Convicted Calif. Serial Killer Pleads Not Guilty to 2 Women’s NYC Murders in 1970s

NEW YORK — A convicted California serial killer pleaded not guilty Thursday to murdering two women in New York City in the 1970s, charges lodged just last year after suspicion swirled around him for decades.

Rodney Alcala, a former dating-show contestant who has spent the last 33 years tangling with authorities in a series of trials and overturned convictions, was arraigned Thursday in the deaths of Cornelia Crilley and Ellen Hover.

Hands and feet shackled, Alcala looked thin and drawn as he said only “not guilty” in a steady voice. He wore an orange jail jumpsuit and long gray hair in ponytail.




He was ordered held without bail and is due back in court Oct. 30.

A former photographer with an IQ said to top 160, Alcala was convicted in 2010 of killing four women and a 12-year-old girl in Southern California in the 1970s. He represented himself, offering a defense that involved showing a clip of his 1978 appearance on “The Dating Game” and playing Arlo Guthrie’s classic 1967 song “Alice’s Restaurant.”



While appealing his death sentence in California, Alcala was indicted last year in New York, partly on evidence that emerged during his California trial, prosecutors said. He was brought to New York on Wednesday on a U.S. Marshals Service plane unsuccessfully fighting his extradition to New York.



Crilley was found strangled with a stocking in her Manhattan apartment in 1971. Hover, a comedy writer and former Hollywood nightclub owner’s daughter who had a degree in biology and was seeking a job as a researcher, was living in Manhattan when she vanished in 1977. Her remains were found the next year in the woods on a suburban estate. Both women were 23.



Alcala had been eyed in Hover’s death for decades and in Crilley’s killing for at least several years. New York Police Department detectives investigating her killing went to California in 2003 with a warrant to interview Alcala and get a dental impression from him.



A forensic dentist later found that a bite mark on Crilley’s body was consistent with Alcala’s impression, a law enforcement official has said. The official was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.



The Manhattan district attorney’s cold-case unit also conducted new interviews with more than 100 witnesses.



“After more than three decades, the defendant will finally face the justice system in New York for the murder of two victims,” District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said. “Today’s arraignment brings us a step closer to obtaining justice for Ms. Crilley and Ms. Hover.”



Alcala has been behind bars since his 1979 arrest in one of the California killings. Before that arrest, he also served a prison sentence on convictions of furnishing marijuana to a minor and kidnapping and trying to kill an 8-year-old girl.



After his 2010 conviction, California authorities released more than 100 photos, found in his storage locker, of young women and girls. They said they were exploring whether Alcala could be tied to cases in New York and other states.

Etan Patz Case: Doctors Assess Mental State of Murder Suspect Pedro Hernandez

(CBS/AP) NEW YORK - Pedro Hernandez, the man who has confessed to killing 6-year-old Etan Patz in one of New York City's and the country's most notorious missing child cases, remains in a psychiatric hospital as court-appointed doctors assess his mental state.
Defense lawyers said Hernandez, 51, has schizophrenia and a history of hallucinations and it's unclear how much that will factor in the case charging him with the Etan's 1979 murder.

If Hernandez' psychiatric record becomes an issue, he'll encounter a justice system that seeks to strike a balance between recognizing mental illness and holding people responsible for their actions. It is a balance that has shifted back and forth over more than a century and a half.


Hernandez confessed last week and is now charged with Patz's murder. The boy vanished on his way to school in his lower Manhattan neighborhood. The suspect, who had worked at a convenience store near Etan's home, confessed after hours of police questioning, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said on Friday. Kelly said Hernandez told police he lured the boy to the convenience store with the promise of a soda. He then took him into the basement and choked him.


After defense lawyer Harvey Fishbein told a judge that Hernandez was schizophrenic, bipolar, had had visual and auditory hallucinations, and had been on psychiatric medication for some time, the judge ordered an examination to see whether he was mentally fit to stand trial.



The results aren't yet known and either side could challenge the findings and get another exam. It will ultimately be up to a judge to declare whether Hernandez can go to trial. If not, he would be sent to a psychiatric hospital and evaluated periodically to see whether he had improved enough to go to court. Most people found unfit are eventually returned to court, legal experts say.



Such exams aim to assess whether someone is well enough to participate in a trial and aid his or her own defense. They are separate from an insanity defense, which revolves around the defendant's psychological state at the time of the alleged crime.



In New York and many other states, defendants have to prove they were so mentally ill that they didn't know what they were doing was wrong. If successful, they are sent to psychiatric hospitals until judged well enough for release, if ever.



One of Hernandez's sisters, Norma Hernandez, said Tuesday that she went to police in Camden, N.J., years ago to report a rumor he had confessed at a prayer group. Camden police declined to comment on her remarks.



Meanwhile, Etan's father made clear that the attention to the case since Hernandez's arrest last week had taken a toll, telling reporters they had "managed to make a difficult situation even worse."



"It is past time for you to leave me, my family and my neighbors alone," Stan Patz said in a note posted on his apartment building's door.

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It's a tragedy they had to lose their son, especially in such a henious way, but that goes to show why you should NEVER LET YOUR CHILD ROAM THE STREETS ALONE.  Especially only six years old!

WTF, even if it was the 1950s that is something you NEVER DO. Or even if just to walk "around the corner"... NEVER DO IT.

Elevator Kills Madison Ave. Ad Exec

NY Post- An ad executive taking the elevator to her Midtown office like any other day was crushed to death in front of two horrified fellow passengers yesterday when the car suddenly shot upward with the doors still open.

Suzanne Hart, 41, a top exec at Young & Rubicam, was halfway aboard an elevator in the ground-floor lobby of 285 Madison Ave. when suddenly it shot upward like a bullet.

Hart fell forward into the car, part of her body inside and part still outside the entryway, said authorities. The elevator — its doors still open — then got stuck between the building’s first and second floors.

Inside the elevator, the man and woman stuck with Hart were forced to look on in horror as she died just inches away — a scene so harrowing that both were left “in severe distress,” said Fire Lt. Glenn Berube, one of the first rescuers on the scene.

The surviving woman “was crying . . . She was so physically shaken, she looked like she was convulsing. It was very traumatic for her,” Berube said.

Though they were not physically hurt, both witnesses were hospitalized for treatment of psychological trauma.

It was hours after the 10 a.m. accident before workers could remove Hart’s body from the scene.

The elevator had been taken out of service in 2003 after Department of Buildings inspectors found a “hazardous safety violation,” a city-government source said. But that unspecified problem was corrected long ago, said the source.

City records indicate that the building’s 13 elevators — known to workers as creaky and scary — have piled up 56 violations in the past 11 years. Most were cleared up.

However, inspectors in June found several unspecified “administrative” violations of safety rules regarding the elevators.

City sources said the violations — though still listed as “open” on Department of Building records — appear to offer no explanation for yesterday’s tragedy.

Hart had everything going for her — a loving family and a solid career as one of the agency executives responsible for bringing new business to the worldwide advertising giant.

“She was a fantastic young woman,” said her grieving father, Alex Hart, who was flying to New York last night from his home in Florida.

“She was a talented woman. She had a lot of family and friends who loved her,” the distraught dad said between tears.

“I’m grateful for every day I had with her. I’m just sorry it happened so soon . . . I miss her.”

Suzanne moved about a year ago from Manhattan to a brownstone apartment in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, with her boyfriend, Chris Dicksen.

“She’s a beautiful person, and I don’t have words for this,” Dicksen said.

Just the day before she died, Suzanne had lunched with Young & Rubicam’s Global CEO, David Sable.

She was “someone I worked closely with, truly respected and, quite simply, adored,” Sable wrote in a memo to employees.

Hart grew up in California and graduated from Knox College in Illinois.

Away from work, she was interested in landscaping and had just completed a two-year course at New York Botanical Garden in The Bronx.

After yesterday’s accident, employees were evacuated from the building, which is expected to remain closed today.

Young & Rubicam, which owns the 25-story building on Madison Avenue at 40th Street, is preparing to move to a new location near Columbus Circle.

This Day In History

Sep 16 1920
A horse-drawn carriage parked at the corner of Wall and Broad streets suddenly explodes just past mid-day. 100 pounds of dynamite hurls 500 pounds of steel shrapnel into a crowd of New Yorkers, killing 40 and wounding almost 300 others. No one is ever charged in the world's first car bombing.

Sep 16 1985
Art Scholl, Hollywood's greatest aerobatics pilot, loses control of his Pitts S-2A biplane over the Pacific Ocean during the filming of Top Gun. Before heading off to the Danger Zone in the sky, Scholl's last words were "I have a problem -- I have a real problem."

This Day In History

Jun 12 1978
David Berkowitz is sentenced to 365 consecutive years in prison without the possibility of parole. Berkowitz killed six New Yorkers between 1976 and 1977, known collectively as the Son of Sam murders.

Jun 12 1991
After 500 years of silence, Mount Pinatubo erupts, making an estimated 100,000 homeless and killing 300. Two U.S. military bases, Clark Air Force Base and Subic Bay Naval Base, are abandoned. The blast is ten times larger than the eruption of Mount St. Helens in 1980.

Jun 12 1994
Nicole Brown Simpson and her male friend Ronald Goldman are savagely murdered in front of Simpson's condominium complex in Brentwood, California. The most plausible suspect turns out to be Nicole's estranged husband O.J., who is arrested for the crime a month later.

This Day In History

May 31 1889
Relentless rain and inadequate maintenance causes the South Fork Dam to fail, unleashing a 35-foot-high wall of water on Johnstown, Pennsylvania. Then 2,209 people are entombed beneath a pile of debris half a mile wide.



May 31 1921
After a white woman claims that a black man had grabbed her arm in an elevator, the largest race riot in U.S. history breaks out in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Marauding whites set fire to the exclusively-negro Greenwood district, leveling its 35 city blocks of black-owned businesses. The official death toll is reported as 36, but later historians estimate it was more like 300.



May 31 1963
Nun Nu Thanh Quang, a Buddhist monk, immolates himself at the Dieu de Pagoda in Hue, Vietnam.



May 31 1996
Timothy Leary dies quietly in his sleep, thereby failing his intended mission of suiciding live on the Internet. On a brighter note, a longstanding Moody Blues prophecy is fulfilled.




May 31 2005
Actor Christian Slater is arrested in New York City after a woman complains of ass-grabbery to police. Slater denies everything and is charged with third-degree sexual abuse.

Connecticut Be Buggin' Today!

BRANFORD, Conn. — Police and FBI agents Friday night said a tractor-trailer stopped in Branford, Conn., and suspected of carrying explosives was empty, NBC station WVIT of Hartford reported.

Branford first selectman Anthony DaRos earlier said police told him authorities were holding the semitrailer at a travel stop on Interstate 95.

The Hartford Courant reported troopers approached the vehicle and took the driver and a passenger into custody at gunpoint, then checked the vehicle for hazards. It also reported that the state police bomb squad was en route.

Police were told to be on the lookout for a brown Peterbilt tractor-trailer that may have a bomb in it that was en route from Rhode Island to New York City, the New Haven Register reported. Officers were told if they encountered it to stop it and create a perimeter and stand by.

Branford is about 80 miles north of New York City.

In another incident, around 6:21 p.m. Friday, a Connecticut state trooper shot and killed a motorist after what police said was a routine traffic stop on I-84 near Danbury, the Courant reported. Danbury is about 45 miles away from Branford.

The driver opened fire on the officer, who returned fire and shot the motorist multiple times. The trooper was uninjured, the Courant said.

The two passengers fled.

The highway was closed in both directions Friday night.

On Wednesday, two men were found in a Mercedes with what appeared to be a pipe bomb, ammunition, gas masks and other materials. Authorities say it's unclear whether they planned to use the explosives because they are not talking to investigators. Both were being held on $500,000 bond.

This Is Why the World IS A Scary Place..

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A 24-year-old Colorado resident and Afghan national who is a suspect in an alleged terrorist plot in the United States has admitted to having ties to al Qaeda, an administration official familiar with the matter told CNN on Friday.

Either a plea deal or charges are possible for the man, identified as Najibullah Zazi, the official said.

A spokeswoman for Zazi's attorney said Zazi began meeting in Denver with the FBI at 9 a.m. Friday for the third consecutive day, and was still there by nightfall. Zazi's father Mohammed met for three hours Friday afternoon with the FBI, then returned to his home.

The alleged terrorist plot, which came to light this week after raids in New York, may have been targeting a major transportation center, such as a large railroad or subway station, sources close to the investigation told CNN on Thursday.

There were plans for an attack, presumably in the New York area, where crowds are large and security screening for travelers who are not flying is lax, the sources said.

"While DHS and FBI have no information regarding the timing, location or target of any planned attack, we believe it is prudent to remind transit authorities to remain vigilant," the Department of Homeland Security said Friday in a written statement.

Two sources familiar with the investigation said that Zazi had video of New York's Grand Central Terminal, a massive junction of rail and subway lines, as well as shops and restaurants, through which pass a half-million people per day.

A former counterterrorism official briefed on the investigation said bomb instructions were found but could not say where. (rest of article)

HOW CAN WE POSSIBLY THANK YOU... FOR PLANNING TO KILL OUR INNOCENT, OUR WOMEN, OUR CHILDREN, OUR BABIES?

NYPD Cop Charged In Murder-For-Hire Plot Against Ex-Wife

NEW YORK (WPIX) - An New York City police officer - accused of hiring another man to kill his ex-wife - appeared in a Long Island courtroom Friday morning where he entered a plea of not guilty in connection with the crime.

Officer Anthony Battisti, 42, a 17-year veteran of the force was suspended by the NYPD, after allegations surfaced that he had hired a hit-man to attack his ex-wife, 44-year-old Patricia Battisti.

According to prosecutors, Patricia Battisti was stabbed in the neck with a screwdriver outside the couple's Franklin Square home in January. Battisti paid 37-year-old Timothy Gersbeck, who had worked as a handyman for the officer, to execute the assault on his ex-wife because he was jealous of her new boyfriend, investigators said.

Gersbeck was also charged in connection with the stabbing.

Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice reacted to the news about the indictment with remorse.

"I'm sickened by this officer's betrayal of the badge," she said in a statement. "We cannot let one single act by one officer overshadow the brave work by men and women who wear the uniform and put themselves in harm's way every day to protect our families and our neighborhoods."

Battisti reportedly met his wife Patricia when both were enrolled in the New York City Police Academy. The couple also served together in the Bronx's 41st Precinct before Patricia Battisit left the department, the New York Daily News reported.

Queens Baby Dies After Falling into Mop Bucket at Day Care Center

Daily News- Police were investigating the death of a Queens baby who perished Monday when he fell headfirst into a mop bucket at his baby-sitter's house.

James Farrior, who would have been 1 year old next month, was declared dead at Jamaica Hospital at 11:25 a.m.

"What can I say, he was my baby? We're trying to cope," said his devastated mom, Chrisann Josiah. "We don't know what happened yet."

It was not immediately clear if James drowned or broke his neck. An autopsy will be performed today.

"I saw the firefighters bring the boy out. He was gasping for air," said neighbor Billy Casares, 41. "It's heartbreaking."

Baby-sitter Kristal Khan, 28, who normally took care of two neighborhood kids along with her small son and daughter in an informal but legal day care arrangement, was charged with endangering the welfare of a child, a misdemeanor, police said.

Police sources said Khan told cops James and her two kids, ages 3 and 4, were in the living room with the bucket when she went to fetch a mop.

When she came back, she found James had fallen headfirst into the blue 7-gallon mop bucket that was three-quarters full of water.

Neighbor Liz Rivero, 31, a mother of three, said she began to pray when she saw a firefighter running Monday morning with the baby, limp and faceup, to an ambulance waiting a block away.
"I started to cry when I saw that. I am a mom," Rivero said.

Khan and a man neighbors said was her brother were taken away for questioning.

"They looked sad," Rivero said.

At Khan's green two-story house on 108th St. in South Richmond Hill, colorful stickers on the door advertise, "Childcare, All Day, Everyday."

The operation had no permits or license, but did not require any because there were fewer than three outside kids and the caregiver was older than 18.

Neighbors said Khan is well-known and well-regarded.

"She usually takes good care of the kids," said William Munoz, 40. "She's a very responsible person."

Khan's Web site says she is a married, convent-educated immigrant from Trinidad who taught elementary school for eight years and has a teacher certificate.

Because children can drown quickly and virtually silently in small amounts of water, drowning is the second leading cause of accidental death in children, after car crashes.

NYC Parking Tickets Pile Up on Windshield of Dusty Minivan With Dead Body Inside

NEW YORK - A man's decomposing body inside a minivan covered in parking tickets went undiscovered for weeks because the vehicle's windows were apparently tinted and ticketing officers don't normally search cars, police said Friday.

George Morales, 59, died naturally from heart disease, the medical examiner's office said Friday. The body was found in the backseat Wednesday when a city marshal tried to tow the vehicle from beneath an overpass on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, police said. He was believed to have been living out of the white Chevrolet minivan, which had North Carolina plates.

But his daughter, Jennifer Morales, 29, told the Daily News he had been living with her family in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan. She said she last saw him in early May and had called police.

"The window was cracked open. I don't understand how no one noticed him. They just gave him tickets," she told the Daily News.

She said her father was a handyman who suffered from diabetes. But police do not have a missing person's report on record for Morales.

It wasn't clear exactly how many tickets were on the minivan's windshield when the body was discovered. Witnesses had reported a foul odor near the vehicle.

The Morales family plans to cremate the remains. Officials used X-rays taken of him in 2007 at Elmhurst Hospital Center to positively identify him, Jennifer Morales told the newspaper.

EMT Charged With Posting Photo of Corpse on Facebook

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A New York City emergency medical technician is facing misdemeanor charges after being accused of taking a picture of a female murder victim and then posting it to his Facebook page.

Mark Musarella, 49, was in court Thursday awaiting arraignment on charges of misdemeanor official misconduct. The retired New York Police detective is accused of posting the picture of a 26-year-old woman's corpse. The woman was found strangled with a hair-dryer cord March 30 on Staten Island, according to authorities, and a 28-year-old man has been charged in her death.

According to Musarella's lawyer, Edward J. Pavia Jr., the appearance of the photo on the social networking site was a technical mistake and not a morbid act. Pavia said years of working as a detective instinctively led Musarella to take the picture after he was called to the scene of the death.

"He's deeply sorry for any pain this incident has caused the family of the victim," Pavia told CNN by phone Thursday evening. "The posting of the photo was completely inadvertent, done completely by accident."

When asked how a photo could accidentally be posted to a Facebook page, Pavia said his client sent the photo along with many others on his camera phone without realizing it was still there.

"We will be able to prove very easily that this photo wasn't sent by itself, " said Pavia, adding that Musarella spent 20 years with the NYPD, and he was cited numerous times for honorable work.

Despite media reports that Musarella was fired from his job as an EMT at Richmond University Medical Center Hospital in Staten Island, Pavia insisted Musarella quit the job about three weeks ago.

New York Bouncer Found Guilty In 2006 Slaying of Student

(His DNA is found on the ties used to bind her, and he kidnapped someone else back in 2005.. Oh, yeah, "definite" scapegoat.)

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A Manhattan nightclub bouncer was found guilty of murder Wednesday in the slaying of a 24-year-old graduate student from Boston, Massachusetts, the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office said.

Darryl Littlejohn, 44, could be sentenced to a maximum of life in prison without the possibility of parole for the death of Imette St. Guillen, a criminology student at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

Sentencing is scheduled for July 8.

"We're going to appeal," Littlejohn's lawyer, Joyce David, told CNN after the conviction. "We're disappointed. I'm hoping this gives the family of the victim some closure. But I think that the wrong man was convicted."

The verdict came several hours into the first day of deliberations by the jury.

Before the verdict, David stressed to CNN that she believed in the innocence of her client, saying that Littlejohn was framed and that another person was a likely suspect.

"He was a convenient scapegoat who has a long criminal record," David said.

During the trial, witnesses said they saw Littlejohn and St. Guillen leaving The Falls bar in lower Manhattan together early on February 25, 2006. Hours later, St. Guillen's nude body was found in an isolated lot in Brooklyn.

Her face was covered with strips of packing tape, and a sock was stuffed in her throat. She died of asphyxiation. Investigators determined she had been raped.

Littlejohn was charged with murder after investigators linked his DNA to blood found on plastic ties used to bind St. Guillen's hands behind her back.

Littlejohn is already serving a term of 25 years to life for the October 2005 kidnapping of a 19-year-old college student in Queens.

NYPD Police Officer Killed by Fellow Officer

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A police officer chasing a theft suspect was fatally shot Thursday night by another officer after he failed to drop his weapon when ordered to, authorities said.

Authorities said Officer Omar Edwards, 25, was shot three times. The incident is under investigation.

Edwards was in plainclothes and carrying a handgun as he chased the suspect past a police car.

Authorities said the officer who shot him said he didn't realize Edwards was a police officer.

Edwards had just left the Housing Bureau Station House on East 124th Street, said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly at a news conference Friday. As Edwards approached his vehicle, he saw a man rummaging through it.

Edwards took out his gun -- a Smith and Wesson 9 mm -- and chased the alleged thief, 43-year-old Miguel Santiago, said NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne.

Meanwhile, a police cruiser with a sergeant and two officers, including Officer Andrew Dunton, had just turned onto 125th Street from 1st Avenue.

Santiago ran in front of the unmarked vehicle as it approached halfway up the block and the vehicle stopped.

The officer in the front passenger seat got out of the vehicle and shouted for Edwards to stop running and drop his weapon.

According to Kelly, the officers reported that, after the command was given, Edwards turned toward Dunton with his gun in his hand.

Dunton fired his Glock 9 mm six times, hitting Edwards three of those times -- once in the left arm, once in the left side and once in the back, according to police. Emergency crews responding to the scene found Edwards wearing a police academy T-shirt under his clothes and found his police shield and ID in his front left pants pocket, according to Browne.

Edwards, who lived in Brooklyn, was recently married and had two small children, according to CNN affiliate WABC-TV in New York.

On Friday, his relatives remembered him as a good person who achieved what he set out to do.

"He was a wonderful, wonderful child from when he was small," his father, Ricardo Edwards, told WABC.

"His desire was always to be a policeman and to play football," his uncle, Jerome Harding told the New York TV station. "And he did accomplish both, because he plays for the Police Department."

Edwards was pronounced dead at Harlem Hospital at 11:21 p.m. Thursday, according to Kelly.

"Tragic accidents like this are another reminder of the dangers our police officers often face as they keep our city the safest big city in the nation," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Friday.

"Rest assured we will find out exactly what happened here, see what we can learn from it so it may never happen again. All the city's prayers are with Omar Edwards and his family."

Five eyewitnesses, along with 20 people who reported hearing gunshots, were interviewed by police.

The officer who fired the shots has 4½ years' experience, authorities said.

The officers involved have been placed on administrative duties while the shooting is investigated. Police later arrested the alleged thief on suspicion of breaking into Edwards' car.

Confirmed H1N1 Flu Cases Nearing 10,000

Wooooo-EE!

(CNN) -- The number of confirmed H1N1 flu cases worldwide is nearing 10,000, the World Health Organization said Tuesday morning.

Commonly known as swine flu, the outbreak has sickened 9,830 people and caused at least 79 deaths -- mostly in Mexico, the organization said. The actual number of people affected may be higher, as it takes time for national governments to confirm cases and report them to the global body.

In the United States, at least 5,123 cases of swine flu have been reported, according to the latest figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC has linked five deaths to the outbreak; health officials in New York have connected a sixth death to the disease.

Concern about the disease deepened Tuesday, even as authorities have said that the outbreak may prove to be less severe than first suspected.

In New York, medical investigators were looking into the death of a baby boy whose mother brought him to Elmhurst Hospital. The baby died Monday evening, said Dario Centorcelli, a hospital spokesman. The cause of death was not immediately known.

That death comes a day after an assistant principal from New York died after contracting the H1N1 virus. That man -- Mitchell Wiener -- had an underlying health condition, said Dr. Thomas Frieden, New York City's health commissioner and President Barack Obama's pick to lead the CDC.

Wiener died Sunday evening of complications of the H1N1 virus, hospital and state officials said.

If confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Wiener's death would be the sixth linked to swine flu in the United States. The CDC has confirmed three in Texas, one in Arizona and one in Washington state.

Wiener's school is among a handful in New York City that temporarily closed at the recommendation of the city's Health Department.

Frieden said Sunday that "with the virus spreading widely," closing affected schools "will make little difference in transmission throughout New York City, but we hope will help slow transmission within the individual school communities."

The flu strain, which originated in Mexico, killed dozens of people there, causing U.S. officials to worry that it could take a similar toll after spreading across the border.

So far, however, it has acted similar to typical seasonal influenza -- which usually can be treated successfully but can be deadly among the very old, very young and people with pre-existing health problems.

White House Plans To Release Plane Flyover Report & Photo

(CNN) -- The White House indicated Wednesday that a report and a photo from the controversial low-altitude New York flyover by a 747 plane used as Air Force One could be released soon.

Earlier, White House officials had said that there were no plans to release photos to the public.

But the tone seemed to change on Wednesday.

"The report, I believe, will be concluded at some point this week. We'll release its findings and release a photo," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said during his daily press briefing.

The review, led by Deputy Chief of Staff Jim Messina, will focus on "why that decision was made and to ensure that it never happens again," Gibbs said.

The flyover, officials said, was a training mission -- it was also a government-sanctioned photo shoot.

Military officials also estimate that the mission and the photo shoot, aimed at updating file photos of Air Force One -- cost $328,835 in taxpayer money.

But they said "the hours would have been flown regardless, and the expenses would have been accrued on a different mission."

The photo shoot, which President Obama said he was "furious" with, happened on April 27. The image of a low-flying plane accompanied by an F-16 fighter jet sent some New Yorkers into the streets and into a panic -- reminding them of the tragic 9/11 attacks on the city.

Building evacuations also took place across the Hudson River in Jersey City, New Jersey. Read more of Obama's reaction

White House Military Office Director Louis Caldera later apologized for the flyover.

Witnesses reported seeing the plane circle over the Upper New York Bay near the Statue of Liberty before flying up the Hudson River.

A YouTube video showed people standing in a parking lot, watching the plane approach. As it nears, they begin to run. "Run, run!" said one person. "Oh my God," cried another.

A 911 call, released later by the Hudson County Sheriff's Department in New Jersey, illustrated the fear and panic felt by residents since the 9/11 attacks.

"There's a plane falling. There is a big aircraft falling like 9/11," a man says to the operator. "Everybody is running and people are crying and panicking."

CNN iReporter Tom Kruk, who saw the plane and took a photo, called the sight of the aircraft low in the sky "unsettling."

Mayor Michael Bloomberg was visibly angry last week. "I'm annoyed -- furious is a better word -- that I wasn't told," he said, adding that the decision by the White House Military Office and Federal Aviation Administration to withhold details about the flight were "ridiculous" and "poor judgment."

But according to Air Force Capt. Anna Carpenter, local law enforcement agencies and the FAA had been notified of the exercise.

New York Police Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne confirmed that department had been alerted about the flight "with directives to local authorities not to disclose information about it."

That decision riled local media.

"Given that we are not big on reminders of 9/11, we could have done without the whole thing. But the FAA outdunced itself by asking the NYPD to keep the photo op a secret, as if no one would look up and say, 'What the hell?' " the New York Daily News said on April 28.

The New York Post, in its editorial on the same day, said: "The FAA had long preferred to keep passengers ignorant of these dangers. Better to have people panic, it seems, at the sudden sight of low-flying aircraft over Lower Manhattan. ... Someone needs to straighten out these folks -- quick."

The controversy had some questioning President Obama's declaration of a new era of openness, who on January 21, said: "The old rules said that if there was a defensible argument for not disclosing something to the American people, then it should not be disclosed. That era is now over."

So why, exactly, didn't that initially apply to the photos? An advocate for government disclosure said it should, and that it's "silly" and "absurd" to withhold them.

"These are public records because they were done on government time, with government resources, and government personnel," said Patrice McDermott of openthegovernment.org.

In New York, news that the photos might not be released reignited public outrage over the incident.

It doesn't seem right," said Kurt Wallin from New Jersey. "If we spent the money to have these photos taken, they should be available for the public to see."

Emily Ritter from Park City, Utah, added: "I feel like maybe they're covering it up because it's been seen in a bad light already ... maybe they are still worried about their image and don't want to be seen in a bad light."