All Blog Posts from Crimesider

JUPITER, Fla. - A Thanksgiving dinner turned into a violent horror show as three women and a child in bed were shot to death during a family gathering, say Florida police, and now Paul Michael Merhige, the man police say is responsible, is on the run.

Police said 17 relatives were in the house when Paul Michael Merhige, 35, shot to death his twin sisters Carla and Lisa Merhige, 33, aunt Raymonde Joseph, 76, and 6-year-old cousin Makayla Sitton.

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SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. - Devon Hollahan, a 22-year-old Arizona man who teaches English overseas, vanished during a concert in Germany last weekend. Now his father is fighting to find him and bring him home safely.

Hollahan was last seen at around 3 a.m. Nov. 21 after a concert in Frankfurt, Germany. He was traveling back to a hostel with his friend Josh Friedman, who stopped to ask for directions. When the friend turned back around, Hollahan was gone.

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WASHINGTON (CBS/AP) America’s most successful party crashers, Michaele and Tareq Salahi, who stormed the gates of a White House state dinner and somehow managed to get in, may soon be facing criminal charges, according to the Secret Service.

Secret Service spokesman Jim Mackin says the agency is moving closer to beginning a criminal investigation. He says that's one reason the Secret Service hasn't yet explained what happened when Michaele and Tareq Salahi arrived at the security checkpoint Tuesday for the dinner honoring Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

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FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. (CBS/AP) Basketball star Shaquille O'Neal was so moved by the horrible fate of 5-year-old Shaniya Davis, who police say was kidnapped, raped, and murdered in rural North Carolina, that he paid for the little girl's funeral.

O'Neal's spokeswoman says the Cleveland Cavaliers player was touched by the stories and got in touch with the family to see what he could do to help.

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TAMPA, Fla. - The way Kathleen Heide tells it, a prison movie she watched on TV as a kid back home in New Jersey started it all.

The 1950 film "Caged" was about a naive 19-year-old woman who becomes hardened after going to prison for a robbery. Heide figures it was about 9 when she saw it on TV in the early 1960s and found herself thinking for the first time about "why people got in trouble." It's a theme she would end up exploring for much of her life.

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NEW YORK - "Courage" may not be a stone cold killer living on death row, but he was slated for execution anyway -- that is, until President Barack Obama gave this lucky bird a second chance.

After 10 months in office, Obama granted his first pardon — to Courage, a turkey spared the Thanksgiving table.

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FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. - A team of about 20 people continues to investigate the rape and slaying of Shaniya Davis, a 5-year-old girl who was allegedly sold into sexual slavery by her mother before she was murdered.

"There are a plethora of leads that we're following up on," said Chief Tom Bergamine of the Fayetteville police department, which is leading the probe.

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NEW YORK (CBS) - Three members of the elite Navy SEALs, who were hailed as heroes for capturing one of Iraq's most wanted terrorists, are now being court martialed for roughing him up, according to Fox News.

The detainee claims he was punched during the operation and suffered a bloody lip, reports Fox, who said the complaint was made by Ahmed Hashim Abedm, the alleged mastermind of the gruesome 2004 murder and mutilation of four American contractors in Fallujah. The four worked in the security division of Blackwater USA. The bodies of two were hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River.

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FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. - Bradley Lockhart, the father of Shaniya Davis, the North Carolina girl who was kidnapped, raped, and murdered in early November, said he made the best decision he could at the time when he let the girl live with her mother, who has since been charged with prostituting her own daughter.

Lockhart said during a Tuesday interview on NBC's "Today" show that he regrets how the decision turned out, but thought he was making the right choice for the daughter he had raised himself.

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DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla. - Six weeks after a group of Florida teens doused 15-year-old Michael Brewer in rubbing alcohol and lit him on fire, burning over 65 percent of his body, one of the teens initially accused is speaking out and he claims he was "best friends" with the victim.

"I'm Jeremy Jarvis; I want to read something I wrote last night," the 13-year-old said Tuesday during a press conference.

"I want to express my deepest sympathy for Mikey and his family," he said. "I will pray for Mikey to grow stronger every day and have a speedy recovery."

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