Basement Apartment

The body of a missing 10-month-old child has been found at the King of Prussia apartment complex where she was snatched as her grandmother tried to save her life, authorities said today. The body of Saanvi Venna was discovered at 4:30 a.m. in a basement area of the apartment building, said Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Ferman. Police arrested Raghunanean Yandamuri, a family friend, who they said had sought a $50,000 ransom. Yandamuri, who lives in the same Marquis apartments complex, left a chilling ransom note.

Fire damaged a basement apartment at 1109 Spruce St. in Center City yesterday. Fire officials said the blaze was reported at 9:53 a.m. and placed under control at 10:40. The cause was under investigation. Several people displaced by the fire were relocated by the Red Cross.

Police remove the body of Thomas Moore, 28, from his basement apartment on 55th Street near Whitby Avenue in West Philadelphia, where he had been shot several times in the shoulder and neck yesterday. Moore was declared dead at Misericordia Division, Mercy Catholic Medical Center, shortly after 5:30 p.m. Police said the shooting apparently stemmed from an argument between Moore and another male tenant for whom police issued a warrant.

A boy and girl died early yesterday in a fire in a basement apartment in the Fern Rock section of Philadelphia, authorities said. Firefighters responding to a call at 7:16 a.m. found David Alexander, 7, and Danielle Horsey, 8, dead in bed. David's mother, Donna Barrett, and Danielle's father, Francis Horsey, also lived in the basement apartment at 5700 Camac Street, police said. They were not present when the fire broke out. Another basement apartment resident, Crystal Hicks, 19, escaped without injury, fire officials said.

Vicki Smith told police that justice had not been done in her rape case, so she decided to take the law into her own hands. Unfortunately, an innocent man paid with his life for her wrath. Smith, 34, said she was raped in 1988 in an apartment house on 40th Street near Preston. Charges were later dropped against her two alleged rapists, so she set the building on fire on Feb. 7, 1989, she told police. Isbel Ortis, 45, died in the early- morning blaze. He had been sleeping in a basement apartment.

Within a half hour of a killing yesterday morning in North Philadelphia, police spotted a suspect in a car parked at Fifth Street and Lehigh Avenue, two blocks from the shooting scene. The occupant, Victoriano Cruz, 34, was ordered out of the car, police said. Standing by his car, he heard the description of the murderer being broadcast over one of the patrol car radios. "That's me," Cruz told police, pointing an imaginary gun toward Seventh Street. "I'm your man. " Cruz was taken to homicide headquarters in the Police Administration Building, where he was charged with murder and weapons offenses in the death of Iris Negron, 23, police said.

A woman discovered slain in her basement apartment died after her throat was slit, Montgomery County detectives said yesterday. The body of Jennifer Still, 20, of the Belmont Village Apartments at 200 Ross Rd., was found around 7 p.m. Tuesday, according to Bridgeport Police Chief Zenny Martyniuk, whose department is working with county detectives on the case. "This was definitely a murder and it is being treated as such," said Montgomery County First Assistant District Attorney Bruce L. Castor Jr. Castor said Still's boyfriend, who lived with her, found her body after returning home from work and contacted police.

A 40-year-old man was critically burned late last night when a one-alarm fire of suspicious origin swept through the Kensington rowhouse in which he lived, fire officials said. Fire rescue workers took John Glinsky from the second floor of the house on Almond Street near Albert shortly after the fire was reported at 11:01 p.m. He was treated at Episcopal Hospital, later transferred to St. Agnes Medical Center's Burn Unit. A hospital spokesman said he was in critical condition with third-degree burns over 60 percent of his body.

Angry residents at the Morton council meeting Wednesday blamed borough officials and SEPTA for the flood Aug. 9 and asked for help. The owners of the Cornerstone Court Apartments, along with their tenants, urged the Borough Council to take immediate action on improvement of the SEPTA culvert and flood way that handles the flow from Stoney Creek. Bob Shaffer and Bob Cohen, co-owners of the apartments, decried what they called the borough's and SEPTA's consistent inaction to correct flooding problems that they said had occurred four times since 1987.

An Iraqi being sought as a kidnap victim showed up at the Northeast Detective Division headquarters yesterday and said he had not been abducted. Cops don't believe him. "There's no doubt he was kidnapped," said Capt. William Sprenkle. Sprenkle said Sadiq Alabudi, 28, arrived at the detective division at Harbison Avenue and Levick Street yesterday morning to deny reports that he had been snatched from his Northeast apartment Thursday night by a group of men dressed commando-style with ski masks and gloves, guns drawn.

The body of a missing 10-month-old child has been found at the King of Prussia apartment complex where she was snatched as her grandmother tried to save her life, authorities said today. The body of Saanvi Venna was discovered at 4:30 a.m. in a basement area of the apartment building, said Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Ferman. Police arrested Raghunanean Yandamuri, a family friend, who they said had sought a $50,000 ransom. Yandamuri, who lives in the same Marquis apartments complex, left a chilling ransom note.

Behind a door in a dark hallway of a rundown Roxborough apartment complex, a blind woman told a social worker that she "did something" to her elderly roommate, and that something turned out to be incredibly disturbing.   Chex Party Mix, a lotion bottle, a piece of a diaper, a candy wrapper and 10 inches of rope. Geraldine Cherry, 50, admitted that she took all those items and shoved them down her roommate's throat, killing her, according to an arrest affidavit. At first, Kathleen McEwan, 70, appeared to have died June 10 of natural causes, face up in her bed. It wasn't until an undertaker noticed something in McEwan's mouth as he was preparing her body that the heinous way she died came to light.

On Monday afternoon, Joseph Pierce, 29, his girlfriend, Tiffany Miller, 20, and their 4-week-old baby, McKenzie Miller-Pierce, were in Pierce's mother's basement apartment at the Windermere Court Apartments, on Walnut Street near 48th, when Miller smelled smoke. "[Tiffany] smelled smoke in the hallway and, when I got outside, I saw that the roof of our building was on fire," Pierce said. "We got out fast. " As firefighters battled the five-alarm blaze, the Miller-Pierce family was among the first to arrive at the temporary shelter set up in the West Philadelphia High School gym across the street, where Miller said that the Red Cross provided formula, diapers, wipes and bottles for the baby, and money for clothing and personal needs.

DEAR ABBY: I'm 25 and live in my mother's basement apartment with my boyfriend. We would like to be married soon, now that we're out of school and have stable careers. But I insist that we move out of Mom's house before making any permanent plans. The problem is my mom, who is divorced, is unemployed and a social phobic, with few friends. We provide her with financial support by paying several hundred dollars a month in rent, in addition to other bills. She helps me with a loan when the rare emergency arises.

A 19-year-old man died and his girlfriend was critically injured yesterday morning when they were trapped by a smoky fire in the basement bedroom of a Laurel Springs home, police said. Thomas Doherty and Veronica Conway, also 19, were trapped after a fire started in an adjacent laundry room in the house owned by Doherty's parents. Four other family members were treated for smoke inhalation. "I could see smoke pouring out the windows and hear the father yelling," said neighbor Lloyd Shaw, who woke about 6:10 a.m. to the sound of fire alarms across the street.

Icess Spawn recently moved with her fiance into a small Fern Rock apartment complex because they thought it would be quiet and peaceful. A shooting Saturday night outside their apartment on Park Avenue near Champlost Avenue that killed one man and wounded another quickly changed her mind. Spawn and her fiance were watching "The Soul Train Awards" on TV just before 9 p.m. when they heard a raucous argument outside. A few minutes later, she heard a gunshot and a flurry of footsteps right outside.

A woman discovered slain in her basement apartment died after her throat was slit, Montgomery County detectives said yesterday. The body of Jennifer Still, 20, of the Belmont Village Apartments at 200 Ross Rd., was found around 7 p.m. Tuesday, according to Bridgeport Police Chief Zenny Martyniuk, whose department is working with county detectives on the case. "This was definitely a murder and it is being treated as such," said Montgomery County First Assistant District Attorney Bruce L. Castor Jr. Castor said Still's boyfriend, who lived with her, found her body after returning home from work and contacted police.

An Iraqi being sought as a kidnap victim showed up at the Northeast Detective Division headquarters yesterday and said he had not been abducted. Cops don't believe him. "There's no doubt he was kidnapped," said Capt. William Sprenkle. Sprenkle said Sadiq Alabudi, 28, arrived at the detective division at Harbison Avenue and Levick Street yesterday morning to deny reports that he had been snatched from his Northeast apartment Thursday night by a group of men dressed commando-style with ski masks and gloves, guns drawn.

They arrived like commandos, dressed in black hooded jackets, ski masks and gloves, with guns drawn. Three of them wore black pants. One apparently couldn't find his black pants and wore blue ones. They said nothing - just led the kidnap victim out of his Northeast apartment to a silver van the victim used. The mysterious abduction of an Iraqi national has puzzled Northeast Detectives, who were also hampered by language problems in the case. Police have asked the FBI for assistance.

A desperate immigrant who said he had been marked for death by the Russian mob grabbed a gun from a police lieutenant's belt in South Philadelphia yesterday, fired a couple of shots at officers in pursuit, then carjacked a bewildered motorist and forced him on a 150-mile trek to suburban Washington, police said. Yuri Furman, a 23-year-old paralegal who told investigators he was an FBI informant, was still at large last night after leaving the driver and his purple Ford Escort station wagon in the historic section of Alexandria, Va., police said.