(PHILADELPHIA) — Philadelphia Police on Tuesday said they arrested Gary Cabana, 60, the suspect in a stabbing inside New York City’s Museum of Modern Art, after he was found sleeping at a Greyhound bus station.
Surveillance video released by police Sunday shows the suspect who stabbed two employees inside New York City’s Museum of Modern Art leaping over a counter near the entrance with a knife in hand and proceeding to attack the workers.
The New York Police Department on Sunday identified Cabana as the suspect, saying he allegedly committed the double stabbing a day after his membership to the museum was revoked.
Security video from inside the museum shows a man wearing a dark-hooded jacket and a mask coming through the building’s glass revolving door, charging toward the reception desk with a knife in his right hand and hopping over the counter to attack the employees.
The episode unfolded around 4:15 p.m. when the suspect was denied entry to the world-renowned museum.
A female employee was stabbed in the lower back and neck and a male employee in the left collarbone, the New York Police Department said. The victims, both 24 years old, were taken to Bellevue Hospital and listed in stable condition, according to police.
NYPD Deputy Commissioner John Miller told reporters a letter was sent to the suspect revoking his membership on Friday.
“He’s known to employees here,” Miller told reporters at a news conference Saturday.
It is not believed to be a random attack, he said.
Miller said the suspect’s membership was revoked due to two recent incidents of disorderly conduct, but didn’t provide more information.
He also said the suspect was connected to two other incidents in the midtown area.
Fabien Levy, a spokesman for Mayor Eric Adams, said the mayor is monitoring the situation, adding that the incident is isolated.
“Neither victim is suffering from life-threatening injuries at this time,” he tweeted.
The museum was closed on Sunday.
MoMA, which opened in 1929, is one of the most popular museums in New York City. It is located on 53rd Street in the heart of midtown Manhattan.
(NEW YORK) — The mayors of New York City and Washington, D.C., are offering a $70,000 reward in connection to deadly shootings involving people experiencing homelessness between the two cities.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams and Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser announced the news in a rare joint press conference on Monday.
“Homelessness should not be a homicide,” Adams said. “This was a cold-blooded attack.”
Police are jointly investigating the shootings of five homeless people across both cities that they said may have been committed by the same suspect.
Because of similarities in “the modus operandi of the perpetrator, common circumstances involved in each shooting, circumstances of the victims and recovered evidence,” both police departments in New York City and Washington D.C., will jointly investigate the shootings with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, they said in a Sunday news release.
The first shootings occurred in Washington on March 3, 8 and 9. The victim found on March 9 was discovered by police when they were responding to a tent fire in the city’s northeast. He succumbed to stab and gunshot wounds, according to an autopsy.
The two shootings in New York occurred on March 12. One victim was injured and another was killed, according to the joint news release.
NYPD Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell and MPD Chief Robert J. Contee III said in the news release that they are committed to safety for homeless individuals and to finding the suspect in the shootings.
“Our homeless population is one of our most vulnerable and an individual praying on them as they sleep is an exceptionally heinous crime,” Sewell said in a statement.
“We are committed to sharing every investigative path, clue and piece of evidence with our law enforcement partners to bring this investigation to a swift conclusion and the individual behind these vicious crimes to justice,” Contee said.
Both communities “are heartbroken and disturbed by these heinous crimes in which an individual has been targeting some of our most vulnerable residents,” Adams and Bowser said in a statement on Sunday.
“It is heartbreaking and tragic to know that in addition to all the dangers that unsheltered residents face, we now have a cold-blooded killer on the loose, but we are certain that we will get the suspect off the street and into police custody,” they said.
The mayors said they spoke on Sunday about their cities working together on the investigation.
(NEW YORK) — Against all the odds, Meighen Lovelace pulled off a feat sure to impress any parent: convincing her adolescent girls to adore broccoli.
For Lovelace, a single mother of two in Eagle County, Colorado, it was a hard-fought, decades-long battle. Through mornings of at-home gardening, afternoons of hands-on chopping and evenings of homemade pizza baking, her girls came to love fresh vegetables. And even as budgets tightened during the pandemic — Lovelace said she was fired from her job waiting black-tie banquet tables at a Vail ski resort when the lifts shut down — she relied on school meals to ensure her daughters remained nourished and full.
But with universal free meal programs set to expire in June, Lovelace fears what the future holds. If that happens, she expects her grocery budget to double — something her current gig in a barbeque food truck will be hard-pressed to support. She anticipates relying on food banks to ensure there’s enough to go around.
“This isn’t forever but it is right now,” Lovelace said, “without school [meals], I don’t really know what right now is going to look like.”
Lovelace and her family are not alone.
In a move that took advocates by surprise, universal free school meal programs, initially introduced in March 2020 as the pandemic began, were not included in the $1.5 trillion spending bill passed by the Senate on Thursday night.
Should the programs be left to expire in June, an estimated 10 million children will lose access to free school lunches, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) told ABC News. And for families like Lovelace’s, losing school meals isn’t easy to replace. They’re often the healthiest and most consistent source of sustenance for children of families under financial pressure.
That’s why having school meals as a buffer against food insecurity is so important, Robert Harvey, president of FoodCorps — a nonprofit supporting healthy meals for over 150,000 students every year — told ABC News.
Food insecurity — which the USDA defines as “limited or uncertain access to adequate food” — plagued more than 11 million American children before the pandemic. “Adequate food” refers to the difference between a lunch with fruits, vegetables and milk to one with chips and a soda, Harvey said. Those numbers have only worsened during the pandemic: recent studies indicate that millions more children may go hungry every day.
The numbers only reinforce the importance of schools as sanctuaries for consistent and healthy eating habits, Harvey said.
Especially for families near the poverty line, not having “to think about providing five breakfast meals, five lunch meals, a snack, and a drink,” he said, that makes school meals “one of the stress-reducing, anxiety-reducing, financially-liberating benefits of public education in this country.”
Another issue with the expiration of universal meals? Stigma.
After the program expires, families will still be able to apply for reduced-price meals for their children, Robin Cogan, a school nurse in Camden, New Jersey, told ABC News. But lots of parents may be reluctant to apply. For example, for those with unsettled citizenship status — like many of the Honduran and Guatemalan families in her majority-minority district — “there’s distrust of any government system,” Cogan said.
“They really don’t want to leave a trail of who they are because they’re afraid they’ll be picked up,” she said.
Children may also fear using reduced-price meals that often constitute a scarlet letter, Ben Atkinson, nutrition services coordinator for the Auburn school district in Washington, told ABC News.
“Kids aren’t stupid,” he said. “They know who’s getting free lunch, who is paying cash, [and] who can afford to get an extra bag of chips from the vending machine.”
All of this matters because at the end of the day, Cogan said, hunger isn’t just about feeling full. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, “multiple adverse health outcomes [are] strongly correlated with food insecurity” including brain function — which can lead to poorer academic achievement, mental illness and/or behavioral problems — and chronic illnesses like diabetes that already afflict hundreds of thousands of American kids.
Lovelace fears these challenges for her daughters if Congress doesn’t renew universal school meals.
Democrats said they are still pushing to extend the program, at least through the 2022-23 school year. But the degree to which the Biden administration is on board for the estimated $11 billion program remains unclear.
According to one congressional aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity, the administration requested an extension of the USDA program last January. But the department has declined to answer questions about that request. Now that the spending bill has come and gone, advocates are holding out hope that extensions to school meals will be tacked on to another bill in the pipeline, like one expected to pay for more COVID testing and vaccines.
In the meantime, parents like Lovelace are watching nervously from the sidelines.
“Access to food is sacred,” she said, “let’s not fight about it — let’s just feed our kids.”
“It’s the one thing Congress shouldn’t be squabbling over,” she added.
(NEW YORK) — After a weekend of cold temperatures, snowstorms and heavy winds on the East Coast, a new storm is making its way to the South.
Southern states such as Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana should be on alert for severe thunderstorms where damaging winds, hail and a few tornadoes will be possible. This storm will move across the South in the next few days with heavy rain causing a threat for more severe weather.
Meanwhile in the West, several storms will continue to move through the area with heavy rains ranging from Washington to Northern California. The San Francisco bay area may get much-needed rain Monday night into Tuesday morning.
In the Pacific Northwest, heavy snow is expected in parts of the Washington area and a few inches coming to the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
Ahead of the western storms, wildfires are being fueled by the wind and dry weather from Southern California to Texas.
More than 100 firefighters were battling a brush fire Sunday night from the air and the ground in the Hansen Dam Recreation Area, near Pacoima, California.. The fire escalated to “Major Emergency” status within the 10 p.m. hour.
Just after 11 p.m., crews appeared to get the upper hand with “a well coordinated air attack combined with a relentless ground-based offense with firefighting hand lines and hand tools,” according to the Los Angeles Fire Department.
Firefighters contained the Hansen Fire to four acres, according to officials. Crews will continue working the fire’s perimeter with hose lines, hand tools, and heavy equipment throughout the night to extinguish hot spots.
There are no structures threatened at this time, and no injuries have been reported. Officials said there are currently no evacuations.
(LOUISVILLE, Ky.) — Two years after Breonna Taylor was shot and killed by police in her Louisville, Kentucky home, her mother met with officials at the Department of Justice, urging federal charges against the officers involved in her daughter’s death.
“The most important thing is to remember that Breonna didn’t deserve this,” her mother, Tamika Palmer, told reporters on Monday following the meeting with Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke and attorneys in the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division. “She was at home, in her own home minding her business when these people kicked in her door and murdered her.”
A DOJ spokesperson confirmed to ABC News that Clarke and attorneys from the Civil Rights Division met with members of Taylor’s family and attorneys, saying, “This matter is currently under investigation and we have no further comment.”
Attorney Ben Crump, who represents Taylor’s family, told ABC News that the meeting at the DOJ lasted for 45 minutes and officials said that they were conducting a “thorough investigation.”
“We don’t want to have to come here next year this time and still not have decisions made,” Crump said.
“You have to think about it from the perspective of the Black community. There are charges brought against us for a lot less, so we hope that they are just as zealous in holding these police officers who killed Breonna Taylor accountable,” he added.
Following the press conference, which took place outside the National Council of Negro Women in Washington, D.C., the family, joined by advocates and leaders in the Black Lives Matter movement, walked to the DOJ to hand-deliver 18,000 signatures from people, calling for the officers to be held accountable.
The 26-year-old Taylor, an emergency medical technician, was fatally shot down on March 13, 2020, in a hail of bullets by plainclothes officers Brett Hankison, Myles Cosgrove and Jonathan Mattingly. They were executing a “no knock” search warrant for Taylor’s ex-boyfriend for allegedly dealing drugs.
He was not at the residence, but her current boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, thought someone was breaking into the home and fired one shot from a 9 mm pistol at the officers. Mattingly was struck in the leg and three officers fired 32 shots into the apartment, killing Taylor, who was in her bedroom.
“No-knock” warrants, which are when officers don’t announce themselves before entering a home, have come under renewed scrutiny following the Feb. 2 fatal shooting of Amir Locke, a 22-year-old Black man who was killed during a raid by Minneapolis police officers.
“For the nation, it’s been two years and one day. For me, I’m trapped in March the 13th, 2020,” Palmer said. “I don’t know how people think I should just move on; that I should just walk away from this thing. Half my life has been spent being Breonna’s mother. It’s the only thing I’ve learned to do well in my life. It’s the thing that I’ll die for – fighting to make sure she gets justice.”
ABC News reached out to the attorneys representing Hankison and Cosgrove, but requests for comment were not immediately returned.
Mattingly’s attorney Kent Wicker told ABC News they have “no comment at this time.”
Hankison and Cosgrove were ultimately fired from the police department and Mattingly retired in 2021.
Taylor’s killing gained national attention and sparked nationwide “Black Lives Matter” protests in the summer of 2020 after the police killing of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man in Minnesota, who died after an officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.
Six months after Taylor was killed, Kentucky Attorney General Cameron convened a grand jury to investigate possible charges against the officers.
The grand jury indicted former Louisville police officer Brett Hankison in September 2020 on three counts of wanton endangerment in the first degree for firing into the apartment directly behind Taylor’s, where three people were inside.
Earlier this month, a jury in Louisville found Hankison not guilty on all three counts of wanton endangerment in the first degree.
But none of the officers were charged for their involvement in Taylor’s death – a decision that sparked widespread backlash from social justice advocates.
Amid a barrage of criticism, Cameron told ABC affiliate WBKO in Bowling Green, Kentucky, in October 2020 that the officers who opened fire were “justified” because they “returned fire after having been fired upon.”
He also defended his decision not to give the grand jury on the case surrounding the death of Breonna Taylor the option to consider murder charges.
“I fully take responsibility for the recommendation that we made,” he said at the time. “Based on the facts, that was the appropriate recommendation to make.”
Palmer said on Monday that Cameron and Kentucky “failed” her daughter and she is now asking the DOJ to “do the right thing.”
Trayvon Martin’s mother, Sybrina Fulton, reflects on her son’s legacy a decade after his death
ABC News’ Kendall Ross and Mark Osborne contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — Police in New York City and Washington are jointly investigating the shootings of five homeless people across both cities that they said may have been committed by the same suspect.
Because of similarities in “the modus operandi of the perpetrator, common circumstances involved in each shooting, circumstances of the victims and recovered evidence,” the two departments will jointly investigate the shootings with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, they said in a Sunday news release.
The first shootings occurred in Washington on March 3, 8 and 9. The victim found on March 9 was discovered by police when they were responding to a tent fire in the city’s northeast. He succumbed to stab and gunshot wounds, according to an autopsy.
The two shootings in New York occurred on March 12. One victim was injured and another was killed, according to the joint news release.
NYPD Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell and MPD Chief Robert J. Contee III said in the news release that they are committed to safety for homeless individuals and to finding the suspect in the shootings.
“Our homeless population is one of our most vulnerable and an individual praying on them as they sleep is an exceptionally heinous crime,” Sewell said in a statement.
“We are committed to sharing every investigative path, clue and piece of evidence with our law enforcement partners to bring this investigation to a swift conclusion and the individual behind these vicious crimes to justice,” Contee said.
Both communities “are heartbroken and disturbed by these heinous crimes in which an individual has been targeting some of our most vulnerable residents,” New York City Mayor Eric Adams and Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser said in a statement on Sunday.
“It is heartbreaking and tragic to know that in addition to all the dangers that unsheltered residents face, we now have a cold-blooded killer on the loose, but we are certain that we will get the suspect off the street and into police custody,” they said.
The mayors said they spoke on Sunday about their cities working together on the investigation.
ABC News’ Aaron Katersky and Joshua Hoyos contributed to this report.
Surveillance video released by police Sunday shows the suspect who stabbed two employees inside New York City’s Museum of Modern Art leaping over a counter near the entrance with a knife in hand and proceeding to attack the workers.
The search for the suspect, identified by the New York Police Department as 60-year-old Gary Cabana, continued Sunday. Cabana allegedly committed the double stabbing a day after his membership to the museum was revoked, police said.
Security video from inside the museum shows a man wearing a dark-hooded jacket and a mask coming through the building’s glass revolving door, charging toward the reception desk with a knife in his right hand and hopping over the counter to attack the employees.
The episode unfolded around 4:15 p.m. when the suspect was denied entry to the world-renowned museum.
A female employee was stabbed in the lower back and neck and a male employee in the left collarbone, the New York Police Department said. The victims, both 24 years old, were taken to Bellevue Hospital and listed in stable condition, according to police.
NYPD Deputy Commissioner John Miller told reporters a letter was sent to the suspect revoking his membership on Friday.
“He’s known to employees here,” Miller told reporters at a news conference Saturday. It is not believed to be a random attack, he said.
Miller said the suspect’s membership was revoked due to two recent incidents of disorderly conduct, but didn’t provide more information.
He also said the suspect was connected to two other incidents in the midtown area.
Fabien Levy, a spokesman for Mayor Eric Adams, said the mayor is monitoring the situation, adding that the incident is isolated.
“Neither victim is suffering from life-threatening injuries at this time,” he tweeted.
The museum announced it will be closed on Sunday.
MoMA, which opened in 1929, is one of the most popular museums in New York City. It is located on 53rd Street in the heart of midtown Manhattan.
(NEW YORK) — Two people were stabbed inside the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan Saturday afternoon, police said.
The unidentified victims were transported to Bellevue Hospital and listed in stable condition, according to the New York Police Department.
Preliminarily, per a source familiar, authorities believe a former employee came back to the museum and stabbed two people who work there. It is not believed to be a random attack.
Officers were still looking for a suspect and the investigation was ongoing, according to police.
This is a developing story. Check back for details.
Courtesy of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NEW YORK) — The East Coast is getting hit with a major late-winter storm this weekend that is bringing severe weather from Florida to Maine, as tens of millions are under winter weather alerts.
After dumping several inches of snow in the Southeast, the storm is intensifying as it moves up the East Coast, with states on alert for wintry conditions, strong wind gusts, freezing temperatures, damaging winds and heavy snow and rain.
The storm triggered severe thunderstorms in parts of Florida and the Carolina coast earlier Saturday. Wind gusts over 70 mph were reported in parts of northern Florida and along the North Carolina coast, bringing reports of wind damage. There was one reported tornado in northern Florida, though no significant damage has been reported at this time.
The heaviest snowfall is expected from Pennsylvania and northern New Jersey into Maine. As of early Saturday afternoon, the biggest totals so far have been across the central Appalachians into central New York, where over half foot of snow has been reported in some areas.
Up to a foot of snow is forecasted for inland areas from West Virginia to Maine, with the highest amounts expected in the Green and White Mountains of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.
The latest Key Messages for the impending eastern U.S. winter storm. Heavy snow and gusty winds are anticipated today from the Central Appalachians into the interior Northeast, followed by record cold in the Southeast Sunday morning. More information ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/Ul09j0hIsm
— NWS Weather Prediction Center (@NWSWPC) March 12, 2022
Snowfall along the I-95 corridor is expected to be lighter — between 1 to 3 inches from Washington, D.C., to Philadelphia and into New York City. Boston is expected to see heavy rain ending as a few snow showers.
By this evening, lingering precipitation will be focused mostly into northern New England. Strong gusty winds, blustery conditions and lingering scattered snow showers will persist across the region into the night.
Behind this storm system will be a bitter cold blast across the East. Wind chills are forecasted to be in the single digits Sunday morning from New York to Boston and feeling like the teens from Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., down to Raleigh, North Carolina, and Atlanta. Wind chills could be in the 20s in northern Florida Sunday morning.
Daily record lows will be challenged in multiple cities in the South over the next 24 hours, with temperatures running more than 20 degrees below average for this time of the year in parts of the region. A freezing warning has been issued for most of the Gulf Coast, including Florida, for Saturday night.
Thousands are without power amid the winter storm. As of noon ET, more than 183,000 customers were without power in Georgia, North Carolina, Florida, Pennsylvania and Virginia, according to PowerOutage.us.
Several St. Patrick’s Day parades were postponed due to the late-winter storm, including in Albany, New York, and Erie, Pennsylvania. In Knoxville, Tennessee, the parade was canceled due to the road conditions after several inches fell.
ABC News’ Alexandra Puri contributed to this report.
