Allentown City Councilwoman Ce-Ce Gerlach says the city can't stop immigration officials from coming to Allentown and rounding up illegal immigrants, but she says the city can make sure it won't help the cause. "What this piece of legislation does is it makes it so we are not going out of our way. We're not going around to collect documentation status on people. Most importantly, we are not using our local resources which are strained, to enforce federal policy," Gerlach says. She says City Council will consider a bill establishing the city as a "welcoming city" for immigrants.
One of the dwindling number of D-Day survivors has died. 102-year-old Dick Schermerhorn died from pneumonia Tuesday at Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest. Schermerhorn cleared mines on Utah Beach during the June 6, 1944 invasion and remained at Utah Beach for about two months after the initial attack. While in Europe, Schermerhorn met both Brig. Gen. Theodore Roosevelt Jr. and General George Patton, who Shermerhorn said chewed him and other soldiers out for sitting down and taking a smoke break. Schermerhorn, who was discharged in December 1945, was originally from New York, but moved to Allentown in 1949 and had been living at the Luther Crest retirement community for the last 15 years.
A hearing is scheduled today in the murder trial of the man accused of killing four University of Idaho students. Attorneys for Bryan Kohberger are asking the judge to unseal records that show how detectives matched his DNA to the crime scene. Prosecutors say his DNA was found on a knife sheath. Kohberger's attorneys want to know how detectives made the DNA connection to identify Kohberger as the suspect. They're trying to get the evidence thrown out. Kohberger is accused of stabbing and killing Ethan Chapin, Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen and Xana Kernodle in their beds in off-campus housing in 2022.
Lehigh Valley International Airport hit a milestone last year that it hadn't seen in two decades. Officials say over a million passengers went through the airport for the first time since 2004. The airport says the number of passengers increased by more than eight-percent from 2023. The amount of cargo that processed through the airport declined by almost ten-percent, but the airport is expected to remain an "integral part of the air cargo logistics supply chain."
Pennsylvania Democrat Sen. John Fetterman says you can forget about him changing to the Republican Party. “It’s not going to happen,” Fetterman said simply. Rumors had spread on social media following Fetterman’s visit to President-elect Trump at Mar-a-Lago. He also called for Joe Biden to pardon Trump in his New York hush-money case. Shortly after Trump's inauguration Monday Fetterman sent a fundraising email that said, “Even though Donald Trump is officially back in the White House, I’m not backing down from fighting for what’s right.”
Three people are facing charges in Montgomery County for allegedly selling sports merchandise with a forged Jason Kelce signature. Officials said the three sold over a thousand forged items that were supposedly verified by an authentication service. However, that's where one of the suspects worked. The sales reported totaled about $200,000.
A federal judge has rejected former Senator Bob Menendez's bid for a retrial. Menendez's lawyers argued that his conviction should be dismissed because the jury was given a laptop that contained material that was supposed to be excluded from trial. The judge ruled it was unlikely the jurors were even aware of the materials because they were not referenced during the trial. Menendez was found guilty last summer of accepting cash and gold bars to benefit Egypt. Two businessmen were also convicted and Menendez's wife is awaiting trial on similar charges. His sentencing date is January 29th.