METRO DIGEST || Landscaping training for local men

Landscaping training

YOUNGSTOWN

Sly’s Landscaping LLC will host a program next week to train local men between age 18 and 24 on the basics of landscaping at a vacant lot at 511 W. Indianola Ave.

The training is from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. next Friday and from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. April 25.

After training, up to 12 participants will be given an opportunity to join the company. Sly’s recently hired six men through a similar training program, and the company plans to do more in the future.

Social Security crime

PITTSBURGH

A federal grand jury has indicted a 57-year-old Grove City, Pa., man on a charge of theft of government property by converting his dead mother’s Social Security benefits to his own use. Alexander Viskovatoff is charged with committing the crime between January 2011 and September 2012, the U.S. attorney said. The Social Security Administration’s inspector general’s office investigated the case.

DiPaolo trial reset

WARREN

The building-code trial in Warren Municipal Court for Sergio DiPaolo, owner of the former Packard Electric buildings on Dana and Griswold streets, was reset to 1:30 p.m. May 13.

DiPaolo, of Niles and Girard, faces charges accusing him of occupying his former Packard buildings without a permit and carrying out demolition without a permit.

Woman faces charges

BOARDMAN

A township woman faces charges of aggravated menacing, obstructing official business and resisting arrest after an incident at her Hillman Way apartment early Thursday.

Tara Williams, 42, was arrested after 911 dispatchers overheard Williams threatening to shoot other people at her apartment. Police say they heard what sounded like a muffled gunshot, but later determined that Williams did not have a gun. Williams was taken to the Mahoning County jail.

Shots fired at car

YOUNGSTOWN

Police reports said a car was shot up around noon Wednesday in a driveway in the 2200 block of Ohio Avenue.

A 22-year-old woman told police she was standing next to the car when an SUV pulled up with two men inside, one of them armed with an AK-47 assault rifle. Several shots were fired, hitting the car and the house, reports said.

The woman told police a friend of hers has been feuding with the suspect for more than a year.

The woman also said her other car was shot at April 10 but she did not report it, and witnesses said they saw a similar SUV Tuesday, and someone inside was firing shots.

Police found multiple bullet holes in the car and home. No one was injured.

Sentenced for rape

WARREN

Michael E. Jachimiak, 62, with addresses on State Road in Champion and Vine Avenue in Warren, was sentenced to 10 years in prison Thursday in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court for raping a 14-year-old boy at Packard Park on Aug. 16.

His indictment says Jachimiak compelled the boy to submit to the sexual conduct by force or threat of force. The sentence was ordered by Judge Ronald Rice.

Facing rape charges

GIRARD

Tommy R. Edwards, 41, of Attalla, Ala., is in the Trumbull County jail in lieu of $1 million bond, charged with raping a 17-year-old girl at Motel 30, 1600 Motor Inn Drive in Liberty.

Liberty police arrested him at 2:57 p.m. Tuesday at the motel after an investigation.

Edwards was arraigned in Girard Municipal Court Wednesday. No plea was entered for the charge.

Police were called to the same hotel room two days earlier for a fight between the 17-year-old and an adult woman related to “inappropriate actions” involving the 17-year-old and Edwards, according to a police report.

Hunger strike ends

COLUMBUS

The organizer of a hunger strike at Ohio’s highest-security prison says inmates decided to end their protest after negotiating some changes with the warden.

Siddique Hasan, an inmate at the Ohio State Penitentiary on state Route 616 on Youngstown’s East Side, says the warden has agreed to allow more access to religious services.

But he adds the warden wasn’t willing to meet their demands for changes to the prison’s recreation policies.

Hasan said in a phone call released by a representative Wednesday he and other inmates who began the hunger strike in mid-March will continue their protest if the warden doesn’t follow through with his promises.

A prisons department spokeswoman says the warden met with inmates and said a review was underway looking at several issues before the protest began.