Convicted rapist Vincent Heyward received a sentence of 428 years in prison yesterday after being found guilty of dozens of felony charges for sexually assaulting five women in Hamilton Heights and Chinatown. Prosecutors told NY1 that Heyward's victims gave statements before the sentencing, and that Heyward received one sentence of 200 years to life, along with a consecutive sentence of 228 years. more ›

Yesterday, a convicted Virginia drug dealer was sentenced for 20 years for raping a 16-year-old girl on the Lower East Side in 1993. It took nine years for DNA evidence at the crime scene to be analyzed and then last year, the DNA was entered into a national database—bringing up Alberto Barriera. more ›

A former Manhattan model set fire to her New Jersey home and killed both herself and her boyfriend last week. In 2004 the cover girl made headlines for successfully fighting off the advances of a would-be rapist in Central Park, but in the end her “emotionally unstable” personality got the best of her. "They had their up and down moments," said Scott Broschart a close friend of Carina Schlesinger and Daniel Cresci, who’d been together 18 months. more ›

Law enforcement agencies throughout the state will soon be allowed to use partial DNA matches to track down criminals—or people who are related to criminals, according to opponents of the new rules. Under the old rules, police could only pursue a suspect using DNA found at a crime scene if the recovered DNA is an exact match with one of the 343,000 genetic profiles contained in a state database of convicts. But starting this spring, police will be allowed to pursue suspects if DNA found at a crime scene is a partial match with someone already on file, meaning that innocent people whose relatives are in the database could come under investigation. more ›

Police believe they've apprehended the serial rapist responsible for four sexual assaults in Hamilton Heights since early August. The suspect is identified as 21-year-old Vincent Heyward, of 281 Edgecombe Avenue, just blocks from where the last sexual assault took place. According to police spokesman Paul Browne, officers approached Heyward on Tuesday around 12:30 a.m. because he resembled sketches of the rapist. Heyward agreed, telling the cops, "Yeah, that does look like me." He also consented to swab his cheek for DNA testing, then went on his way. more ›

Daniel Schuler now says that he plans to extract DNA from his wife's toothbrush in order to ensure the validity that autopsy results indicating his wife Diane was drunk and high when she caused the Taconic crash that killed eight. Sounding slightly conspiratorial, Schuler's private investigator told reporters, "That'll give us her exact makeup that is almost indisputable... we can be assured that the lab test samples - blood, urine, eye fluid - to make sure that the sample that they're about to test is Diane Schuler's." Meanwhile relatives of the two Bastardi victims who died in the crash continued to snap back at Schuler's appearance, saying they're "tired of hearing it" and wondering, "Is he out to make us feel worse than how we feel?" They took particular offense to Schuler lawyer Dominic Barbara's claim that "60 percent of America" thinks Diane Schuler wasn't drunk. Michael Bastardi's daughter Rosann Guzzo said, "Did he just go out and interview 10 people in a bar?...Read the blogs. Most of the people agree with the Bastardis and the Longos and the facts from the state police, the DA and the Medical Examiner." more ›

It couldn't have been scripted better: A cute receptionist helps catch a career criminal—thanks to her deep love for Law & Order: SVU—and then appears on the Today Show and gets props from Detective Olivia Benson herself! more ›