Crime & Safety

Woman Arrested for "Stealing Education" for Child Not Really Homeless: Officials

This week's most unusual arrests and police investigations from our town and surrounding communities.

In the latest turn of a nationally, Norwalk’s mayor tells Patch that the 33-year-old woman arrested on felony larceny charges for enrolling her child illegally in a city elementary school wasn’t, as has been reported, homeless. Instead, the mayor says, Tanya McDowell was living in Bridgeport when she enrolled her 5-year-old son in Brookside Elementary School. Officials claim that McDowell misrepresented her son’s custody and address in order to get him into the Norwalk school. Catch up on this troubling story with a quick summary of details and latest developments .

Two women — one a man’s ex-wife, the other his current girlfriend — began spitting, hurling obscenities and slapping each other last week as the two divorcees exchanged custody of their young children. Unusual twist: The fight erupted in front of the Fairfield Police Department — a neutral, supposedly safe location that had been selected to avoid a blow-up, police said. "Usually when you exchange at the Police Department, it's gotten to the point when you can't agree with each other," Fairfield Police Lt. James Perez told Patch. More .

A South Carolina woman is facing felony larceny charges after allegedly stealing engagement ring valued at more than a quarter-million dollars. The 21-year-old is accused of stealing the diamond ring, worth about $270,000, and then selling it in Georgia. Unusual twist: She apparently stole the ring at a birthday party hosted by a friend. The ring belonged to her friend’s mother. Full .

Find out what's happening in New Canaanwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Darien police are investigating a disturbing reported burglary. A town resident says she left her 1993 Saturn unlocked briefly and returned to it to find that a wallet with $30 in cash, an AARP card, a check card and a driver's license was missing. Unusual twist: She had left the car to visit a gravesite at St. John's Catholic Cemetery. More .

As one Patch commenter , a neighborhood in Fairfield saw a pair of incidents involving BB gun pellets, after a 16-year-old was charged with shooting a 12-year-old in the back with a BB gun from a second-floor window this week. Unusual twist: That arrest followed a nearby, when a woman driving on Black Rock Turnpike had a BB fly through her open driver's-side window, then rolled up her window to feel several more pellets strike the side of her car. .

Find out what's happening in New Canaanwith free, real-time updates from Patch.


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