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Steven Hayes was sentenced to death by a Connecticut jury today for his role in the deadly 2007 home invasion that killed Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her two daughters. The verdict came halfway through day four of deliberation for the jury that spend the whole weekend holed up in a New Haven courtroom discussing the fate of Hayes, 47. Hayes is convicted of raping and choking Hawke-Petit to death, while accused accomplice Joshua Komisarjevsky is accused of sexually assaulting 11-year-old Michaela Petit. Michaela and her older sister Hayley, 17, died after they were tied to their beds and the house was...

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Connecticut police say they arrested a man at a management company after he mentioned the shooting rampage across the state that killed nine people and said he understood the killer's mindset. Fifty-eight-year-old Francis Laskowski of Derby was charged with breach of peace Wednesday after making the comments while working at Fusco Management Co. in New Haven.

Illegal immigrants fleeing Arizona because of SB 1070 will find the welcome mat set out for them in New Haven, Connecticut. The city appears ready to pick up the cost of their medical care, schooling and other services that will take the financial burden off the backs of Arizona taxpayers.

NEW HAVEN, CT (WPIX) - A journalism professor at Southern Connecticut State University is accused of standing naked in front of his window and exposing himself to his neighbor. Jerry Dunklee, a well-known radio personality in New Haven, was taken into police custody last week after police said they observed him naked in front of a window of his home. His neighbor alerted police, after seeing Dunklee dancing naked at the window overlooking her yard. She reportedly told police she saw Dunklee last Thursday fondling himself and waving at her. Dunklee told police that what he did inside his...

NEW HAVEN — Attorneys for a group of black city firefighters Monday filed a motion asking a federal court to halt the promotion of 10 other firefighters (including four minorities) who scored well enough on 2003 exams to be promoted. The 10 firefighters’ advancements were approved Friday by the Board of Fire Commissioners, just three days after the board ratified the promotions of 14 other firefighters (all but one of them white) mandated by the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Ricci v. DeStefano. The 10 in question scored high enough on the test to be promoted, but weren’t plaintiffs with...

A New Haven man is under arrest after police found pipe bombs and a weapon in his vehicle late Saturday,  Marlon Reddick, 44 was stopped by West Haven Police last night around 11:00 p.m. in the area of Elm Street and Kimberly Avenue for equipment violations. During the motor vehicle stop, officers observed a clear plastic bag containing pills in the passenger compartment of the vehicle. After Reddick claimed no knowledge of the pills, the officers asked him to exit the vehicle as they continued their investigation, according to a police report. As officers searched the vehicle, they discovered a duffle bag behind the front seat. ...

SNIPPET: "NEW HAVEN — A 38-year-old man arrested after police discovered a pipe bomb, shotguns, gas masks and other items inside his Mercedes late Tuesday was arrested earlier this year on bombmaking charges in East Haven. John Iannucci was held at New Haven police headquarters for most of the day on a host of weapons and explosives charges. The arrest could likely complicate the situation on his current court case. He is due to appear in court on Oct. 22 on the East Haven charges of illegal possession of explosives and illegal bomb manufacturing. He was free on $25,000 bail...

NEW HAVEN, Conn. - Police have identified a suspect in the killing of a person whose body was found stuffed behind a wall in a high-security laboratory building at Yale University, law enforcement sources told NBC News on Monday. The suspect, a student, has defensive wounds, and failed a polygraph test, the sources said. The body found Sunday in the Yale Medical School building is believed to be that of Annie Le, a 24-year-old native of Placerville, Calif. She was last seen in the building on Tuesday and Sunday was to have been her wedding day. An autopsy was being...

Investigators are trying to determine whether a San Diego sailor passed Navy secrets about security weaknesses and warship movements to a British man accused of having terrorist links, according to court documents unsealed yesterday. E-mail messages from the unnamed sailor, sent in late 2000 and 2001 before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, were found in December in computer files belonging to Babar Ahmad, who was detained Wednesday in London, according to the 31-page arrest affidavit. The computer files contained details about security arrangements and movements of the San Diego-based Constellation carrier battle group, which included the destroyer Benfold, on which...

Legislation: Still believe in post-racial politics? Read the health care bill. It's affirmative action on steroids, deciding everything from who becomes a doctor to who gets treatment on the basis of skin color. President Obama is on the record as being officially opposed to reparations for slavery. But as with other issues, you have to sift through his eloquent rhetoric and go beyond the teleprompter to get at what he really means.

Legislation: Still believe in post-racial politics? Read the health care bill. It's affirmative action on steroids, deciding everything from who becomes a doctor to who gets treatment on the basis of skin color.President Obama is on the record as being officially opposed to reparations for slavery. But as with other issues, you have to sift through his eloquent rhetoric and go beyond the teleprompter to get at what he really means. His opposition to reparations is based on the fact they don't go far enough. In a 2004 questionnaire, he told the NAACP, "I fear that reparations would be an...

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor's backers are reportedly urging reporters to probe what one called the "troubled and litigious work history" of New Haven firefighter Frank Ricci.

NEW HAVEN — The two dozen firefighters who packed into Humphrey’s East Restaurant were celebrating a coming marriage, drinking and jawboning in the boisterous style of large men with risky jobs, but Lt. Ben Vargas spent the evening trying to escape the tension surrounding his presence. During a trip to the bathroom, he found himself facing another man. Without warning, the first punch landed. When Lieutenant Vargas awoke, bloodied and splayed on the grimy floor, he was taken to the hospital. Lieutenant Vargas believes the attack, five years ago, was orchestrated by a black firefighter in retaliation for his having...

On Monday’s Newsroom program, CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin couldn’t find a consistent argument about the Supreme Court’s ruling in favor of New Haven firefighters who accused their city of reverse discrimination. Toobin first reported that Justice Kennedy, “the swing vote in this case, as in so many others,” wrote the decision, but minutes later, he labeled it as a ruling by “the five conservatives on the Court.”

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Monday that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were unfairly denied promotions because of their race, reversing a decision that high court nominee Sonia Sotomayor endorsed as an appeals court judge. New Haven was wrong to scrap a promotion exam because no African-Americans and only two Hispanic firefighters were likely to be made lieutenants or captains based on the results, the court said Monday in a 5-4 decision. The city said that it had acted to avoid a lawsuit from minorities. The ruling could alter employment practices nationwide, potentially limiting the circumstances in which...

A few months ago, David Frum wrote a cover article for the leftist magazine Newsweek smearing the most prominent conservative in America, Rush Limbaugh, as some kind of sinister McCarthyite hater who should "shut up." The message was that conservatives should shut up and surrender to liberalism. Now Ramesh Ponnuru, a senior editor of National Review, has followed in Frum's footsteps, writing an op-ed for the leftist New York Times in which he attacks conservatives as hypocrites for supporting the plaintiffs in the Ricci anti-white discrimination case. Here's his reasoning: Mr. Ricci probably deserved his promotion and had a right...

The Law Offices of Steven W. Dulan, PLC announces federal civil rights suit against City of Grand Haven and Ottawa County over open-carry ordinance. The suit, brought under Title 42, Section 1983 of the U.S. Code, was filed on behalf of Christopher Fetters, an off-duty Air Force Security Officer who was attending the Coast Guard Festival in Grand Haven last year. Mr. Fetters was openly carrying a holstered pistol, which is legal under Michigan law, as in most states. He was arrested and detained and charged with a violation of a Grand Haven city ordinance prohibiting open carry of firearms....

The Supreme Court heard arguments in an important discrimination case brought by 20 firefighters from New Haven, Connecticut. They charge that the city passed them over for promotion, despite the fact they achieved high scores on their promotion test. Nineteen of the firefighters are white, one Latino. No blacks scored high enough to qualify for promotion. The city then threw out the entire test and promoted no one. The firefighters who passed the exam are claiming they were denied promotion because of their race.

The Supreme Court has an opportunity to reaffirm or reshape the nation's civil rights laws as it faces a rare confluence of cases over the next two weeks, including a high-profile challenge brought by white firefighters who claim they lost out on promotions because of the "color of their skin." ... The most emotionally charged case is from the New Haven, Conn., firefighters, whose complaints define the real-life quandary that sometimes accompanies government efforts to ensure racial equality. The firefighters accuse city officials of violating civil rights laws and the Constitution by throwing out a promotions test on which they...

The heirs of an Apache chieftain whose remains are rumored to be held inside Yale's oldest secret society filed a lawsuit today demanding the return of their ancestor's skull. Twenty descendants of the legendary Apache chieftain Geronimo are suing the federal government, the University and the society Skull & Bones in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to seek the return of his remains as well as punitive damages. One hundred years ago today, Geronimo died of pneumonia at Fort Sill, Okla., but the suit alleges members of the society exhumed his remains in 1918 or 1919 and...