Search crews have located a body as they hunted for a veteran missing since Thursday morning. 

Robert Cricks, 76, was last seen in unincorporated Murrieta at around 2:30 a.m. Thursday morning.

Sheriff's officials said they found his 2007 silver Infiniti G35 sedan Sunday at 5:35 p.m., 45 minutes away from the Cal Fire station on 39400 De Luz Road, just west of Temecula. 

At about 11 a.m. Monday, searchers discovered a body near his vehicle. However, the deceased person has not been identified.

Crick's wife told sheriff's deputies he was waiting for her in the car with the engine running while she went into a restaurant near Winchester Road and Murrieta Hot Springs Road. His wife said she then saw him driving toward Temecula on Winchester Road. 

Cricks suffers from severe dementia and does not have a cell phone or any money. He was last seen wearing a a black baseball cap with military pins a blue jacket, a long sleeve blue shirt and blue jeans. 

Anyone with information is asked to call the Riverside County Sheriff's Department at (951) 696-3000 or the San Diego County Sheriff's Department at (858) 565-5200.

A Carlsbad woman awaiting retrial in the shooting death of her husband has been granted a delay due to her pregnancy.

Julie Harper appeared in court Monday for a motion hearing Monday where the judge moved Harper’s pretrial motions to Aug, 20 and the trial to Sept. 8 after two doctors said the pregnancy was high-risk and going forward with the original trial date on April 15 would harm the baby.

The defense had asked for the pregnancy to be kept secret because, they argued, if the information were public it would lead to a prejudice and undermine her medical privacy, they said in court.

The prosecution argued in court that they had emailed the defense asking if it would be okay to put her pregnancy in the report and never received an objection, so they put it in.

A judge will decide at a later date if Harper’s pregnancy can be brought up in front of a jury. The trial had originally been slated to start next month.

A jury on Oct. 1 acquitted Harper of first-degree murder, but deadlocked on lesser charges of second-degree murder and manslaughter. That gave prosecutors the option to re-try the case, which they plan to on April 15. 

In her weeks-long September trial, Harper told jurors that she shot her husband, Jason Harper, on Aug. 7, 2012, because she feared he would kill or rape her.

Harper was a math teacher at Carlsbad High School.

Prosecutors, on the other hand, said Harper was angry and spiteful over the marriage. They questioned why, if she were innocent, she would bury the gun and not immediately report the shooting to policce. 

A Chula Vista man who stabbed his brother to death with a samurai sword and barbecue fork was sentenced Monday to 31 years to life in prison.

A jury last month convicted Alberto Gonzalez Figueroa Jr. of first-degree murder in the death of his younger brother, Mario.

Prosecutors said at trial that Figueroa stabbed his brother 38 times from the top of his head down to his feet, then left him to die a slow and painful death. The stabbing happened in April 2013 inside a condo unit in Chula Vista.

The men's grandfather was still home and heard the yelling, but before he was able to call 911, prosecutors said Figueroa took the phone, tossed it in the bedroom with his brother's body and calmly told his grandfather, "Everything is fine."

Figueroa's defense attorney, however, said at trial that he was acting in self-defense after his brother attacked him with the samurai sword. The attorney said the two wrestled each other for the weapons when Figueroa stabbed his brother.

A neighbor called 911 and officers responded to find the younger brother dead on a bedroom floor.

Figueroa was later arrested near Prospect Street and Sweetwater Road.

SeaWorld Entertainment Inc., parent company of SeaWorld San Diego and the Aquatica water park in Chula Vista, has named Joel Manby as its new president and CEO, effective April 7.

Company officials said Manby, 55, will also join the company’s board of directors. David F. D’Alessandro, who most recently served as interim CEO, will continue to serve as SeaWorld’s chairman.

Manby is the permanent replacement for Jim Atchison, who resigned in December as president and CEO amid continuing attendance drops at SeaWorld’s theme parks, spurred in part by a controversial documentary related to the company’s handling of captive orcas.

Manby most recently was CEO of Atlanta-based Herschend Family Entertainment Corp., which owns several entertainment entities including the Dollywood theme park in Tennessee and The Harlem Globetrotters basketball team. He previously spent 20 years in the auto industry, including a stint as CEO of Saab Automobile USA.

SeaWorld Entertainment (NYSE: SEAS) is based in Orlando, Fla., and operates 11 theme parks nationwide.

They're priceless and a part of American history, but most have disappeared.

American artists produced about 200,000 paintings during the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a government program that put millions of unemployed Americans back to work.

Best known for its large-scale projects, the WPA also helped struggling artists. The artwork produced was meant to be publicly displayed, but the majority of the paintings were lost, stolen or misplaced.

Local artist Charles Reiffel's paintings can be seen all over San Diego. Some, as part of the WPA, are displayed in city and county offices. He was considered one of the most important landscape painters of his time.

“He’s a plein-air artist, where the idea is to go out and paint in nature,” Tammie Bennett with the San Diego History Center in Balboa Park explained.

But some of Reiffel's work vanished, along with thousands of other WPA pieces by other artists.

"It’s part of the fun of the chase. You know, the unanswered questions,” said Mike Ramos, a special agent with the Inspector General’s office. Part of his job is tracking the missing pieces down.

“It's the public's art, and we're just returning it back to the public,” he added.

Nine Reiffel paintings are now at the San Diego History Center in Balboa Park after federal agents recovered them at an estate sale.

According to Ramos, reports indicated the estate that sold them belonged to a former teacher's estate. Knowingly selling or buying WPA art is a federal crime.

“We've had tremendous success. And we're quite pleased on our return on investment, thus far,” said Ramos.

The nine Reiffel paintings are considered priceless because they cannot be sold or purchased, but Ramos said they are valued at around $350,000.

Of the 200,000 WPA paintings considered "missing,” Ramos said they have only recovered or documented 27,000.

The public is aware of WPA artwork for sale or have knowledge of existing pieces in non-federal repositories (libraries, schools, hospitals), Ramos said they can contact him at (415)522-2756. They can also remain anonymous by contacting the GSA's hotline at 800-424-5210 or fraudnet@gsaig.gov.

An exhibit of plein-air paintings showing the landscape of California from ocean to rural scenes, including works from Charles Reiffel, can be seen from March 22 to May 3, 2015 at the California Center for the Arts, Escondido. For more information, click here.

A strange man tried to convince a 7-year-old girl to go with him in his car, San Diego County Sheriff's officials said Monday.

The man approached the girl behind Skyline Elementary, located at 606 Lomas Santa Fe Drive, as the student was heading to an after-school enrichment program at 3:25 p.m. 

When the girl screamed, the man ran off and she was able to get away.

"She did the right thing," said sheriff's Capt. Theresa Adams-Hydar. "She screamed and made herself not a victim; she did a great job."

Staff members and parents saw the encounter and gave officials a description of the man.

He is described as a Caucasian man with light brown hair and a tan skin tone, possibly in his 40s. He has a medium build and stands about 6-feet tall.

"He was wearing, it looked like, a red, white and blue athletic, maybe baseball jersey, buttoned down; a green baseball cap; off-white baseball pants with athletic shoes; and was holding a small duffle bag," said Adams-Hydar.

The man was driving a silver Ford Flex-type car with chrome trim on the back and a black top when he talked with the girl.

If you know anything about the suspect, call the sheriff's department at 858-565-5200.

Parent Isabel Hernandez, who volunteers as a traffic monitor at Skyline, said the incident is surprising and concerning for this typically safe neighborhood.

"It makes me scared," said Hernandez. "It also made me want to really really make sure we parents talk to our kids about not to be trusting of anybody and be aware of it because you never know what's going to happen in these days."

The Solana Beach School District sent an email out to parents, letting them know about the incident and thanking the student and adults for their quick action.

The email also includes the following list of "stranger danger" tips:

• Make sure your children are walking to and from school in a group and/or with an adult supervising.
• Remind your child to never talk to strangers. If someone approaches them in any way, they should not talk to the person but immediately scream loudly and run to the school, nearest adult they know, neighbor’s house, etc.
• Do not take shortcuts or different routes to or from school. Have a plan and make sure your children know you expect them to walk with friends and a certain route every day.
• Report any unusual occurrences to the school office. We have an extensive network whereby we notify all other schools and they also notify our district so we can keep our children safe.
• If you see a vehicle or an individual that looks “out of place” or suspicious, write down the license number and a brief description of the car and person. The police do follow-up on this information and they need our help.

Jim Parsons, widely popular for his oddball character Sheldon Cooper on the hit show “The Big Bang Theory,” will be honored by University of San Diego, where he received a master’s degree.

USD officials said Monday they were awarding the actor with the Author E. Hughes Award for Outstanding Career Achievement.

Parsons rose to fame and has received widespread acclaim for his role on the hit show where he plays an eccentric, neurotic, socially awkward theoretical physicist. He’s received four Emmy awards and a Golden Globe for the role.

Parsons graduated from USD in 2001 with a master of fine arts degree from the Old Globe theatre program.

Parsons was among several alumni bestowed awards from the university.

Also honored: Karen P. Hewitt, a former U.S. attorney in San Diego; Matt Reno, founder and CEO of Reno Contracting; lung health researcher Barbara Driscoll; Emiliano Gallego, Pagasa Pasta general manager; Sandra Solem, a director at the VA San Diego health care system; Henry Acquarelli, a Poway teacher and coach; Stephen and Victoria Nasman, leaders of the Orange County alumni chapter; and NFL player Josh Johnson.

The alumni will receive the honors at a celebration on April 25.

Police said Monday they've been investigating a link between the 1971 disappearance of a Middlebury College student and millionaire murder suspect Robert Durst.

Investigators have been aware for several years of a link between 18-year-old Lynne Schulze and Durst, who operated the All Good Things health food store in the town, the Middlebury Police Department said in a statement.

Schulze, a native of Simsbury, Connecticut, who entered Middlebury College as a freshman in September 1971, was last seen that December. 

The Schulze case was reopened in 1992 and has continuously generated leads, police said.

Middlebury police call it an ongoing criminal investigation and say they aren't releasing any other details. 

Meanwhile, Vermont State Police were recently looking into unsolved homicide cases and are now looking into any links to Robert Durst. But so far, officers say they are not aware “of any information from the FBI with regard to unsolved crimes and Durst.”

The 71-year-old Durst is a member of a wealthy New York real estate family that runs 1 World Trade Center. He's charged with killing a woman 15 years ago in Los Angeles. He's been ordered held on weapons charges in Louisiana, where a judge decided he's a flight risk and a danger to others after considering what FBI agents found in his hotel room — an elaborate disguise and other escape tools fit for a spy movie.

Durst was arrested at a hotel in New Orleans, where he had registered under a fake name and was lying low while HBO aired the final chapters of his life story, a documentary series called "The Jinx."

Authorities said FBI agents found Durst's passport and birth certificate, stacks of $100 bills, bags of marijuana, a gun, a map folded to show Louisiana and Cuba and a flesh-toned latex mask with salt-and-pepper hair.

"This was not a mask for Halloween," Assistant District Attorney Mark Burton said.

Durst's lawyers say his arrest was illegal. They say the timing of an agent's inventory proves the search was illegal.

"That's an improper search," defense attorney Dick DeGuerin told the judge.

Durst, who previously was acquitted of murder after a neighbor's dismembered body was found in a Texas bay in 2001, appeared in court Monday with his hands shackled to his sides in padded cuffs. He has been in a prison's mental health unit for nearly a week. Prison officials have called him a suicide risk.

Authorities have said they believe Schulze, at the time of her disappearance, may have been a little depressed and self-conscious because of an acne condition but appeared to be well-adjusted. In 2005 they called her "a typical, wholesome, all-American kid off at college" who "wasn't into the counterculture scene of that time."

On Dec. 10, 1971, Schulze was with some friends heading to a final exam when she told them she had to go back to her room to get a pencil, police said in 2005.

"She didn't show up for the exam," Officer Vegar Boe said then. "Later, her friends went back to her room. All her stuff was there, but she was gone."

The San Diego City Council gave its approval Monday to a five-year, $92 million contract for San Diego Police officers.

The tentative agreement lays out 3.3 percent pay raises to come in the final two years of the plan, as well as increases in flexible benefits.

The contract addresses the problem of low pay that has discouraged top notch candidates from applying to the SDPD, and many experienced officers have been enticed away by better-paying agencies.

The issue has eroded the department to “dangerously low staffing levels,” the San Diego Police Officers Association says.

According to city council staff, at least half of the department is also eligible for retirement over the next three to five years or has entered the Deferred Retirement Option Plan, which requires employees to retire within five years of enrolling in it so they can collect a pension in a different account.

The agreement between the city and SDPOA includes a recruitment allowance of $2,500, 40 hours of leave annually for all SDPOA members, and additional flexible benefits for those with eight or more years of service.

The city has budgeted for 2,013 officers, but the SDPD has employed about 100 fewer than that in recent years. The SDPOA hopes to up that number to 2,100 officers by 2018. The pay increase will come out of the city’s general fund.

NBC 7's Gene Cubbison offers this analysis on the latest developments in the scramble for a new Chargers stadium.

The challenge of keeping the Chargers in San Diego appears to be growing bigger, with stadium boosters in Los Angeles and Carson gaining momentum and the attention of NFL owners at their spring meeting in Phoenix.

That’s where the Chargers are understood to be seeking other teams’ support in blocking Stan Kroenke, the owner of the St. Louis Rams, from moving his team to Inglewood.

The 24 votes of the National Football League’s 32 team owners are needed to authorize franchise relocations, and a briefing on the status of current site-shopping ventures is among the league meeting’s agenda items as they gather in Arizona this week.

Meantime, efforts to lure the Bolts and Raiders to Carson show signs of having gone over-the-top.

Signature gatherers there have filled so many ballot petitions that a “March on City Hall” media event scheduled for Monday was postponed until further notice, so that the 14,000-plus names listed could be validated as those of registered voters.

Just over 8,000 is the statutory minimum for placement on the citywide ballot.

But in San Diego, Mayor Kevin Faulconer’s stadium advisers — and backers of the publicly owned Mission Valley site, which the group has endorsed over the Chargers’ preferred East Village turf — are hanging tough.

“Really, I think the Carson and L.A. issues — a lot of that is just posturing,” said San Diego City Councilman Scott Sherman, in whose 7th District Qualcomm Stadium is located.

"So I really don't think going to L.A. is that serious,” Sherman added in an interview Monday. “Yes, it could be a possibility. But I think more, it's to put pressure on the city."

Nonetheless, the Chargers seem heavily invested in the Carson effort, even as they continue to hammer on the theme of a downtown hybrid stadium and convention facility just east of Petco Park.

Could they yield more 'pay dirt' from Carson in the long run, given the huge financial incentives that Goldman Sachs, the team’s investment bankers, are offering?

Jim Steeg, a longtime former NFL and Chargers executive who produced 26 Super Bowls, said money most certainly is an object in the Bolts’ calculations — but not unduly so.

"I bet you they're probably $150 million behind the top-grossing teams, and in the middle of the fourth quartile as far as (annual) revenues,” Steeg told NBC 7. “And they need to get themselves at least up to the top of the third quartile in order to be competitive. And that's part of what this has got to be all about."

It’s been estimated that the Chargers have been turning profits in the $40 million range on yearly revenues of around $250 million in recent years.

Despite the NFL’S announced goal of having two teams in the L.A. region  and there are two pending proposals for joint-use stadiums — heavily populating that market could risk its usefulness as leverage against cities whose league franchises are looking for bigger and better deals.

"I think the league is going to be very careful about how they go through this process, and where they go,” Steeg, a member of the mayor’s stadium group, observed. “And they know, potentially — dating all the way back into the 80s-- this could be (legally) challenged."

Steeg said business concerns also will be key considerations: "I know it's a big market and it's got a lot of Fortune 500 companies than we've got here. But I think they'll take it cautiously and do the right thing, because it's been 20 years (since the NFL was there) and they don't want to go in and fail."

And as fiscally inviting as having a home in the Los Angeles market now seems, Sherman warns that it could be illusory: “L.A., on paper, it makes you look like you have a lot more value. But if I'm the Chargers and thinking of moving to LA, well I'm going to lose 75 percent of my fan base overnight."

Moreover, the league’s two-decade absence from Los Angeles also sounds a cautionary note.

“Half of the NFL has said they’re going to move to L.A. over the last 20 years,” Sherman noted. “I mean, two teams have tried there (Rams and Raiders) and not been able to make it — they left. If you look at all that, when it comes down to it, San Diego makes the best choice once you get done with all the posturing and keep our eye on the ball."

The farther things progress in Carson, the closer Carson gets to being sued by the Anschutz Entertainment Group over environmental issues.

AEG owns the Stub Hub Center there and has been high-profile in bashing the Inglewood project after shelving its own Farmers Field project in downtown Los Angeles

Carson’s city planning commission is expected to have some stadium site and recommendations for the council by Tuesday evening.

Assuming the number of petition signatures tops the required minimum, council members could approve the project themselves and dispense with taking it to the voters.

Local military families are taking steps to protect themselves after the faces, names and addresses of about 100 service members, including some from San Diego, were posted online by a group called the Islamic State Hacking Division.

In the threat, the group asked that attacks be carried out against members of the military conducting airstrikes on ISIS.

One of the ships listed was San Diego-based aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson.

A local military spouse, who did not want to reveal her identity for safety reasons, told NBC 7 she was concerned as soon as she heard about the posting.

“It was frightening, very frightening,” the woman said. “My gut reaction, are we on that list because my husband is active duty?”

She said she and her active-duty husband changed their social media accounts and eliminated any pictures or references to the military. Their privacy settings are switched so only friends and family can see their accounts.

Nathan Fletcher -- a Marine veteran, former state Assemblyman and a Truman National Security Project board member -- thinks this threat will backfire for the terror group.

“Americans don't react well to being bullied and service members in particular,” he said. “And I think what you are going to see is a tremendous pushback, and I think it will be a great miscalculation of the part of ISIS.”

NCIS has contacted the people on the threat list; they are working the FBI. A defense official told NBC 7 Monday that safety is always a primary concern and the Department of Defense is encouraging personnel to exercise appropriate operational security (OPSEC) and force protection procedures.

On Monday, USS Carl Vinson’s commanding officer posted this on the Vinson's Facebook page: "Personal safety and operational security must be a consideration as we live our lives in today's Internet and socially connected society. We continually train our Sailors to be smart about how they use social media, and this latest event is a good reminder to guard personal information."

That means military personnel and their families need to be vigilant and be aware of their surroundings.

The DOD says there is no indication there has been a data breach. Many of the images of the service members can be found on public military websites.

But without specifics and with limited resources, the FBI says they can't protect every member threatened. The fear is that a lone wolf who sympathizes with ISIS might carry out an attack, similar to the one in Canada.
 

A nine-year-old boy fell 40-feet down a well on a vacant property in Mineral Wells, Texas, on Saturday but was pulled to safety by his “hero” neighbors, his family said.

Jaxson Tune suffered head injuries but was released from the hospital on Monday and is talking and walking around, according to family.

“All I remember is waking up with one light above me and I was very cold and I didn’t know what was going on,” Tune said of the accident.

It was just around 3 p.m. on Saturday, when Tune's aunt called 911, telling the dispatcher her nephew “fell into a well.”

Shawnee Coomer said Tune and other neighborhood kids were playing in the grass of a home that no one lives in next door, near the Airport Mobile Home Park. While Tune was doing pull-ups on a bar over the well when he fell.

"All he remembers is picking flowers and then waking up in the hospital," Coomer said. "He doesn't remember the accident, he doesn't remember falling through."

His mother, Teresa Degarmo, was overwhelmed when she got the call about her son Saturday.
“Hysterical, that’s about the only way to describe it. Nobody expects to hear leaving work that your son fell into a well,” she said.

The family said their neighbors, Joshua Richard and Christopher Hicks, rushed to the well, pulling off the remaining pieces of tin and tile covering the well and then finding a long strap to lower Hicks down.

"They helped out a lot, he probably wouldn't be here if it wasn't for them," Coomer said.

Hicks said he thought the well was only a foot or two deep, but discovered it was deeper then he is tall.

"When I got down there, I was up to here," Hicks said, referring to his chest.

Hicks was able to brace himself in the well and pulled Tune onto his lap, while Richard and others used the strap to pull Tune out.

"I'm just glad I was able to be around and he was around when we did (act), because there's no telling what would have happened to that little boy," Richard said.

A Mineral Wells police officer also went into the well to help get Hicks out. The family and many other neighbors consider Hicks to be a hero.

"I don't consider myself a hero," Hicks said. "I did what any good natured human would do. They're calling me a hero, an angel; I'm not. I'm just a normal human being.”

Tune suffered a fractured scull and was taken to Palo Pinto General Hospital and then transferred to Cook Children's Medical Center in Fort Worth. He had surgery to relieve the pressure from that injury, but it went so well he was released from the hospital just before 5 p.m. Monday, family said.

“I feel great since I get to go home. I get to sleep in my own bed again,” Tune said outside the hospital Monday.

Tune and his mother are both thanking everyone who saved the boy's life.

“'Thank you'’, is all I can say. Very blessed, very blessed. Don’t know what we would have done if they wouldn’t have been there,” Degarmo said.

NBC 5's Kevin Cokely and Holley Ford contributed to this story.

Carlos Montoya's birth certificate shows he was born in Los Angeles in 1977. But when he tried to come back to the U.S. from Mexico on March 1, he says border agents deported him.

"I showed them everything," he said, admitting he struggles with English. "And they took everything away from me."

Montoya, who showed his birth certificate to NBC4, says he spent the last year in Mexico undergoing treatment for epilepsy but had been traveling back and forth to Mexico for treatment every six months before then.

He says he always carried his birth certificate, social security card, and California ID card and had no problems. But he says when he scanned his fingerprints this time, something very different came up on the border patrol’s screen.

Attorney Luis Carrillo who now represents Montoya, explained.

"What pops up on the screen is a photo of another individual and they turn the screen and they show him," Carillo said. "And Carlos says, 'That’s an impostor, ‘yo soy Carlos Montoya,’ and they say, 'No, you’re the impostor.' And he says, 'No, I’m Carlos Montoya."

Montoya's sister said her brother was born in Los Angeles in 1977 and has spent much of his life in Mexico, particularly recently as, she says, medication and treatment for epilepsy is cheaper there.

The Chief Customs and Border Patrol Office and Public Affairs Liaison in San Diego, Angelica De Cima provided this statement to NBC4:

“While we are not at liberty to discuss an individual’s processing due to the Privacy Act, we can provide general information about document requirements for U.S. citizens. As part of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI), U.S. citizens entering the United States at sea or land ports of entry have been required to present a WHTI-compliant document such as a valid passport, U.S. passport card, Trusted Traveler Program card or an Enhanced Driver’s License since June 2009. For more information about documents required to enter the U.S. please click on (this) link."

Montoya couldn’t provide anything else, admitting he did not have a passport, so he said after a four-hour interrogation and two nights in a jail cell, he felt forced to do whatever the border agent told him.

He claims he was coerced to come up with a fake name — he says he chose Jose Francisco Garcia-Garcia — and to sign the paperwork that would deport him back to Mexico. Among the questions he says he was forced to answer falsely — that he was born in Mexico and that he had never been to the United States.

Carrillo is asking the U.S. Inspector General to investigate the case, claiming coercion, incompetence and even corruption. All the while, Montoya remains in Nayarit, Mexico, hoping to come back home to Compton, California.

A 32-year-old woman was killed in a freak accident after a gravel truck tipped onto her car in Martinez, California, Monday afternoon, crushing her inside it, Martinez police and the California Highway Patrol said.

The woman was identified as Lindsey Combs. Family members say Combs' 4-year-old daughter ran out of the house and saw the accident in their driveway. Combs' fiancé was in the house at the time.

The accident happened at 820 Shell Ave around 1 p.m., when the truck was delivering gravel for the Shell Avenue sidewalk construction project. According to the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, a member of the JJR Construction crew asked Combs to move her car. Preliminary reports indicate that as soon as Combs got into her car, a truck trailer loaded with gravel tipped over, crushing her vehicle, Cal-OSHA said.

But truck driver Darryl Crockett told NBC Bay Area he had nothing to do with asking Combs to move the car. Crockett said he was about to drop a load of gravel and his trailer was very near the top of its lift. The last time he saw the car it was right next to the garage door, and when the truck tipped over, the car had moved 10 feet closer to the sidewalk putting it in harms way, he said.

Crockett said he has been delivering gravel for 30 years and never had a trailer tip over on him — until the tragic accident Monday.

JRR Construction says another worker asked Combs to move her car further away.

Contra Costa County Fire officials said the trailer's "dump capacity" being used on a hill may have caused some stability issues.

According to Travis Hagerthy, who witnessed the incident, at least three men, including himself and two construction crew workers, tried to help Combs before firefighters arrived.

"I started helping them dig, and I cut my foot a little bit on the broken glass," Hagerthy said. "I yelled at them to get a backoe up there." One of the men from the construction team used a backhoe to rip off the backdoor to the car.

"As far as I know she was either pulling in or backing up and the truck was pulling in to dump the gravel," Hagerthy said.

Hagerthy said that after construction crew members tried to rip off the backdoor, he look inside the car and found the woman "smashed." "It's horrible," he said.

Regina Simmons worked as a hair stylist with Combs at Sport Clips in Pleasant Hill.

"She was a beautiful mother, very happy," Simmons said. "She was in a good place in her life right now. This is very tragic."

Family and friends gathered at the scene of the accident Monday night to pay tribute to Combs, including some who grew up wuth her.

"She was sweet and loving and loved her daughter so much, always posting pictures and talking about her on Facebook," said her friend Jessica Dixon-Estes.

Responding to speculation from commenters on NBC Bay Area's Facebook page about whether a lawsuit would be filed, Combs' brother Rob Combs wrote: "A lawsuit won't bring my sister back, my niece's mother back, my mom's daughter back. Nothing will bring my sister back nothing at all."

NBC Bay Area's Gonzo Rojas and Terry McSweeney contributed to this report.

#UPDATE: Witness: 3 men tried to help woman trapped inside car after truck fell on it. http://t.co/eBBOrJ1yMo https://t.co/JIEHIwf1y5

— NBC Bay Area (@nbcbayarea) March 23, 2015

Amy’s Kitchen, Inc. is voluntarily recalling approximately 73,897 cases of certain frozen food products due to a possible health risk.

The recall is based on a recall notice from one of Petaluma-based Amy’s organic spinach suppliers that Amy’s may have received organic spinach with the possible presence of Listeria monocytogenes, an organism that can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems, according the company's release.

Amy’s Kitchen is not aware of any illness complaints to date related to the recalled products, the release said.

The recalled products were distributed to stores nationwide in the United States and in Canada.

For a complete list of the recalled products, CLICK HERE.

Amy’s Kitchen has notified its distributors and retailers.

Consumers who have any of the products are urged to dispose them or return them to the store where they were purchased for an exchange or full refund.

Consumers may also call Amy’s at (707) 781-7535, Monday through Friday between 11 a.m. and 7 p.m. CST.

Two women and two dogs were rescued Monday evening after their house caught on fire. 

Flames and thick smoke were first reported in the 3100 block of Levante Street at about 8:40 p.m.

Firefighters helped get the women out safely and pulled out their pets. Crews then climbed on the roof to create vents and help battle the fire. The blaze was knocked out within 20 minutes.

The victims were given oxygen as they were treated at the scene. Officials said one of the women has Alzheimer's and the other is her caretaker.

The two dogs were put in a police car until a temporary shelter can be found.

Chelsea Investment Corp. of Carlsbad has completed and opened Versa at Civita, a $27.7 million, 150-unit apartment complex featuring affordable apartments for seniors 55 and older in Mission Valley.

Developers said the complex, at 2365 Via Alta, is the first affordable-housing project to open at the larger mixed-use community known as Civita, which is master-planned by San Diego-based Sudberry Properties and has several housing communities now operating.

Officials said the new apartments were developed in cooperation with Pacific Southwest Community Development Corp. and the San Diego Housing Commission, which administers the city’s inclusionary housing fund.

The city program requires developers to dedicate 10 percent of homes to units that are affordable to households with incomes at or below 65 percent of the San Diego area’s median income.
 

One hundred fifty people are feared dead after a German passenger jet crashed in the French Alps on Tuesday morning.

Germanwings flight 4U 9525 was less than an hour into its route from Barcelona to Dusseldorf when it went into a long descent and crashed between Barcelonnette and Digne, the airline's CEO said Tuesday. It's not clear what caused the descent or crash.

Here is a brief look at the crash by the numbers.

150: Number of people aboard the jet — 144 passengers and six crew members.

2: Number of babies included in the passenger count.

16: Number of 10th-graders from a German high school who were on the plane, along with their two teachers.

38,000: Altitude at which the plane was cruising just before it began its descent and crashed.

8: The number of minutes the plane descended steadily before crashing.

6,550: The approximate altitude of the Alpine site where the plane crashed, near the town of Digne in the French Alps.

More than 400: The number of police officers and rescue personnel dispatched to the area of the crash, according to the French Interior Ministry.

More than 6,000: The number of hours the plane's captain had logged on the plane.

24: The age of the plane that crashed.

46,700: The number of flights that plane had made before its crash.

About 58,300: the number of flight hours the aircraft accumulated since it was delivered to Lufthansa in 1991, according to Airbus.

1953: The year an Air France plane crashed the near the town of Barcelonette, killing 49 people.