From the start of 2016 through April 2018, there were 679 homicides in Philadelphia. Many of them only received attention through short mentions on the evening news or briefs in the local papers. 

One of those slain was Trina Singleton’s son, Darryl. He was killed outside of his grandmother’s home in Southwest Philadelphia just one day before his 25th birthday.

“From sunup to sundown on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2016, shootings were happening all over Philadelphia,” Singleton said. “Darryl was, ‘Man, 24, Shot.’ No suspects or motive or follow-up story.”

Darryl’s death was a brief in the newspaper, part of a roundup of 10 separate shootings that day, she said.

No one yet has been charged with his murder. A change of detectives on the case hasn't helped solve the crime, Trina Singleton said.

But Darryl's case and dozens of others are now receiving much-needed awareness.

A website called the Philadelphia Obituary Project is dedicated to shedding light on slayings that previously received little coverage. Attorney Cletus Lyman, along with Albert Stumm, a former editor at the Philadelphia Daily News, and two reporters created the site as a digital memorial.

More than 430 obituaries have been created for the website since its creation in 2016. Obituaries on the site can be sorted by the year and month each respective victim was killed. 

All obituaries are also featured on a homicide map that shows exactly where each victim was when he or she died. 

Annie Coulter lost her daughter, Caitlin Jaje, when someone killed the young woman and her boyfriend inside their South Philadelphia home in August 2017. She said though the 23-year-old had struggled with a drug problem in her youth, Caitlin was working to become a peer counselor.

“She wanted to help other [people] through the situation she had been through,” Coulter said.

When Caitlin was murdered, there were three brief stories that mentioned her. Only one included her full name.

“The first story just had, ‘Girl, 23, murdered,’ Coulter said. “Then it moved forward to a Cait with no last name. Then, the third story finally had her last name and that was it. After the first 48 hours, there was nothing else.”

People have a tendency to only pay attention to the details of how someone died and what they were doing before they were killed, Stumm said.

“We’re not in the position to judge people,” Stumm said, noting that the project highlights the person's life rather than the circumstances of their death.

Since its launch in June 2016, the Philadelphia Obituary Project has given many families of homicide victims the chance to provide a legacy for those killed.

Lyman said the idea came to him when he realized how many people have been affected by homicide in the city. He has funded the project.

"When I was growing up, everybody seemed to get an obituary," Lyman said. "Now, it seems kind of disrespectful that so many people go unnoticed."

"In the beginning, people were skeptical because it’s a different kind of story," he added.

The obituaries are investigated and written by reporters Taylor Farnsworth and Jen Lawson. According to Stumm, each reporter receives a list of homicides from the city’s police department every month for potential story leads. They also scour for information from Philadelphia’s major news outlets. He said they have also been developing their own contacts within the community.

"By telling these stories, we are telling the life of these people, not just their names," Stumm said. "And maybe it will make someone think twice about pulling the trigger."

Southwest pilots Tammie Jo Shults and Darren Ellisor have been praised for successfully landing their Boeing 737 after it blew an engine. Now, three weeks after the harrowing experience, Shults and Ellisor are detailing those moments in the cockpit together immediately after the explosion. 

"My first thoughts were actually, 'Oh, here we go," Shults said in an interview with ABC News' "20/20." "Just because it seems like a flashback to some of the Navy flying that we had done."

Captain Shults and co-pilot Ellisor, bother former military pilots, were forced to make an emergency landing of Southwest Flight 1380 at Philadelphia International Airport on April 17 after an engine broke apart and blew out a window. A passenger died after being partially sucked out of the opening. 

"We heard a large bang and a rapid decompression," Ellisor told ABC. "The aircraft yawed and banked to the left a little over 40 degrees. We had a very severe vibration from the number one engine that was shaking everything. That all kind of happened all at once."

Shults explained that the plane was very loud after the explosion, forcing her and Ellisor to use hand signals to talk to each other. But it didn’t hinder their teamwork, she said, because "Darren was just very easy to communicate with." 

While descending, Shults said she and Ellisor were able to "split the cockpit." Shults did the flying and talking with air traffic control, and Ellisor “took care of everything else.”

President Donald Trump personally thanked Shults and Ellisor at the White House on May 1, saying they did an "incredible" job.

A recent report from the National Transportation Safety Board found that the pilots struggled to control the plane after the explosion. The report, released on April 17, also said investigators found that pieces of the engine’s fan blade may have triggered the accident when it broke off due to metal fatigue, or microscopic cracking. Those fan blades had been inspected by sight in November 2012 with fluorescent dye used to find surface defects. 

The Federal Aviation Administration has since ramped up its regulations since the fatal accident aboard the Southwest plane, requiring similar engines to the one that exploded to be inspected.

Fairmount Avenue between north 48th and 49th streets is closed to traffic Thursday because of a massive sinkhole. Neighbors say it's been causing problems for weeks.

As if the tri-state's tick problem wasn't already bad enough: officials said an exotic species of the bloodsucker that mysteriously popped up in New Jersey last fall has survived the winter. 

Longhorned ticks have been found in Hunterdon and Union counties this spring, months after New Jersey Department of Agriculture officials said the species native to east Asia was found latched onto a sheep at a farm. In the most recent sighting, the tick that had never before been found in America was in the wild, snacking on a white-tail deer.

Officials said the tick, which normally can be found in warmer habitats, may have become established in the state. Agriculture Department and Rutgers University officials are working to eradicate the species in the areas where they have been found.

But experts told NBC's "Today" the tick -- also called the east Asian tick and bush tick -- will likely continue to spread throughout the region.

"I would be surprised if it does not spread out of New Jersey quickly," said James Lok, a professor of parisitology at the University of Pennsylvania.

Longhorned tick females can reproduce on their own, officials told "Today." And unlike common deer ticks, they're not picky about what they latch onto at any stage of life. 

The Agriculture Department said in a news release that the ticks are a serious pest to livestock, wildlife, pets and humans and can spread diseases to humans and animals. They're particularly dangerous to cattle because they transmit a disease called Theileriosis, which can cause severe anemia or death.

Officials said it is not clear whether longhorned ticks could spread tickborne illnesses common to New Jersey. But Lok told "Today" there is evidence the species can transmit Lyme disease.

“(The longhorned tick has) got a pretty terrible track record in China, Japan and recently in New Zealand and Australia,” Lok said. “And it’s not a stretch to assume it would be able to transmit the related diseases in North America.”

A Philadelphia police officer has been found liable for $10 million in the 2011 arrest of a city man, who spent three years in jail before being found innocent.

Khanefah Boozer was arrested by Officer Ryan Waltman after Waltman charged Boozer with shooting a gun at the officer. Boozer could not afford bail after the arrest and spent the time between his arrest and his trial in jail, according to Boozer's attorney Robert J. Levant.

Levant was expected to hold a press conference Thursday afternoon to discuss the civil verdict. It is believed to be the biggest finding against a city officer ever.

Investigators never followed up on claims Waltman made in his initial arrest report, according to a press advisory released by Levant's law firm.

Boozer was acquitted in his criminal trial when another man testified that he was actually the one who fired a fun into the air during the original incident in 2011, the press advisory said.

"Khanefah Boozer maintained throughout his ordeal that other individuals had fired a gun out of a car (shooting up in the air) and gave police their names and other identifying information. Police failed to investigate those individuals and did not recover a gun, shell casing or bullet," the advisory said. "After nothing was recovered, the officer amended his police report to note that our client had been standing next to another unknown African American male who fled the scene after the shot was fired. Mr. Boozer was acquitted following a jury trial in 2014 in which individuals (including the man who fired the gun into the air) testified in court, corroborating his version of the events."

Check back for more information on this breaking news story.

The NBC10 First Alert Weather Team partnered with the Philadelphia Phillies to celebrate Weather Education Day at the ballpark.

A deadly end to a high-speed chase was caught on dash cam video. The entire ordeal started when police started chasing the suspect after a murder in Millville, New Jersey.

A baby shower donated by Thirty-One gifts celebrated expectant mothers in North Philadelphia.

Severe storms are headed our way, and they could bring hail. The NBC10 First Alert Weather team has your neighborhood forecast.

She dances into our living rooms every afternoon, but what happens behind the scenes of the Ellen Show? We'll show you.

Citizens Bank Park was packed with fans cheering on the Phillies on Thursday, but first fans filled the seats for Weather Education Day hosted by the NBC10 First Alert Weather team.

A father has donated six kits to stop bleeding to local schools -- to prepare them if there's a serious accident or violence. Chris Saullo, a dad in Montgomery County's Wissahickon School District, wanted the district to be prepared.

Vendors at the Wilmington Flower Market are keeping their fingers crossed for nice weather as the market opens. NBC10's Tim Furlong shows you around the market.

Prosecutors in South Jersey want to speak with the boyfriend of a mother whose baby was found dead inside her Sicklerville home Thursday.

Crime scene investigators flooded a home along Marcia Court near Monroe Place Thursday afternoon.

Law enforcement sources said the mother awoke to find the baby not moving in the crib.

Neighbors tell NBC10 that the woman frantically ran out of the home screaming for someone to save her baby.

"We were just trying to keep going and keep going and keep going, but we really couldn’t do anything for him," Krista Gonzalez, a neighbor who came out to help the woman, said.

Gonzalez said the woman kept repeating "I hear your voice" to the child as they tried to revive him.

Sources said the woman's boyfriend was missing when the baby was found. Police are actively looking for him saying he's a person of interest in the case.

Police have not said how the baby died.

For weeks, a police surveillance camera at North Broad and York streets in North Philadelphia showed black.

Another camera in West Philadelphia at 60th and Catherine streets wouldn't pan back and forth.

Back in North Philly, at 29th and Allegheny, a camera wouldn't zoom.

Malfunctions like these can take a long time to have fixed. Only three city workers handle the more than 550 taxpayer-owned cameras — including 428 police surveillance cameras — though there is a request for an additional two maintenance workers in the next budget.

NBC10 Investigators reviewed hundreds of pages of documents, received through a right-to-know request, that found nearly 100 of the police-operated cameras suffered from malfunctions or black outs for periods between Jan. 1, 2015 and Jan. 1, 2018.

Most of the malfunctions are minor in nature, such as water on the lens or lack of control over movement, according to the documents. Officials with the police department declined to be interviewed about the camera network.

A spokesman for Mayor Jim Kenney said the police camera network has "issues face by many municipalities that use public safety cameras."

"We have worked hard to address them, while at the same time expanded the number of cameras," spokesman Mike Dunn said in an email.

Both the police department and the commerce department are slated to add 75 cameras combined annually.

The city Office of Innovation and Technology is budgeted to add up to 50 cameras annually for the police department. The two organizations coordinate to determine the new locations.

Starting in 2018, the commerce department will fund the installation of 25 new city cameras along business corridors as enhanced safety.

"The number of Commerce funded camera installations will occur annually starting with 25 and may grow over time," Dunn said in the email.

He added that 94 percent of the city's 428 public safety cameras are fully functioning with no issues, while 4 percent are operating with "minor display issues."

Councilman Curtis Jones said he is working on legislation to mandate quicker maintenance on cameras that aren't fully operational. On the day of a recent interview, he said 35 cameras were reported not working properly.

"At the end of the day, minimum, we’re going to get more resources to it," Jones said.

In addition to the PPD cameras, the city Streets Department operates 120, the Delaware Valley Intelligence Center operates 11 and the Office of Emergency Management operates nine.

On a much larger scale, SEPTA operates by far the most surveillance cameras in the city: 2,911.

Outside of the city and transit agency, the University of Pennsylvania operates 11, the federal government (DHS/DOJ) operates 16 and the Philadelphia International Airport operates 13.

A camera costs $3,500-$4,000 to buy from the current vendor, Tyco Integrated Security LLC.

Most of the time rides at amusement parks run smoothly and safely. But what happens when they don't? Crews today practiced rescue techniques at Morey's Piers in Wildwood, New Jersey, and we got a first hand look at the training.

A drug bust on the Main Line resulted in investigators finding 140 different types of items containing THC or marijuana, including coffee pods, police said. The pods are typically used for brewing coffee.

During the 78 days Iyo Bishop sat in jail unable to post bail, the 43-year-old lost her job, car and apartment, she said. No loved ones could help pay $5,000 for her release on assault charges, so she waited. And waited.

More than two months after being arrested, something unexpected happen. A stranger visited Bishop in jail and, within two weeks, secured her pretrial release.

All charges were eventually dismissed. 

That stranger was a volunteer from the Philadelphia Community Bail Fund, which posted bail earlier this week for more than one dozen women just in time for Mother’s Day.

On Thursday, Bishop joined those 15 women outside City Hall to call for the end of cash bail.

“I was in a dark, dark place,” Bishop said of her time in jail. “I had to start all over when I got out, all because could not afford the ... price tag on my freedom.”

The other women released this week each sat in jail between five and 451 days, according to Candace McKinley from the Philadelphia Community Bail Fund. None of them could afford to post their bail.

The bail fund has raised $75,000 to help other low-income, pretrial defendants in the city. It’s part of a national effort to end cash bail, and fits right into District Attorney Larry Krasner’s ongoing policy reform. In February, he instructed prosecutors to recommend that no cash bail requirements be set for low-level offenders.

"There is absolutely no reason why someone who will show up for court, is not a flight risk, and is no threat to their neighbors and community, needs to sit in jail for days because they can't post a small amount of bail," Krasner said at the time.

The new policies did not impact Bishop, however. She was already in jail on charges stemming from a domestic abuse altercation with her ex-boyfriend. She was initially charged with aggravated assault, simple assault and recklessly endangering another person, according to court records. 

Bishop denied those charges and her case was eventually dismissed, but she still had to wait behind bars because she could not afford to pay for her release.

“The consequences of even a few days locked in a cage pretrial can cause irreparable damage,” she said.

Since her release, Bishop spends her free time looking for work and volunteering with the community bail fund. She hopes her efforts will prevent others from going through the same legal nightmare she experienced.

A boy drowned after falling into a Burlington County lake while fishing Thursday afternoon.

The 12-year-old boy and a few friends were fishing off a dock at Sylvan Lake in Burlington Township, New Jersey, when he and another boy fell into the water, police said.

The one boy resurfaced, but the other didn't. The kids then called for help.

A dive team took to the water to search for the boy. It took three hours to find his body, which was still submerged, because of murky water conditions, police said.

They said water plants also hampered their efforts.

The investigation into how the boys fell into the water remains ongoing.

Here are the top news stories you need to know to start your day from your friends at NBC10.

TODAY'S TOP STORY 

Boy, 12, Drowns After Falling into Lake: A boy drowned after falling into a Burlington County lake while fishing Thursday afternoon. The 12-year-old boy and a few friends were fishing off a dock at Sylvan Lake in Burlington Township, New Jersey, when he and another boy fell into the water, police said. The one boy resurfaced, but the other didn't. The kids then called for help. A dive team took to the water to search for the boy. It took three hours to find his body, which was still submerged, because of murky water conditions, police said. They said water plants also hampered their efforts. The investigation into how the boys fell into the water remains ongoing.

• MORE ON THE BOY
  

WHAT YOU MISSED YESTERDAY

Prosecutors Investigate Baby's Death Inside Home: Prosecutors in South Jersey want to speak with the boyfriend of a mother whose baby was found dead inside her Sicklerville home Thursday. Crime scene investigators flooded a home along Marcia Court near Monroe Place Thursday afternoon. Law enforcement sources said the mother awoke to find the baby not moving in the crib. Neighbors tell NBC10 that the woman frantically ran out of the home screaming for someone to save her baby. Sources said the woman's boyfriend was missing when the baby was found. Police are actively looking for him saying he's a person of interest in the case. Police have not said how the baby died.

• MORE ON THE BABY
  

YOUR FIRST ALERT FORECAST  

Friday is expected to be sunny with temperatures in the 70s. Saturday and Sunday could see temperatures nearing 80 degrees with plenty of sunshine.   Get your full NBC10 First Alert forecast here.

Girl's Family Sues Wawa Over Hot Tea Spill: A New Jersey family is suing Wawa over burns they allege their 3-year-old daughter sustained when a cashier knocked over a cup of hot water at the checkout. The federal suit, filed Monday, claims the store dispenses water at a "highly dangerous temperature." David Mazie, an attorney for the family, released a video of the April 25 spill in Neptune, Monmouth County. It shows the clerk bagging the family's purchases, and accidentally knocking over a water bottle, which then hits and topples the cup of hot water. The child can be seen jumping and writhing in seeming pain. Mazie says the girl was taken to a hospital with second and third-degree burns. "We are devastated about this unfortunate accident, and our hearts go out to the child and her family," Wawa spokeswoman Lori Bruce said. "We can’t comment on the specifics of the lawsuit."  The lawsuit seeks more than $150,000 in damages.

• MORE ON THE LAWSUIT
  

AROUND THE WORLD

AT&T Paid Trump Lawyer to Advise on Time Warner Deal: AT&T paid President Donald Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, $600,000 for advice on its proposed purchase of Time Warner shortly after Trump's election, according to a report published Thursday by The Washington Post. The ties between AT&T and Cohen had previously been revealed, but the telecommunications company had only said it agreed to pay the attorney to gain a better understanding on how the incoming Trump administration might approach a wide range of issues, including antitrust issues. The Justice Department is seeking to block AT&T's $85 billion purchase of Time Warner on the grounds that it would stifle competition. AT&T disagreed, sending the battle into a federal trial. U.S District Judge Richard Leon is expected to issue a ruling next month. Dallas-based AT&T Inc. didn't immediately respond to requests for comment about the Post's story. Its contract with Cohen ended last year.

• MORE ON THE PAYMENT
  

That's what you need to know to Catch Up Quickly, but we've got more stories worthy of your time. Click here to check them out.