In the news
■ George Howard, general manager of the Swamp Park Outdoor Adventure Center in Ocean Isle Beach, N.C., said alligators go into brumation with their “eyes closed and just the nostrils sticking up out of the water, just enough to breathe,” to survive in freezing weather.
■ Lynn Ritter and Kirk Ritter, both 61, of Overland Park, Kan., were charged with fraudulently collecting $216,067 in pension and Social Security payments on behalf of a dead relative while they concealed his body inside their home for six years.
■ Jameelah Michl, 36, accused of killing a high-profile marketing consultant and social justice advocate, pleaded innocent in Los Angeles Superior Court to murder and burglary, as prosecutors say she used a semi-automatic handgun to commit the felonies.
■ David Crowe, 33, of Seattle, was charged with harassment and stalking, as New York police say they received reports of an “emotionally disturbed male” acting erratically near pop artist Taylor Swift’s Tribeca townhouse.
■ Kelly Armstrong, North Dakota’s sole U.S. House member, announced his candidacy on Tuesday for governor of the sparsely populated state, the day after Gov. Doug Burgum said he won’t seek a third term.
■ Erik Duran, a 37-yearold New York police sergeant, was charged with manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and assault, as he’s accused of hurling a plastic drink cooler at a man fleeing officers on a motorcycle, causing a crash that killed the driver.
■ Martin Shkreli, 40, of New York, the former chief executive officer of Vyera Pharmaceuticals, had his lifetime ban from working in the pharmaceutical industry upheld.
■ Juwan Brown, 29, a former Detroit police officer accused of causing the death of a 71-year-old man by punching him in the face and causing him to fall, “is grateful that the charges were dismissed,” his attorney Steve Fishman said, noting that “Brown was defending himself, as he had a right to do.”
■ Chris Avell, pastor of Dad’s Place church in Bryan, Ohio, was targeted with 18 criminal charges against him for opening his downtown sanctuary to homeless people and city officials are “creating problems in order to gin up opposition to this church existing in the town square,” attorney Jeremy Dys claimed.