American Broadway theater usher is charged with attempted murder 10 months after attacking two workers at New York's MoMa museum and mocking the city's lax bail laws - before committing arson in Pennsylvania

Gary Cabana, 60, was extradited back to New York City this week from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

By Edward Era Barbacena

An on-the-run Broadway theater usher has finally been charged after being accused of stabbing two employees at New York City's Museum of Modern Art in March 2022.

Gary Cabana, 60, was extradited back to the Big Apple this week from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where cops found him sleeping at a Grayhound Bus terminal three days after he allegedly knifed the two 24-year-old museum employees.

He is now charged with two counts of attempted murder and two counts of assault for the attack. He could face life in prison if convicted of first-degree attempted murder.

Cabana has previously pleaded guilty to arson in Philadelphia, where he set his hotel room on fire when employees there denied his request to extend his stay, New York 1 reports.

After his arrest by Philadelphia police on March 15, Cabana was scheduled to undergo a mental health evaluation before he could be arraigned on arson charges. 

He was being held in custody in the meantime, and was finally extradited back to New York on Tuesday. 

Authorities say Cabana attacked the employees after his museum pass was revoked for 'disorderly conduct.' He then taunted cops online saying they would 'still be doing paperwork' while he remained on the run.

Cabana is said to have bipolar disorder. It is unclear when he finally pleaded guilty. 

Cabana allegedly broke into a frenzy on March 12, one day after his membership to the museum was revoked for two unspecified incidents involving disorderly conduct.

He told the New York Post he was trying to see Van Gogh's Starry Night that day when he 'lost it.'

Horrifying video footage from inside the museum showed him jumping on top of the reception desk, pulling out a knife and stabbing the two unidentified employees before fleeing.

Police said one the employees was a 24-year-old woman being treated for stabs to the lower back and one stab to the back of her neck.  The other was stabbed in the collar bone. 

From there, authorities have said, he fled to Philadelphia, where he checked into a Best Western under his middle and last names — but used his rewards card identifying his full name.

But when hotel staffers told him he could not extend his stay, police said, Cabana trashed his fifth-floor hotel room and set fire to the place.

 

American transgender Missouri inmate Amber McLaughlin executed for fatal stabbing of former girl friend 

The first one to be executed this year in the US

By Edward Era Barbacena

A Missouri inmate was put to death Tuesday for a 2003 killing, becoming what is believed to be the first transgender woman executed in the U.S.

Amber McLaughlin, 49, was convicted of stalking and killing a former girlfriend, then dumping the body near the Mississippi River in St. Louis. McLaughlin’s fate was sealed earlier Tuesday when Republican Gov. Mike Parson declined a clemency request.

McLaughlin spoke quietly with a spiritual adviser at his side as the fatal dose of pentobarbital was injected. McLaughlin breathed heavily a couple of times, then shut her eyes. He was pronounced dead a few minutes later.

“I am sorry for what I did,” McLaughlin said in a final, written, statement. “I am a loving and caring person.”

A database on the website for the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Center shows that 1,558 people have been executed since the death penalty was reinstated in the mid-1970s. All but 17 of those put to death were men. The center said there are no known previous cases of an openly transgender inmate being executed. McLaughlin began transitioning about three years ago at the state prison in Potosi.

The clemency petition cited McLaughlin’s traumatic childhood and mental health issues, which the jury never heard during her trial. A foster parent rubbed feces on his face when he was a toddler and his adoptive father used a stun gun on him, according to the petition. It cited severe depression that resulted in multiple suicide attempts, both as a child and as an adult.

The petition also included reports citing a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, a condition that causes anguish and other symptoms as a result of a disparity between a person’s gender identity and their assigned sex at birth. But McLaughlin’s sexual identity was “not the main focus” of the clemency request, his attorney, Larry Komp, said.

In 2003, long before transitioning, McLaughlin was in a relationship with Beverly Guenther. After they stopped dating, McLaughlin would show up at the suburban St. Louis office where the 45-year-old Guenther worked, sometimes hiding inside the building, according to court records. Guenther obtained a restraining order, and police officers occasionally escorted him to his car after work.

Guenther’s neighbors called police the night of Nov. 20, 2003, when she failed to return home. Officers went to the office building, where they found a broken knife handle near her car and a trail of blood. A day later, McLaughlin led police to a location near the Mississippi River in St. Louis, where the body had been dumped. Authorities said she had been raped and stabbed repeatedly with a steak knife.

McLaughlin was convicted of first-degree murder in 2006. A judge sentenced McLaughlin to death after a jury deadlocked on the sentence. Komp said Missouri and Indiana are the only states that allow a judge to sentence someone to death.

A court in 2016 ordered a new sentencing hearing, but a federal appeals court panel reinstated the death penalty in 2021.

“McLaughlin terrorized Ms. Guenther in the final years of her life, but we hope her family and loved ones may finally have some peace,” Parson said in a written statement after the execution.

McLaughlin began transitioning about three years ago, according to Jessica Hicklin, who spent 26 years in prison for a drug-related killing before being released a year ago. Hicklin, now 43, sued the Missouri Department of Corrections, challenging a policy that prohibited hormone therapy for inmates who weren’t receiving it before being incarcerated. She won the lawsuit in 2018 and became a mentor to other transgender inmates, including McLaughlin. McLaughlin did not receive hormone treatments, however, Komp said.

Hicklin described McLaughlin as a painfully shy person who came out of her shell after she decided to transition.

“He always had a smile and a dad joke,” Hicklin said. “If you ever talked to him, it was always with the dad jokes.”

The Bureau of Justice Statistics has estimated there are 3,200 transgender inmates in the nation’s prisons and jails. Perhaps the best-known case of a transgender prisoner seeking treatment was that of Chelsea Manning, the former Army intelligence analyst who served seven years in federal prison for leaking government documents to Wikileaks until President Barack Obama commuted the sentence in 2017. The Army agreed to pay for hormone treatments for Manning in 2015.

In 2015, the U.S. Department of Justice wrote in a court filing that state prison officials must treat an inmate’s gender identity condition just as they would treat other medical or mental health conditions, regardless of when the diagnosis occurred.

The only woman ever executed in Missouri was Bonnie B. Heady, put to death on Dec. 18, 1953, for kidnapping and killing a 6-year-old boy. Heady was executed in the gas chamber, side by side with the other kidnapper and killer, Carl Austin Hall.

Nationally, 18 people were executed in 2022, including two in Missouri. Kevin Johnson was put to death in November for the ambush killing of a Kirkwood, Missouri, police officer. Carman Deck was executed in May for killing James and Zelma Long during a robbery at their home in De Soto, Missouri.

Another Missouri inmate, Leonard Taylor, is scheduled to die Feb. 7 for killing his girlfriend and her three young children.

 

American man charged with Hertel Ave hate crime from 2020 arrested in Arkansas after skipping court

Michael J. Cremen, who faced a hate crime charge for the Hertel Avenue incident that was caught on video, failed to show up for several court appearances and was indicted by a grand jury in May on a charge of second-degree bail jumping, prosecutors said.

By Edward Era Barbacena

Aformer Western New Yorker who confronted Black Lives Matter demonstrators with a knife while using a racial slur in the summer of 2020 is being held without bail in the Erie County Holding Center after being taken into custody in Arkansas, the Erie County District Attorney's Office said.

Michael J. Cremen, who faced a hate crime charge for the Hertel Avenue incident that was caught on video, failed to show up for several court appearances and was indicted by a grand jury in May on a charge of second-degree bail jumping, prosecutors said. 

Cremen, 50, who last showed up for a court appearance in July 2021, was picked up by the Baxter County Sheriff's Office and transported by U.S. marshals back to Buffalo earlier this week, prosecutors said. He was arraigned on the new felony charge Friday.

For the original incident, Cremen faces a felony charge of second-degree menacing as a hate crime, as well as second-degree harassment, a violation.

 

American man arrested after early morning Dothan shooting

The victim,  sustained one gunshot wound to the upper torso. The only other person present at the time of the incident was Justin Tyler Marchozzi, who called 911.

By Edward Era Barbacena

 An early morning shooting turned murder arrest at a Dothan apartment complex, per police investigation.

According to police officials, on Monday, January 2, at 3:10 a.m. Dothan Police Officers and Dothan Fire and Rescue were dispatched to a possible suicide at Highland Hills Apartment Complex on South Brannon Stand Road.

Officers and Paramedics arrived and began life saving measures on the victim.

The victim, Richard Brandon Littlefield, 48 years-old, sustained one gunshot wound to the upper torso.

The only other person present at the time of the incident was Justin Tyler Marchozzi, 31, who called 911.

After gathering evidence at the crime scene, and gathering information from neighboring witnesses, Marchozzi was charged with one count of Murder with a $1.5 Million bond, and one count of Certain Persons Forbidden to Possess Pistol with a $15,000.00 bond.

No motive for this incident has been determined at this time.

The investigation of this case continues; however, no further arrests are expected at this time.

 

Missouri could become first state to execute a transgender woman

Amber McLaughlin, 49, convicted of 2003 first-degree murder of former girlfriend

By Edward Era Barbacena

Missouri may be the first state to ever execute a transgender woman in the United States, unless the state’s governor grants clemency, according to reports.

Amber McLaughlin, 49, is a transgender woman and is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection Tuesday after being found guilty of killing a former girlfriend in 2003.

McLaughlin was tried as Scott McLaughlin and did not transition until after being sentenced to prison.

The Associated Press reported that McLaughlin was in a relationship with 45-year-old Beverly Guenther before transitioning and would sometimes show up at an office in St. Louis where Guenther worked.

At times, McLaughlin hid inside the building, according to court records, leading Guenther to obtain a restraining order.

Police officers, at times, would escort Guenther to her vehicle after work.

On the night of Nov. 20, 2003, Guenther’s neighbors called police after she failed to return home, AP reported.

Officers went to the office where Guenther worked and found a broken knife handle near her car and a trail of blood. The next day, McLaughlin showed police where Guenther’s body had been dumped in the Mississippi River.

McLaughlin was ultimately convicted of first-degree murder in 2006 and sentenced to death after a jury deadlocked on the sentence, AP reported. In 2016, a court ordered a new sentencing hearing, but in 2021, the federal appeals court panel reinstated the death penalty.

With no appeals pending, McLaughlin’s attorney, Larry Komp, told AP that clemency is being sought.

The request for clemency does not primarily focus on McLaughlin’s gender identity but instead on traumatic childhood and mental health issues that were never presented to a jury during trial.

AP reported that the clemency petition claims that when McLaughlin was with a foster parent as a toddler, that person rubbed feces in her face. Another time, her adoptive father used a stun gun on her, according to the petition.

The petition also claims McLaughlin suffers from depression and attempted to kill herself several times.

When it comes to McLaughlin's gender identity, the petition addresses a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, which is a condition that can cause anguish and more because of a person struggling between their assigned sex at birth and their gender identity, AP reported.

"We think Amber has demonstrated incredible courage because I can tell you there’s a lot of hate when it comes to that issue," Komp told AP on Monday. But he added it is not the focus of the clemency request.

Missouri Gov. Mike Parson is reviewing the request for clemency, which a spokesperson for the governor told AP is still underway.

The Death Penalty Information Center, according to AP, said there is no known case of a transgender inmate being executed in the U.S.

This is also the state's first use of the death penalty on a woman since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment in 1976, according to U.S. House of Representative members Cori Bush and Emanuel Cleaver, who urged Parson to grant clemency.

Before 1976, the only woman ever executed in the state was Bonnie B. Heady, AP said. She was executed in a gas chamber on Dec. 18, 1953, for kidnapping and killing a 6-year-old boy.

 

HOMELESS AMERICAN MAN OF NORFOLK CHARGED WITH ATTEMPTED MURDER

36-year-old Jeremy J. Heiderman was arrested in Norfolk, NE on attempted 2nd degree murder

Edward Era Barbacena

A homeless white man was arrested in Norfolk on Sunday after allegedly strangling a man with a dog’s leash.

According to the Norfolk Police Division (NPD), at around 11:22 p.m. police were called to the area of Third Street and Norfolk Avenue for an assault.

Police said that when they arrived at the scene they made contact with the victim of the assault.

The victim told officers that he had been walking his dog and decided to take a break at a bench on Norfolk Avenue when the suspect, identified as Jeremy Heiderman, 36, began shouting at him from across the road.

According to NPD, the victim said he did not know Heiderman and tried to ignore him. He told officers that eventually Heiderman came across the road and confronted him, started an argument, and shoved him causing him to fall. The release states that Heiderman took the victim’s dog’s leash and wrapped it around the victim’s neck and said he was going to kill the victim.

Police said that a witness had seen and heard what happened as well.

 Once police were called, Heiderman left the area, leaving the leash around the victim’s neck.

After speaking with the victim, witness, and Heiderman, Heiderman was arrested for criminal attempt of second-degree murder. Heiderman is being held in the Madison County Jail.

 

Racist CEO accused of pressuring former NFL player to sleep with co-worker 

Janine Yorio, the CEO of metaverse company Everyrealm, is alleged to have made frequent remarks about Johnson’s sex life, including crewd comments about his girlfriend’s menstrual cycle.

By Edward Era Barbacena

The CEO of a New York-based metaverse company has been accused of sexually harassing a pair of African-American subordinates — including a former NFL player who claims she subjected him to bizarre come-ons and prodded him to have sex with co-workers.

Teyo Johnson — a former tight end for the Oakland Raiders who also played ball as an undergraduate at Stanford University — claims Everyrealm CEO Janine Yorio presided over a toxic work environment where she made lewd references about employees’ sex lives as well as racial slurs directed at black employees, including one remark threatening to “trade” Johnson if he didn’t perform in his job.

In a lawsuit filed in Manhattan federal court against Yorio and Everyrealm — whose backers include the Silicon Valley venture firm Andreessen Horowitz and which has tapped celebrity endorsers including Paris Hilton, Will Smith and The Weeknd — Johnson also alleges that he was pressured into “sexually harassing games” in which coworkers and clients were encouraged to sleep with each other.

In March, Johnson alleged that Yorio told him about a “sex-related game that she encouraged employees to play” during a business trip to the SXSW (South By Southwest) festival in Austin, Texas. “KYP,” which stands for “know your personnel,” or “KYC” — “know your client” — were “euphemisms for having sex or hooking up with co-workers and business partners,” according to the lawsuit.

Yorio told Johnson that “the way to pay the game” was to “get laid by a co-worker on a business trip,” the lawsuit alleges. She then allegedly asked him if “he would be doing any KYP.” Johnson was “taken aback” by Yorio’s suggestion and “politely informed her that he was ‘already really close with someone’,” the lawsuit states.

That same evening, Johnson alleged that Yorio was “testing the waters” with him after she came to his hotel room in Austin and “insinuated in no uncertain terms that she believed he would” cheat on his girlfriend “to participate in the company’s KYP game,” the lawsuit alleges.

Johnson also alleged that Yorio made offensive jokes about his girlfriend’s menstrual cycle and referred to him as a “stupid black person” and “the whitest black person.” Other slurs that Yorio is alleged to have hurled at Johnson include “d-ck,” “big swinging d-ck,” and “f–king d-ck.”

Elsewhere William Kerr, the company’s general counsel, once referred to celebrity hotel heiress Paris Hilton — an Everyrealm investor who has been photographed with Yorio at prior events — as “a night in Paris” — the title of a revenge porn video that was leaked to the internet in 2004, according to the suit.

Johnson, whose job required managing celebrity accounts including Hilton’s, “was horrified that in order to carry out his job duties he was made to listen to the derogatory commentary and sexually harassing nickname” from Kerr, the suit claims.

Johnson claims he was fired after he blew the whistle on a cryptocurrency-based “gambling scheme” involving NFT (non-fungible token) playing cards of professional soccer players. According to Johnson, the scheme “involved a cryptocurrency version of fantasy sports in which users would buy packs of NFTs representing professional soccer playing cards.”

“Users would enter cryptocurrency into a pool and then win prize money if their NFT playing cards performed better than the other players’ NFTs,” according to the lawsuit. Johnson “reasonably believed” that the scheme “would violate numerous New York and federal laws” since “randomizing the packs of cards … would quality as a game of chance and thus be illegal,” according to the filing.

Johnson, whose says his sports connections include an “active business relationship” with former NBA star Yao Ming, claims that his proposal to forge a relationship between Everyrealm and the NFL was intentionally sabotaged by Yorio and her executive team as revenge for his blowing the whistle on the crypto scheme.

After he reported his concerns to an executive, the NFT project was scrapped — and Yorio “soured on” Johnson, who eventually ended up in her “doghouse,” according to court papers.

When reached by The Post, a spokesperson for Everyrealm denied the allegations, calling them “lies.”

“As we have stated in our court filings, this employee worked at the company for only three months and was terminated for poor performance, expense account abuse, and falling asleep on the job,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

Everyrealm also alleged in a legal filing that Johnson “openly and routinely disparaged the mother of his child and demanded that Everyrealm pay a portion of his wages in cash to avoid garnishment for child support payments.”

The company said that it refused Johnson’s alleged demand.

“Johnson made various inappropriate comments in the workplace regarding other women in his life, hazed a junior female employee by disparaging her as ‘rookie’ and refusing to meet with her, and referred to [Everyrealm co-founder Julia] Schwartz as ‘that b—h’ and Mrs. Yorio as ‘that crazy b—h’,” the company alleged in its filing.

Everyrealm, a “metaverse technology and infrastructure company,” received $20 million in venture capital from Andreessen Horowitz. The Silicon Valley firm didn’t respond to requests for comment.

When reached for comment by The Post, Seppinni responded: “Janine Yorio and her enablers at Everyrealm’s comments show just how scared they are of the truth.”

Yorio faces similar accusations from another former African-American employee in a suit filed last week in Manhattan federal court. Gatsby Frimpong, who said he has done stints as a product manager at Google, Microsoft, Apple, and Cisco Systems, claims he was paid far less at Everyrealm than a white engineering director was offered for similar work, and that Yorio refused to consider him for a promotion after he rejected her sexual advances.

Yorio once told Frimpong during a meeting about engineering and product that “it is important [that he] get the customer wet, just like [he] would with a woman,” the suit claims. On another occasion, Yorio said she and her husband, Jesse Yorio, “are only married in the metaverse,” according to the suit.

An Everyrealm spokesperson told The Post: “These allegations are absurd. This former employee (Frimpong) worked remotely, and Mrs. Yorio only interacted with him a few times on video calls,” according to the company rep.

“We will defend against his false allegations. These lawsuits are filled with false allegations by former employees who are demanding multimillion dollar settlements,” the company spokesperson added. “Our company works hard to foster a supportive, inclusive workplace, and we will continue to defend against these lawsuits.”

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