Two sisters arrested on drug charges

May 22, 2015 at 12:00a.m.

YOUNGSTOWN

A pair of New Castle, Pa., sisters were arrested for having drug-abuse instruments and drug paraphernalia after a car they were in was pulled over for failing to stop at a stop sign about 1:05 p.m. Wednesday at East Boston Avenue and Southern Boulevard on the South Side.

Reports said Teresa Hooks, 37, was the driver of the car, and her sister, Shannon Hooks, 44, was a passenger.

Reports said Teresa Hooks was very nervous when talking to police, and she gave police permission to search her car.

Inside, police found seven used syringes and a burnt spoon, reports said.

Reports said Shannon Hooks told police she and her sister take heroin every day and spend about $100 a day on their heroin habit. They had used earlier in the day, Shannon Hooks told police.

Both women were booked into the Mahoning County jail, reports said.

Ex-recruiter accused of identity theft

CLEVELAND

A federal grand jury has indicted a former Ohio Army National Guard recruiting assistant living in Southington on charges of theft of public money and aggravated identity theft.

Jack Reppart, 46, who had been based in Springfield, Ohio, is accused of using the means of identification of six people to steal about $14,000 from the U.S. Department of Defense between 2006 and 2011, the U.S. attorney said.

The case was investigated by the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command.

Legislation objects to liquor permit

WARREN

Councilman Eddie Colbert, D-7th, has sponsored legislation that would notify the Ohio Department of Liquor Control that council objects to a liquor permit being issued for a business at 2382 W. Market St.

The legislation also asks for a local hearing. The business would be called Fam US II, the legislation says.

The address in question is the same one where The Ohio Department of Public Safety, formerly known as Ohio Liquor Control, executed a search warrant May 8, finding evidence that the club Better Daze was serving alcohol without a license.

Frederick A. Moore, 59, of Highland Avenue Southwest, was charged with six misdemeanor offenses in connection with the operation.

Woman faces burglary, menacing charges

GIRARD

Sonni J. Stanford, 19, of Trumbull Court, Liberty, is in the Trumbull County jail in lieu of $25,000 bond, charged with felony burglary and menacing and misdemeanor menacing and criminal damaging.

She was arraigned Thursday in Girard Municipal Court, pleading not guilty to the menacing and criminal damaging; no plea was required on the felonies.

Liberty police said the charges stem from allegations she broke down the door to an apartment at Oaktree Apartments on Trumbull Court and damaged a television inside Sunday evening.

She’s also accused of threatening the man living at the apartment on Facebook. The man showed police posts Stanford purportedly wrote indicating she broke into the apartment and asked for others to come to his apartment with guns.

Sentenced for firing gun outside store

WARREN

Aswad Fleming, 25, of Warren, was sentenced to 10 years in prison Thursday in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court for firing a gun outside the Dollar General store on West Market Street on Jan. 22.

Police said the gunfire followed an argument he had with a girlfriend inside the store and a confrontation with a man in which he showed the man he was carrying a gun. He left the store and fired the gun in the parking lot, hitting a parked vehicle.

He pleaded guilty Thursday before Judge Ronald Rice to four counts of felonious assault, two counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm and one count of tampering with evidence.

Child-porn sentence

WARREN

Ian Weddell, 33, of Tami Court in Cortland, was sentenced Thursday to 90 days in the Trumbull County jail, an additional 180 days of house arrest at his expense and a $2,500 fine after pleading guilty in February to 10 felony child-pornography charges.

Weddell will serve five years of intensive probation and must serve 400 hours of community service. He cannot be around children under age 18 without supervision of the child’s guardian, said Judge Ronald Rice of Trumbull County Common Pleas Court. Prosecutors had recommended four years in prison.

Man gets 9 months in prison for importuning

WARREN

Melvin V. White, 52, of Bane Street in Warren Township, was sentenced to nine months in prison Thursday for grabbing a juvenile female at a restaurant in the Eastwood Mall Complex in Niles in November and holding her in a bear hug while making sexual comments to her.

White let go of the girl after her male friend intervened, Niles police said. White pleaded guilty to the felony charge of importuning and will have to register as a sex offender.

Board of health panel has meeting today

AUSTINTOWN

The Mahoning County District Board of Health Personnel Committee will meet at 5 p.m. today at the Mahoning County District Board of Health, 50 Westchester Drive.

St. Patrick Church to display nations’ flags

YOUNGSTOWN

St. Patrick Church, 1420 Oak Hill Ave., will celebrate the 104th anniversary of the parish and the feast of Pentecost with a parade, an international display of flags and a reception after Sunday’s Mass, which begins at 10 a.m.

Flags from 31 countries will be carried in the parade to represent how crowds of people speaking diverse languages and dialects could understand perfectly all that the disciples were saying after the Day of Pentecost.

Victory Christian Church from Coitsville provided the flags to be carried in the parade, and later they will be displayed in the church.

In the early years of St. Patrick’s, the congregation was largely Irish, but through the years, it has become diverse. After the Mass, a celebratory reception will take place in the church social hall.

Low water pressure

POLAND

Parts of Poland, North Lima and Struthers were without water or with low water pressure late Thursday night, Vindicator broadcast partner 21 WFMJ-TV reported.

Aqua Ohio was trying to find out the cause and was reporting that the water was safe to drink. No other information was available by press time.