With winter weather in full force, the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission has a reminder for drivers: clean snow and ice off your vehicles. 

It is a law in Pennsylvania to remove all snow and ice from your car before heading out on to the roads. Motorists who fail to do so could face fines if any snow or ice falls from their vehicle and causes injury or death to other drivers or pedestrians. Penalties range from $200 to $1,000 for each offense.

“We urge all motorists to clear the snow and ice from their vehicles, not only for their safety, but for the safety of everyone traveling Pennsylvania roadways,” says Craig Shuey, Chief Operating Officer of the PTC.

The Pennsyvlania Snow/Ice Removal Law went into effect in 2006, following the death of Christine Lambert the previous year. 

The 51-year-old Palmer Township woman was killed on Christmas Day 2005 when ice fell from a tractor trailer and broke through the Lamberts' sports utility vehicle.

But some truck drivers say clearing off the tops of their big rigs is difficult.

"It's kinda tough to get on top of there," said John Chaves, a truck driver. 

Trucks' height makes it tough to check for snow, ice or other debris and carrying a ladder is impractical, the drivers say.

"But if you can clean it," Chaves said, "Clean it for safety purposes. If it was my family driving behind one of these big rigs, I would want that snow to be cleared off."

The PTC also reminds drivers of the law requiring headlights to be turned on whenever windshield wipers are in use.  Violators could face fines of $25. 

Passengers at five PATCO stations in our area continue to deal with repairs that have put the escalators out of commission.

“I helped a woman down the other day who couldn’t get down on her wheelchair,” said Michael Doody of Blackwood, New Jersey.

The escalators at the Lindenwold, Woodcrest, Ashland, 8th and Market and 13th and Locust stations have been down for months.

PATCO officials have tried to fix the broken escalators. They recently received word however from Fujitec, the company that made the escalators, that they were beyond repair and had to be completely replaced, a process which could take months.

“They came in, they looked at the escalators and when they opened them up they said they couldn’t agree to replace them unless they were either completely replaced or significantly overhauled,” said Tim Ireland of PATCO.

Ireland says it will cost about $2 million to replace each escalator. He assures passengers however that rates and fees won’t go up because of it.

“Our capital budget was approved today,” Ireland said. “In no time in the foreseeable future do we intend to raise PATCO fares or tolls. This will have no impact on tolls or PATCO fares.”

PATCO officials don’t have a set date yet for when the escalators will be completely replaced. They do say it will happen within a year however.

Police are searching for three suspects who they say broke into a man’s Southwest Philadelphia home, tied him up and then stole a cell phone.

The three men allegedly entered through the back door of a home on the 6700 block of Trinity Street shortly before 6 p.m. on Wednesday. Police say the men roughed up the homeowner, a 71-year-old man and demanded that he give them cash.

"At one point the guy tells him, 'If you move or do anything, I'll kill you,'" said Lieutenant John Walker. "But they never displayed a weapon at any point."

One of the men then allegedly tied up the homeowner with plastic ties while the other two searched through the room of the homeowner's son.

"The son is in the army," Walker said. "He has a couple of containers up there. They rummaged through the containers looking for something. We believe possibly guns."

Police say the suspects ultimately only stole a cell phone before fleeing the scene. The victim's wife then returned home where she found her husband tied up. She then called police.

The victim was not seriously hurt and is currently being interviewed at Southwest Detectives.

Residents living nearby say there has been a rash of home break-ins in the area.

All three suspects are described as dark skinned men in their early 20’s with no facial hair, standing 6-feet tall. Police also say they were all wearing black clothing.

If you have any information on their whereabouts, please call Philadelphia Police.
 

Crowds visiting stores during a holiday shopping festival couldn't deter a man from robbing a bank Wednesday evening.

A man entered a TD Bank branch at 8600 Germantown Ave., pulled a gun and demanded money from the teller before fleeing, according to police. 

The robbery occurred while shoppers strolled the busy Chestnut Hill retail strip during Stag and Doe Night - a neighborhood tradition that features music and a visit from Santa along Germantown Avenue. 

Police say the man, who was wearing all black clothing and a mask, headed east on Evergreen Avenue following the robbery. No one was hurt.  Officials are still trying to determine the amount of money stolen.

Extra police patrols were on hand for the event. This was the second Stag and Doe Night, which was scheduled for three Wednesdays in December beginning on the fourth.  Retailers remain open until 9 p.m. and seasonal refreshments are available. 

The FBI will be taking over the case. 

Jahzairh Sutton knows what it feels like to go to bed hungry.

"I grew up on Oodles of Noodles and hot dogs," said 12-year-old Jahzairh. 

As Congress considers more cuts to food subsidy programs, one local organization is trying to bring more attention to the issue.

Beginning in 2008 Witnesses to Hunger, a program at the Drexel University School of Public Health, provided low-income caregivers--mostly mothers-- with digital cameras so they could document living in poverty.

The photos, a mix of shots showing empty refrigerators, children's faces and violence on the streets, were on display at the group's 5-year anniversary event Wednesday.  The exhibit will also be available for the public to view at Drexel's Bossone Research Enterprise Center lobby through Dec. 12. 

"What Witnesses to Hunger is doing," said Dr. Mariana Chilton, associate professor at the Drexel University School of Public Health, "is trying to magnify that voice.  To make sure our legislators can really hear their experiences."

One out of five families in Philadelphia struggle to put food on the table. 

A 5 percent cut to food stamps went into effect on Nov. 1.  Since then, the average Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, or SNAP, recipient receives $1.40 in supplemental funds per meal, according to Dr. Victoria Mayer of the University of Pennsylvania.

The organization is lobbying officials in Washington D.C. to rethink additional cuts.

Witnesses to Hunger, which began in Philadelphia, opened additional sites in Camden, Baltimore and Boston and has plans to expand to other cities so he can help more kids like Jahzairh. 

"The refrigerator is full," he said.

A 19-year-old freshman at Baruch College died during a visit to the Poconos after taking part in a fraternity ritual where he was blindfolded, weighed down and knocked over repeatedly while trying to walk a path, authorities said.

Chun Hsien "Michael" Deng was brought unresponsive with head trauma to a hospital in the Poconos early Sunday, according to the Monroe County district attorney's office. He died Monday.

Detectives learned that Deng was injured "while partaking in a ritual" outside the Poconos home where he and 30 other members of the Pi Delta Psi fraternity were staying for the weekend. Deng was one of four pledges on the trip. 

Pledges had their eyes covered and were told they had to get from one point to another while wearing weighted bags and being pushed about, Pocono Mountain Regional Police Chief Harry Lewis told NBC News.

Deng was knocked unconscious in the ritual and was brought inside, Lewis said, but there was “a considerable delay” before fraternity brothers drove him to the hospital.

"It's very tragic," Lewis told NBC News.

The ritual bears resemblance to a hazing activity called “the gauntlet,” which was implicated in deaths at Florida A&M University in 2011 and Lenoir Rhyne University in North Carolina in 2008, NBC News reports.

Authorities say alcohol doesn’t appear to have been a major factor.

Baruch College said the trip was an "unsanctioned fraternity pledging event."

"Baruch College had no knowledge of this event or that the fraternity was rushing a pledge class," the school said in a statement.

"Michael’s death is a deeply painful reminder that no individual should ever be put into a position where his or her personal safety is in jeopardy," the statement added.

The school said it has a zero tolerance policy on hazing and requires fraternities and sororities to attend training that includes anti-hazing discussion.

Baruch students were stunned to hear of Deng's death.

"To know that they go to this extreme pressure of being a part of something, and to actually harm their health, it's disgusting," said Anastasia Kachur.

No one has been arrested, but police are investigating.

Two people died and two others were hurt after their car became lodged under a parked tractor-trailer.

The crash happened on I-95 southbound near mile-marker 8.8 in Lawrence Township, N.J. -- that's just past the interchange for I-295 northbound -- after 1 a.m. Thursday.

Two people in the car died at the scene and medics transported a third person in serious condition to Capital Health-Trenton and a fourth person suffered less serious injuries, according to New Jersey State Police.

It wasn’t immediately clear what led to the wreck.

Sources said it appeared the car crossed a few lanes of traffic before colliding with the big rig.

Police continued to investigate through the morning blocking the merge ramp near I-295 for nearly five hours.

• Get the latest traffic from NBC10.com

It took crews hours to get the car removed from under the truck. The car was so badly damaged that it was difficult to tell what type of car it is.

No word yet on if any charges will be filed.

A 5-month-old was among a group of siblings inside a minivan when it crashed overnight.

Luckily the tot wasn’t seriously hurt when his mother’s minivan collided with a  sedan near where Pratt Street intersects with the Roosevelt Boulevard in the Frankford section of Philadelphia around 2 a.m.  Thursday.

Police said no one was seriously hurt but the woman and her children were taken to the hospital for observation. They didn’t say how many kids were in the van.

The impact of the wreck did damage to front of the car and sent the minivan up on the sidewalk in front of a nearby auto repair shop -- coming to rest up against a fire hydrant.

The wreck caused police to block the outer lane of the Boulevard and Pratt Street as they investigated.

• Get the latest traffic from NBC10.com

No immediate word on what caused the wreck.

Two people are hurt after a driver loses control of a school bus.

The driver lost control of the bus while taking students home from St. Joseph's High School Thursday.  The bus struck a parked vehicle before crashing into a tree on the 2000 block of Union Road in Vineland, N.J., according to police.

Officials say a 16-year-old student and the driver were injured.  Both were taken to Inspira Medical Center Vineland. 

Two other students were on the bus at the time of the accident.  Neither suffered any injuries.

A former Pennsylvania gas drilling company executive has been charged with stealing $9.2 million from his company.
 
Federal prosecutors on Thursday charged 53-year-old Larry D. Winckler, of Indiana, Pa., with conspiracy, mail fraud and filing false income tax returns.
 
Martin Dietz, Winckler's lawyer, says his client has agreed to plead guilty to the charges, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported.
 
Winckler was chief operating officer of Falcon Drilling LLC. Prosecutors say that between 2004 and 2012, he allegedly forged checks and then forged invoices and other documents to cover up the thefts, and used the money for personal expenses and gambling.
 
Two other former employees of the company have already pleaded guilty to similar charges.

A high-tech lab is helping one local police force combat crime.

"We have this tremendous amount of new technology which can make us smarter and quicker in how we do things," said Camden City Police Chief Scott Thomson. 

The real time crime center is stocked with giant monitors displaying the output from 121 surveillance cameras stationed throughout the city. 

Located at police headquarters at 800 Federal St., the lab operates 24 hours a day assisting investigators by providing quick access to information about crimes through databases and allowing them to quickly identify potential suspects seen on camera.

Plus the center is helping officers stop crime before it occurs. 

"What these officers are doing," Thomson said, "They are walking blocks on the camera." 

When suspicious activity appears on the screen, the force sends units to the scene to prevent a crime from happening, he said.

"This is helping us get in front of crime," Thomson said.

The center, which was developed over the past 30 months, already helped crime to drop in the city.  Police say, 800 fewer crimes occurred in Camden in the past year. 

"We're down 25 percent in murders," Thomson said.  "We've got overall crime down 14 pecent across the city."

Two men cased an area Laundromat overnight before going inside, handcuffing an employee and breaking into an ATM.

NBC10 cameras captured firefighters cutting the handcuffs off the victim inside the Laundry Depot Center off Cheltenham Avenue near the Cheltenham Mall in the West Oak Lane section of Philadelphia.

According to Philadelphia Police Capt. George Fuchs, surveillance video showed the two men sitting in a car outside the Laundromat waiting for their moment to pounce.

They were wearing masks entered the Laundromat around 4:30 a.m. Friday, handcuffed the victim and stole money before fleeing the area, according to authorities on the scene.

One man carried a gun while the other carried a duffel bag full of tools, said Fuchs.

The armed man forced the employee and a woman doing her laundry to the ground -- handcuffing the man, said Fuchs.

"At that point they both walked over to the ATM machine and the guy with the tools... opened the duffel bag started bringing out tools and breaking in," said Fuchs.

The men spent about 20 to 25 minutes in the store while the scared victims continued to lay on the floor.

"They actually did break into the machine and they did take an undisclosed amount of cash," said Fuchs.

According to investigators the armed man was wearing a gray hoodie and blue jeans while the man with the tools wore a blue hoodie and jeans. Both men kept the faces covered and wore gloves during the heist.

The men got away in a car.

The Laundromat remained closed as police investigated.

It’s a little after 8 a.m. at People for People Charter School (PFPCS) in North Philadelphia. Teacher Maxwell Tartar has just begun his lesson on language and point-of-view. While the classroom full of somewhat groggy 7th grade students listens attentively to Tartar’s lesson, a student blurts out a random comment. In one silent motion, a second teacher, Vance Lewis walks over to the disruptive student and quietly discusses his behavior. The disturbance is calmed so quickly that none of the other students react to it, and Tartar is able to continue his lesson without a flinch.

This is a picture of a co-taught classroom. According to the National Education Association, co-teaching is a decades-old school system practice of having two teachers in one classroom. One teacher is typically a subject specialist, and the other is usually an English Language Learner (ELL), special-education, or other remediation specialist that serves students with disabilities through Individualized Education Programs (IEPs).

Due to dwindling funding resources in the city, PFPCS is one of only a few schools that have been able to take advantage of the beneficial teaching method. PFPCS spokesman Arlene Barochin says that is in part thanks to the abundance of Teach For America (TFA) Corp members on its staff.

"Over the past two years, PFPCS administration has worked to ensure students who require additional academic support receive classroom based interventions and modifications based upon their learning needs. By doing so, students in these classes experience a smaller teacher-student ratio and are able to receive the individualized support they require to make academic gains," Barochin said.

"TFA Corps members greatly add to PFPCS' capacity to provide a variety of course offerings at PFPCS. In addition to current corps members, PFPCS is also home to 11 TFA alumni and veteran teachers who provide additional teaching capacity to meet the needs of the students."

A recent study by the National Dissemination Center for Children with Disabilities found that the co-teaching method has benefits for teachers, and for students, both with and without disabilities.

Co-teacher participants in the study said students in co-taught classrooms cooperated with one another at a greater level than students in classrooms taught using traditional teaching methods.Student participants said that when co-teachers drift around the classroom assisting whoever needs help -- like Lewis does -- they felt more attention was being paid to all students, not just the students with disabilities.If student success is any indication that the co-teaching method is beneficial, PFPCS has some bragging rights.

According to the PFPCS school performance profile, more than 95-percent and 92-percent of all PFPCS students assessed on the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) demonstrated growth in math and reading, respectively. The administration believes that this is in part due to the schools’ offering of a variety of classes to meet the needs of the students, including co-taught classrooms.KIPP Philadelphia Charter Schools also uses co-teaching methods in some of its classrooms. In addition to providing inclusion homerooms that are co-taught by one general education teacher and one special education teacher, KIPP also has kindergarten and first grade classes that are co-taught by one veteran teacher and one new teacher.Though the school employs somewhat of a different co-teaching method than that of PFPCS, KIPP Philadelphia Elementary Academy's co-founder Ben Speicher cited similar benefits to students."The benefits for us are developing new teachers internally so they can be successful, both in their first year and long-term. It also allows our students to make strong academic progress because they get more attention and differentiated instruction, allowing us to meet the need of every student," Speicher said.

According to Barochin, seventh grade teachers and TFA alums Tarter and Lewis are an ideal co-teaching team. Tartar and Lewis have known each other since their grade school years, and through a series of coincidences, were assigned to teach at the same school, PFPCS, and now in the same classroom, after being accepted as corps members in the 2011 class of Teach for America.

Tarter cited the benefits of the co-teaching method for students, and of being able to teach alongside a close friend."I started the corps in 2011; I taught 7th and 8th grade English for two years at PFPCS. Last year, we began using this co-teaching model and it was an amazing experience, and I really saw a lot of positive impact for kids. They were really getting the attention they needed," Tarter said.

"Co-teaching is a model that I absolutely believe in, that supports full inclusion of students with all sorts of needs, but also to teach with someone I’m so close to, makes it all the better an experience."

According to Barochin, PFPCS has roughly 30 classrooms for students in kindergarten through eighth grade; more than half of those classes, 15-17, are co-taught.

A carjacking, a police chase, a crash, police gunfire and an arrest.

A violent series of events left one man in the hospital and a teenager behind bars overnight.

A 56-year-old man told police that he stopped at the Gulf gas station at 60th Street and Lindbergh Boulevard in Southwest Philadelphia around 11 p.m. Thursday to fuel up his new sports utility vehicle when an armed teenager approached him.

“His 2014 Kia Sorrento was carjacked point of gun and just before his vehicle was taken he was hit in the head with the gun,” said Philadelphia Police chief Inspector Scott Small.

The 56-year-old man reported the incident to police and was taken to the Hospital at University of Pennsylvania to get eight stitches in his head, according to police.

Around 1 a.m. Friday, an officer spotted the stolen SUV and attempted to stop the vehicle but the car sped off leading to a chase, said Small.

The chase ended at 56th Street and Springfield Avenue in the city’s Kingsessing neighborhood.

“Unfortunately the suspect… lost control and crashed that Kia Sorrento into a parked vehicle and caused major damage to the front-end,” said Small.

The crash also damaged a Cadillac parked along the roadway and a police car also sideswiped another cruiser.

Officers also at some point opened fire on the suspect but the shots missed. Neither the suspect -- a 19-year-old nor the officers were hurt.

Officers said the victim was taken to the scene to identify the suspect.

Nearly five hours after the crash, police continued to investigate the incident as the unidentified teenager was taken in for questioning. Police said this wasn't the first time the 19-year-old was in trouble with the law.

Police say the gun used in the robbery wasn't recovered.

This is the second carjacking to take place at a gas station this week. On Wednesday, a cabdriver was carjacked while pumping gas in Center City. The suspect in that case also crashed the car and was later arrested.

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Local housing rights organization Fair Share Housing Center (FSHC) says it has obtained data from the Christie Administration that shows that Latino and African-American residents applying for two major Sandy relief programs were denied by the state at higher rates than their Caucasian counterparts.

According to the FSHC, 35-percent of African American applicants and 18-percent of Latino applicants applying to the Homeowner Reconstruction, Rehabilitation Elevation and Mitigation (RREM) program were rejected by the state; while 13-percent of Caucasian applicants were denied from the same program.

Similarly, FSHC says 38-percent of African Americans and 20-percent of Latinos that applied to the Resettlement Grant Program had their applications rejected; while 14-percent of Caucasians were rejected from the same program.

President of the Latino Action Network (LAN) Frank Argote-Freyre and members of the New Jersey chapter of the NAACP reviewed the data along with FSHC and noticed inequities in both the amount of Latino and African Americans that applied for the programs, and the amount of Latino and African American residents that were approved to receive relief funds.

Argote-Freyre says he wants to know how the Christie Administration plans to correct the error.

“Given the misinformation presented to the Spanish-reading community by the Governor's relief website, I think Governor Christie should explain what he intends to do to help those who were unfairly rejected or who missed deadlines due to the administration's neglect," Argote-Freyre stated in a press release.

“We hope that these data, supplied by the Christie Administration itself, will help to shed light on why these programs are not working.”

LAN is currently in litigation with the Christie Administration. The group claims that information provided on the English version of New Jersey’s Sandy recovery web site was omitted from the Spanish version of the web site, and left many Spanish speaking Sandy victims unable to take advantage of grant program benefits.

In October, members of the LAN filed a complaint with the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) arguing that the Christie Administration’s failure to provide equal access in English and Spanish to Sandy recovery grant information was a violation of federal law that deterred African Americans and Latinos from applying to the program.

New Jersey Department of Community Affairs Commissioner Richard E. Constable, III, Esq. argued that the FSHC manipulated the data and called the accusations patently false.

“This is an outrageously false implication that exposes a complete lack of credibility and integrity by Fair Share Housing Center,” Constable said.

“To be absolutely clear, eligibility and qualification for the housing recovery programs were approved by the Obama Administration, are objectively based, and do not take race or ethnicity into account in any way whatsoever.”

LAN says, due to the state's failure to properly advertise the programs—specifically to lower income communities—that there were only 849 Latino applicants and 878 African American applicants to the Resettlement Program, compared to nearly 18,000 Caucasian applicants. Similarly, the organization says a mere 432 Latino applicants and 485 African American applicants applied to the RREM Program, compared to more than 7,000 Caucasian applicants.

According to Constable, 44-percent or nearly half of the federal Sandy relief funding has "been obligated or is out the door to people in need.” Constable says nearly three-quarters of those funds were distributed to low- or middle-income renters and homeowners.