Image of the Day – August 1, 2013

USA Postage Stamp issued in 1901 commemorating the Upper Steel Arch Bridge at Niagara Falls linking USA and Canada.

Cuomo presents casino cash during Falls visit

[From Niagara-Gazette.com]

Gov. Andrew Cuomo joined Seneca President Barry Snyder Sr. and Mayor Paul Dyster at the Seneca Niagara Gaming Complex to announce the delivery of funds from the negotiated settlement between the parties.

READ REST OF STORY HERE: http://niagara-gazette.com/local/x1558083699/Cuomo-presents-casino-cash-during-Falls-visit

Schumer, Higgins endorse Hamister’s Falls hotel plan

[From www.Niagara-Gazette.com]

A pair of federal lawmakers say they’re confident city officials will be able to come to terms on an agreement with a Buffalo developer that is looking to build a $25 million hotel in downtown Niagara Falls.

Both U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and U.S. Rep. Brian Higgins, D-Niagara Falls and Buffalo, suggested Monday the hotel plan as submitted by the Buffalo-based Hamister Group appears to offer exactly what Niagara Falls needs

Image of the Day – July 31, 2013

Found this gem… bought it.

Man who encouraged driver to flee scene violates probation, heading to jail

[From www.Niagara-Gazette.com]

A Tonawanda man already on probation for encouraging an acquaintance to flee the scene of a 2009 accident in Amherst will now serve jail time for violating the terms of his release.

John Pieri, 40, of Wendel Avenue, who was a passenger in a vehicle driven by Andrea Glinski when she struck two woman near Daemen College in March 2009, had been found guilty of criminal solicitation for telling her to leave the scene of the accident, in which both woman were injured, one of them seriously, according to Erie County District Attorney Frank Sedita.

Pieri was convicted later that year and sentenced to one year in jail, though that conviction was later overturned on what Sedita framed as a “legal technicality.” Before a retrial on the solicitation charges took place in November 2009, Sedita said, Pieri pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced to probation and 30 days served at the Erie County Correction Facility.

Sedita said, however, that “despite the substantial reduction in his sentence” from one year to one month, “Pieri repeatedly and publicly consumed alcohol in violation of his probation conditions.” As a result he was found guilty of violating those terms this year and sentenced to one year in jail.

Yet on Monday, after an appeal, that sentence was reduced to 10 months incarceration by Erie County Court Judge Thomas P. Franczyk. Sedita indicated that the judgement came despite Franczyk’s reservations that “Pieri’s behavior was wanting for human decency and compassion.”

However, Sedita said the sentence was reduced to 10 months because Pieri did not have a prior criminal record and because he was employed.

READ SOURCE ARTICLE HERE:

Comments on community development plan for $2.7M sought from public

[From www.Niagara-Gazette.com]

The Niagara Falls Department of Community Development

Search for Buffalo man continues in Niagara gorge

[From www.Niagara-Gazette.com]

State Park Police will resume their search, later Tuesday, for a Buffalo man who is missing and feared drowned in the lower Niagara River near Devil’s Hole.

Police said the 22-year-old man from Buffalo slipped into the fast moving waters of the lower river early Sunday morning. He had gone to the river gorge to fish with friends.

“The water is very swift there,” Park Police Lt. Patrick Moriarty said. “We understand he was the first to catch a fish and he was trying to reel it in. He apparently got up on a rock to do that and slipped and went into the water.

The man’s friends said he tried to “fight” his way back to the shoreline.

“He tried to get back to the rocks, but got pulled out into the middle of the river,” Moriarty said. “His friends could see him out there for a while and then he disappeared.”

The Park Police lieutenant said the men were fishing an area not normally used for that activity.

“That area is not restricted for fisherman,” Moriarty said, “but it’s not a place where experience fisherman would normally go because of the swift moving water and the danger.”

He said police, ordinarily, have not problem with fishermen in the gorge because they can act as “eyes and ears” for officers and frequently spot possible trouble before it happens.

“In this case, you had three young men who didn’t realize the risks of fishing in a spot like that,” Moriarty said. “The didn’t perceive the danger until it was too late.”

On Sunday afternoon, Park police called in the Erie County Sheriff’s Department helicopter to assist them in their search. While the chopper was in the area, its crew made another discovery.

“They saw what appeared to be the remains of a woman on the Canadian shoreline,” Moriarty said.

The body was spotted upstream from where the American search was underway. Ontario Park Police said they have tentatively identified the body and believe it is that of a suicide victim.

Ontario Park Police also made a rescue and an arrest on Sunday.

Members of the department’s High Angle River Team, along with Niagara Falls, Ontario firefighters and EMTs were able to being a 22-year-old Welland woman, who suffered an ankle injury, out of the gorge.

Canadian park Police said the woman was charged with being intoxicated in a public place.

READ SOURCE ARTICLE HERE:

Bank forecloses on wrong house, changes locks, steals tons of stuff, won’t compensate owner in full

[From www.BoingBoing.net]

On Popehat, Ken

Whisper-thin gas-pump credit-card skimmers

[From www.BoingBoing.com]

A pair of crooks in Oklahoma made more than $400,000 with

Someone buried a walrus under St Pancras station

[From www.BoingBoing.com]

The body of a four-meter long walrus