New Castle bomb threat

New Castle bomb threat
NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- A bomb scare kept about 160 people from the McGill Community Center for nearly two hours Wednesday. Police say a man with a raspy voice called in a bomb threat around 9 a.m. to the Lawrence County Habitat for Humanity office in the center. Center Executive Director Bernadette Schaffner said everyone was evacuated and taken to nearby Clen-Moore Presbyterian Church. The center is the home of the New Castle Christian Academy, a private elementary school, McGill Adult Care Center and some Title I programs. Police say they don't know if the bomb threat was related to two bomb threats made Tuesday to the Lawrence County Government Center.
Motorcyclist dies
HERMITAGE, Pa. -- A Greenville man was killed when he was thrown from his motorcycle as he rode along River Road around 9 p.m. Wednesday. Police said Michael Kovac, 41, of 347 Hadley Road, failed to negotiate a curve and struck the guardrail. He was thrown from his motorcycle and fell down a 38-foot embankment. Dr. Charles Zeigler, Mercer County deputy coroner, pronounced Kovac dead at the scene from blunt force trauma to the chest.
Missing teen-ager
YOUNGSTOWN -- Anyone with information about the whereabouts of 16-year-old William Brewer of North Bon Air Avenue is asked to contact the Youngstown Police Department juvenile division at (330) 742-8960. The boy has not been seen since March 23. He is 6 feet tall, 160 to 165 pounds with red hair and brown eyes.
Possible house move
NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- One of the homes slated to be razed to make way for a new city high school could be spared. Schools Solicitor Thomas Piccione said someone wants to buy one of the 14 homes and move it. Piccione did not know the man's name and said no price has been discussed. The house can be sold in three ways -- an auction, sealed bids or court-approved sale. Officials likely will seek sealed bids if they decide to proceed, Piccione said. The district plans to raze the homes in August to make way for a new education wing. Several of them were built in the 1800s.
Sentence in sex crime
PITTSBURGH -- A man who met a 14-year-old Lawrence County girl on the Internet and took her to another state will spend 15 months in federal prison. Christopher Zabukover, 29, of Limon, Colo., was sentenced Wednesday in U.S. Federal Court. He was convicted earlier this year of transporting a minor across state lines with the intent to engage in sexual activity. Prosecutors said Zabukover drove to Ellwood City on July 23, 2000, and met the girl at a prearranged location. The two left the state together and were eventually found in Missoula, Mont., Aug. 10. Zabukover was arrested; the girl was sent back to her family in Ellwood City.
Halfway house fugitive
SHARON, Pa. -- State police said an inmate apparently walked away from a state prison halfway house at 300 E. State St. a week ago. Charles Searcy, 25, of the New Castle area was last seen in the Sharon Community Corrections Center at 9:30 p.m. April 11. Searcy had been serving a burglary and aggravated assault sentence at a state prison in Shamokin, Pa., but was assigned to the halfway house Feb. 5, 2001, in anticipation of his release on parole. He would have been eligible for parole Dec. 6 but now faces a charge of escape and return to prison.
1 arrested in theft
SHARON, Pa. -- Police said a man and woman didn't get very far after breaking into a car in the municipal parking garage at Pitt Street and Vine Avenue around 11 p.m. Tuesday. While police were investigating the theft, they got a call about a disabled vehicle on the Shenango Valley Freeway near Budd Street. Police said they found items in the disabled vehicle that had been stolen from the car in the parking garage and arrested the occupant of the disabled car, a 32-year-old West Middlesex woman, on charges of receiving stolen property and public drunkenness. She was held overnight for arraignment. Police said they are looking for a second person, a man, who was with the West Middlesex woman but left the disabled car before police arrived.