The parents of a South Carolina teenager who was killed last month by police demanded Wednesday that law enforcement give them more information about their son's final moments.

"We just want answers. We have no clue as to what happened," said Angie Hammond, the mother of 19-year-old Zachary Hammond, who was shot in a Seneca Hardee's restaurant parking lot on July 26.

Hammond was unarmed when Seneca Police Lt. Mark Tiller opened fire on him, shooting him twice. Police say Hammond was trying to run Tiller over.

Along with her husband, Paul, Angie Hammond pleaded in a press conference for officers to release dash cam video of the fatal interaction "just so we can know what happened."

"Our son deserves that, and we deserve that as a family," Paul Hammond told reporters.

Community members have launched an online fundraiser to rebuild a beloved Vietnamese sandwich shop in Linda Vista that was destroyed in a kitchen fire last week.

So far, the GoFundMe page has raised $105, but hopes to collect $5,000 to go to the Tran family, who owned K Sandwiches at 7604 Linda Vista Road.

Jennifer Tran, one of the owners of K Sandwiches, told NBC 7 that her family plans to rebuild the eatery “as soon as possible” and is grateful for the outpouring of support.

She confirmed her family is receiving the proceeds from the GoFundMe page.

“We’re extremely grateful to you and the community for the support that we have received,” Tran said in a statement. “Our spirits have been lifted by the kind words.”

She said her family was doing fine, though they are still shaken up over the fire.

The fire started in an oven the evening of Aug. 4, but all workers inside at the time managed to exit safely. The business suffered $1.5 million in damage and was a total loss.

K Sandwiches was a beloved staple of the Linda Vista neighborhood for 10 years and specialized in Bahn Mi sandwiches.

Officials have arrested four men in San Diego’s North County they say are connected to a series of “takeover” armed robberies that involved pointing guns at victims and tying them up.

The incidents happened at the GameStop at 2535 Vista Way in Oceanside on August 5, a GameStop in Vista in July, the Oceanside Pharmacy at 3601 Vista Way on July 10 and a Beauty Supply Store in Vista in March.

In the process of robbing the stores, suspects tied up the victims and moved them around to other rooms or offices in the building while pointing weapons at them.

Oceanside Police Department’s SWAT team and several other units working with the San Diego County Sheriff’s Office said they served four search warrants at 5 a.m. Wednesday morning in connection with the crimes on the 3400 block of Los Mochis Way in Oceanside, the 400 block of Craven Road in Oceanside, the 200 block of Avalon Drive in Vista and the 1800 block of Christi Drive in Vista.

When at the residences, officials found evidence connecting the men to the crimes.

John Gonzales, 21, of Vista, Jaleil Thomas, 21, of Vista, Timothy Williamson, 20, of Oceanside were arrested for armed robbery, burglary, possession of stolen of property and conspiracy to commit robbery. Lucas Gravelle, 20, of Oceanside, was arrested for possession of stolen property.

The investigation is ongoing.

A photo shared over 90,000 times on Facebook was taken by a photographer who says the shot took him seven years to capture.

Greg McCown, 42, snapped the photo of a lightning bolt hitting the ground while a rainbow appears in the sky above Arizona, according to The Weather Channel.

“Finally! After years of trying I finally got my lightning and rainbow picture," McCown said in the Facebook post. “What an awesome evening.”

According to The Weather Channel, McCown is a real estate salesperson from Tucson who takes photos in his downtime. He that the shot, taken in a small town just to the northwest of Tucson, required a lot guesswork and experience to capture. He said he had hoped the lightning would hit the ground where he wanted it to strike.

He also told The Weather Channel that it took him over seven years to take the photo, saying that the shot was something out of a dream for him.

Victoria McCullough was looking for a new rental home when she came across a great deal in Clairemont.

"He said, all I want is someone who's going to take care of our house," said McCullough, "and it was a three bedroom house."

Victoria found the rental online.  She said it looked legitimate and had pictures and an address that she checked out. The "owner" of the house said his family was moving to the Midwest where he would be working as a minister. In the emails, she said he quotes Bible verses and even asks her about her beliefs.

"I thought, OK, I'll just see where this goes," said McCullough.

When he offered her the house, she was excited and skeptical at the same time. At this point she'd only made contact through email. She hadn't spoken to the owner or looked inside the property.

Then she got a phone call.

"He started pressuring me about wanting to overnight the keys and would I send him a thousand dollars?" said McCullough.

At that point, Victoria backed off. The person on the phone had a thick accent and appeared to be calling from a crowded room. She says she even heard goats in the background.

The Better Business Bureau says that situation and other like it are most likely a scam.

"There's significant numbers of people over the summer that tend to look for rentals and to relocate," said Sheryl Reichert with the San Diego Better Business Bureau,"so this is the time the con-men are particularly active."

Reichert says con-artists will actually steal an entire online ad of an existing true location and create their own rental site. She says the scammers often try to avoid suspicion by playing up religion or ethnicity or some other connection that might give them an advantage.

And then there's the need to make the transaction go quickly.

"The story is often, I'm in a hurry to move on this," said Reichert.

The F.B.I. warns people looking for a rental to only deal with landlords or renters who are local. They have these warnings for renters:

• Be suspicious if you're asked to only use a wire transfer service to send money.
• Beware of e-mail correspondence that is in poor or broken English.
• Look out for rental rates that are significantly lower than average.
• Don't give out personal information, like social security, bank account or credit card numbers.

The White House says President Barack Obama has spoken with former President Jimmy Carter and wished him a full and speedy recovery from cancer. 

"Jimmy, you're as resilient as they come, and along with the rest of America, [Michelle and I] are rooting for you," Obama said in a statement.

Carter announced Wednesday that he has been diagnosed with cancer and will undergo treatment at Emory Healthcare in Atlanta.

Condolences and prayers poured in on social media following Carter's announcement as politicians, journalists and supporters of the former president wished him luck in his battle against the disease.

Carter, the nation's 39th president, says the cancer was discovered during surgery this month to remove a small mass in his liver.

It was not immediately clear where the cancer originated, but Carter said it is in "other parts of [his] body." The former president said he will release more information "possibly next week." 

Children are biologically hard-wired to eat sugar during periods of growth when their bodies demand high-calorie foods, according to scientist Julie Mennella, a researcher with the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, NBC News reported.

"[Kids] are attracted to foods that give us calories. In the past, it was fruits: dates, honey," she said. "Now children are living in environments where sugar's everywhere."

Sugar consumption has been linked to health issues by numerous studies, in a country where 28 percent of Americans are clinically obese. Nearly 30 percent of children and teenagers in the U.S. are obese or overweight — up from 19 percent 35 years ago.

The industry argues that calories coming from sugar don't contribute to obesity any more than calories from other sources.

A San Diego woman may have to pay more than $15,000 for renting rooms in her home through the home-sharing website Airbnb despite a city order to cease operations.

On Aug. 5, an administrative hearing officer ruled Rachel Smith, a 70-year-old retired schoolteacher, violated the city’s law against operating a bed and breakfast without permit.

In her decision, hearing officer Catriona Miller wrote that Smith had accrued $22,400 in civil penalties, but she would only have to pay $15,000 — plus $2,968 in city investigation fees — if she stopped renting her rooms and has no similar offenses for two years.

Smith began listing her 1912 Craftsman home located in Burlingame, east of Balboa Park, on Airbnb in May 2012, offering two rooms for $80 each per night. While she initially considered opening up her house as a bed and breakfast, she liked the discretion that the website offered.

“The beauty of Airbnb is, unlike bed and breakfasts and hotels, that you can screen your guests. They’re reviewed by prior Airbnb hosts,” Smith told NBC 7 in February.

But neighbors soon took a disliking to what they called the “revolving door” of strangers taking up parking and roaming about their area. By September 2013, they started taking their complaints to the city of San Diego.

After two visits from a city inspector in October 2013 and May 2014, the city mailed Smith a civil penalty notice and order (CPNO) in August 2014, telling her that she must cease operation of the bed and breakfast.

However, Smith vehemently denied that her Airbnb rentals qualified as a bed and breakfast. As she tried to determine where Airbnb fell into city codes, Smith continued to rent out her rooms until Nov. 23, 2014, when her attorney advised her to halt until the matter was settled in court.

According to Miller’s decision, Smith made about $13,800 from room rentals since the October 2013 inspection.

“She did not feel she should have to cease renting through Airbnb unless and until a judge told her she could not,” Miller wrote in her findings. “She believed the city was wrong in its application of the Bed and Breakfast law to the Airbnb rentals and did not have the authority to stop her.”

While the city has no specific code addressing short-term rentals, Miller said Smith’s case does fall under the bed and breakfast code, which requires a conditional use permit, because she used her primary residence to provide lodging for less than 30 days to paying guests.

Smith was ordered to pay $200 for every day she did not comply with the city’s order to cease and desist: 112 days. She will have to pay $15,000 of that to the city treasurer in the next 60 days.

Smith’s attorney Omar Passons said they are still evaluating options to appeal.

He sent NBC 7 the following statement on the Aug. 5 decision:

“The issue in my client’s case is not whether you believe people should be allowed to rent their primary home (or rooms in their home) on a short term basis in residential zones. That is a policy issue. The issue in my case is whether the law the city used to go after my client actually makes her use illegal.

“The city collected transient occupancy tax from my client while at the same time hitting her with penalties for the very use the tax was for. I am surprised about the recent Airbnb tax deal with the city given its position about listing on Airbnb.

“Fearing huge fines, my client stopped doing Airbnb three months before the hearing and the city kept pushing anyway. My client’s house was never a party haven or one of those overcrowded menaces in the beach communities.”

Miller’s ruling is considered a draft final decision, and city attorney spokesman Gerry Braun told NBC 7 a final ruling still must be made.

A man walking in a darkened area of City Heights tumbled 30 feet into a gully Wednesday night, San Diego Fire-Rescue officials say.

At about 7:30 p.m., the man fell down a hill near the 2600 block of Euclid Avenue.

The fall left him badly injured and unable to get out.

When firefighters arrived, they discovered it would be too hard to get the patient out via ropes.

A rescue helicopter was called in, and a firefighter descended from the chopper to where the man was lying.

Rescuers put him on a stretcher and airlifted him out. He was taken to Scripps Mercy Hospital for unknown injuries.

An Ohio woman whose death in police custody is being investigated, may have been improperly medicated by authorities, newly released documents show.

Ralkina Jones, 37, was found dead in a jail cell on July 26 after being arrested by the Cleveland Heights Police Department two days earlier following a fight with her ex-husband outside of a bar.

On Wednesday, authorities released Jones' prisoner medication log as well as the main jail log — and officials admit there is a discrepancy: Jones' prisoner log indicates that she was given medications twice over the course of about 24 hours, while the jail log indicates that drugs were dispensed three times.

Part of the ceiling collapsed during a concert at a famed Minneapolis club on Wednesday night, sending at least two people to the hospital, NBC News reported.

Canadian rock band Theory of a Deadman were playing a set at local landmark First Avenue when, witnesses say, smoke and the sprinklers went off in the rear of the venue before a portion of the ceiling fell at around 10:15 p.m. local time (11:15 p.m. ET).

The Minneapolis Fire Department said three to four people were hurt, with two transported to a hospital for further evaluation.

Rolling Stone placed First Avenue at No. 3 on its list of "The Best Big Rooms in America." The musician Prince frequently played there in the 1980s and featured the venue in his movie "Purple Rain."

A courtroom artist whose gaunt sketches of Tom Brady at the first "Deflategate" civil suit hearing in Manhattan federal court led to a Twitter flurry says it's her job to show what's going on.

Jane Rosenberg's drawings of the New England Patriots quarterback Wednesday were compared with everything from "Lurch" in "The Addams Family" to the figure in Edvard Munch's "The Scream."

Rosenberg, who's been sketching high-profile court cases for 35 years, says she was working under pressure and working fast.

"I have to apologize to Tom Brady and all of his fans," she told necn.

"He's obviously a famous personality, and everyone expected me to make him more beautiful or as beautiful as he is, and when I'm under such pressure I tend to just grab onto certain lines and I don't flatter people," she said.

After her sketches were released Wednesday, humorous images depicting the sketches went viral on social media. Rosenberg says some of the backlash was funny, but some of it was "just mean." She also said it hadn't all "sunk in yet."

"I did a wide shot with 100 people in it, and people are just pulling into this little picture of Tom Brady and I'm working with pastels, it's very hard to get the likeness when you work so small," she explained.

In one GIF, or animated image, Tom Brady morphs through the years into the sketch from today. In another, his head on the Mona Lisa.

Rosenberg has been sketching for decades on major federal cases- most recently the Boston Bomber case.

She says she's not on social media, but was informed of the viral photos and videos through email right away.

"Some of it's funny. Some of it's just mean," she said. 

Elementary school students get three times more homework than is recommended for children their age, according to a new study published in The American Journal of Family Therapy.

The study, which surveyed nearly 1,200 parents on issues of homework and family stress, revealed that children in kindergarten, first grade and second grade, may be hitting the books too hard in their after-school hours, Today.com reported. It showed that kindergartners are spending an average of 25 minutes on homework, and the homework load for first and second-graders is just shy of 30 minutes.

Education leaders recommend a "10-minute rule" that increases gradually as students age: no homework for kindergartners, 10 minutes for first-graders, 20 minutes for second-graders, 30 minutes for third-graders and on up to the 12th grade, when students could handle about 120 minutes of homework a night.

Authors of the study pointed out that 25 minutes of homework for kindergartners "may be both taxing for the parents and overwhelming for the children."

Two Southern California residents pleaded guilty Tuesday to smuggling 28 pounds of heroin across the U.S.-Mexico border using what officials believe to be a Mexican drug trafficking drone, U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy announced.

Jonathan Elias and Brayan Valle of El Centro appeared in federal court to face drug charges in what prosecutors are calling the first international narcotics seizure by U.S. law enforcement officials involving drones connected to Mexican drug traffickers.

In a guilty plea, Elias and Valle said they drove to an agricultural field in Calexico, a town near the border, to pick up the packages of smuggled drugs.

Valle picked up them up using a drone controller. He then took the drugs and put them in a bag in the trunk of the car. U.S. Border Patrol agents later stopped them.

Elias and Valle knew the bags had drugs, but did not know what type of drugs or how many, Duffy said, as part of their guilty plea.

“The use of drones to smuggle drugs across the U.S.-Mexico border is an emerging threat, which fortunately, has not proven to be a lucrative criminal enterprise in the Imperial Valley,” Ronnie Martinez, assistant special agent in charge for HSI El Centro, said in a statement. “HSI and our law enforcement partners on the Imperial Valley Border Enforcement Security Task Force are working together to identify and dismantle the criminal organizations behind drone smuggling activity and to wipe out their illicit experiments.”

They are scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 20 at 8:30 a.m. before U.S. District Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel.

At least 76 people were killed and 212 wounded in a bomb attack on Thursday at a popular food market in Baghdad's Sadr City district, police and medical sources said.

According to local police, a refrigerator truck packed with explosives blew up inside the Jamila market at around 6 a.m. local time (11 p.m. EST).

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast in the Shi'ite Muslim neighborhood, but ISIS militants, who seized swathes of northern and western Iraq last year, regularly send bombers into the capital.

The bombing was one of the largest attacks on the capital since Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi took office a year ago. 

Former clients of a local immigration attorney claim his failure to properly handle their cases has caused them significant problems with the immigration system, in some cases forcing their families to remain separated by the U.S.-Mexico border.

Two former clients of attorney Christopher Macaraeg have filed lawsuits against the him. He ultimately was required to refund them a total of almost $10,000 in legal fees. One of those clients told NBC 7 Investigates Macaraeg has not kept up with those court-ordered payments.

Public documents also reveal Macaraeg has been disciplined twice by the California State Bar Association, the state agency that licenses and disciplines attorneys.

Macaraeg declined our request for an interview, but in a written statement, his attorney Michael Hernandez described Macaraeg as a “trusted and knowledgeable lawyer” who has “fully resolved” his problems with former clients who complained about his work.

Hernandez also said Macaraeg “fully resolved” his discipline issues with the State Bar and “has resumed his standing a respected member of the legal community.”

Click here to read the complete statement.

Macaraeg has appeared in several NBC 7 news stories as a “legal expert.”

India Henretta told NBC 7 Investigates that is how she found Macaraeg in 2013. Henretta called him for help in getting her brother the proper immigration papers to allow him to enter the U.S. legally from Mexico.

Henretta said she paid Macaraeg $1,400 plus court filing fees. After a year, Henretta said she became concerned Macaraeg wasn’t making any progress on her brother’s case. That’s when she said she did her own research and learned that Macaraeg had failed to file important documents on her brother’s behalf.

She told NBC 7 Investigates Macaraeg continually evaded her questions and would stall when asked about her brother’s case.

“He was playing with our emotions,” Henretta said. “We were waiting and waiting and hoping and hoping for two years.”

Henretta said she finally told Macaraeg she would contact NBC 7 about her problem if he didn’t refund the $1,400 she paid him. She said Macaraeg paid her $500 after that conversation, but at the time she couldn’t get more money than that from him.

Henretta contacted NBC 7 on June 26.

NBC 7 Investigates began to research her allegations and contacted Macaraeg and his attorney.
Henretta said a month later, in late July, Macaraeg paid her the remaining $900.

Gracie Lopez hasn’t been as fortunate.

She sued Macaraeg for $2,400 in San Diego County Small Claims Court, alleging "non-completion and multiple mistakes" on her husband's immigration case. The January dispute was settled without a trial because Macaraeg agreed to pay Lopez $1,890, according to court documents.

Lopez told NBC 7 Investigates Macaraeg paid her an initial payment of $390, required by that April 30 settlement. But she said that was the only payment she received, until NBC 7 Investigates called Macaraeg and his attorney to discuss the complaints and lawsuits lodged by Macaraeg’s former employees.

Just a few days after our calls, Lopez told us she got two checks from Macaraeg totaling $500.
Those checks covered the payments due on June 1 and July 1. But as of early August, Lopez said she had not received the $250 payment from Macaraeg, due Aug. 1st.

San Diegian Rigo Aguilar said he had a similar problem with Macaraeg. More than 10 years ago, Aguilar sought legal help for his Mexican-born wife, who lives in Tijuana and can’t enter the U.S. legally.

Aguilar says he paid Macaraeg $1,500 for assistance.

“We waited and we waited, but the call from the consulate never came,” Aguilar told NBC 7 Investigates.

Ten years passed, severely testing Aguilar’s patience.

“I would call him and I would text him,” Aguilar told NBC 7. “Actually, I would call him several times. I would have to email him about five times before he answered.”

Last year, Aguilar called U.S. Immigration and learned Macaraeg had essentially done nothing on his case since 2006.

Aguilar said his patience finally ran out. He demanded -- and received – a partial refund of his legal fees. He recently hired another local immigration attorney to handle his wife’s case, but he laments he’s “back to ‘ground-zero’” in that legal process.

Other court documents obtained by NBC 7 Investigates reveal another former client, Rigoberto Olea, claimed he lost his job because Macaraeg mishandled his immigration case.

A judge heard the evidence in that case in October 2011 and ordered Macaraeg to pay Olea $7,400. That award included repayment of a $1,200 retainer fee and $6,300 in “consequential damages (loss of job).”

Documents on file with the California Bar Association confirm Macaraeg was disciplined in 2012 for "failing to perform legal service with competence.”

He was placed on probation, but the Bar Court handled the matter as a “private reproval,” meaning it did not post any information about any disciplinary action on its public website.

That discipline case became public last year, when the Bar Court again disciplined Macaraeg, this time for failing to complete the terms of his 2012 probation.

On June 18, 2014, the Bar Court suspended Macaraeg from the practice of law for 60 days and placed him on two years’ probation. The Bar Court also ordered Macaraeg to pass exams in ethics and professional responsibility.

Before hiring an attorney, the Bar Association suggests you get recommendations from friends or coworkers. The San Diego County Bar Association also has a “Lawyer Referral and Information Service” that connects potential clients with experienced lawyers who offer up to 30 minutes of free consultation.

Click here for more tips on how to hire and maintain a good relationship with an attorney.

Target Corp. has scheduled two local job fairs for Aug. 13, where the company will interview candidates for 340 positions at upcoming new San Diego stores.

A company statement said the retailer will hold a job fair from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Radisson Hotel Rancho Bernardo, 11520 West Bernardo Center Road, where it will interview candidates for 280 positions at a store planned for San Diego’s Del Sur neighborhood.

During the same hours, the retailer will host a job fair at its Mission Valley store, at 1288 Camino Del Rio North, as it interviews candidates for 60 positions at its upcoming new store in South Park.

Interviews should be pre-scheduled, with more information at Target.com/careers.

A civilian employee for the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department has pleaded not guilty to allegations he ran a very lucrative side business selling Sibutramine, a banned obesity drug.

Francisco Terriquez appeared before a federal judge Tuesday in downtown San Diego to face charges that include money laundering and drug possession with intent to distribute.

Terriquez makes approximately $40,000 a year in his prison job but yet, prosecutors claim he made over 700 bank deposits totaling $967,816 from July 2010 to August 2014.

When he was interviewed by FBI agents Monday at George Bailey Detention Facility, Terriquez allegedly admitted to selling dietary supplements and not reporting the income on his tax returns.

When the interview was over, agents claim Terriquez got into his car and drove toward the U.S.-Mexico border. That’s when they took him into custody.

According to the complaint, Terriquez had been under investigation since September 2014 when the FBI and the Sheriff’s Department were alerted to $1.7 million in suspicious transactions involving his personal accounts at Wells Fargo, Bank of America and J.P. Morgan Chase.

In February, investigators searched an Otay Mesa storage facility allegedly belonging to Terriquez and found hundreds of small vials labeled "Alcochofivida." The substance tested positive for sibutramine, according to the complaint.

The drug, formerly sold under the brand name Meridia, was voluntarilly pulled from the market in 2010 after the FDA determined it increased the risk of heart attack and stroke in patients. 

Terriquez also faces a charge of making a false statement in connection to an April interview with the U.S. Customs and Border Protection employee. Prosecutors allege the defendant denied having any income other than his sheriff’s civilian employee paycheck.