Kennett Square

A West Chester high school swim coach was arrested Wednesday on charges that he posed as a swimmer's father, plied her with beer, and had sex with her. Kenneth William Fuller, 47, head coach of the Bayard Rustin High School swim team, was charged with felony sex assault and corruption of a minor. "This was a despicable violation of trust," said Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan. A member of the team, a teenage girl, told police that Fuller took her to a Kennett Square hotel April 27 and gave her "multiple" beers, court documents state.

A Kennett Square man was struck by a vehicle and killed while trying to cross Route 1 in Chester County, state police said Sunday. Matthew Davis, 28, was hit at 7:36 p.m. Saturday south of Greenwood Road in East Marlborough Township, authorities said. He died of his injuries at Chester County Hospital, police said. Authorities identified the driver only as a 37-year-old Wilmington woman. Police are investigating. Anyone who witnessed the incident is asked to contact Trooper Elisha Bomberger at 610-268-2022.

At 7 p.m. on a recent Friday, Talula's Table closed its market doors for the night as usual. The lights still glowed through its cafe windows, beckoning cheerfully from beneath a yellow-striped awning at the central crossroads of downtown Kennett Square. And I can only imagine the disappointment of some poor hungry soul, arriving too late to sneak in for one of the day's last lobster pot pies (all sweet crustacean, peas and tarragon-scented bisque beneath its buttery crust), a sugar-dusted pumpkin scone, or one of the house-smoked salamis that hang near the rear, where a glass case brims with farmstead cheeses.

Six months ago, it was the bedroom of a small-time tough named Cuahuctemoc Bedolla. Now, it is his shrine, a tribute to a short life with a bad ending. A Mexican flag covers one wall of the narrow nook in his parents' house in the West Grove woods of Chester County. Votive candles flicker near a statuette of Our Lady of Guadalupe. On the bed are his mechanic's tools, green T-shirt emblazoned "El Paso, Old Mexico," and a red wool beanie, a partial tableau of his 27 years. At the center of the single bed, in a box cloaked in red velvet, are his ashes.

Don't ever ask Barbara S. Bove if she would consider moving her jewelry store from the aged downtown of Kennett Square to a modern shopping mall. "Oh, heavens no," said Bove, laughing at the mere thought, in her somewhat cluttered office in the back of Bove Jewelers Inc. "It's hard to find a salesperson that's a human being at the mall. " "We're all specialty shops around here, and we would never want to be inside such a place," she said. "We cater to people in a personal way, and you can't do that in a mall.

After 14 years of sewers and street repairs, Douglas Marguriet's tenure as borough manager will end this spring. The Borough Council voted Monday not to renew his contract. Few are surprised. Marguriet was not expected to last long after Ken Roberts, council president for many years, lost the November election. While many praised his administrative abilities, the team of four new council members called Marguriet "secretive" and had campaigned on plans to "dump Doug and Kenny.

Kennett Square decided to forgo its parade this year for an afternoon of activities and performances, followed by fireworks. Visitors were able to see gymnasts, a martial-arts demonstration, dancers and live bands.

If you buy a plant at the Kennett Square Beautification Committee's 12th Annual Plant sale Saturday, you can help beautify Kennett Square as well as your own backyard. "Over the years, we have purchased 300 trees for Kennett Square," said Bill Thomas, chairman of the event. Thomas, a borough resident, is a horticulturist for Longwood Gardens. The local beautification committee began in the mid-1960s in response to Lady Bird Johnson's call for residents to help beautify and clean up America by starting with their neighborhoods, he said.

A West Chester high school swim coach was arrested Wednesday on charges that he posed as a swimmer's father, plied her with beer, and had sex with her. Kenneth William Fuller, 47, head coach of the Bayard Rustin High School swim team, was charged with felony sex assault and corruption of a minor. "This was a despicable violation of trust," said Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan. A member of the team, a teenage girl, told police that Fuller took her to a Kennett Square hotel April 27 and gave her "multiple" beers, court documents state.

Six months ago, it was the bedroom of a small-time tough named Cuahuctemoc Bedolla. Now, it is his shrine, a tribute to a short life with a bad ending. A Mexican flag covers one wall of the narrow nook in his parents' house in the West Grove woods of Chester County. Votive candles flicker near a statuette of Our Lady of Guadalupe. On the bed are his mechanic's tools, green T-shirt emblazoned "El Paso, Old Mexico," and a red wool beanie, a partial tableau of his 27 years. At the center of the single bed, in a box cloaked in red velvet, are his ashes.

Most families have a scrapbook or a photo album to show what they have been up to for the last decade or so. To document what they've been doing for the last 12 years, Wayne and Colleen Simpson have their house, all 4,000 Tuscan-style square feet of it, in Kennett Square. Sunny-colored stucco covers the house, which sits on four acres and greets visitors at an angle, so they must navigate the curved driveway and notice the structure's resemblance to an Italian villa. Wayne, an architect, and Colleen, an interior designer, began applying their skills to the design of their home in 2000.

A former Kennett Square police officer who told young female victims that he was possessed by a spirit that needed to have sex with them has pleaded guilty. Just before his trial was scheduled to begin Monday, Jose Manuel Santiago, 56, of Newark, Del., pleaded guilty in Chester County Court, admitting to three counts of rape, three counts of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, and one count of aggravated indecent assault. The offenses will subject him to an evaluation to determine whether he qualifies as a sexually violent predator under Megan's Law. Under the terms of a plea agreement negotiated between Assistant District Attorney Kimberly A. Callahan and defense attorney Christian J. Hoey, Santiago will spend 121/2 to 25 years in prison, followed by 10 years of probation.

A Kennett Square man was struck by a vehicle and killed while trying to cross Route 1 in Chester County, state police said Sunday. Matthew Davis, 28, was hit at 7:36 p.m. Saturday south of Greenwood Road in East Marlborough Township, authorities said. He died of his injuries at Chester County Hospital, police said. Authorities identified the driver only as a 37-year-old Wilmington woman. Police are investigating. Anyone who witnessed the incident is asked to contact Trooper Elisha Bomberger at 610-268-2022.

A night that turned violent began with a baby shower in southern Chester County, according to testimony at the preliminary hearing Friday for five of 12 defendants accused of participating in a gang-linked double slaying. After listening to more than three hours of testimony, District Judge Matthew Seavey ruled that sufficient evidence existed to hold Manuel "Mongo" Mora, 20, of Kennett Square; Dominick Daddezio, 17, James L. Jones, 19, and Rafael "Rafa" Lopez Alvarado, 19, all of West Grove; and Cristian "Snoopy" Eumana, 18, of Greenville, Del., for trial on charges that include third-degree murder and conspiracy.

After nearly 41/2 years of litigation triggered by a dispute over compensatory time, a former Kennett Square police chief reached a six-figure settlement with the borough this week. Albert J. McCarthy, who now serves as chief in neighboring Kennett Township, said Wednesday that he would be paid $150,000 plus about $200,000 in back pension benefits. Barbara A. O'Connell, an attorney representing the borough, said that the borough admitted no liability and that officials would not comment.

In a remote area of southern Chester County's mushroom-growing country, young people partying around a bonfire on Dec. 3 scattered when two carloads of Sureños - a Hispanic gang - roared up, wielding bats, boards, knives, brass knuckles, and broken bottles. In the ensuing melee, two members of the rival Vikings gang (sometimes called the Vaqueros) were quickly surrounded, knocked to the ground, and beaten and stabbed to death, authorities said. The fatal ambush marked the bloodiest outbreak of gang violence in the area since 2004, when a man was fatally stabbed by a rival gang member outside a Kennett Square restaurant.

Seconds after entering a Kennett Square apartment Thursday afternoon, a man pulled a gun on the two people inside, ordering them to the floor, police said. Five hours later, two of the three suspects were in custody facing armed robbery charges, the result of "swift work and mutual cooperation" among multiple police agencies, said Kennett Square Police Chief Edward A. Zunino Jr. A third man was apprehended early Friday morning, he said. Zunino said the residents knew the men and let the trio into an apartment in the 100 block of State Street about 3:30 p.m. Once the victims were lying on the floor, the suspects took cash, several iPods, a laptop, a PlayStation 3 and some games.