Top Vindicator stories for Tuesday

Here are The Vindicator's top stories for Tuesday. Read more in today's Vindicator and on Vindy.com.

The suspect in a shooting threat against the Jewish Community Center in Youngstown was ordered to stay off the internet and away from guns should he be able to post 10 percent of his $250,000 bond. James Reardon, 20, of Eastwood Drive in New Middletown, remains in the Mahoning County jail after his Monday arraignment before Judge Dominic Leone on charges of aggravated menacing and telephone harassment, two misdemeanors. He entered pleas of not guilty. A pretrial hearing is set for Sept. 14.

Reardon has been in custody since a warrant was served at his home Saturday by the New Middletown Police Department.

Two Lordstown Village Council members are proposing legislation that would limit village tax abatements to no more 50 percent abatement of property taxes over 10 years. Councilman Robert Bond said the legislation would reduce the amount of time an abatement can last from 15 years to 10. The village approved a high-profile tax abatement Jan. 1 for the 1.2 million-square-foot, $140 million to $170 million TJX/HomeGoods distribution center now under construction on Hallock Young Road.

Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins says convicted child rapist Martin A. Petersime is the “consummate child predator lurking among us.” Petersime, 65, who has been in prison 26 1⁄2 years on a sentence of 12 to 40 years, is eligible for parole in September, but Watkins has asked the Ohio Parole Board to keep him behind bars longer. Petersime, the former owner of the Warren Music Center on High Street, was convicted in 1992 of 20 felony sex offenses involving six children. Among them were two convictions for raping boys 11 and 12 years old.

Justin R. Leeper, 19, of Russell Avenue in Niles, pleaded not guilty Monday to two counts of rape, one of attempted rape and two of gross sexual imposition. Prosecutors say the crimes happened Nov. 21, 2018, and Jan. 24, when Leeper was 18. Judge Peter Kontos of Trumbull County Common Pleas Court set Leeper’s bond at $200,000. Niles police became aware of allegations against Leeper on Jan. 27 after the victim, a teen girl, reported it to Akron Children’s Hospital Mahoning Valley in Boardman.

Mahoning County and Western Reserve Port Authority officials Monday unveiled a plan to repopulate the shuttered Youngstown Developmental Center. With the proposal comes a plea for $1.5 million in startup funds — which could possibly come from the state’s capital budget — to allow county Mental Health and Recovery Board partnering health agencies such as Alta Behavioral Healthcare, Meridian HealthCare, Compass Family and Community Services and Easter Seals to expand offices and programming for the under-served there.

One person was killed in a Monday morning crash along Western Reserve Road in Beaver Township, according to the Ohio State Highway Patrol. The three-car collision occurred just after 11 a.m. on Western Reserve near the Ohio Turnpike underpass between Hitchcock and New Buffalo roads, dispatchers said. One person died. Another person in that same car was injured. None of the other motorists were injured, dispatchers said. The patrol did not release any names.

An officer with the Mill Creek MetroParks Police Department early Monday found a loaded AK-47 assault rifle during a traffic stop. The officer pulled over a car about 12:35 a.m. driven by Dawaylon Wilkerson, 24, of Clarencedale Avenue, for running a stop sign at Old Furnace Road and Robinson Hill on the West Side. The officer saw the rifle in the backseat and also smelled marijuana, reports said. Reports said the rifle was loaded. Wilkerson is charged with improper handling of a firearm in a motor vehicle and is in the Mahoning County jail.

Police said a man found shot to death late Sunday afternoon on a South Side street was driving his car when he was killed. Anthony Bowers, 29, was found about 5 p.m. by offices answering a gunfire call in the 500 block of Sherwood Avenue. Reports said Bowers was lying in the street and had gunshot wounds to the neck and chest. He was taken to St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Read more about these and other stories in The Vindicator and on Vindy.com