A Middle Village man was arrested on two counts of second-degree murder Friday after confessing to the killings of Joseph Odierno and Jairo Santos in a drug deal gone wrong. The Daily News reports that police raided the Queens home of 28 year-old Darren Lynch to discover "handguns, rifles, an AK-47 machine gun, a bulletproof vest, cocaine, heroin and marijuana, and books about serial killers." Lynch was upset that he paid Odierno and Santos $20,000......

Investigators looking for the cause in Sunday's fatal Queens fire now suspect that the ex-girlfriend of the most recent victim may have started the fire. It is believed Agnes Bermudez doused William Salazar with an accelerant, possibly carpet cleaner. Salazar died from his injuries yesterday. Video showed Salazar and Bermudez both on fire. Bermudez, a 48-year-old former stock trader, had recently broken up with Salazar and, according to family members, the split was an amicable......

Two men were found dead when firefighters arrived to battle a fire in the Tompkinsville section of Staten Island. The fire at a vacant building was so intense that it took firefighters two hours to get it under control. The fire looks suspicious, and the authorities are investigating whether the men died before or during the fire. Additionally, the building is one of three that was given the go-ahead for demolition last month by the......

The fire in a three-story building that killed one yesterday morning has claimed two more deaths. A 58-year-old man was in an apartment, dead of smoke inhalation and his wife and 20-year-old son died later at a hospital. According to the Post, FDNY believe the fire is suspicious; it "broke out between the second and third floors of a building in Middle Village, Queens--"not near any electrical outlets." Five others were seriously injured, including one......

Early this morning, a fire ripped through a three story building with a store on the ground floor and apartments above. There has been one reported fatality so far, with three people critically injured and four more residents seriously injured. The proprietor of the ground floor deli said two people ran onto his store while on fire. He was able to douse them with water The seven injured survivors have all been hospitalized. Witnesses described......

An 81-year-old man who was getting into his parked car in Middle Village, Queens was struck by a vehicle yesterday at 11AM. The car did not stop and passersby chased the van, yelling for the driver to stop. Finally, the car was stopped by another vehicle and one of the men, Anthony Causi, told the Post, "I ran up to the door and yelled at her, 'Did you see what you just did?'" to which......

On the edge of Middle Village sits Uvarara Vineria and Ristoro, a charming family-owned wine bar that looks and feels like it should be in the middle of an Italian village instead of Queens. This is due to the efforts of the Iadicicco's who spent nine months converting what had been a tailor shop with dowdy green walls into a cozy space with exposed brick and a dining area whose four rooms each have a......

NY1 is reporting that City Councilman Dennis Gallagher has been indicted on rape charges by a Queens grand jury. Yesterday, the Queens City Councilman told the grand jury the sex was consensual. The alleged rape took place on July 8. A 52-year-old woman claims that Gallagher took her back to his Middle Village office and sexually assaulted her. The 43-year-old Gallagher cooperated with the police, giving a DNA sample. He is married, but his neighbors......

One of the many things I love about this town is that there are a thousand places where you might find yourself saying, “It doesn’t even feel like I’m in New York City anymore.” I started driving a yellow cab, in large part, to try to find as many of those places as I could. I’ve discovered quite a few. The first time I drove down those steep streets in upper Manhattan I imagined I......

The case of Monica Lozado-Rivaidneira gets odder and odder. The police said that Caesar Ascarrunz confessed to killing his Bolivian-born girlfriend in their Queens apartment, but now, while in lockup at Rikers, he is saying he never confessed. The police have written, taped, and oral confessions from Ascarrunz, which seem to counter Ascarrunz's claims. This may all be a part of Ascarrunz's attempts to create some sort of defense as he awaits court hearings. Police......

Authorities are trying to find relatives of the four year-old girl found wandering in Middle Village, Queens last Sunday. She says her name is Valerie, and that her mother is Monica and father is Casear, plus noted another father named Felipe and Gary the cat. The way Valerie tells it, Caesar took her for a drive in the middle of the night, leaving her in MIddle Village; she also said, "He took me out with......