Author: CNN Newsource

By Anthony Sabella

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    NORFOLK, Virginia (WTKR) — A Norfolk woman says she watched her dog take her last breath after a police officer entered her apartment by mistake and opened fire.

Alizana Cummings says she was at the pool at her apartment complex, Renew Little Creek, off Military Highway when she saw police vehicles arrive. She returned home, where a neighbor met her with devastating news.

“My neighbor, he ran downstairs and he told me, he said, ‘Hey man, they shot your dog,'” Cummings recalled.

While at the complex pool, she had left behind her two dogs — three-year-old Stormi and seven-month-old Cashmere. Cummings says her neighbor told her police had shot Stormi.

“Stormi. That was my baby,” Cummings said. “She loved belly rubs, she loved whipped cream.”

“Stormi was laying on my chest before we left and I said, ‘Storm Storm, we’re gonna be right back,'” Cummings said.

According to a statement from the Norfolk Police Department to News 3, officers were called to Crescent Way on Sunday afternoon for a man who accidentally shot himself. The statement added:

“While on scene conducting their investigation, responding officers encountered a vicious animal, and an officer discharged their service weapon in the direction of the vicious animal as it was approaching. The dog was pronounced deceased. No other injuries were reported during this incident.”

Cummings said police on scene did not allow Cummings through to her apartment. She and her girlfriend entered through a back door, and Cummings went through to the front door.

“I opened the door and peeped around the corner. I saw Stormy just laying right there by the stairwell. She was breathing so hard and she was looking at me and I just fell to my knees,” Cummings said.

She says she watched Stormi take her last breath — and that officers threatened to handcuff her as she tried to reach her dog, telling her it was a police scene.

“They were telling me that if I went by her and didn’t calm down that they were gonna put me in handcuffs,” Cummings said. “That was my life. That was my baby.”

Cummings says the assistant chief on scene told her the officer who shot Stormi had opened her door by mistake.

“It was the officer’s fault. He had the wrong apartment,” Cummings said, adding that self-inflicted gunshot wound incident had happened on the third floor while her unit is on the first floor.

Police radio audio appears to support that account.

“(Unit) 304 was where the gunshot victim was. Apartment 102 has an open door and that’s where the dog is at,” a dispatcher can be heard saying on Broadcastify.

News 3 asked Norfolk Police if they could confirm that the officer entered the wrong apartment. They responded with a statement similar to the original — but this time, the word “vicious” was removed:

“While on scene for this incident, an officer discharged their service weapon one time in the direction of an animal as it was approaching. The animal, a dog, was pronounced deceased. No other injuries were reported during this incident.

The Officer involved has been placed on administrative duty pending the outcome of this ongoing investigation.”

Police say that’s all they’re able to share right now and will release updates when they’re available.

Cummings says she has contacted a lawyer while she waits for more information. She is also waiting to receive Stormi’s ashes. She says condolences from neighbors and friends have provided some comfort — as has knowing she was the last thing Stormi saw.

“Before she took her last breath and went to heaven, her mama fought for her. She knows that her mama fought for her,” Cummings said. “I just want to tell everybody please hug your babies tight.”

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 Ricardo Tovar

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    California (KSBW) — Months after making national headlines for advertising her search for a husband on Bay Area billboards, a Salinas native says her story has reached a happy new chapter: she has found love.

Lisa Catalano, a Salinas High School graduate who drew attention in the fall for promoting her dating website, marrylisa.com, on billboards from San Francisco to Santa Clara, recently shared that the effort ultimately helped lead her to the relationship she had been hoping to find.

While she did not meet her boyfriend directly through the billboard campaign or through an application on her website, Catalano said the entire experience played an important role in getting her there.

“I don’t feel like any of it was a waste of time or effort or resources,” Catalano said in an interview with KSBW 8. “All paths led me to where I am now.”

Catalano, 42, launched the campaign after growing frustrated with dating apps and wanting a more intentional path toward marriage and family.

Her website laid out her values, goals and non-negotiables, serving as a deeper filter for compatibility than traditional dating profiles.

Catalano said she received roughly 4,000 applications between September 2025 and May 2026, with 3,221 deemed genuine.

She said many of the responses came from men outside her area or from people who did not meet the basic qualities she was seeking in a partner.

She contacted 20 local men and went on first dates with five of them.

At the same time, Catalano continued using dating apps, often directing matches to her website to help assess compatibility early on.

In January, she matched with a man on a dating app who had also seen one of her billboards. That connection eventually turned into a relationship.

Catalano said the two went on 19 dates over three and a half months before becoming exclusive.

In June she announced on her website that she is now in a relationship with a Bay Area man she described as kind, intelligent, and aligned with the values most important to her.

She said he meets the standards she had been seeking all along, including shared views on marriage, family, lifestyle, religion and politics.

Catalano also revealed more details about the cost of her widely discussed campaign. She said the billboards themselves cost about $967, while the website and taxi-top ads in San Francisco brought the subtotal to about $1,980.

After adding follow-up expenses tied to the attention the campaign received — including wardrobe, makeup and increased security — her total spending came to $4,746.

Despite public speculation that the campaign may have cost tens of thousands of dollars, Catalano said she was strategic in choosing billboard locations and ad timing to stay within budget.

She said she started the process without ever imagining the amount of attention it would receive. Some people speculated that she was doing it for attention or fame, while others supported her. She also faced nasty and hateful comments directed at her efforts. Some even accused her of being AI.

She said she had tried all the traditional approaches, including meeting people in public and using dating apps, but none of them were working, and she was not finding dates.

She even said she turned down offers for Bachelorette-type shows in an effort not to muddy her real goal of finding love.

“I wasn’t getting dates, and I really wanted to find love, get married and have all of that,” she said. “I was like, ‘Okay, my current trajectory on things is not working. How am I going to make this work?’ I had to change something, so I decided to go big on it. And, you know, I didn’t meet my boyfriend off of the website or billboards, but I think the whole combination of everything that happened led me to where I am now.”

She also said she would not necessarily recommend billboards as the answer for everyone, but she does believe in finding creative solutions when something in life is not working.

“I don’t know if I would necessarily recommend going the billboard route per se, but I think that with anything in life, if you have a problem, it can be beneficial to try to think about creative solutions to the problem,” she said. “And that’s essentially what I did in this situation.”

Now, Catalano says she is simply grateful the story ended the way it did.

For a woman who once put her love life on Highway 101, the road appears to have led exactly where she hoped.

She said that despite the costs and effort, she does not regret what she did because it led her to where she is today.

She said she is very optimistic about her future with her new boyfriend and that they are both very happy right now. She would not disclose much about him other than to say he is a 35-year-old Bay Area man who is not bothered by her website or the media attention she has garnered.

She said she is trying to keep details about her relationship private, but added that they have spoken about a future together.

“He’s just way better than I thought I could even find in one person,” she said. “So I’m very lucky. I’m very happy. And he feels the same way about me.”

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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    NORFOLK, Virginia (WTKR) — A Norfolk police officer and a group of strangers worked together Tuesday afternoon to rescue a woman trapped inside her car after a water main break opened a 7-foot sinkhole on City Hall Avenue.

Officer AJ Stevenson was first to act, climbing down into the sinkhole to reach the woman as water rushed around her vehicle. Bystanders, including Brennan Feldman, stopped what they were doing and rushed over — not to record the scene, but to help.

Body camera footage captured the moments Stevenson descended into the hole and talked the woman through the rescue.

Stevenson said he never considered waiting for backup before going in.

“I just immediately thought that I need to get her out that vehicle and one way or another. I was gonna get her out,” Stevenson said.

Feldman said he was driving past when he heard the woman screaming and stopped immediately.

“As I drove by, I heard the lady screaming and then as I got a little bit closer, I saw her,” Feldman said.

“And I said oh my goodness I really have to get this lady out that was my first thought,” Feldman said.

“Lady was sitting in her driver seat still buckled. There was a rushing river of water around her,” Feldman said.

While Stevenson worked to reach the woman, Feldman and others positioned themselves at the edge of the sinkhole to keep the officer anchored and help pull them both out safely.

“I’m sitting there and I’m grabbing his belt as hard as I can because he’s a big guy,” Feldman said.

Stevenson said the response from the people around him made the difference.

“Yes, I probably could’ve done it by myself, but it was a team effort. I owe a lot of thanks to the citizens that stood by. They didn’t pull their phones out and start recording. They actually stood by and even checked on me as well as the woman,” Stevenson said.

Feldman said he hopes Stevenson gets the credit he deserves for putting himself in danger to save a stranger.

“I would just tell him that you’re just like I told him that day he did a fantastic job. I hope that he gets the recognition that he deserves because he risked his life to save a ladies life,” Feldman said.

Stevenson said what stands out most from the rescue is not his own actions, but the fact that complete strangers came together without hesitation to help someone they had never met.

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 Ashley Glass

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    WEST PALM BEACH, Florida (WPTV) — Ahead of the July Fourth holiday, WPTV is examining ways to celebrate and support our military.

As local Chris Claflin will attest to, the Hanley Center in West Palm Beach is a valuable resource in supporting the mental health and well-being of service members or anyone struggling.

As Claflin explained to WPTV Morning Anchor Ashley Glass, he graduated from Harvard Business School. He was also a U.S. Navy pilot and flew jets in combat, but all of that success fell apart when he became drug addicted for eight years.

Claflin traced the onset of the drug addiction, in part, back to not dealing with trauma he experienced as a child. He is currently more than a year sober, and has a message for anyone struggling, especially veterans.

“Get help,” Claflin said. “You have to get help. You can’t do this on your own. It’s not something you can figure out. Once you get so far down the rabbit hole, you can’t pull yourself out on your own.”

Claflin is working to become a certified counselor after receiving help at the Hanley Center. He said the care he received there changed everything for the better.

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 Taylor Epps

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    BALTIMORE, Maryland (WMAR) — Mystery solved in West Baltimore. A West Baltimore woman searching for the good Samaritan who rescued her stolen packages has found him and formed an immediate bond.

D. FitzGerald Smith, known by friends as Chip, wasn’t feeling well, so he went out for an early morning walk around 5 a.m. Sunday, when he spotted two people breaking into cars in his neighborhood.

“I see these individuals; they don’t see me. They actually go inside of a white SUV, and they took boxes out. At that point, they began to run, so I’m now yelling at them,” Smith said.

The thieves dropped the packages. Smith looked at the address on them and rang the doorbell at Cruz’s home, but she was asleep.

“I’m determined that this woman is going to get her packages back, I said ‘I’m not going to leave them here, I’m gonna pick them up and put them on her doorstep,'” Smith said. “To me, what I did is normal; this is not out of the ordinary for a man to do.”

Smith said it is simply how he was raised, and he was hesitant when people began calling him a hero. He eventually dropped a note in Cruz’s mailbox, and the two connected by phone.

That is when he learned the packages contained items the community had raised money to buy to improve a green space in the neighborhood.

When the two finally met in person, Cruz was overcome with emotion.

“You really, really came through, and I have to say, it’s really hard living here,” said Cruz. “Things like this really crush your spirit and chip at your happiness, but when you meet people like you, it brings back some faith in people.”

She gave him fresh sunflowers and a card to mark the occasion.

Cruz is not from Baltimore. She moved to the area because she heard there were good people here. Smith reminded her that there are. Now she knows he’s just a few blocks away.

“That’s it, we’re friends for life,” Cruz said. “I feel safer, I do. I met Chip, I’m good now.”

“And you are now, as I say, you are my sister,” Smith said.

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. WMAR’s editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.

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 Castellucci

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    BRIGHTON, Colorado (KMGH) — Barry Hildebrant has spent decades collecting military uniforms and artifacts, building what may be the largest private collection of its kind — spanning from the Civil War to today. But the real story isn’t just about the collection. It’s about the unlikely friendship that grew out of it.

Hildebrant’s basement holds an estimated 100,000 items. Among them: a nurse’s uniform from the China-Burma theater of World War II, and a toiletry bag with an unused bar of Palmolive soap.

“This came with a nurse’s uniform. She was in the China-Burma theater during World War II and this was her toiletry bag…unused bar of Palmolive,” Hildebrant said.

For Hildebrant, every item is a connection to a life once lived.

“I wondered who carried this and what their life was like, what they saw,” Hildebrant said.

Ishamina Johnson, who visited the collection, said the experience left her speechless.

“I had to come and see this… It’s incredible, actually,” Johnson said.

Johnson said the personal nature of the artifacts is what makes them so powerful.

“It’s interesting to me because it’s so personal… There’s another human being that touched this and used these items,” Johnson said.

One uniform — pulled at random from thousands — turned out to belong to a World War II sniper. Hildebrant knew the story immediately.

“He was a sniper during World War II… The fun thing is figuring out how many hangers go with it,” Hildebrant said.

But beyond the collection, Hildebrant and Johnson share a story of their own.

The two were matched through a buddy telephone program. Johnson needed volunteer hours. Hildebrant needed someone to talk to.

“We got matched up… I’d call him once a week,” Johnson said.

“She needed to talk to someone who was going through some things. I’ve been through cancer twice, I had my right kidney removed last October, open heart surgery when I was 4,” Hildebrant said.

For Johnson, watching Hildebrant go through his health struggles was deeply difficult.

“One of the saddest things in my life, seeing him like that,” Johnson said.

The volunteer program eventually ended. Their friendship did not.

“I mostly take him on walks,” Johnson said. “I manage his Facebook page called the National War Museum of the Rockies, and he has become family.”

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. KMGH’s editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.

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 Jasmine Franklin

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    WAUWATOSA, Wisconsin (WISN) — Several cannabis stores are fighting to stay in business, including Kelly’s Greens in Wauwatosa.

The owner, Erin Kelly, said they’re facing uncertainty as a new federal hemp law is set to take effect this November.

Kelly opened the cafe after losing her job during the pandemic, but she says they are now at risk of shutting down.

“The ban is super impactful here because Wisconsin has no other access to legal cannabis,” Kelly said.

Recreational and medicinal marijuana are both illegal in Wisconsin.

But stores selling THC and CBD products have been working under a federal loophole, until now.

New federal legislation set to take effect on Nov. 12 would ban all hemp products with a THC concentration over .3 percent, impacting shops across the state.

“We have 3500 jobs on the line; this is a $700,000 million industry,” Kelly said.

“I mean, it would be devastating if we have to close. Kelly’s Greens has become an essential place in our community,” Kelly said.

The cannabis cafe is not giving up; they’re hosting a rally on Monday, hoping to gain more attention from state lawmakers.

Several bipartisan bills aimed at regulating t-h-c products in the state have already failed.

“All of those would go away, including CBD dog treats and sleep gummies, so it’s a complete ban that would leave our community with no options,” Kelly said.

Kelly says the ban’s impact reaches far beyond her shop; it will also be a change for the many Wisconsinites who rely on it.

The “Save Hemp” rally is Monday at 5:30 p.m., outside Kelly’s Greens located at 90th and North.

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.