This Week in Tech with Jeanne Destro-4-19-19 Featured
Written by Jeanne Destro
This week, how Amazon Alexa may be spying on you, and how companies like Facebook and a big, well-known government contractor, are using artificial intelligence. (**Please note: You can subscribe to this program as a podcast on your Apple or Android device. In addition, you can find it through apps including Stitcher, Podbean, and Spotify.)
The Summit County Sheriff's Office is investigating a deadly crash along East Turkeyfoot Lake Road in the City of Green Thursday morning.
According to the Sheriff's report, around 7:30 a.m., a 71-year-old man driving a yellow Corvette eastbound on East Turkeyfoot collided with a tractor trailer that was waiting to turn into a gas station, and then hit another car.
The driver of the Corvette, a 71-year-old resident of Green, was transported to Summa Akron City Hospital where he was later pronounced dead. Neither the driver of the truck nor the driver of the Civic were injured.
East Turkeyfoot Lake Road was closed for roughly three hours after the accident Thursday morning.
Investigators with the Sheriff's Office do not suspect that alcohol played a factor in the accident.
An Akron Police cruiser that was escorting a funeral procession along Darrow Road, just a block from the Newcomer Funeral Home, was hit by another driver, according to police.
The officer had to be extracted from the cruiser, and was taken to Akron City Hospital with non-life threatening injuries. The other driver, a 21-year-old woman, had minor injuries, and was cited for several violations, including driving under a suspended license.
See the full release from the Akron Police Department below:
(APD) Accident involving cruiser doing a funeral escort:
Shortly before 2:00pm this afternoon, an officer in a marked cruiser was doing a funeral escort for the Newcomer Funeral Home, located at 131 North Canton Road. As the procession drove north bound on Darrow Road, about a block north of the funeral home, the cruiser was struck by a Chevy Malibu driven by a 21 year old female from Dudley Street in Akron. The officer was confined, due to the damage of the cruiser. The officer was removed from the cruiser and transported to Akron City Hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
The 21 year old female driver and her passenger where transported to Cleveland Clinic Akron General with non-life threatening injuries. The driver was cited for left turn approaching traffic, driving on a suspended driver’s license, and right of way for a funeral procession. The driver also had a warrant for driving on s suspended license from Copley Police Department.
Summit County Approves North American First People's Day
Written by Jeanne DestroLike the City of Akron did last year, now--Summit County has designated the first Monday of October, "North American First People's Day".
It comes after sustained efforts by students and teachers at The Lippman School in Akron, which has a long-standing cross-cultural partnership with the Northern Cheyenne Nation.
Ray Horner talked to Sam Chestnut, Lippman's Head of School, and their Curriculum Director, Matt Russ, about it today.
(Summit County Sheriff's Office) In February of this year the Summit County Sheriff’s Office responded to a breaking and entering that occurred at a storage facility in the City of Green. An enclosed trailer (valued at over ten thousand dollars) had been stolen and this crime mirrored other crimes that had been occurring in different areas of Summit County.
Sheriff’s detectives began their investigation (assisted by information provided from Sheriff’s Deputy Mike Jones) and soon developed suspects with Detectives Jason Kline and Brian Breeden working various night and day hours to confirm the information they had received. Soon they developed suspects involved in several burglaries and thefts. The property taken in these incidents usually involved vehicles, boats, trailers and construction equipment, including a heavy duty Earth Mover, snow plows and power tools.
On April 3, 2019, suspect Jerry Stubblefield, 48, of Hunter Avenue, Munroe Falls, Ohio, was arrested and charged with 3 counts of Breaking and Entering, 5 Counts of Felony Theft, and Possession of Drugs-Methamphetamine. Suspect Jeremy Harnack, 39, of Gage Street in Akron, was arrested and charged with 3 Counts of Breaking and Entering and 3 Counts of Felony Theft. Suspect Mark Harkless, 52, of The Brooklands, Akron, was charged one count of Felony Theft and all have been booked into the Summit County Jail. Additional charges will also be addressed at Grand Jury.
Over one hundred thousand dollars worth of stolen property has been recovered over the past several weeks, with cases being cleared in several areas of the county. Sheriff Barry credits his deputies and entire detective bureau, along with the assistance provided by the Akron, Boston Heights, and Tallmadge Police Departments and the Portage County Sheriff’s Office.
CITY OF AKRON: Today (Monday), Akron Mayor Dan Horrigan and Health Commissioner Donna Skoda joined together with community partners to mark the public release of Akron’s Youth Violence Prevention Strategic Plan. The plan—which was developed after more than two years of research, data collection and community conversations with neighborhood stakeholders—calls for a 20%+ reduction in youth violent crime in Akron by 2023. The Youth Violence Prevention Steering Committee is comprised of leaders from government, public health, recreation, education, law enforcement, corrections, and non-profit community organizations.
“We cannot allow violent crime among our youth to continue to devastate lives, families and neighborhoods,” Mayor Horrigan said. “Our young people are in crisis. While we have dedicated non-profits, advocates, and law enforcement agencies in our community, we must do more to coordinate all our efforts around specific, shared goals and action steps if we are going to make real progress.”
The Youth Violence Prevention Strategic Plan targets older youth, ages 15 to 24. The plan is intended to remedy the weaknesses in Akron’s continuum of comprehensive services for all at-risk youth by plugging the service gaps for youth in the targeted age range.
The Plan identifies key risk factors that lead youth to commit acts of violence, along with important protective factors that can diminish the likelihood of violent activity. These findings were used, along with crime statistics and mapping, to develop specific action steps related to the following eight Recommended Approaches:
- Mentoring
- Recreation and Discretionary Time
- Re-entry Support
- Police-Youth Relations
- Mental Health and Substance Abuse Supports and Treatment
- Gun Access Reduction
- Community Awareness and Involvement
- Capacity and Infrastructure Development
Each approach will require the commitment of various community partners. Summit County Public Health will be the lead agency on coordinating implementation of the plan among all the partners.
Health Commissioner Donna Skoda says, “Youth violence is a public health issue. It comes in all forms, from bullying, to assault, to gun violence. It deeply affects the mental, emotional and physical health of our youth, causing a wide variety of issues that Summit County Public Health works to combat every day. Many organizations and community groups have a hand in reducing youth violence, and this strategic plan offers us a chance for true and meaningful coordination. This will be a living document, one that can be updated and adjusted to best fit the needs of the community, as our work progresses.”
The City of Akron will be leading the charge on several approaches, including reducing access to guns, increasing positive recreational opportunities, and enhancing police youth relations and community awareness
“It is essential that we continue to get guns off our streets, provide neighborhood services like Midnight Basketball, and build trust between our youth and law enforcement by creating opportunities for positive interaction and open dialogue,” Mayor Horrigan continued. “As the African proverb states, ‘it takes a village to save a child.’ Likewise, it will take our entire community to save our children from heading down a path of violence. Through true coordination and real action, I believe we can accomplish a meaningful reduction in violent crime and provide Akron’s next generation with the tools and opportunities to thrive.”
A full copy of the Youth Violence Prevention Strategic Plan—including Steering Committee and Workgroup members, data graphs and maps, and a list of resources currently serving local youth—can be found at www.akronohio.gov/preventyouthviolence.
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This Week in Tech with Jeanne Destro-4-12-19 Featured
Written by Jeanne Destro
Everybody knows you should be running some kind of anti-virus security software on your computers. But, what you might not know, is that's not the only--or even the best--way to keep hackers, criminals, and spies out of your network. So, this week, we're focused on cybersecurity in general, and in particular, on what you can do to make your router more resistant to attacks. (*Please note: You can subscribe to this program as a podcast on Apple and Android devices, through their app stores. It's also available on Spotify, Stitcher, and Podbean.)