It’s Monday, October 18th - and NBC 6 has the top stories for the day.
No. 1 - A convicted murderer has been arrested and charged with the killing of a woman who was missing for weeks.
Police arrested convicted murderer, Eric Pierson, who was released from prison last year, for the slaying. Pierson, 54, was charged Saturday with first-degree murder for the murder just hours after Erika Verdecia's body was found Saturday near Fort Lauderdale. Sunrise police say Pierson confessed to stabbing the single mother four times with a screwdriver on Sept. 25. Erika Verdecia, 33, was the mother of a young daughter and had been missing since Sept. 24. The missing persons flyer says her disappearance "was completely out of character."
No. 2 - Some residents of a Hollywood Beach apartment complex have to evacuate their condos after city officials were made aware of a sewer problem that was causing backups in several units.
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The residents of 15 units at The Waterway at Hollywood Beach Condominium, located a 2200 S. Ocean Drive have until 9:00 a.m. Monday to remove their personal belongings. The city of Hollywood was informed of an ongoing issue underneath the building with its sewer pipeline Thursday. City building officials inspected the sewage system and according to a statement from the city, the line was sinking, "causing a two-foot bend in the pipe which in turn is causing solid waste and wastewater to back up into several of the building units on the ground floor." The water supply was then cut off for the impacted units and repairs are expected to last 3-4 weeks, according to the city of Hollywood.
No. 3 - A notorious Haitian gang known for brazen kidnappings and killings was accused by police Sunday of abducting 17 missionaries from a U.S.-based organization. Five children were believed to be among those kidnapped, including a 2-year-old.
The 400 Mawozo gang kidnapped the group in Ganthier, a community that lies east of the capital of Port-au-Prince, Haitian police inspector Frantz Champagne told The Associated Press. The gang was blamed for kidnapping five priests and two nuns earlier this year in Haiti. The gang, whose name roughly translates to 400 “inexperienced men," controls the Croix-des-Bouquets area that includes Ganthier, where they carry out kidnappings and carjackings and extort business owners, according to authorities. Ohio-based Christian Aid Ministries said the kidnapped group consisted of 16 U.S. citizens and one Canadian, for a total of five children, seven women and five men.
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No. 4 - Bill Clinton arrived Sunday at his home in New York to continue recovering from an infection that left him in treatment for six days at a Southern California hospital, officials said.
The former president left the University of California Irvine Medical Center around 8 a.m. with Hillary Clinton on his arm. Dressed in jeans and a sports coat and wearing a face mask, he made his way out of the hospital slowly and stopped to shake hands with doctors and nurses lined up on the sidewalk. He gave a thumbs-up when a reporter asked how he was feeling, and he and Hillary Clinton then boarded a black SUV. Bill Clinton's “fever and white blood cell count are normalized, and he will return home to New York to finish his course of antibiotics," Dr. Alpesh N. Amin said in a statement shared on Twitter by a Clinton spokesman.
No. 5 - Volunteers hit the sand in Miami Beach Sunday for a weekly cleanup effort to help make our beaches a better, cleaner place.
The event organizer, Clean Miami Beach, said they are getting more requests for these events because there is more pollution. In 2019 and 2020, Clean Miami Beach says they picked up over 20,500lbs of trash. Group founder Sophie Ringel wants to connect more with the younger generation. She says the group cleaned up 112lbs of trash over two blocks in 30 minutes after high school seniors who enjoyed a day by the water left their trash behind. The issue is something they say they are constantly dealing with.
No. 6 - The Jacksonville Jaguars have a championship pedigree at coach and quarterback. However it took a software engineer-turned-kicker to finally end the misery of a 20-game losing streak.
Matthew Wright’s 53-yard field goal as time expired gave the Jags a 23-20 victory over the Miami Dolphins on Sunday at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London. The Dolphins lost their fifth consecutive game, spoiling the return of Tua Tagovailoa, who made his first start in a month. The second-year quarterback threw two touchdown passes to Jaylen Waddle. Tagovailoa finished 33 of 47 for 329 yards with the two TD passes and one interception in his return from fractured ribs. Miami played without starting cornerbacks Xavien Howard and Byron Jones, who were both out injured, and will host Atlanta next Sunday.
