The high school principal urged students Thursday morning to help identify the gunman who shot and wounded a 17-year-old dropout on the steps outside the school gym Wednesday evening.
“This violent individual, who totally violated the atmosphere of safety and trust we have at Brockton High, needs to be arrested and prosecuted,” said Principal Susan Szachowicz. “He crossed every line of decency in society.”
Meanwhile, investigators continued interviewing potential witnesses to identify the shooter and any accomplices.
According to police, the victim, identified as Linandl Brown-Madison, had been at the school gym when someone confronted him. He later went outside where he was shot by another person. Brown was listed in stable condition at Good Samaritan Medical Center in Brockton Wednesday night.
Lt. John Crowley, chief of detectives, said no arrests had been made as of 11 a.m.
I also read on the Bostonchannel.com that the shooter is described as a light-skinned black male, somewhere between 5'6 and 5'9, wearing a red sox hat. This is the second Brockton shooting that has been in the news this week. The massacre at the Hess station on the South side in the Sunday paper had my grandparents talking about it all day. It's weird because I always thought that Hess was sketchy and then my friend Tara told me that it's like the most dangerous one in Brockton after dark. Who'd have thought? It's right on Main St! Anyways, the thing that bothered me most about the Hess incident is that four cars were shooting at each other, one man DIED, and three more were injured, and it was in a little section in the newspaper, not even the top story. THIS is why people have no idea what's going on in Brockton. The crime has gotten so bad it's chased out 4 generations of my family. When is something else going to be done about this? 30 years ago Brockton wasn't nearly as bad a place as it is now. Last year when I lived on the South side with my dad for a few months, there was a shooting on my street, in the house diagonal from my apartment. It was a baby shower and there were a bunch of people there and three people were injured, a little girl even died. When did Brockton become South Central Los Angeles?
That's all I have to say about that.
(CNN) -- The 6-year-old Colorado boy who is believed to have set adrift a helium balloon Thursday, prompting ground and air searches, has been found alive, authorities said.
The balloon landed near Keenesburg, Colorado, about 60 miles from its Fort Collins departure point. Falcon Heene was found in a box in the attic of his family's Fort Collins home, according to authorities. People across the world watched Thursday as the homemade helium balloon soared 7,000 feet over eastern Colorado for more than an hour and a half. A sibling said he saw the Falcon get into the craft Thursday morning, authorities said.
But the boy was not inside the craft when it made a soft landing near Keenesburg, about 60 miles from its starting point, at 1:35 p.m. (3:35 p.m. ET). Shortly after the landing, authorities launched a ground search and suggested that Falcon never took off in the balloon. "I'm very confident we will find him. I think it's a matter of him being a little scared," Larimer County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Eloise Campanella said. "Maybe he's not ready to be found."
Falcon's parents, science enthusiasts Richard and Mayumi Heene, were featured on the 100th episode of ABC's prime-time program "Wife Swap" in March, ABC said. According to the network's Web site, the Heene family devote its time "to scientific experiments that include looking for extraterrestrials and building a research-gathering flying saucer to send into the eye of the storm." Richard Heene is a meteorologist and former television weatherman who has submitted to CNN iReports accounts of his sons helping him chase Hurricane Gustav, among other contributions.
The dome-shaped balloon, about 20 feet long and 5 feet high, appeared to be a Mylar-coated helium balloon, similar to a party balloon. It had been tethered to the family home, the Larimer County Sheriff's Department said. The boy got into the craft Thursday morning and undid the rope anchoring it.
Before the balloon touched the ground, fears that the boy could be riding in the soaring vessel prompted the Colorado Air National Guard to launch a rescue mission Thursday afternoon to see if the agency could use a helicopter to steer the aircraft to safety, a spokesman said. Officials could not immediately confirm how fast the balloon was going while airborne.
Marc Friedland, the family's next-door neighbor, said he saw Richard Heene working on the giant Mylar balloon in the backyard. "Basically, the whole family was out there and they were working with it," he said. "When I came back is when I found out that the event happened." He said the aircraft was intended to hover around 20 feet in the air and was not intended to carry people. "Obviously, something went wrong with that."
Friedland described his neighbors as "a great family. They're unusual, yes, of course. He's sort of a scientist-slash-inventor. They're storm chasers -- they go after tornadoes, hurricanes, things like that," he said. "He's a great kid," Friedland said of Falcon. "We see him a lot and they come over and they're always friendly."
What a little sneak! As I was watching the footage on the news my roommates and I were freaking out. Everyone thought he was in the balloon but he wasn't! I can't imagine being one of his parents and going through that entire ordeal. His parents, however, strike me as a bit odd. "The Heene family devote it's time 'to scientific experiments that include looking for extraterrestrials and building a research-gathering flying saucer to send into the eye of the storm.'" Hm..... what to say about this. I guess the fact that this doesn't really surprise me that this is the family that this happened to. Did his parents ever tell him "Don't play near the big balloon in the backyard." What kid of kid doesn't want to play with a huge balloon? Also, what kind of parent names their kid Falcon?
If that was my kid I honestly don't know what I would do. How would you punish him?
Meleanie Hain, 31, made national headlines last year as the mother who carried a loaded, holstered handgun to her 5-year-old daughter's soccer game.
She was found dead in her Lebanon, Pennsylvania, home along with her husband, Scott Hain, 33, on Wednesday evening, Lebanon police said.
Hain was in her kitchen talking with a friend via webcam just before her death, police said.
The friend, who police will not name, was looking away from the computer screen when he heard a shot and a scream, police said. He turned back to the monitor, he told police, and no longer saw Meleanie Hain but instead saw Scott Hain firing several rounds from a handgun toward where his wife had been.
Police said that the woman's body had already fallen to the floor by the time the friend turned back to the screen.
Scott Hain then went upstairs to a bedroom, where he shot himself in the head with a 12-gauge shotgun, police said.
Meleanie Hain was shot several times with a 9 mm handgun, police said. Her fully loaded 9 mm handgun was found in her backpack hanging on the back of the front door.
The couple's three children were home at the time of the killings, police Capt. Daniel Wright said. They were unharmed and took refuge at a neighbor's house before police arrived, he said.
Investigators have confiscated the webcam and computer, but cannot review what the friend says he saw because the online conversation was not recorded.
The death of the couple came four months after Meleanie Hain told her attorney she was separating from her husband, her attorney, Matthew B. Weisberg, told CNN Thursday. However, police said the couple still appeared to be living together.
Meleanie Hain drew media attention on September 11, 2008, when she carried a Glock strapped to her belt to her daughter's soccer game.
Nine days later her permit to carry a gun was revoked by Lebanon County Sheriff Michael DeLeo, who claimed she showed poor judgment by wearing the weapon to a child's game. County Judge Robert Eby later reinstated the permit.
