Duct Tape

Colleen Broe, a Levittown mother who became a national target of outrage over allegations that she illegally duct-taped her foster children, was found not guilty of child-abuse charges last night in Bucks County Court. After more than six hours of deliberations, a jury acquitted Broe, 34, of endangering the welfare of children, false imprisonment, and conspiracy, all felonies. The verdicts, announced at 8:20 p.m., left Broe shaking and sobbing uncontrollably on the shoulder of her attorney, Andrew Schneider.

Colleen Broe, a Levittown mother who became a national target of outrage over allegations that she illegally duct-taped her foster children, was found not guilty of child-abuse charges last night in Bucks County Court. After more than six hours of deliberations, a jury acquitted Broe, 34, of endangering the welfare of children, false imprisonment, and conspiracy, all felonies. The verdicts, announced at 8:20 p.m., left Broe shaking and sobbing uncontrollably on the shoulder of her attorney, Andrew Schneider.

A onetime foster father accused of duct-taping children in his care pleaded guilty yesterday in Bucks County Court. Neil Broe, 42, once held out as a shining example of the county's foster-parent program, pleaded guilty to felony charges of endangering the welfare of children, false imprisonment, and conspiracy. No sentencing date was set. He faces punishment that could range from probation to 10 years in prison. The Levittown man is expected to testify this week against his estranged wife, Colleen, who faces similar charges.

"Stash away the duct tape," Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge advised yesterday, but "be ready. " The counsel came as Ridge announced a terrorism-preparedness Web site and manual during a visit to an Ohio Red Cross center, chosen to suggest that Washington and New York are not terrorists' only possible targets. "An emergency is not a time to plan; it's the time to react," Ridge said. "We can be afraid or we can be ready, and today Americans declare we will not be afraid and we will be ready.

We live in a duct-tape world. Nobody knows that better than the Duct-Tape Guys, Tim Nyberg and Jim Berg. "It's the ultimate power tool," Nyberg says. "We know; we're duct-tape evangelists. " They're stuck on their favorite subject. The team of brothers-in-law has written seven books (and 15 years' worth of page-a-day calendars) about the ubiquitous tape. "It's got thousands of uses, including some pretty incredible stuff, but who's counting?" Nyberg says. "It's limitless what you can do. " Their motto: "It's not broke; it just needs duct tape.

The most frequent question Ryan McLaughlin gets about her duct-tape prom gown is: "Doesn't it stick to you?" No, it doesn't, explains the Great Valley High School junior: The top is double-faced, sticky side to sticky side, and the skirt is lined with a shower curtain liner. Far from its hardware-store origins, the dress looks as if it were made from fine, pliable leather woven into squares. The black, sleeveless top is laced up the back corset-style with ribbon, and the ankle-length black skirt ties at the waist.

Caira Ferguson might have thought it was hilarious to wrap duct tape around her 2-year-old daughter, from mouth to ankles, and pose for photos as if her living room were Abu Ghraib prison. But police in Delaware County weren't laughing yesterday when they charged Ferguson, 21, with unlawful restraint, false imprisonment and child endangerment after she confessed to taping the girl to her little purple chair last summer. And Magisterial District Judge C. Walter McCray III was equally unamused when Ferguson appeared for her arraignment.

Question: I just read your advice on duct tape and mastic. Should I not use duct tape to join the pieces of my clothes dryer's vent line? Is mastic the thing to use for that also? Answer: I think you'd be better off using duct tape - the kind for sealing heating, ventilation and air-conditioning ducts, not the cloth-backed variety - rather than mastic, which is better for sealing duct seams. Duct tape is flexible and tears off the roll easily. I prefer the tape to mastic because, though many basement laundry rooms aren't exactly pretty, mastic looks ugly.

The images of two wide-eyed toddlers, their arms bound snugly to their torsos with layered rings of duct tape, stared from a projector screen in a Bucks County courtroom. They were the foster children of Colleen Broe, 34, a Levittown homemaker accused of abusing them. As Broe's child-endangerment trial opened yesterday, lawyers alternately portrayed her as a sneaky, selfish phony or as the victim of a set-up by a jealous, devious husband she was trying to shed. "Colleen Broe had two sides," Chief Deputy District Attorney Michelle Henry told jurors in her opening statement.

The body of a woman whose head and body had been duct taped and who had a handcuff on one ankle was found floating this morning in the Schuylkill in Fairmount Park. A bicyclist spotted the body called about 10:30 a.m. and called 911, police said. After searching the river, a police boat recovered the remains about 30 minutes later near the Columbia Railroad Bridge, which crosses the Schuylkill near where Montgomery Drive intersects with Martin Luther King Drive. A homicide investigation is just getting started and there is no information about a possible cause of death.

Armed, masked men broke into a Haverford Township couple's home last night, duct-taped the wife, and made off with an undisclosed amount of money, police said today. The incident occurred shortly before 8:15 p.m. Thursday on the 600 block of Paddock Road in the Paddock Farms development as the couple was in their bedroom, according to Haverford Deputy Chief John Viola. The couple, who own a corner store in West Philadelphia, heard, "a loud crash downstairs" just before three men came up the stairs and entered the master bedroom, Viola said, adding that at least one of the men was believed to have had a handgun.

A FAMILY in the Fairhill section of North Philadelphia was thrust into a real-life nightmare after a group of masked men burst into their rowhouse and murdered a 36-year-old man while his mother, siblings and 6-year-old niece sat helpless, bound and gagged by the thugs. Cops were called to the house, on 9th Street just north of Somerset, shortly before 11 p.m. Wednesday and found the man - whom police identified Thursday as Roshan Sullivan - in a rear bedroom bleeding from a gunshot wound to the back of his head.

A Fairhill family was thrust into a nightmare when a group of masked men burst into their rowhouse and killed a 36-year-old man while his mother, siblings, and 6-year-old niece sat helpless, bound and gagged by the intruders. Police were called to the house, on Ninth Street just north of Somerset, shortly before 11 p.m. Wednesday and found the man in a back bedroom bleeding from a gunshot wound to the back of his head. On Thursday, police identified the victim as Roshan Sullivan, who was pronounced dead at the scene at 11:03 p.m., Chief Inspector Scott Small said.

A FAIRHILL FAMILY was thrust into a real-life nightmare after a group of masked men burst into their rowhouse and murdered a 36-year-old man in cold blood while his mother, siblings and 6-year-old niece sat helpless, bound and gagged by the thugs. Cops were called to the house, on 9th Street just north of Somerset, shortly before 11 p.m. Wednesday and found the man - whom police identified Thursday as Roshan Sullivan - in a rear bedroom bleeding from a gunshot wound to the back of his head.

A 40-year-old man died after being assaulted and bound with duct tape during what appeared to be a home invasion Tuesday afternoon in the city's Olney section, police said. The bloodied man, described only as Asian, was found by his wife in an upstairs bedroom of their home in the 200 block of West Ruscomb Street with his wrists, ankles, and mouth wrapped in duct tape, police said. Medics pronounced him dead at 4:30 p.m. The cause of death had not been determined Tuesday night.

AN OLNEY WOMAN arrived home yesterday afternoon to a horrifying discovery: Her husband's lifeless body bound with duct tape and bleeding from the head on the floor of a second-floor bedroom. She called 9-1-1 just before 4:30 p.m., and officers arrived to find the 40-year-old man on his back in a bedroom of the home at 2nd and Ruscomb streets, Chief Inspector Scott Small said. He had a cracked skull and had been shot in his left shoulder and right hip, his hands and feet were bound and his mouth taped, Small said.

An Olney woman arrived home Tuesday afternoon to a horrifying discovery - an unused window forced open and her husband's lifeless body bound with duct tape and bleeding from the head in a second-floor bedroom. She called 9-1-1 just before 4:30 p.m., and officers arrived to find the 40-year-old man on his back on the floor in a bedroom of the home at 2nd and Ruscomb streets, Chief Inspector Scott Small said. He had a cracked skull and had been shot in his left shoulder and right hip, his hands and feet were bound and his mouth duct-taped, Small said.

A 40-year-old man died after being assaulted and bound with duct tape during what appeared to be a home invasion Tuesday afternoon in the city's Olney section, police said. The bloodied man, described only as Asian, was found by his wife in an upstairs bedroom with his wrists, ankles, and mouth wrapped in duct tape in the 200 block of West Ruscomb Street, police said. He was pronounced dead by a medic unit at 4:30 p.m. The cause of death remains to be determined. The closets and drawers in the home were ransacked, police said.

Households in the United States consume nearly a quarter of the nation's energy - 23 percent. When President Obama spoke about domestic energy production and energy efficiency in his State of the Union address last week - "the easiest way to save money is to waste less energy," he said - the cameras briefly panned to Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist. He was smiling slightly and nodding. Before becoming energy secretary in 2009, Chu directed the Energy Department's Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, known for its work on energy.

A Wilmington man has been charged with kidnapping and murdering a 65-year-old woman who was out walking her dog, police said Tuesday. Dwight L. Smith, 24, of West 36th Street, was held without bail after his arrest Monday night. He is accused of killing Marsha Lee of Whittier Road in the Brandywine Hills section of Wilmington. Smith's Facebook page indicates that he is an Army staff sergeant. His father, Dwight Sr., told television news reporters that his son was a combat veteran who was wounded during his second tour in Afghanistan.