” said witness Antoinette George, who also lives in the building. more ›

The estranged husband of an Upper West Side wealth manager who was found strangled to death on New Year's Eve 2009 has never been formally charged in her death—but he has now been hit with a wrongful-death suit by her estate. Roderick Covlin, a former trader who founded the U.S. Backgammon Federation, has been accused in the suit of murdering Shele Danishefsky Covlin. Public Administrator Ethel Griffin, who handles estate complications, alleges Covlin “intentionally, deliberately, willfully, wantonly, maliciously, brutally and without provocation or just cause did strangle, choke, strike, injure, assault, abuse, beat and murder” his wife. more ›

A three-month-old baby died after being dropped from what the police say was a "fairly high level" onto a bed in a Bronx apartment, and now her father is under arrest. more ›

Last week, a Brooklyn teen standing on a street divider in Gravesend was struck and killed by an alleged drunk driver. Driver Vitali Korzavin, 46, was arrested and charged with a DWI, speeding, and vehicular manslaughter in the death of 17-year-old Stuyvesant High School student Terence Tsao. Yesterday, Korzavin's charges were upgraded to aggravated vehicular homicide from manslaughter, after it was revealed his blood alcohol level was .32, four times over the legal limit. more ›

The Brooklyn man who allegedly confessed to cops that he killed a 73-year-old woman by setting her on fire in a Prospect Heights elevator has been formally charged with murder. Jerome Isaac was indicted today on a charge of first-degree murder in the death of Deloris Gillespie, the woman who he allegedly killed over a money dispute. more ›

A man who was arrested for attempted larceny in Washington Heights died in police custody after suffering an apparent asthma attack last night. The 52-year-old suspect, whose name hasn't been released yet, was allegedly caught breaking into a car; he fled into Tommy’s Grill, near the corner of West 158th and Broadway where police caught up with him. As he was being arrested, he told officers he was having difficulty breathing and said he had an asthma inhaler in his pocket. more ›

Police have released part of the confession of the Bronx man who is accused of fatally stabbing an Italian college student to death. Bakary Camara, 41, who once dated Borough of Manhattan Community College student and part-time waitress Rita Morelli, has been charged with second-degree murder. He pleaded not guilty to murder from his hospital bed in Bellevue yesterday, but cops say Camara already admitted to the crime when cops found him, saying: "I killed Rita." more ›

A Queens man has been found guilty of beating a woman to death and ripping out her heart and lungs after she turned down his romantic advances and didn't find him a job. Huang Chen was sentenced to 29 years in jail for the death of 46-year-old Qian Wu. Wu had taken out six restraining orders against Chen, following repeated instances of harassment. “The victim was left at the mercy of a raging psychopath, a monster who had no business being in our state, in our county, in our country,” said Queens Supreme Court Justice Richard Buchter. more ›