A string of after-school fights broke out Wednesday in Reading, leaving a boy bloodied in City Park and police without any explanation for two melees.
Sgt. John M. Solecki said fights occasionally happen after dismissal, but the violence Wednesday was unusual because various objects were used as weapons.
About 4 p.m., police converged on City Park, where between 75 and 100 teens were fighting at the basketball courts, some of them wielding 2-by-4s and baseball bats.
Map of Berks County, Pennsylvania, United States with township and municipal boundaries (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Law enforcement from around Berks County swarmed a Birdsboro neighborhood Monday night after hearing that a man staying in a house there threatened to hurt himself and his girlfriend.
The 46-year-old man and his girlfriend came out of the house in the 900 block of Denise Drive shortly before 10 p.m. after police contacted them by phone, borough Police Chief Theodore R. Roth said.
They were taken to the police station but not arrested, Roth said. Police planned to transport the man, whose identity they did not release, to Reading Hospital for a mental health evaluation.
A 1947 topographic map of the Reading, Pennsylvania area. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
One man was shot and another man stabbed in less than an hour early Sunday morning in Reading.
City police said the two incidents are unrelated.
Neither victim is cooperating with investigators.
In the shooting case, police were called to the 200 block of South Ninth Street for separate reports of shots being fired in the block and that a person had been shot.
A 1947 topographic map of the Reading, Pennsylvania area. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Reading did not see sunlight in 2013 before police were investigating two killings on city streets.
Two men were also wounded in the separate shootings about 80 minutes apart early Tuesday, police said.
Police identified the dead as Luis Medina, 19, of South Third Street and Najeebie Johnson, 34, of Robeson Street.
The killings marked a rough start to a new year in a city that has seen a resurgence in violent crime.
A 1947 topographic map of the Reading, Pennsylvania area. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Two men were killed and another two were wounded in a series of overnight shootings in Reading, investigators said.
One man was shot to death and another grazed about 3:50 a.m., according to city police Sgt. John M. Solecki.
According to Solecki:
The pair and another man were driving around northeast Reading looking for a club where they were supposed to pick somebody up. They stopped to ask directions from a man walking in the 900 block of Amity Street who fired several shots into the vehicle, fatally wounding the driver and grazing one of the passengers.
Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Berks County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Medical treatment available at Reading Hospital and St. Joseph Medical Center is as good as or better than any other hospital in Pennsylvania.
But the cost of that treatment is more expensive at Reading Hospital, 16 percent more expensive on average.
The Hospital Performance Report released today by the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council measures the in-hospital death and readmission rate of all hospitals in the state in 2011. A readmission is defined as being admitted to the hospital within 30 days of being hospitalized for the same condition.
It also measures the average cost for treating some common medical conditions.
A city man was killed Thursday when he drove through a red light on Schuylkill Avenue at Buttonwood Street while talking on a cellphone and his car was hit broadside by a work van, authorities said.
Jose E. DeJesus Garcia, 53, who investigators said lived in the northwestern area of the city not far from the crash site, was pulled from the car by a nearby resident as the vehicle caught fire following the 8:25 a.m. accident. He died before police arrived.
Within minutes, police vehicles, firetrucks and ambulances filled a one-block area that was strewn with mangled vehicle parts. Firefighters quickly put out the burning car.
City detectives and evidence technicians responded along with patrol officers. The intersection was closed nearly four hours, slowing commuter traffic on other routes.
Finding attractions along Penn Avenue and Penn Street will soon be a bit easier.
Representatives from the Penn Corridor Initiative on Tuesday shared with City Council plans to install way-finding signs along the corridor, pointing people in the direction of spots like the Reading Public Museum, Reading Hospital and the Sovereign Center.
“A lot of people coming into the city see the Miller Center right there and say ‘How do I get there?’ ” said John Weidenhammer, chairman of the initiative.
Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Berks County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
A man riding his bicycle on the Thun Trail next to the Schuylkill River was hit on the head and knocked down by a falling tree Thursday night as a powerful thunderstorm roared through Berks County, felling trees, power lines and even street signs.
The rider, a middle-aged man who was not identified by emergency personal, managed to call 9-1-1 for help from under the large tree, which shattered his helmet and mangled his mountain bike.
The accident happened at 7:20 p.m. as the storm knocked down trees and wires across Berks. Transformers blew up, alarms went off in homes and commercial buildings and the lights flickered in the city.
County emergency dispatchers were able to direct city firefighters to a general area along the trail after using cell towers to triangulate the location of the injured man’s cellphone.
Seems like Kate isn’t so sure that her 15 minutes of fame will last much longer!! I hope not. Kate filed to renew her nursing license this week. She was an RN at Reading Hospital before she got famous. Good grief!
Hoping these two slither back into obscurity soon!
