BOO! Now that I have your attention, here's what's happening this weekend in spooktacular San Diego: 

Thursday, Oct. 30

San Diego Zombie PubCrawl
5 p.m. – 2 a.m. in the Gaslamp Quarter
Drinking witch’s brew doesn’t have to break the bank. Revelers will meet at Taste and Thirst to receive a map of participating bars, offering $2 draft beers, BOGO mixed drinks and $4 shots. Dress as your favorite “Walking Dead” zombie and be there. (Halloween-themed PubCrawls will also take place Friday and Saturday.)

Pre-Halloween Bash
7 p.m. – close at the True North Tavern in North Park
We celebrate Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve, so why not All Hallows’ Eve Eve? DJ Demon will spin haunting hits as dancers devour $5 Fireballs and $5 Blue Kamikazes. You should be afraid to miss it.

Friday, Oct. 31

Monster Bash
6 p.m. – 12 a.m. in the Gaslamp
If you only attend one Halloween event this year, make it the biggest Halloween block party in California. The 14th Annual Dos Equis XX Monster Bash will fill eight blocks of the Gaslamp Quarter Halloween night with live music and crazy costumes. The event benefits the Gaslamp Quarter Historical Foundation.

Zombieball
7 p.m. – 12 a.m. at the Museum of Man
Calling all VIZs (Very Important Zombies.) Guests will enjoy Halloween-themed cuisine, live performances and even professional makeup artists to complete their costumes. Plus, it’s the best night of the year to check out the Museum of Man’s new Monsters! exhibit. Proceeds benefit San Diego’s Mo’olelo Performing Arts Company.

For a complete list of Halloween events in San Diego for both adults and kids, click here.

Saturday, Nov. 1

Shave the Date
Starts at 12 p.m. at Harrah’s Resort in Valley Center
It’s the first day of “Movember,” a whole month dedicated to men’s health issues. Brave men will step on stage to shave their beards and mustaches, and celebrities will compete in a poker tournament to benefit the Movember Foundation. Stick around until 7 p.m. for a comedy set from funnyman Jay Mohr.

Bite San Diego
1 p.m. – 4 p.m. in La Jolla
Take a bite out of San Diego – literally – at this gourmet tasting event. From Hawaiian BBQ to sweet and savory crepes, attendees will savor local delicacies and the beautiful La Jolla landscape at the same time.

Sunday, Nov. 2

The California Ballet Presents “Giselle”
2 p.m. at the San Diego Civic Theatre
Heartbreak. We've all been there. Watch how the impeccable dances of the California Ballet convey the emotion of lost love in "Giselle." 

An armored truck lost an unknown amount of money on a Maryland interstate Friday morning -- and numerous drivers quickly scooped up the money, police said.

Maryland State Police are now "reminding" the drivers to that they are "welcome to turn in the money at the local barrack."

The incident happened shortly before 8 a.m. in the northbound lanes of I-270 near Route 80.

According to a preliminary investigation, a door lock on the armored truck malfunctioned, causing a side door to open. A bag of cash fell into the left lane of I-270, scattering cash into the air and across the highway, police said.

The truck driver pulled over to the shoulder and saw multiple vehicles had also stopped, with drivers picking up the cash. When a fire department official arrived at the scene, the drivers quickly left.

Maryland State Police, assisted by a K-9 team, recovered just over $200 from the scene.

Authorities have issued a warning to the drivers who grabbed the cash, telling them they can turn in the money at Maryland State Police's Frederick barrack. Those who don't return the cash could face theft charges if police learn their identities, authorities said.

A convicted sex offender could likely be living within 200 feet of an elementary school in Lakeside and concerned parents have been told the placement is legal.

Lee Austin, 33, was convicted in 2001 of lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14 years of age. This weekend, Austin will be released to live with his family on Lakeview Road, just across the street from Lakeview Elementary.

Even though some community members say they are concerned about students' safety, the agency releasing Austin said it's all within the law. 

Austin was sentenced to more than two years in prison on Feb. 7, 2012 for making terrorist threats , or in his case threatening to harm someone. . He has been tested but does not fit the criteria to be classified as a Sexually Violent Predator, CDCR officials said.

Austin was paroled on October 20, 2013. His parole has been revoked twice and for that he was sent to county jail. Austin’s latest revocation was on September 16. He is scheduled to be paroled within days.

The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) told NBC 7 the agency routinely places a 2000-feet residency restriction on sex offenders, prohibiting them from living near a school.

However, because those restrictions are being challenged in San Diego County, a CDCR spokesperson said a location cannot be legally disqualified based on that 2000-feet restriction.

San Diego County is the only county in the state of California to have a stay on Jessica’s Law, according to multiple CDCR officials. The law was approved by legislators to prohibit registered sex offenders from living near parks or schools.

“CDCR will, however, require Austin to keep at least 250 feet from any location where children usually congregate. Austin will be required to wear a GPS unit at all times while on parole,” CDCR spokesperson Luis Patino wrote in a statement.

Neighbors Laurie Gallamore and Beth Marshall were among the group of parents who protested the release at a recent school meeting.

“Why risk our children for this guy,” Marshall asked.

“Makes me sad we live in a society where criminals are protected more than innocent children,” Gallamore said.

The stay on Jessica’s Law is expected to be argued again before the California Supreme Court in December.

The court has 90 days to make a decision.

In the meantime, both women told NBC 7 they plan to take action to protect their families.

“We're planning to put black mesh all across this chain link fence hopefully so that people won't be able to look in the campus,” Gallamore said.

A karate teacher who pleaded guilty to having sex with a minor student will spend four years and four months in prison.

Josh Thomas Churchill, 32 — the former operator and lead instructor at United Studios Self-Defense Karate Studio — was handed down his sentence Friday.

He admitted last month to ten charges, including lewd acts on a child and unlawful intercourse with a minor, pleading down from 53 criminal counts with which he was originally charged.

In June, San Diego County Sheriff’s deputies crashed through the front door of Churchill’s Poway karate studio to serve search warrants as the suspect was arrested near his San Diego home.

Investigators say for more than three years, he committed illegal acts against a minor at the studio and other locations.

According to his Facebook page "Sensei-Josh Churchill," Churchill was previously an instructor at Z-Ultimate Self Defense Studios in Poway, but as of April, he was no longer working there.

NBC 7 also found a civil court complaint filed on June 2 by Churchill. In the court papers, he asked for a protective order against an ex-employee of Z-Ultimate and her father, alleging that they attacked him in May after she was fired.

The ex-employee responded with a restraining order application of her own.

When Sammy Yohannes is driving his cab, he hopes his next fare will pay in cash.

"They use their credit card and it is about 5 percent to 8 percent of the total fee," said Yahannes.

Cab drivers picking up rides at San Diego's Lindbergh Field says they make less money when they get paid in plastic because of the fees and charges that come with the credit cards. But some riders say cab drivers claim their credit card reader is broken, so riders are forced to pay in cash.

"I'm pretty sure some do that just to get the cash," said Yahannes. "But I'm not going to do that to the customer."

It is, in fact, against the rules in San Diego. When a driver is given the rights to drive a cab he must agree to take credit card payments. Some drivers use Apple Square to take payments because it takes less of a percentage to use.

Most cab drivers say credit card payments make up as much as 80 percent of their fares.

"It's important for me that the customer is happy," said Mostafa Shjades, who's been driving a cab for 30 years. "And if taking a credit card is part of what makes them happy, I have no problem with that."

Drivers today not only have to pay for the right to take a credit card, but they also have to deal with competition from ride sharing apps like Uber and Lyft. That makes it hard when customers are only going a short distance.

"When it is three bucks or $7 fares and they try to give you a credit card it's like, 'Come on, that's why you get these drivers that try to push eagerly to go to a ATM machine,'" said Alex Gebreselassie of Cross Town Transportation.

"After a while it gets pretty annoying," said driver Sammy Yahannes.

But he admits when he's not driving a cab he usually pays with a credit card himself because of the changing economy and the fact that younger riders rarely carry cash. But for the drivers, cash is still best.

"Absolutely," said Gebreselassie, "but we have to face reality, cash is not existent."

Reporters were given a tour Friday of University of California San Diego Health System’s new infectious disease care unit in Hillcrest.

The unit was created to care for suspected and confirmed cases of Ebola. As Dr. Jay Doucet told reporters, the hospital has been designated as one of the area’s Ebola-receiving hospitals.

The special unit, which is entirely cordoned off from the rest of the hospital, is able to treat one or two patients should some cases arise in San Diego County, Doucet said.

The hospital sealed off the space, ensuring that no air from the unit spills into the rest of the building. Health workers are also ordered to wear complete HazMat suits, restricting their faces, hands and feet.

In addition to infectious disease training, the dedicated team at the unit will undergo environmental hazard training.

On Friday, health workers were taking part in a training session and were seen repeatedly cleaning work areas and ensuring they were already in HazMat suits before they entered the unit.

Hospitals nationwide have been questioned about preparedness to treat Ebola after two Dallas nurses contracted the deadly virus. Friday's UCSD tour aimed to alleviate the public’s concerns over.

The cost for the new unit wasn’t immediately available.
 

After more than three decades, a woman is reunited with a retired San Diego Police sergeant who delivered her as a baby on the 163 freeway in Kearny Mesa.

Trinh Kennedy is now 31 years old. Before Friday, she didn’t know what he looked like. She only had an article from 1983. She told NBC 7 her mom often told stories of the delivery.

“She tells the story all the time, and most people don't believe her. They’re like ‘Oh my gosh! You were born on the freeway?” Trinh said.

For years, Kennedy looked for Sgt. Bob Jackson. She now lives in Las Vegas and said it was very challenging, for she didn’t even know if he was with the San Diego Police Department or the California Highway Patrol.

Earlier this year, Kennedy reached out to NBC 7’s Candice Nguyen who worked with the San Diego Police Department to track him down.

NBC 7 and the department found Jackson. He’s now retired and has two daughters and a son-in-law also working at the San Diego Police Department.

Jackson met with NBC 7 before the reunion to describe what happened. He remembers that evening 31 years ago very well.

“I was working graveyard out of the Northeastern Division in Rancho Penasquitos,” he said. “I looked at my rearview mirror and saw this car coming at me blinking its headlights. [Trinh’s father] came up behind me he must’ve been going 80-85.”

“He's speaking Vietnamese and every once in a while popped out ‘Baby! Wife.’ I didn't speak any Vietnamese, but I understood that,” Jackson said.

With the mother’s contractions minutes apart and no ambulance in sight, Jackson knew it was only them.

“I got right down and took care of the situation. She was crowned already and within a couple minutes I had a little baby girl in my hands,” he said. However, they weren’t in the clear yet.

“I got the baby out and the cord was wrapped around the baby's neck, and there hadn't been a lot of motion yet or crying. I got the cord off the baby's neck and turned her over and rubbed her back. I put her on mom's belly and she started crying,” Jackson recalled. “Yeah that really made my day right there.”

After a quick photo opportunity at the hospital after the delivery, the family never saw Jackson again. That is, until Friday.

Trinh, her husband, her mother and her 8-week-old baby named Clayton drove to San Diego from Las Vegas to reunite with him.

“Our whole family is very, very thankful when it was desperate, most needed,” said Doan Hang, Trinh’s mother. She laughed with Jackson, telling him her English was much better now and they have a larger vehicle than the tiny Honda Civic in which she gave birth to Trinh. The family and the retired sergeant shared memories for more than an hour.

Referring to Jackson being there for the delivery, Trinh said “That is such divine intervention. So many things could’ve gone bad. What if my mom gave birth in the car? What if Bob hadn’t been there on the freeway at the time?"

The family made sure to take plenty of pictures with the retired sergeant. Trinh said she’s happy she has more than the old article to now remember Jackson by.

A rollover crash involving two vehicles has prompted California Highway Patrol to issue a Sig Alert in Encinitas.

CHP says two sedans collided at 8:45 p.m. as they traveled on Interstate 5 near Santa Fe Drive.

The crash sent one car rolling down an embankment.

Those inside only had minor injuries, but the vehicles are blocking the far right lane of traffic.

A newly obtained search warrant reveals new details about how San Diego Police came to accuse one of their own lab technicians and another man of the 1984 slaying of Claire Hough.

Fourteen-year-old Hough was found beaten with her throat sliced and left breast cut off on Torrey Pines State Beach. The county coroner determined she had died from manual strangulation, but an initial investigation turned up few leads and no eyewitnesses.

Since DNA technology was limited, for nearly 30 years, her murder remained a mystery.

But on Oct. 23, SDPD investigators announced they had identified two suspects in the case: Ronald Tatro, who died in a boating accident in 2011, and 62-year-oldKevin Charles Brown, who committed suicide on Oct. 21, 2014.

A December 2013 search warrant for Brown, his home and his vehicles — obtained by NBC 7 on Friday — lays out how police came to suspect the two in Hough’s death.

In July 2012, an SDPD detective revisited Hough’s case and submitted a new lab request to examine the evidence found from the beach crime scene, hoping the new technology would yield better results.

By November, it did. The state DNA databank matched Brown’s DNA to sperm found on vaginal swabs collected during Hough’s autopsy, and Tatro’s blood and DNA was found on the victim’s clothing, according to the warrant.

Digging deeper into Tatro’s background, detectives learned he had been a police officer in Arkansas for more than a year before he pleaded guilty to first-degree rape in 1975 in that state. After serving seven years of a 20-year sentence, he moved to San Diego in 1982.

He was on parole when Hough was killed, and about a year later, Tatro was convicted of an attempted rape in La Mesa. His multiple felony convictions meant he had to submit a DNA sample to police.

Brown, however, had to submit his DNA when he was hired as a criminalist at the SDPD, where he worked from 1982 to 2002.

Immediately upon hearing Brown’s DNA was a match, the search warrant says the lab manager investigated possible cross-contamination in case Brown’s DNA accidentally ended up on the vaginal swab while handling it in the lab.

The manager told detectives “Brown had no known contact with the evidence relating to this case and was never assigned to work with any evidence relating to this investigation,” the search warrant states. She said cross-DNA contamination was not possible.

A lab supervisor said Brown had a reputation of unusual behavior, often going to local strip clubs and boasting about it, according to the warrant.

Brown’s nickname around the lab was “Kinky,” one co-worker said, and retired detective remembered Brown asking a female SDPD records employee if she would be willing to pose for nude pictures, which she refused, the document says.

“Creepy” is the word another fellow criminalist used. She described an incident in which Brown offered to read a crime report out loud, something they would often do if reports were written in a funny way.

Instead, the report was about a violent sex assault case in which a man forced himself on two women. The lab employee said “the power the man was displaying over the woman was very clear,” according to police, and after that day, she felt uncomfortable around him.

The warrant states investigators believe Brown and Tatro possibly met while traveling in similar circles, such as in strip clubs.

The detective writing the search warrant explained why he thinks Brown’s sperm could not have gotten into Hough through consensual sex. He said an interview with her best friend revealed Hough was faithful to her boyfriend at the time, was not attracted to older men and would not have had sex with someone she just met.

“I believe the sexual intercourse Brown had with Claire Hough was not consensual and appears to be contemporaneous to the murder,” the detective wrote in the warrant.

Although the SDPD has maintained that Hough’s case is not related to that of 15-year-old Barbara Nantais, who died in a similar way on the same beach in 1978, the search warrant says detectives searched for any references to Hough, Nantais or her boyfriend, James Alt, in Brown’s Internet search history or emails.

But Brown’s widow Rebecca told NBC 7 on Friday the case police were building was more cover-up than crime solving.

“His DNA is in the lab. That’s how it got on the swab, right there in the lab, and they don’t want to admit to that because that would mean possibly they had cross-contamination issues in the lab in the 80s,” she said.

Her family attorney Gretchen von Helms says DNA methods were primitive when the evidence was collected in this case 30 years ago.

According to Rebecca, she knew about her husband’s trips to the strip club and his pornography but they were part of his single life. Such activities stopped before the two were engaged 22 years ago, she said.

She is determined to prove her husband innocent.
 

A woman was stabbed multiple times early Halloween morning by someone dressed as the Grim Reaper, San Diego County officials said.

It was just before 2 a.m. Friday in a home on Thibido Road in Vista when deputies say the person dressed in costume attacked the woman while she was in the bathroom.

The attacker ran out of the home.

Deputies found the woman alive and searched the area with deputies and police dogs but did not find the assailant.

The victim was rushed to Palomar Hospital with what’s described as non-life threatening wounds.

She told deputies she could not identify her attacker's face but did hear the person's voice and described it as female.

It's not known how the suspect gained entry into the woman's home, officials said.

Check back for more on this developing story.
 

One crew member was killed and another suffered a "major injury" after Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo rocket plane, designed for suborbital commercial flights above the Earth, went down Friday during a test flight over the Mojave Desert in Southern California.

The test flight, in preparation for space tourism trips for which 700 customers have already paid up to $250,000, involved two crew members. Ground controllers lost contact with the crew shortly after the space tourism plane separated from a mothership that carries it to a height of about 50,000 feet, according to a Federal Aviation Administration statement.

One crew member was found dead in the vicinity of what authorities described as a widespread debris field. A second crew member was hospitalized, but details regarding a condition were not immediately available.

"At times like these, we recognize we engage in our craft freely," said Stuart Witt, CEO of Mojave Air and Space Port. "The test community is very small. We are human, and it hurts."

Crews found three distinct debris fields, indicating SpaceShipTwo broke apart mid-air, said Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood. A witness told The Associated Press the space tourism plane exploded over the desert after its rocket motor ignited.

"Space is hard, and today was a tough day," Virgin Galactic Chief Exec George Whitesides said.

Parts of the plane landed in the Cantil area, about 25 miles northeast of Mojave Air and Space Port and 95 miles north of Los Angeles. Aerial video showed several pieces of aircraft debris marked with the Virgin Galactic logo.

"Well the aircraft was not in one piece when it hit the ground, so there was some kind of structural failure obviously," Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood said.

Witt and other members of the test flight team watched the test flight from the base of the control tower. He said he "detected nothing that appeared abnormal."

"During the test, the vehicle suffered a serious anomaly resulting in the loss of SpaceShipTwo," according to Virgin Galactic. The "anomaly" occurred as the plane fired its rocket engine in flight, according to NBCNews.com. A tweet posted by Virgin Galactic's account Friday morning said, "#SpaceShipTwo has experienced an in-flight anomaly."

The tweet was posted just minutes after the plane, carried to 50,000 feet by a mothership called WhiteKnightTwo, began flying under rocket power, something the hybrid-rocket engine plane had not done in more than nine months, according to NBCNews.com. WhiteKnightTwo landed safety, according to Virgin Galactic.

Billionaire Richard Branson, Virgin Galactic's founder, had planned to be among those on the plane's first commercial voyage. Branson's company is considered a front-runner in the space tourism industry.

"Thoughts with all @virgingalactic & Scaled, thanks for all your messages of support. I'm flying to Mojave immediately to be with the team," Branson tweeted Friday afternoon.

Branson's tweet referred to Scaled Composites, Virgin Galactic's flight test partner.

Authorities did not comment with regard to a cause at a Friday afternoon news conference.

Virgin Galactic had switched the plane's fuel mixture since the last powered flight, NBCNews.com reported. The fuel change involved a switch from a rubber-based compound to plastic-based mix, NBCNews.com reported. Engineers were attempting to determine whether the new mix would boost engine performance.

Test flight officials said at a Friday news conference that the new fuel formulation had been tested many times on the ground.

A judge on Friday ordered a mental exam for a woman accused of driving the wrong way on Fiesta Island and crashing into a group of cyclists, injuring many of them.

Theresa Owens was ordered to undergo an exam on Dec. 9 to determine whether she’s competent to stand trial. In the meantime, all criminal proceedings will be on hold.

San Diego police said Owens was driving her vehicle on Fiesta Island Road around 6:30 p.m. on August 12 when her car struck about 10 cyclists in a larger group finishing up a training ride.
Six people went to the hospital with injuries, including Juan Carlos Vinolo, who was paralyzed.

Vinolo has continued to recover and according to his gofundme page, he should be leaving the hospital soon.

“JC is making progress every day and his high spirit is there with him most of the time,” a gofundme update posted four days ago said. “He is working and working and getting a little better every day.”

After the crash, Owens was found to have a baggie of meth hidden in her vagina, a deputy district attorney revealed at her August 15 arraignment.
 

A Palomar College student hospitalized with meningococcal disease a week ago has been discharged from the hospital, county health officials said Friday.

The unidentified student is recovering well, a health official confirmed.

The student was diagnosed on October 19, and later testing showed the student had the same strain of meningococcal bacteria that claimed the life of San Diego State University student Sara Stelzer.

Officials say, though, they don’t believe the two cases are connected.

The Palomar student attended only one class in the three weeks prior to contracting the disease, so there are no close contacts at the college, county officials said.

The San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency notified those people who they believe should take antibiotics to prevent any possible infection.

At the time both students fell ill, there wasn’t a vaccine that covered the B strain of meningococcal disease.

Earlier this week, however, the Food and Drug Administration approved a vaccine to prevent that subtype of meningococcal disease in people ages 10 to 25.

Two years after the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, the economy tops guns as the central issue Connecticut voters choose as most important. But with Democratic Gov. Dannel Malloy running for his second term, gun control proponents say they want to send a message with his re-election: They will protect politicians who take on the gun lobby.

"He was really a strong, indispensable supporter of gun violence prevention after Sandy Hook and he should be rewarded for that," said Shannon Watts, who has paired up with former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to create the group Everytown for Gun Safety.

Days before Tuesday's election, Malloy was running neck-and-neck with his Republican opponent Thomas C. Foley, a former ambassador to Ireland and private equity investor, who has said he would sign a repeal of the gun control legislation passed after the shootings if it were approved. The latest Quinnipiac University poll this week puts them at 43 percent each among likely voters, while an independent candidate, Joseph Visconti, has 7 percent of the vote.

The campaign is a rematch for Malloy and Foley, who were separated by about 6,400 votes in 2010. Foley leads Malloy when voters are asked who would do a better job on taxes, jobs and government spending, according to a September poll from Quinnipiac University. But the tragedy in Newtown is still raw and backers and opponents of the stricter legislation, both inside the state and out, are watching the election closely and trying to turn it into a deciding issue. Some of those directly touched by the Sandy Hook killings, meanwhile, have channeled their grief into activism for Malloy. Others in Connecticut, sometimes even in the same family, straddle both sides of the gun issue.

Big Spending on Gun Issue

The election comes as national organizations advocating gun-control measures are taking on the long influential National Rifle Association. Their goal: to equal the NRA in passion, if not spending.

Former Rep. Gabby Giffords, a gun-control activist since she was shot in the head at a 2011 "Congress on Your Corner" event in Tucson, has visited Connecticut. Last week, former Mayor Michael Bloomberg's Independence USA PAC began buying $1.7 million in ads to highlight the state's gun control laws. Other groups have spent about $780,000 to see Malloy returned to office.

“The NRA praises Tom Foley, calling him pro-gun," says the narrator in the Bloomberg ad. "No wonder. The NRA opposes comprehensive background checks — and Foley promised he'd sign a bill to weaken them — undermining our gun safety laws."

On the other side, the NRA is sending out $49,000 worth of postcards supporting Foley in the last days before Tuesday's vote. The gun industry’s trade association, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, has reported more than $290,000 for advertising and political mailings on Foley’s behalf. The foundation, which is based in Newtown, argues that the new gun restrictions do little to protect the public.

“We think that the governor purposely set out to identify the firearms industry as a straw man, as an enemy,” said the foundation’s spokesman, Michael Bazinet. “We are not those things.”

Bazinet said his group had been shut out of discussions about the tightened gun-control legislation. It would have wanted more focus on access to guns by those who are mentally ill, he said.

Foley has been endorsed by another gun-rights group, Connecticut Citizens Defense League, whose President Scott Wilson, charged Malloy had maligned gun owners.

“The governor of Connecticut has mislabeled and characterized law-abiding gun owners in Connecticut as extremist, that we are somehow dangerous,” he said.

Nationally, the NRA has spent $30.6 million in independent expenditures for the 2014 federal elections compared to Giffords' Americans for Responsible Solutions has spent $6.8 million and Bloomberg's Independence USA PAC, $5 million, according to the most recent tallies from OpenSecrets.org, which tracks campaign spending. Everytown for Gun Safety has paid $1.2 million for lobbying to the NRA's $2.5 million.

Even as gun-control groups have embarked on their blitz, the issue has receded in most of the country, said Robert Spitzer, author of “The Politics of Gun Control” and a professor at the State University of New York in Cortland.

Connecticut's Gun Law

In Connecticut, emotions are still strong two years after the tragedy. On Dec. 14, 2012, 20-year-old Adam Lanza forced his way into the Sandy Hook Elementary School and killed 26 children and adults in a fusillade from his Bushmaster AR-15 semi-automatic rifle.

The legislation that followed requires weapons be registered, expands the list of banned weapons to include the rifle Lanza used and adds a prohibition on magazines of more than 10 bullets.

"We don't care if you are a Republican or a Democrat," said Watts, who formed Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America after the shootings. "If you don't support gun sense, we want you out of office. And I think that when you see 26 innocent Americans, including 20 first-graders, slaughtered in the sanctity of their American elementary school, there's no un-ringing that bell.”

Overall, Connecticut’s legislation is popular in the state. A Quinnipiac University poll in May found that 56 percent of voters approve of it. But the support is highly dependent on party and gender: More Democrats and women are in favor than Republicans or men.

Not the Top Campaign Issue

Rather than talk about the gun legislation, Foley criticizes Malloy for raising taxes and failing to get spending under control, arguing that Connecticut has the worst economic performance of any state.

“If I’d been governor, the bill would have been very different in response to what happened in Newtown,” he said in response to a question while visiting a recent chili cook-off in Windsor. “But I think people in this race are focused on jobs and the economy, taxes, spending and Connecticut’s future."

Foley has said that he thought the legislation offered little to address access to guns for those who are mentally ill or urban crime with illegal guns, and that he would sign a repeal if one were approved by the General Assembly though no one believes that is likely.

Malloy counters that the mental health criticism is a false issue. Not only did Lanza come from a wealthy family able to afford mental health care, but Connecticut has increased spending on care, he said. And Malloy is unapologetic about his criticism of the NRA, which he says is out of step with its own members on such points as universal background checks.

The NRA did not respond to a request for comment.

The gun legislation in one among a list of accomplishments, Malloy said. He also is running on school reform and agreements on economic development and job creation, he said.

“We win the votes of people who are going to vote this issue and we win the votes of people who are going to vote other issues,” he said. “Intensity gets measured on Election Day.”

Visconti charges that the gun legislation is meant to make it difficult for law-abiding people to own any guns. He would put police officers at every school.

From Grief to Activism 

The morning of the Sandy Hook shootings, Abbey Clements’ class was supposed to be making snowflakes for a PTA luncheon. Instead, the pupils huddled together singing Christmas songs to try to mute the sound of Lanza's rifle.

Today the second-grade teacher is volunteering for Malloy's re-election.

"He continued to push for change and he continued to keep what happened to us right in the forefront of his mind,” she said.

Mark Barden is also among Malloy’s supporters. Barden's 7-year-old son Daniel was killed in the shootings. He said Malloy had the courage to transcend politics and sign legislation — he does not use the phrase gun control — that would save lives while preserving constitutional rights. He would like to see more officials do what Malloy did, he said.

“I think the public sentiment is changing on this issue,” he said. “I think the playing field is changing….Enough people are saying ‘Enough is enough, this is ridiculous.’ And I think that the politics is changing as well.”

Taking Sides on Connecticut's Law

At a recent Malloy campaign stop at Scotts' Jamaican Bakery in Hartford, the owner, Gordon Scott, said that people had the right to own weapons but not all kinds.

“Hunting is one thing but I’m not sure anyone needs an AK-47 to hunt or whatever those other guns are," he said.

But in Windsor, Mike McDonald, the owner of a security guard firm, said he agreed with Foley: The legislation failed to address issue of mental illness and guns.

For Paul Tappenden, the best kind of politician is one who interferes the least with his life and in this race, that means Foley.

Tappenden, a truck driver from Windsor, said his top concern was taxes, not gun laws.

His wife, Trish, who works as a secretary, said she was torn about the legislation. No one needs an Uzi submachine gun, she said.

“People own a lot of things they don’t need,” he countered. “If you’re legal and you’re sane and you’ve passed a background check and you want to go to the range and blast off a thousand rounds in a minute, you should be allowed to do that.”
 

The condition of Dr. Craig Spencer, the physician being treated for Ebola at Bellevue Hospital, has improved from "serious but stable" to "stable," health officials said Saturday.

The announcement was made "based on our patient's clinical progress and response to treatment," the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation said in a statement. "The patient will remain in isolation and continue to receive full treatment."

Meanwhile, the New York City Department of Health announced Saturday that one person under quarantine because of contact with Spencer will only be subject to direct active monitoring. The decision was made after a physician review determined that the individual was not at risk of contracting Ebola. He or she can now move about freely, but must be assessed twice a day by Health Department staff.

The announcements came almost a week after authorities said Spencer had entered the next phase of his illness and warned that he was expected to get worse before he could get better.

He received a plasma transfusion from the second American Ebola patient, Nancy Writebol, on Oct. 25, according to SIM, the Christian organization that Writebol worked with before she was admitted to Emory University Hospital in August.

Authorities have said Spencer was awake, communicating and undergoing plasma and antiviral therapies, treatments that have been used to treat Ebola patients at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta and at the Nebraska Medical Center.

His fiancee, Morgan Dixon, was released from the hospital days ago and returned to the couple's Hamilton Heights apartment. She had not developed any sign of the illness, and she was to remain under quarantine at home.

As darkness fell, fire investigators in Portland, Maine, surrounded the blackened and charred apartment home right near the University of Southern Maine.

Five people are now dead, two others injured, one critically burned, after an overnight Halloween party at the home on Noyes Street.

The blaze was the deadliest in Portland in more than 50 years.

"This house within 10 minutes was engulfed in flames," said one eyewitness.

Other neighbors describe a scene of horror.

"One boy jumped out of the windows," said one neighbor.

Carol Schiller says she saw a young man jump from the porch.

"He was totally engulfed flames," she said. "He was rolling on the ground."

Seven people were able to escape the inferno.

Fire Chief Jerry LaMoria says the department first got the calls for help shortly after 7 a.m., and arrived to heavy flames.

Others spotted those flames early this morning from the very busy nearby Forrest Avenue.

"I saw a man laying in the road," said Damien Croxford.

He says he ran help, but the heat was too intense.

"I went around back to the back door, but the flames were so bad I couldn't handle it, the flames were just too hot," said Croxford.

As of Saturday evening, the victims weren't identified. No cause was determined, either.

Neighbors say the house is referred to as a "party house," a group of young girls and their pets living on one side, others in the next unit.

"As part of this investigation, officials will be looking at whether or not any code violations existed in this building," said LaMoria.

In the meantime, another woman says her boyfriend's 27-year-old son is likely one of the victims.

"We were told there were two bodies found in his room, and that's all that we know," she said, sobbing.

Saturday afternoon, family and friends of the victims were being referred to the University of Southern Maine Woodbury Campus at 35 Bedford Street.