STUART — Stuart Police arrested a man Friday accused of intentionally leaving a woman’s dog locked in a hot car until it died, according to an affidavit released Monday.

Christopher Alan Gunkel, 55, of the 2000 block of Northeast Pinetree Way, was charged with animal cruelty.

The affidavit says Gunkel left the dog in the car with the windows rolled up at an unspecified time Thursday while picking up a prescription near the 600 block of Colorado Avenue.

Gunkel felt too sick to drive home, however, and called a neighbor to give him a ride to his house, the affidavit says. The dog remained in the vehicle until police discovered it dead in the back seat at approximately 10:30 p.m. Friday.

When police questioned Gunkel about leaving the dog in the car, he stated the dog was “sick to begin with,” according to the affidavit.

Gunkel was being held Monday in the Martin County Jail in lieu of $2,500 bond.

TCPalm staff

Esther A. Guzman, a scientist at Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute in Fort Pierce, has received a $375,000 grant for a three-year project to find marine organisms that might help prevent pancreatic cancer.

The 36-year-old Guzman grew up in Mexico City and earned a doctorate in immunology from the University of Texas’ M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston in 2004. She joined the drug discovery program at Harbor Branch, a division of Florida Atlantic University, the following year. (more…)

FELLSMERE — The mother of the 1-year-old boy found dead in a vehicle last month was charged by the Indian River County Sheriff’s Office with aggravated manslaughter of a child.

Alejandra Alvarado, 21, of the 100 block of South Oak Street, Fellsmere, posted $2,500 bail at the Indian River County Jail shortly after she was booked Monday afternoon. Her son, Aiden Alvarado, died after spending at least four hours in the back of his mother’s sport utility vehicle during the afternoon of June 13, detectives said.
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A Fort Pierce woman that was arrested and charged with numerous counts of animal cruelty may have stabbed one of her dead dogs.

St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Deputies found a sick home full of animals, some dead and starving, with an odor of death reeking from it when they arrived on the scene Monday.

Deputies arrived at the home on North Kings Highway after the landlord of the home noticed a foul smell coming from it. The landlord also said he hadn’t seen his tenant, Michele Nunziata, in several days.

Deputies on scene said they were met with “an overwhelming foul odor of decomposition.” They also said they could hear several dogs barking from inside the home.

As deputies tried to get Nunziata to come back to the home and allow them inside, she repeatedly told deputies over the phone that she was “too busy.” When she did arrive home and let deputies inside she admitted to burying dogs in her front yard, though deputies could not find grave sites.

When Animal Control Officers arrived they took inventory of the home and found:

3 very slim Pit Bulls

A Blood Hound suffering from malnutrition

2 Cockatiels without food or water

2 ferrets without food or water

1 Black Wolf and 1 Doberman Pincher locked in a kennel laying in feces with no food or water, suffering from malnutrition

3 dead dogs locked in a kennel, decaying

Deputies and Animal Control Officers also found rabbits caged without food or water and a goose.

Nunziata has been charged with 6 felony accounts of animal cruelty as well as 11 Misdemeanors.

In a follow-up report, Animal Care and Control Officers say it appeared one of the deceased dogs left to rot in a cage had been stabbed in it’s armpit.

Officers said it appeared that most of the dead animals died of neglect.

Nunziata told officers she never neglected her animals and “would get them all back.”

Marianne Wellendorf
WPEC Channel 12

Michele Nunziata

So on Monday night, Michele Nunziata’s landlord called the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office and reported his concerns.

When investigators showed up at the home in the 900 block of North Kings Highway, they found a grim scene.

Three dead dogs locked up in kennels. A black wolf locked up in feces and starving. A Doberman pinscher in the same condition.

There were other animals. Three skinny pit bulls running loose in the house. A bloodhound reported to be malnourished, two cockatiels and two ferrets – all without sufficient food – and a chinchilla with food and water.

Investigators also found veterinary medicine and piles of feces scattered on the dining room floor.

Nunziata, 40, was booked into the St. Lucie County jail on Monday and is being detained in lieu of $42,500 bail. She faces 16 counts of animal abuse charges and one charge of having the wolf without a permit.

Nunziata told investigators that she had put down the dogs on Saturday and had been too distraught to remove their bodies.

The malnurished bloodhound reportedly removed from Nunziata's home.

She said she had received the euthanasia from her landlord, who had called to tell her that the syringes where in her mailbox ready for use by saying in code, “The snowman had arrived.” (more…)

FORT PIERCE — The man whose invention vibrated millions of Americans to sleep, John Joseph Houghtaling, 92, died Wednesday in Fort Pierce.

Houghtaling invented the “Magic Fingers” machine, a coin operated device that caused motel beds to vibrate when a quarter was dropped in the machine.

Born in Kansas City, Mo., Houghtaling joined the Army Air Corps during World War II. He was a crewman on the B-17 bomber and made 17 missions before the end of the war, said his son, Paul Houghtaling of Alexandria, Va.

After the war he became a salesman for a company selling mattresses with built in vibrators. Sales were not good, according to an article by John Grossman in the Spring 2000 edition of American Heritage Magazine. So in 1958, Houghtaling decided to build a device that could attach to a mattress, be cheap to operate and return revenue to his firm and the motels using it. (more…)

PORT ST. LUCIE — Police say preliminary autopsy results for the 2-month-old boy who died at home show the infant died from sudden infant death syndrome.

Braylon Robinson was home with his mother, 16-year-old Maya Young, on Wednesday when just before noon a call came in to police and the St. Lucie County Fire District that he was unconscious and not breathing.

When paramedics arrived at the home in the 1800 block of Southeast Benedictine Street, they found the baby in his cradle. The time of death was called at 12:09 p.m.

Port St. Lucie Police spokesman Thomas Nichols said an autopsy was done this morning and preliminary results showed the cause of death to be SIDS. He said investigators were also waiting on toxicology lab results to confirm the ruling.

According to the Mayo Clinic’s website, sudden infant death syndrome is the unexplained death, usually during sleep, of a seemingly healthy baby.

Most SIDS deaths occur in children between 2 months and 4 months of age, according to the clinic.

MIAMI — After a long and exhaustive investigation, the deaths of two infants and the sickening of a third at Miami Children’s Hospital is a medical mystery.

The infants, born extremely prematurely, their immune systems compromised, were in the hospital’s Neonatal Intensive Care Unit when two of them died of a common yet lethal bacterium in March. (more…)

PORT ST. LUCIE — Cheers, tears and roses were on display before a standing-room-only crowd in the auditorium of Port St. Lucie Elementary Monday night.

The gathering was to say goodbye to the 34-year-old school that is being closed in June as part of the school district’s plan to save $30 million next year.

“We have always been a family,” said Deb Mock, a reading coach who has taught at the school 31 years. “We’ve been there for each other through all the challenges we’ve had — hurricanes, flooding, the deaths of faculty members. We always strived to do the best for our students,” she added.
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STUART — After one hour of deliberation Thursday afternoon, a Martin County jury found Eric Lashawn Wiley guilty of second-degree murder in the Jan. 11, 2008, shooting death of 19-year-old Levi Dwight Starks in Stuart.

Wiley and his sister’s boyfriend were struggling over a gun after an alleged domestic dispute when the gun discharged and the .40-caliber bullet struck Starks in the chest.

In addition to second-degree murder, Wiley, 39, also was found guilty on aggravated assault and aggravated battery charges, and could face up to life in prison. (more…)