Author: CNN Newsource

By Madeline Montgomery

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    ATLANTA (WUPA) — Some young adults in Atlanta who are coming out of foster care are starting the new year with a new home.

Wellroot Family Services is almost done renovating an apartment building in East Lake that will house 20 people aging out of the foster care system. They’ll live there rent-free.

Anwar Hogan lives in Wellroot Family Services’ young adult transitional housing in Atlanta.

“I grew up in Atlanta. Born and raised. My father passed away when I was 13, and three months later my brother passed away. It took a toll on me,” Hogan said. That heavy toll is one of the reasons he ended up in foster care.

“A lot of financial struggle. My mom at the time, she didn’t have a job,” he said. “We had a 30-day eviction notice on our door. We were trying to figure out where to go and anything to keep a roof over our head. So I ended up in foster care,”

After he aged out of the foster care system, Hogan wasn’t sure about his future.

“I just wanted to have a home. It was overwhelming,” he said.

That’s until the DeKalb County School District connected him with Wellroot. Every year, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 700 young adults in Georgia age out of foster care. One in six ends up homeless.

“Being 18, you kind of are spreading your wings to fly, but you also need support. You need to be able to go back home to be able to check in with your parents, and young people that we work with don’t necessarily have that,” Wellroot Family Services President Allison Ashe said.

The faith-centered organization is deeply rooted in the United Methodist Church. Wellroot was founded in 1871 as an orphanage for children orphaned because of the Civil War. It has since expanded to help young adults — men and women 18 to 21 — aging out of foster care.

“These people impacted my life, telling me I could do it. It felt good,” Hogan.

Right now, 11 young adults live on the campus for free, and that number is about to double.

This transitional housing campus is getting more apartments — and a larger community center.

“It’s not just a place they do their laundry, but they actually learn to do their own laundry,” Ashe said. “It’ll be a great place to prepare food for the holidays and things of that nature, but it’s also a place where they can learn to cook.”

They also help with tutoring.

“My first three weeks here, I got my GED. I locked in. The next week, I got a job working at the airport. I was grinding. I’m in grind mode,” Hogan said.

And with room to house 30 people, more young adults, like Hogan, can feel confident about their future.

“I feel passionate about what I’m doing. I feel supported,” Hogan said.

A type of support hundreds of young adults leaving Georgia’s foster care system need every year.

The new apartments will be ready on Jan. 28.

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 Juli McDonald

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    BOSTON (WBZ) — Investigators revealed the man who opened fire at Brown University and killed an MIT professor days later, recorded a series of videos confessing to the shootings before he took his own life. Claudio Manuel Neves Valente said he had planned the attack for six semesters.

Survivor Jacob Spears, who is recovering at his home in Georgia, spoke with WBZ-TV after reading the transcripts from the videos.

“I’m like six semesters? That’s a long time. That’s before I even was there,” Spears said. “This was my first semester. I’m a freshman. So this was like, before I was even there you were planning this.”

Spears was shot in the back in a Brown engineering building in Providence, Rhode Island on Dec. 13. Students Ella Cook and Mukhammad Aziz Umurzokov were killed and nine others were wounded.

“Mukhammad, he was my friend,” Spears said. “That was my friend, so reading it I tried to keep him out of my mind because I knew that would make it even harder. But I couldn’t.”

Transcripts of the chilling reflections by Neves Valente were released by the U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday.

“I am not going to apologize, because during my lifetime no one sincerely apologized to me,” Neves Valente said in the video discovered in the Salem, New Hampshire storage unit where his body was found.

No motive revealed for shootings He did not reveal a motive for the campus shooting, or the murder of MIT professor Nuno Loureiro two days later in Brookline, Massachusetts. Neves Valente attended school in Portugal decades ago with Loureiro.

Neves Valente did mention his interaction with a witness, which ultimately led to police identifying him.

“I was almost confronted by a guy there that day… Not almost, I actually was confronted and he knew my… my… my license plate, I honestly never thought it would take them so long to find me,” Neves Valente said.

In an interview with WBZ-TV, security expert Todd McGhee stressed the importance of reporting suspicious behavior.

“Brown University was the target, and so that just indicates to me, that all the phrasing of ‘see something say something,’ that’s what we need to do,” McGhee said. “We don’t need to look for people conducting criminal actions, we need to look for people that are acting suspicious.”

McGhee, who had a career in law enforcement and now specializes in security analysis, says even without a clear motive, the videos provide an opportunity for police to tap into his mindset and could lead to former colleagues or friends coming forward with key information.

As Brown University continues efforts to transform security across campus, Spears says it’s only there that he’ll be able to find some healing.

“I love the community. I love my friends,” Spears said. “I want to go back, and I want see them and I just want to like try and get back to something kind of normal even though I know for a long time nothing, nothing there will be normal.”

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 Zachary Bynum

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    POLK COUNTY, Florida (WFOR) — A Central Florida man is facing multiple charges after deputies say they found him on a construction site wearing lingerie — and discovered a firearm concealed inside a silicone breast implant.

According to the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, 39-year-old Matthew Zaccarino of Altamonte Springs was spotted standing beside a vehicle at a construction area near Ernie Caldwell Boulevard and Grandview Parkway.

Deputies say Zaccarino began putting on a red lace bra and G-string as they approached. When deputies ordered him to stop, he removed the items instead — revealing a handgun hidden beneath one of the silicone breast inserts he had been holding.

The arrest report notes Zaccarino reached into the vehicle before deputies handcuffed him and took him into custody.

Investigators say Zaccarino claimed he was on his way to a costume party but refused to provide the location.

Zaccarino is charged with trespassing while armed, loitering and prowling, and resisting arrest without violence.

Sheriff Grady Judd commented on the bizarre encounter, saying: “A lace bra, a G-string and a hidden gun. Folks, you cannot make this up.”

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 Don Nelson

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    BOISE, Idaho (KIVI) — The holidays have been tough for the French family out of Twin Falls County. You may remember that about three weeks ago, on Dec. 17, a strong windstorm toppled a tree that ultimately struck two of their three children as they waited at the bus stop. One of those children, Porter French, is still recovering at St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital in Boise.

“He’s a fighter, and it’ll be a long road, but I know he can do it,” said Alisha French, Porter’s mom.

Porter’s parents say they hope the 11-year-old will get out of bed for the first time this week.

Porter’s sister Viviana was released from the hospital on Christmas Eve. “She’s like a normal kid again,” said Alisha. “It’s hard to keep her from limited activity, not running, no jumping, or dancing, twirling— just try and protect her head.”

To say it’s been a rough few months would be an understatement.

Alisha French put it this way: “Speaking of, when it rains, it pours. In October, he was in a car accident, and our main car was totaled, and so we haven’t replaced the car yet.”

Two days before the tree accident, the French family says they were asked by their landlord to vacate, leaving them to find a new home when they return to Twin Falls. For now, the Ronald McDonald House is home.

Their oldest son, Charlie, is with his Grandparents back in Twin Falls.

A fundraiser at Papa John’s in Twin Falls is scheduled for Wednesday, and their GoFundMe account is still active. Ren and Alisha are overwhelmed by the outpouring of support they’ve received in Twin Falls and Boise.

“It’s just amazing to see people reach out and show concern and care that you don’t know. Often people will say, ‘we’re praying for you,’ where I never would have interacted with otherwise, and so it’s amazing to see that.”

And as far as welcoming in a New Year? The couple is praying for the best. “It’s got to be better,” said Alisha. “It’s going to be better; it’s the way you think about it— so 2026 will be better,” added Ren French.

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. KIVI 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 Vanessa Gongora

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    TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — January is National Human Trafficking Prevention Month, and one survivor is using her voice to bring awareness to this critical issue through the power of poetry and art.

Monica Perkins, now 39, survived eight years of human trafficking across multiple states with many predators, beginning when she was just 17-years-old. Her story is featured at a survivors art exhibit downtown called “Every Step has a Story – How we got in, How we got out, Who we are now,” where she shares her experience through a poem called “Against All the Odds.”

Perkins never imagined that fleeing an abusive relationship while pregnant would lead to another path of torture. The trauma from those years still affects her today.

“My brain was being rewired and reconditioned before I even knew myself,” Perkins said.

She said she met her first predator in San Francisco, Calif. when she was in a group home, not realizing what she was getting herself into.

“The day that I met him, he took me around and showed me some of his houses. He had a nice car, he told me he was a rap producer. He had a studio and just all the good things, shiny things that a girl that’s pretty naive and especially, you know, not being from a big city. I just was instantly, you know, enthralled by the whole situation,” Perkins explained.

After she had her son, Dondre Cannon, things took a turn. Her son was taken away from her when he was only four-months-old, and she was forced into prostitution.

“I was handed a purse by one of his women and full of rubber gloves, condoms, and lube, and told what I was going to be doing for how much and I was dropped off at the strip club,” Perkins said.

During her trafficking experience, Perkins faced complete isolation, control, physical and psychological abuse. On top of that, she was only allowed to see her son a handful of times.

“My cell phone was taken away and I was told I was being monitored. That family didn’t exist anymore. That was no more. This is my new life. This is how we go forward. My family didn’t love me,” Perkins said.

Getting out wasn’t easy because the predators maintained complete authority and power, but reuniting with her son was her priority.

She escaped at the age of 25 and hasn’t looked back since.

Now, Perkins is ready to confront those demons head-on.

Through her poetry, she reads: “As survivors it’s up to us to unite and fight for what’s right. Stand tall and turn our pain into power. It’s a grueling dedication to heal while trying to properly function minute by minute, day by day, hour by hour.”

She’s speaking up about her experience in hopes of saving other women, and to let them know there is light at the end of the tunnel.

“Because I never felt like I would get here. And so I feel like everybody comes with a different story, a different approach, and I just know that like I did not, there’s no reason I had to have gone through all that if I can’t use it to help somebody else,” Perkins said. “And if I’m not able to do that, then it was all for nothing. It feels like it would have been all for nothing, that I suffered. My son suffered. My daughter now suffers from the ramifications.”

Perkins also hopes people won’t stay silent when they see something wrong.

“And that’s where this all is a problem, is that there are so many people that could have stepped in and saved my life. And even if they weren’t able to save my life, at least they could have tried because there is going to be somebody that they could have made a difference in their life,” Perkins said.

“When you are shown over and over and over again that nobody’s going to step in. Everybody sees what’s happening. They know it’s not right. They know there’s something wrong, but they don’t say a word. Nobody cares.”

Angela Marie, curator of the “Every Step Has a Story” exhibit and also a survivor, believes it’s crucial to give victims a platform to use their voices after being silenced for so long.

“Being able to walk with other survivors and see them begin to own their own lives again when so much agency had been taken before. To see them stepping out confidently and sharing who they are, not what they are, not what they’ve been through … To remind them they have a voice,” Marie said. “Here we stand together, we support each other and we walk through those steps. We share the stories, we share the tears, we share the laughter.”

Perkins, along with her now 21-year-old son Dondre, and 15-year-old daughter Arianna are working with nonprofits like Southern Arizona Against Slavery (SAAS) to help them heal a deep wound.

Norma Darnell, SAAS President says the mission is to mentor and empower survivors of sexual exploitation and human trafficking and help them to cultivate their gifts and talents.

Darnell is a survivor of sexual exploitation and wants other victims to know she is standing in their corner and will help with whatever they may need.

“I would really want to extend the invitation that I know that you’ve learned how to build walls and not to trust, but all I can say is just to give us an opportunity that we are a safe place and that we will love you wherever you’re at in your journey,” Darnell said.

The art exhibit is at the 7 Legged Spider Gallery inside the Steinfeld Warehouse located at 101 W. 6th St. in Downtown Tucson. It’s open for the month of January on Saturdays from 1-4:00 p.m. and by special appointment. Reach out to Angela Marie on Instagram at @angela_marie_arts for more information.

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. ­­­KGUN 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.