Transcripts For WTTG Fox 5 News 5 20160210

Learn the news. Im in a state of shock. Im hearing that no one was there and the kids were there alone. And this is not the grandmother that i know. Shes very handson with her grandchildren. Always, always planning and doing events, any kind of activity, you name it. She seas a really great grandma. Reporter now, dc police saying that just hours ago they were finally able to locate a parent. We asked if there was any sort of trauma found on that child. They would not answer that question. As for charges, they say this is still an investigation. It is still open. No charges have been filed tovenlt for now reporting in northwest washington, d. C. , marina marraco, fox 5 local news. To a fox 5 exclusive, more fallout from that volunteer in Prince Georges County who was charged with filming children committing sex acts. The principal of the school where the suspect was volunteering administrative leave and shes being sued. Megan dice sat down with an exclusive interview. This is such a disturbing story. Reporter its just unfolding by the minute. The childs guardian of a nineyearold filed a lawsuit that alleges that michele williams, the principal, quote, took no action despite knowing that there were concerns being raised by parents and teachers. Now the School Administration tells me that the principal has not been put on administrative leave. She has not been terminated. She is on paid administrative leave for the time being. The vice principal now the acting principal. The victims and their families still in the healing process. We spoke with one of the victims mothers exclusively today whose child was in the gospel choir. She said she started bringing deonte to church wither h. She is speechless and angry. Take a listen. I was i dont know i was down, i was hurt. I was really in pain. Because when i hear about that, i knew its not the one. All the kind of thing that he did. I trusted this boy. I trusted this boy. Because he is so innocent. He is so nice to the kids. Reporter the School Administration tells me they will be meeting with concerned parents tomorrow at 6 00. In meantime right here at the administrative building they holding a press conference well bring you more from that one at 10 00. In the meantime i reached out to Prince Georges County police who tell me, i asked them are there any more victims who have come forward and they say there are no new announcements at this time. Rear live in Prince Georges County, megan dice, fox 5 local news. Whats the number one thing that needs to change . Leadership. Leadership. And when i say leadership, i dont mean anything personal. This is not personal. This is about doing the right thing. That was the warning from the medical director at dcs fire and ems to mayor muriel bowser. Dr. Juliet suassy unleashed her concerns in a Resignation Letter to the mayor. She called the department highly toxic and she said the response to emergencies was so slow, people are dying. Matt ackland got a hold of that letter as well to the fire chief and mayor today and you took it to them to find out what they had to say. So many people are talking about this and ive got to say some people say im surprised, im shocked others say weve seen these stories play out over and over again and its not tht surprising. But a lot of people are talking, a lot of people are concerned. But the fire chief and the mayor say it is no secret the department is still on the road to recovery. They blame years of poor leadership and poor training. So we asked the mayor who has been in office over a year, and the fire chief in his job for about seven months now, just how long will it take to fix these lifethreatening problems. They both said help is on the way. Reporter its a Resignation Letter so many people are talking about. A medical director hired just seven months ago quitting. Saying her concerns fell on deaf ears and the department is toxic. Theres two sides to every story and thats why im here talking today. We would write to her former boss to talk about the letter. One statement that stands out to me, people are dying needlessly because we are moving too slow. Would you agree . I would agree that we working very hard to deal with the system that we have here. Dr. Saussy was here for seven months. Reporter is that system broken . Weve said all along that the system needs to be ternd around. Reporter dr. Saussy even brought up a stabbing incident last week in southeast. The doctor writing the man who died had a survivable injury. We had people on scene in the first six minutes and they were working on the patient. But again, weve acknowledged from the beginning that we dont have availability of ambulances. Reporter what do you say to the residents . How long will this take before they dont have to worry about these problems . Well, this is what i can say is that we are outlining a system of reforms. Reporter were told that reform starts in four to six fleet is engaged to help with the call volume. And with that assistance comes more training time for those Emergency Responders currently answering calls. We need to give them more time for training. For too long what we found was that instead of monthly training, people were getting once a year or twice a year training. And we dont think thats adequate. Reporter so it sounds to me that the mayor and the fire chief would like this to happen right away. The mayor said she couldnt just snap her fingers and have this change overnight. But they both did point out four to six weeks. Once those ambulances are in place, there will be more of them on the road to respond to minor incidents. And then those people who have been working so hard responding to calls all the time, theyll be pulled off the street and have training several times a month so that will help when they are deployed back on the street because theyll have extra training at that point. Theyre hoping that that really will turn the tide here. Thankfulfully theyre doing something. But cant just snap your fingers. Weve been doing stories for years. The mayor has been in office for a year and under the last administration there was a problem. So i think residents are itching to get this fixed and this letter surely doesnt help. It makes people concerned again for sure. Thank you so much. New tonight, two sheriffs deputies are hurt and another person is dead after a shootout at a Shopping Center in northeastern maryland. The first shooting happened around noon. With the suspect and more shots were exchanged. The suspect was killed, no one else was hurt. Investigate force believe the person did act alone. No word on the deputys condition at this hour. Months after Montgomery County Police Officer noah l he eotta was was hit and killed, one organizations is taking precautions. Madd released their firstever report on the number of time that drunk drivers are stopped by ignition interlocks in the united states. Now its the size of a cell phone. The ignition interlock device is wired into a vehicle. A convicted drunk driver must blow into it for a blood alcohol reading in order to start their car. All the human misery that goes on, that im suffering today and will continue to suffer for the rest of my life, imagine just saving one family from that heartache. Maryland is working on new legislation that would require all drunk drivers with a blood alcohol level of. 08 or greater to have an ignition interlock. The measure is being called noahs law in honor of the fallen officer. A couple dozen metro Bus Operators there 14 street northwest today to protest what they are calling unsafe and unfair working conditions. Their Union Leaders say the bus drivers routinely get harassed including getting hit and spit on during the course of their workday. Fox 5 reached out to metro who told us they have taken say number of steps to protect their employees including dramatically expanding the number of transit Police Officers on buses. Big news for commuters in northern virginia. Today the governor announced a deal to widen a stretch of i66 dwen the dulles corrector road and boston. It will allow them to put tols in place for drivers who travel parts of the interstate. Its expected to begin in 2017. The widening project is expected to be finished by 2020. Lets take a live look outside right now on what is not too bad of a day but its been awful chilly out there. The wind b to make it feel cold out there, sue palka. And its going to keep getting colder. That is the theme of the weather, thats for sure. We are going to be talking about not only a very cold night, wind chills that are really tough to take, but even colder for the weekend with a really significant arctic outbreak coming. Coldest weekend of the winter. Sky fox was above a very unusual scene in Montgomery County. Dont worry, nothing to worry about in this scene, although when you look at it its pretty scary. This was ice rescue training today in germantown. They were out performing drills. They want to make sure they know how to deal with any problems with ice as we get ready for a very cold weekend. Of course its always very difficult to approach ice. You never know if its safe to walk on. It doesnt freeds uniformly and new ice is usually stronger than old ice that has been frozen over for a while. And a Good Opportunity for us to warn you that as we get ready for a very cold weekend, remind your kids do not walk on any icy covered ponds. We dont want to give fire and rescue any reason to get out there and do a drill to save someones life. Even some snow showers this afternoon. Thats what were watching down around the fredricksburg area. This may be vigorous enough to put down a small coating for you guys. Were watching that closely and as we get in tighter you can see there might be more significant cant snow showers around the dale city area. With temperatures pretty cold, a lot of what were seeing tonight may stick and there could be once again some slick spots here and there. As a matter of fact dc 35 degrees right now but you can see gaithersburg and frederick down to 35. Where do we go in dc over the next several hours . Lets check that. 6 00 we could be down to 33. By 8 00, by 10 00, 30. And by midnight down to 29 degrees. So we are anticipating definitely a cold night there and let me just show you as we look at wind chill temperatures currently. Its already in the teens. We have wind chill advisories in the mountains and even some Winter Weather advisories thanks to the wind that we have. Cant rule out flurries at 7 00 with a temperature of 32 by 7 00. By 9 00, 29. And by 11 00, 27. It looks like were heading down to 20 degrees in the district tonight. With teens in the suburbs and even more arctic air on the way. So we have plenty to talk about in the Weather Center tonight but the main message is stay bundled up and protect yourself as we go through a stretch of several days with temperatures well below average. Coming up, tax return trouble. Why the state controller is returning hundreds of marylands tax returns. Plus uber has a new plan to pacify drunk kids toy. And recapping the race. How print media is helping shape the president ial battle and possibly build bias among vote rs. Well show you how some of thele headlines are shaping up today. And some of them might surprise you, next. Next. A bold headline is often the difference between getting someone to read a new story or got. Its from the huffington post. It says a racest, sex it demagogue just won the New Hampshire primary. Donald trump did it. The next one says dawn of the brain dead. Clown comes back to life with a New Hampshire win as mindless zombies turn out in droves. We also have to consider the source in all of these. Yes, you do. Editer of the New York Daily News is not a big fan of donald trump. We spoke to an expert about these today and certainly each paper might have a different intention. We hear the word agenda used. Sometimes people dont realize thats the intention and sometimes you do and wonder maybe they go so far. Lets look at another one theyve got for you. Weve got the New York Post about the women hillary used to help her. Hillarys henchwomen have a dirty secret. I took a trip to the newseum and i saw one from new jersey that stood out from the Asbury Park Press has the line christie crashes in New Hampshire. Some intend to be divisive, thats the goal. But why do they do it. I spoke with a brand can. I wanted to better understand why they might choose these shocking headlines. Theres so much content out there that Everyone Needs to stand on their own two feet and get your attention. So a big, bold picture with a big, bold headline is your best shot a and Attention Spans are completely scattered these days. So just like there iss click bait on the internet, these front pages have become click bait by essentially trying to grab your attention and seeing if youll want to read more. Good point. Interesting perspective people understand what theyre looking at those headlines what they might be trying to get out of you. We also want to let you know we saw Carly Fiorina and Chris Christie they have suspended their president ial campaigns. Not a huge surprise. Which we did expect after last nights results but it became official today. Ronica cleary. Appreciate it. It may seem like deja vu but kanye west is sparking outrage this time over a tweet about bill cosby. If you think you know what designer makes these fashions, you might want to think again. And how the oscars are preventing boring acceptance speeches at this years award show. What do they consider unfortunately im not in a position to give them their burritos. And a maryland man receives hundreds of Text Messages for people seeking a free chipotle burrito. What he is now demanding from the restaurant. Kanye west creating controversy with just one tweet. Dozens of women accusing bill cosby of Sexual Assault and criminal charges, few people are defending him except for kanye west. He took to twitter saying bill cosby is innocent. And a lot of exclamation points you see there. This user said i will never support you ever again. 50 women with nothing to gain . Thanks to a statute of limitations. Others on twitter are speculating that he stirred up controversial for publicity ahead of his new album. The fashion and performances are the draw to watch the oscars not the acceptance speeches. Now they will fill out a card of names they want to thank and theyll scroll on the bottom of the screen during the telecast. Thats kind of lame. Interesting though. They stars being cut off by the music. Instead of just listening to them that say thank you. Theres part of them that wants to say that. Right. But there are some speeches that are so memorable and so good and make it will inspire speeches. Earlier we told you about beyonce renting a home for 10,000 a night. That now looks like a bargain compared to what it will now koflt you to spend the night at the same place. The new asking price 30,000 a night. The listing makes no mention what if anything beyonce did do that police to justify the increase. She just stayed there isnt that enough. Theres many other places that you can stay at. You can buy a place for that. Coming up, marylands top tax controller says hes watching dozens of tax returns. A dc woman is highlighting the issues some women face with catcalls. Street harassment using dogs. Cant wait to hear. Ar. I lead the 11 oclock news with stories of gun violence. And like many of you, my family lived through the beltway sniper crisis. In congress, ill fight to expand background checks on guns and ammunition, ban assault weapons, and mandate gun safety locks, because too many kids die from accidental shootings. Lets show the nra were not afraid of them; as democrats, as americans, as parents. Im Kathleen Matthews and i approve this message. 12k3w4r hes blocking tax returns if dozens of private preparers throughout maryland. They say those returns have questionable activity an statements. Tom fitzgerald is outside one of those companies tonight if silver spring. Tom . Good evening. In his own words he is calling this, quote, a ripoff. Now, this is the Liberty Tax Service here on Georgia Avenue in wheaton. It is now one of 37 such private tax preparers that are under quarantine for the state of maryland. His offices found what they call questionable and suspicious information from the return filed those offices. We caught up with the comptroller in annapolis today. We wanted you to hear in his own words what he says is going on. People claiming business deductions when they had no business. This is not fudging on your taxes. This is out and out fraud. And we decided to get ahead of it. Reporter s that thousands of customers filed their taxes through the quarantine tax prepares will be forced to prove that the information they provide is connect before the state of maryland will process hes particularly concerned about what he sees as a pattern of tax preparation companies setting up shop in low income neighborhoods and filing returns on behalf of low income taxpayers. Those are the ones left holding the bag on this because the Tax Companies prepared returns for them. Now, no one from liberty taxs cooperate office ever got back to us today. However, the owner of a liberty tax franchisee did agree to talk to us. He says hes got nothing to hide but all day long he has been flooded with calls from concerned customers. Have you been doing these things youre accused of . Absolutely not. Not that ive know what ive ne being suspended for questionable returns. I dont know what that means. I welcome the comptroller to audit all my files. All hundred of them. Ill sit with them and go right through them. Reporter where those files may be tonight are on the way to the attorney general of maryland. The comptroller says he is working with the attorney general tonight and they will determine if criminal chavrnrge are warranted in these cases. Tom fitzgerald, fox 5 local news. Some parents at one Virginia High School are upset tonight about a video shown to students about racial discourse. The video was part of a black History Month program at glenallen high school. It begins with four athletes getting ready for a race. When the race starts the two nonwhite athletes are blocked from running. At the same time they are bombarded with words like slavery and segregation. Meanwhile the white athletes run around the track getting older as their batons marked with a money symbol grow larger and larger. The video has created racial tensions at the school. The schools released a statement saying the students participated in a presentation that involved American History and racial discourse. A segment of the video was one component of a thoughtful discussion in which all view points were encouraged. Have you ever gotten a text message from someone you didnt know perhaps . Well, thats what happened to one dc lawyer. The only problem is he received hundreds of them from people he didnt know. Hank levine received more than 300 Text Messages monday containing just one word rain check. The texters were claiming to claim a free burrito by texting the word to 888222. Youll notice that number. But customers who had a 240 area code, and mistakenly added the 2 went to his cell phone. I went into a chipotle store and the store manager comes over and she calls over her entire staff and at that point there was about a hundred of them and she looked up and said how are we going to get these people their burritos . They were more worried about that. The fast food chain has apologized to levine and sent him coupons for four free meals and maybe some help changing his phone number perhaps . You look like the top of dog i could marry. Meanwhile, a dc woman is taking very unique approach bringing awareness to a problem many women deal with. Its a real problem. Elizabeth hayes released a video called doggy harassment. A series of skits of saying things to dogs that women often hear from men. Every scene 234 the video is based on a reallife experience. Dc in particular is a tough place for harassment since so many people walk and bike around the city. Its a creative way to draw attention to the problem. The Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue will show off a little more body diversity this year. A plus sized model will appear in an editorial for the issue set to be released next year. She will also be included as an showing some age diversity check out 56yearold model nicola griffin. She is the oldest woman to appear in the swimsuit issue. I love that. What was that pose you were just striking there . You have no idea what we just had to observe here. Shes such a pro. It was really classy. Class act. If anything, thats what i complem fii here at fox 5. I like what theyre doing. Yeah. Its interesting. Its certainly times have changed and these are things you can get anywhere. You want to give it inclusiveness. I want to talk about the super bowl. All these subplots are coming out and this one is kind of interesting. We talked about the super bowl play three days still generating controversy and this time it had nothing to do with cam newton. There wasnt a lot of love for the assistant is from denver but its how his wife reacted on social media. The play that had the plans crying foul. He bobbled it a bit but many thought it was a catch. Even the cbs commentator who gets everything wrong, but upon the play it was ruled incomplete. Oldham has no contact during the game with refs. But some of the questioning stems from this is the wife. We won emphasis on the we. No one knows this is going to go anywhere but its likely overturning one play would have made much of a difference but people are going to hate. It is what it is. So this guy owns the caps, the wizards, he owns the Verizon Center, he makes movies. You would think he has it all but you would be wrong and if youre a football fan, that could be a goo i just talked to the commissioner of the Arena Football League who calls him a prime candidate and the perfect fit to bring football to the Verizon Center in 2015. Arena football is different they play with eight mean with a 50 yard field. Theres no punting and they can rebound balls off of the nets. Itsz kind of cool. Its interactive and they go into the stands and theres no pesky both feet inbound rules for catches. They tried to bring it back in 2000 and even trademarked the name washington warriors but that team never saw the light of day. Tonight the u. S. National womens soccer team begins qualifying for the olympics in a match against costa rica. Hope solo says if she had to decide right now she would not go to rio because of the zika virus. She doesnt want to take the risk of having an child. Olympic organizers say the games are still full speed ahead. Sometimes parents get wrapped up in their games. It had nothing to do with his team. His daughter margaret plays on the jv team she thought she had fouled out. After an exchange with someone there, and that someone in his words is a middleaged loser on the fan this morning, police were called in and he was removed. He still maintains his daughter had four but not five fouls. So he is a guy who really is of his word. Gw with 18 and 5 and stant joes 18 and 4. Hes a man of his conviction. Parents. Those crazy parents sometim coming up, uber has a very creative new way to distract drunk passengers. Were explaining their plan to use an old toy that is a favorite. And a priceless made of honor moment why this wedding toast was just so flawless. You know we have some flurries popping up on radar right now. So a little bit of snow south of washington wi could quickly coat the roadways as we watch these flurries move by. Ill have the latest on this evenings forecast and the incoming very cold weather for the Holiday Weekend. Thats ahead when we return. We should have issued a cuddle alert for this because it was just so cold. Single digit temperatures by sunday morning. Hopefully indoor plans on valentines day . I would say so. Its also president s day weekend. Its a popular weekend to go to the ski resorts. It will be good. It will be sunny at least. Coldest air of the season. A nice afternoon sunshine with some evening clouds. Actually a few snow flerryes on our maps juts off to our south. Snow showers around tonight mainly just south of just in another hour heads up along the Eastern Shore crossing the bay you can see snow showers. Sunny and breezy thursday. Coldest air of the winter by the weekend. Watching even a storm potential for the next week that looks to be in the mondaytuesday time frame. Northwest winds at 15 miles per hour, it feels like 26 degrees. And along with that cold air powering in here are those snow plurryes. This is whats on radar right now. What i just showed you was future cast. Maybe sticking to the roads right there, road temperatures are at least a little bit colder than when we had that rain and snow earlier in the week. These are moving off to the east staying south of the beltway but up into Prince Georges County youre seeing flurries too and here in Washington Well have a passing flurry through about tonight. 32 in baltimore, 35 here in washington. And well watch those temperatures fall pretty quickly. 30 degrees by 8 00 p. M. And we are in the 20s there by midnight. Overnight tonight falling into the 20s. But again, even much colder as we head into the weekend. With that wind it feels like 26 in washington, it feels like 14 in gaithersburg, 17 out at dulles and 15 in winchester. Weve got a wind chill advisory out for the mountains for late tonight. Whats happening for tonight . It is breezy with low pressure off towards our northwest and weve got the colder air coming through. It will be clear after we get through those passing flurries, then once we get into tomorrow, thursday, and then into friday well be really quiet. In fact through the weekend quiet. High pressure reinforced. Weve got sunshine sand it will be cold. So into friday its the same thing. More sunshine, nice start to the Holiday Weekend if you are traveling or maybe going out to any of those ski resorts. Theres thatrc there which well time out for saturday to bring the final push of the really cold air. Tonight temperatures in the teens, thats air temperatures overnight. 20 in washington. High temperatures tomorrow, 30 here in dc. Thats it. 28 in gaithersburg, 27 in martinsburg. Beautiful sunrise forecast. This picture coming to us20 degrees at 7 04 a. M. Sunday, valentines day, we start at 9 degrees here in the district, but forecasted morning temperatures for gaithersburg, frederick. 5 in hagerstown. Just about everyone in the single digits. President s day 35 degrees. Theres that chance of rain or snow on tuesday. Thats a look at your 7day forecast. Laura and sarah back over to you. Cold looking at it. I know. Lets head over to tony and shawn now for a look at whats 6 00. Thank you very much, guys. Do you ever have trouble staying focused at work . Like if you get distracted easily. Shawn, were doing a thing. Focus. Sorry about that. If you get dust extracted easily it may be a scientific reason and it has to do with your intelligence. Also coming up at 6 00 tonight from chocolate to alcohol and soda, many christians are vowing to give up something for lent. What about social media . Well take say closer look at the lenten sacrifices people make coming up tonight at 6 00.  Luxury Fashion brand burberry is ripping them off. The design label scarfs are a trademark violation. For a comparison, take a look at burberry here. The company took say swipe of the interior quality. Burberry sells the scarf for 475. I see it everywhere. I do too. So many knockoff. Thats the thing. Why now . Why jc penney . I dont know. Uber, meanwhile, has an unusual new approach to help keep its drivers safe. The Car Sharing Service is turning to the popular toy from the do you remember the bop it . It will be in the back seat of ubers in Charlotte North Carolina through a pilot program. Uber thinks this toy might distract drunk passengers from harassing their drivers. So the way it works is you have to bop it, twist it, pull it. And it speeds up and the game tells you what youre supposed to do and you follow the directions and do it. Its supposed to distract you from annoying the driver. Coming up, this bridesmade totally up staged the bride by rapping her entire speech. Its got a lot of what we were kinda talking about. [mother] yeah but this neighborhood,i feel like the kitchen is light and bright,new. We should definitely go see it. So nice to meet you. [mother] this is brendan. [agent] hey brendan. Living room. [dad] hey. [mother] hey sweetie. [dad] sorry about that. What about this . This looks good. [brendan] no. [mother] isnt it so great . I think we found it. [announcer]redfin pays its agents based on your happiness. Thats real estate, redefined. She wanted to do a special toast at her sisters wedding so she rapped her entire speech to the tune of vanilla ices ice, ice, baeb. As you can see she stole the show. Really creative. Thanks for joining us tonight at 5 00. Fox 5 local news at 6 00 starts right now. Right now at 6 00, a baby left without adult supervision dies in a dc home. What were learning about the conditions where the child lived. Why did you bee troy me. Then in a fox 5 exclusive, more parents come forward after multiple children are abused by a Youth Volunteer at a local elementary school. Its not personal. This is about doing the right thing. Plus reaction one day after one of dcs top fire and ems officials calls it quits. It is good to have you with us tonight. Im tony perkins. And im shawn yancy. In a little more than an hour Prince Georges County School Officials are expected to talk about a disturbing case of child pornography involving a volunteer. He is accused of making pornographic of children. Is good evening to you guys. Well, there was a lawsuit that was nineyearold child by the childs guardian that alleges that the principal took no action despite concerns being raised by parents and teachers. The School Administration told me today the principal has not been terminated. She is on paid administrative leave for the time being. The vice principal now the acting principal of that school. In the meantime the victims and their families in the healing process. We spoke with one of the victims mothers today exclusively who told us he was in deontes gospel choir. She started bringing him to church and of course you can imagine she was speechless and very angry. I was, i dont know. I was down