Author: CNN Newsource

By Madeleine Wright

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    WASHINGTON TOWNSHIP, New Jersey (KYW) — Homeowners in one South Jersey community are demanding answers after their fence was hit yet again.

Police body camera video shows Washington Township, Gloucester County, police discovering the scene of the crash around 1:30 a.m. on New Year’s Eve.

By daylight, the damage was clear. A driver veered off Egg Harbor Road near Dorado Avenue and plowed through a backyard fence before taking off. The damage affects three homeowners, who all share the fence, and may have to pay for repairs. The fence runs along the backyard of more than a dozen homes.

The hit-and-run driver turned himself in at 3 p.m. the same day and claimed he swerved to avoid striking a deer, police said. The investigation is ongoing.

“I’m very frustrated because now what do I have to go through to get my fence fixed?” Washington Township homeowner Jeffrey Krouse said.

It turns out this isn’t the first time this has happened. There was another hit-and-run involving this same section of fence in 2019. Police said the driver in that case may have been distracted.

A different section of the same fence, further down Egg Harbor Road, was hit in July 2025 and August 2025. Police said the August 2025 incident involved a drunk driver and the July 2025 incident involved a driver who fell asleep at the wheel.

Homeowners are worried if this pattern continues, somebody could get hurt.

“I have grandchildren and if they’re out in the yard and somebody comes through that fence, there’s nothing to stop it,” Krouse said.

The Washington Township Police Department has been in contact with the Gloucester County Highway Division about the possibility of installing guardrails.

“There’s many homes along the stretch that have swimming pools,” Chief Patrick Gurcsik from the Washington Township Police Department said. “It’s definitely a concern that somebody would be in one of those backyards when an accident happened.”

Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.

By Brian Unger

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    ATLANTA (WUPA) — This time of year can be especially painful for families coping with loss, and for children, that grief can begin far too early.

In Georgia, one in 10 children will lose a parent, sibling or primary caregiver before turning 18. For many of them, help comes from Kate’s Club, an Atlanta-based nonprofit that supports children and families learning how to live with loss.

They are some of the smallest mourners; children just learning to write, speak, and understand the world around them, sometimes before they even learn how to ride a bike. Many are so young they use drawings to express what words cannot: the loss of a mother, father or sibling.

“His name was Deondre,” Anthony Rolland said. “He was very funny. He was tall, 6-foot-5.”

Anthony was just 5 years old when his older brother, Deondre, was killed in a shooting. Now 15, Anthony says the bond they shared is something he still carries with him.

“Me and him just always used to, like, play with each other,” Anthony said. “We just had great bonding together.”

Kate’s Club was founded in 2003 by Kate Atwood, who lost her mother, Audrey, to cancer when she was 12 years old. Since then, more than 15,000 children have found support through the organization, which helps them take their first steps through grief.

“Developmentally, until about 7, a lot of children won’t really realize that death is permanent,” said Lane Pease, the club’s director of education.

Research shows children who lose a parent are five times more likely to develop a psychiatric disorder. Because of that, Kate’s Club offers long-term support, recognizing that grief does not follow a set timeline.

“I don’t believe in the word closure,” Pease said. “I don’t think they can start the healing process till later. With homicide, death, there’s many things, and it can drag on for years.”

Anthony’s mother, Deatrice Stroud, said the loss of her son was overwhelming, and that Kate’s Club helped her family find a way to talk openly about their pain.

“It was the most excruciating pain that you could ever experience,” Stroud said. “It’s not the natural order. You don’t think your children will go before you, and when they’re taken due to violence, it’s horrible because you have to deal with the law.”

The mission at Kate’s Club is to bring grief out of the shadows, to replace isolation with compassion, connection, and understanding.

“I started getting good grades,” Anthony said. “I started becoming, like, a better person.”

For families dealing with loss, Kate’s Club aims to show that grief doesn’t have to be faced alone, and that healing, though slow, is possible.

Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.

By Mike Sullivan

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    TEWKSBURY, Massachusetts (WBZ) — A Tewksbury 7-year-old accomplished a goal she set out to tackle while fighting off a terrible skin infection that left her in the hospital for eight days.

The youngster and her family foster dogs, and when her hospital stay stopped her from saying goodbye to their second foster dog, she became determined to help 10 dogs find a home by her seventh birthday.

Ariana Swenson was about to reach her sixth birthday when she came down with Staph Scalded Skin Syndrome.

“It looked like her entire body was burned”

“The staph infection that started really small on her face started to spread very quickly,” her mother Kasey Swenson said. “It attacks the top two layers of their skin pretty much everywhere, but the lower part of legs and arms. It causes the skin to blister and peel like a burn. In essence it looked like her entire body was burned.”

For days, her parents couldn’t touch her, or else sheets of her skin could just come off.

“[Our foster dog] went home the day after Ariana was admitted to Shriners, so she didn’t get to see her go to her forever home,” said Kasey. “She looked at us in the hospital and said, ‘Can we help 10 before I turn seven?’ And of course, you look to your child and go yes, yes, yes, definitely.”

Dogs helped Ariana heal

Antibiotics halted the attack on her body, and soon she began to recover physically, while mentally that healing came one dog at a time.

“I think it gave her something else to focus on. There was a lot of medical trauma,” Kasey said.

They partnered with Big Wave Dog Rescue in Billerica. The family says they began fostering a new dog almost every month.

“They just kept asking us to foster more dogs, so that’s why we reached 10 before I turned seven,” said Ariana.

They hit the mark in October, well before her December birthday, and then exceeded their goal with an unexpected eleventh foster dog this year.

“I cry because I am sad, and mom does sometimes to,” said Ariana of the bittersweet moment of watching a dog find a forever home.

“We melted, all she cared about was other people and how they were doing,” said Kasey. “She helps with all of them. She helps train them, feed them, whatever we ask her to do.”

Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.

By Christopher Harris

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    ATLANTA (WUPA) — The shooting of a 2-year-old boy on Christmas morning in Walker County has been ruled accidental by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, and no charges will be filed.

The child was shot in the head at a home on Tarvin Road in Rock Spring and survived emergency surgery.

Deputies with the Walker County Sheriff’s Office were called to the home around 9:50 a.m. on Christmas Day after receiving a report of a child with a gunshot wound, Sheriff Steve Wilson said. Deputies and EMS rushed the toddler to T.C. Thompson Hospital in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where he underwent surgery.

Investigators said the child’s father had returned home late Christmas Eve and placed his 9 mm handgun on a nightstand next to the bed. On Christmas morning, after the children were out of bed, the father was in another room dressing an infant when he heard a loud “pop” coming from the bedroom.

When he went to check, authorities said the father found the 2-year-old crying and bleeding from a head wound.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation assisted the Walker County Sheriff’s Office with the investigation.

The infant who was also inside the home has since been placed with relatives. Authorities said no names will be released.

The Walker County Department of Family and Children’s Services assisted in the investigation.

Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.

By Romelo Styles

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    VIRGINIA BEACH, Virginia (WTKR) — A Virginia Beach man who went from paralysis and fighting for his life to walking again is now sharing his story to help neighbors recognize warning signs that could save lives.

Ra-Jon James’ ordeal began in late July when he started feeling weak. The sudden change caught the attention of people around him almost immediately.

“Back on July 28th I started to feel weak and other people that hung out with me, they actually noticed that my eyes were actually red,” James said.

James made the smart decision to get checked out at urgent care, where initial tests came back negative. But within hours of that visit, his condition took a terrifying turn.

“So I went to Patient First and everything sounded very concerned to them. Everything was negative, which was awesome. I just collapsed on the floor,” James said.

That collapse happened at home as his father desperately tried to get him back to the hospital.

“He told me get up son get up. I said why me, I can’t walk or get up. I can’t do any of that. But I actually heard a voice tell me that I was gonna be OK,” James said.

James was rushed to the ICU, where local doctors worked around the clock to keep him alive. In the middle of it all, fear set in.

“They had to take me to the ICU. I was on the trach, I was on the ventilator. I was actually paralyzed,” James said.

When asked what was going through his mind during this time, James responded simply: “Am I going to live?”

Medical teams soon diagnosed James with Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a rare neurological disorder that attacks the body’s own nerve cells.

“For some reason your body creates antibodies that attack your own nerve cells. This is a nerve problem. It’s not a muscle problem,” said Dr. Jennifer Quilter at Sentara Virginia Beach General Hospital, one of the doctors treating James.

Doctors had to perform a plasma exchange on James to remove the infection from his body. He stayed in the hospital for nearly three months.

“Doctor told me I was close to death,” James said.

After months of intensive rehabilitation with local medical teams, Dr. Quilter says James’ recovery has been extraordinary.

“He came back to see us this month for the first time, and we were like holy smokes we can’t believe it, he looked great. His case was very significant, he had very significant deficits. Don’t often see it that severe,” Quilter said.

Today, James is walking again and using his survival story to help neighbors throughout the community recognize warning signs.

“I told myself when all of this stuff happened, when I was fully recovered, I said this could happen to anyone,” James said.

Doctors say Guillain-Barré Syndrome is rare, but early treatment can be life-saving. James says his faith carried him through his darkest days and now he hopes his story encourages families in Virginia Beach neighborhoods to listen to their bodies before it’s too late.

Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.

By ABC7.com staff

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    GARDEN GROVE, California (KABC) — A 100-year-old toymaker in Orange County drew a large crowd to his workshop over the weekend and sold out all his hand-made toys.

Harold Yoak, or Hal, converted the garage at his Garden Grove home into a toy workshop to create unique wood toys and a store front to sell his creations.

Hal’s workspace is filled with tools, paint and wood. He is surrounded by colorful toys: anything from dancing ducks, toy cars and helicopters to celebratory noisemakers and dinosaurs on wheels.

“I used to make cabinets for kitchens and things like that,” Hal said. “I would do repair work. I did an awful lot of repair work. But like you say, you get tired or you get old. One of the two.”

Hal’s career in woodworking began in Ohio, where he was born. He also served in the Navy in the 1940s, taking part in Operation Magic Carpet, helping repatriate millions of American servicemen after World War II. He then became a schoolteacher. When he moved to California, he continued his teaching career at Pacifica High School.

A 100-year-old toymaker turns his Garden Grove garage into a holiday storefront every year, and everything he creates is made completely by hand. Through every era of his life, he created works of art with wood.

“Before retirement, I made canes. I’d tell people to collect pictures and the resume of their lifetime, the highlights of their lifetime,” Hal said. “Then I’d carve their history in the cane or the walking staffs. I did that for years. I sent them all over the world.”

Now, he focuses on toys. This time of year, every weekend, his garage workshop is converted into a Christmas storefront open to the public. He is having his busiest year ever.

“I’ve got over probably $125 in just tips,” Hal said.

Related Story: 100-year-old toymaker turns Garden Grove garage into holiday storefront

For the last weekend of the year, Hal opened his garage doors to the public so they could buy some of his one-of-a-kind creations.

This time, there was a large crowd, waiting in line to take home something special.

Photos shared with ABC7 show people lined up on the sidewalk and people perusing tables filled with Hal’s hand-made toys.

When the weekend was over, Hal had sold out of all his toys.

He sells gifts that give even more to their maker.

“I like doing it. I really do,” Hal said.

Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.