FBI Seeks Public Assistance Locating Antoine Burroughs, Who is Wanted on Federal Criminal Charges

FBI agents are looking for the public’s assistance in locating Antoine Burroughs, aka “Butter” or “Youngblood.” The FBI has just released a wanted poster for him, available at the conclusion of this release. Burroughs faces federal criminal charges for his alleged involvement in the attempted robbery of a man in Queens, New York. Burroughs was last known to be in Harlem. He is believed to have family and friends in Harlem and the Bronx.
Burroughs is 25 years old, is 6’1” tall, and weighs approximately 180 to 190 pounds. He has a prominent mole on his right cheek.
According to the allegations in the superseding indictment unsealed on March 18, 2014, in Manhattan federal court and on other documents in the public record: On September 9, 2009, Burroughs and his accomplice, Leon Whitfield, attempted to rob an individual named Bartolomeo Antoniello at his home in Queens, New York. Burroughs and Whitfield were targeting the cash proceeds of Antoniello’s pizza shop. Antoniello’s son, Gerardo Antoniello, was home at the time and attempted to protect his father. During the struggle, Gerardo Antoniello was shot in the head and died later of his injuries. He was 29 years old.
Burroughs is charged with one count of robbery conspiracy and one count of attempted robbery, which each carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; one count of discharging a firearm, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison and a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison; and one count of murder, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison or death. Whitfield was arrested on March 18, 2014, by FBI agents.
Anyone with information as to the whereabouts to Burroughs is urged to contact law enforcement immediately. The FBI can be reached 24 hours a day at 212-384-1000. Burroughs should be considered armed and extremely dangerous.

Ohio Killer Executed With New Lethal Drug Combo

A condemned Ohio inmate appeared to gasp several times and took more than 15 minutes to die Thursday as he was executed with a combination of drugs never before tried in the U.S.

Death row inmate Dennis McGuire made several loud snorting or snoring sounds during one of the longest executions since Ohio resumed capital punishment in 1999.

Ohio officials used intravenous doses of two drugs, the sedative midazolam and the painkiller hydromorphone, to put McGuire to death for the 1989 rape and fatal stabbing of a pregnant woman, Joy Stewart.

McGuire's adult children sobbed a few feet away in a witness room as they looked on at the state death house in Lucasville in southern Ohio.

McGuire thanked Stewart's family for a letter he apparently received from them referring to "kind words" he said meant a lot. "I'm going to heaven, I'll see you there when you come," he said.

In attempting to halt his execution, McGuire's attorneys argued he was at substantial risk of a medical phenomenon known as air hunger, causing him to experience "agony and terror" as he strained to catch his breath.

The state had adopted the new execution method after supplies of the state's previous drug dried up.

McGuire opened and shut his left hand as if waving to his daughter, son and daughter-in-law. More than a minute later he raised himself up, looked in the direction of his family and said, "I love you. I love you."

McGuire was still for almost five minutes, then emitted a loud snort, as if snoring, and continued to make that sound over the next several minutes. He also opened and shut his mouth several times without making a sound as his stomach rose and fell.

"Oh my God," his daughter, Amber McGuire, said as she observed her father's final moments.

A coughing sound was Dennis McGuire's last apparent movement, at 10:43 a.m. He was pronounced dead 10 minutes later.

Previous executions with the former execution drugs took much less time, and typically did not include the types of snorts and gasps that McGuire uttered.

State attorneys had disputed claims that McGuire would experience terror as he was put to death with the new method. A federal judge sided with the state but acknowledged the new method was an experiment. At the request of McGuire's lawyers, Judge Gregory Frost ordered the state to photograph and then preserve the drugs' packaging boxes and vials and the syringes used in the execution.

McGuire, 53, was sentenced to death for killing Stewart in Preble County in western Ohio. The newlywed was eight months pregnant at the time.

Stewart's slaying went unsolved for 10 months until McGuire, jailed on an unrelated assault and hoping to improve his legal situation, told investigators he had information about the woman's Feb. 12, 1989, death. His attempts to blame the crime on his brother-in-law quickly unraveled and soon he was accused of being the Joy Stewart's killer, according to prosecutors.

More than a decade later, DNA evidence confirmed McGuire's guilt, and he acknowledged that he was responsible in a letter to Gov. John Kasich last month.

"One can scarcely conceive of a sequence of crimes more shocking to the conscience or to moral sensibilities than the senseless kidnapping and rape of a young, pregnant woman followed by her murder," Preble County prosecutors said in a filing with the state parole board last month.

His attorneys argued McGuire was mentally, physically and sexually abused as a child and has impaired brain function that makes him prone to act impulsively.

"Dennis was at risk from the moment he was born," the lawyers said in a parole board filing. "The lack of proper nutrition, chaotic home environment, abuse, lack of positive supervision and lack of positive role models all affected Dennis' brain development."

Documents obtained by The Associated Press show McGuire unsuccessfully sought a reprieve in recent weeks to try to become an organ donor. In November, Kasich granted a death row inmate an eight-month reprieve to let the prison system study his request to donate a kidney to his sister and his heart to his mother.

Kasich said McGuire couldn't identify a family member who would receive his organs, as required under prison policy.

A fresh start for absentee fathers

Marcus Dixon refers to the tattoos on his face as the "art of war": an eye etched on his forehead, five stars down the left side of his face, and the words "don't cry" on his eyelids.

The tattoos are permanent reminders of his past life as a drug dealer.

Dixon got the tattoos, he said, to send a message to his enemies and the police to leave him alone.

"I had to create a character that no one would dare challenge," he said.

But Dixon's mother and his best friend feared for his safety. They staged an intervention and convinced him to make a fresh start.

Dixon stopped selling drugs and moved to Atlanta. But with a criminal record and no connections, he had a difficult time finding a job. After a few months, he moved back to Baltimore, dejected.

"I was at the lowest of my lows," he said.

He also wasn't in contact with his two sons, which troubled him since his own father hadn't been involved in his life. "I was confused, lost, and didn't have the slightest idea of how to be a good father," said Dixon, now 30. "I didn't have examples that could guide me."

Dixon's outlook began to change, however, when he followed his mother's advice and went to the Center for Urban Families in Baltimore. There, he's gotten job training, life skills and support that have made him much more optimistic about his future.

Since 1999, the center has helped thousands of Baltimore residents find jobs and enabled hundreds of fathers to become more responsible parents.

"What we want to do is get these people above ground and back into the mainstream," said Joe Jones, the nonprofit's founder and CEO. "We help them get them jobs so they can pay taxes and child support."

Most men, like Dixon, walk through the center's doors because they need help finding a job.

But Jones believes that jobs are just the first step. For him, the key to creating real change in Baltimore's troubled communities is ending what he calls "the cycle of father absence."

"If we don't crack the code of men having babies for whom they're not responsible for, all of our efforts to build a better Baltimore will be limited," said Jones, 57.

CNN Hero Joe Jones turned his life around, and now he wants to help other men do the same.

"We're there to create a pathway to help them to understand how to begin to take on that responsibility."

According to the 2012 American Community Survey just released by the U.S. Census Bureau, more than 19 million children across the country -- 26% -- are living without a father in the home. In Baltimore, among African-American children, the rate is 69%.

Jones says many of the men he tries to help grew up without fathers themselves. He also knows that children who grow up without fathers are more likely to become teen parents, use drugs and commit crimes, according to the National Fatherhood Initiative.

"The one thing that is consistent with all these men is that they want to be involved with the lives of their children, but they just don't know how," Jones said.

His nonprofit runs a Responsible Fatherhood program to give men the support and tools they need to become better parents and reverse the cycle.

A large part of that is helping men with their financial responsibilities. Jones says you can't fix the problem of deadbeat dads unless you address that many of them are dead broke. In the four Baltimore ZIP Codes where Jones' nonprofit works, there are nearly 3,000 men who together owe more than $40 million in child support, according to the Maryland Department of Human Resources.

It's my way of giving back ... in ways in which I took from my community many years ago.

When Dixon first came to the Center for Urban Families, he owed $47,000 in child support. The size of this debt discouraged him from seeking employment, he said, because it usually only paid minimum wage and most of his wages would be garnished.

But a counselor at the center helped Dixon arrange a plan with Child Support Services, which forgave more than $30,000 of his debt as long as he stayed employed.

The center also helped Dixon land a full-time job -- loading trucks on the overnight shift at a clothing warehouse -- so he could earn money while taking classes at Baltimore City Community College. Dixon, who now covers his tattoos with makeup every day, is six credits away from earning his associate's degree in general studies. He plans to apply to more colleges soon to study pharmacology and molecular sciences.

Jones' program also teaches men that being a father is about more than finances. They are taught nurturing skills, such as how to change diapers and communicate with their kids.

"You have a group of men speaking about issues they are having about their children," Dixon said. "That's unheard of. Men don't do that, especially black men in the neighborhoods that we come from.

"Without these meetings, I would not know how to be a father."

Dixon has now embraced his role as a dad. He recently filed for visitation rights with his eldest son, who is 10 years old, and he takes his younger son, age 3, to school at least three times a week.

Marcus Dixon is rebuilding his relationship with his 3-year-old son, Akeo.

"The first day I took him to school, I got the sense of fatherhood," Dixon said. "It has made me feel (like) more of a man."

Jones knows firsthand the struggles Dixon endured and the satisfaction he feels from having turned his life around. It's a transformation he experienced himself.

Jones grew up in Baltimore and remembers the day his own father left, when he was 9 years old. As a teenager, Jones became a heroin and cocaine addict and spent 17 years selling drugs and committing petty crimes to support his habit, spending time in and out of jail.

Jones said his biggest regret is that when he was 21, he had a son who he didn't take responsibility for.

In 1986, after being charged with multiple drug-related offenses, Jones decided to turn his life around. He begged a residential rehabilitation program to let him into the program, and he persuaded the judge to let him complete the one-year rehab instead of going to jail.

"I didn't want to go to jail anymore," Jones said. "I was physically and psychologically tired and my conscience was bothering me."

Jones earned his associate's degree at Baltimore City Community College, and he says he hasn't looked back. He found a series of nonprofit jobs and was hired by the Baltimore City Department of Health, eventually working on an initiative to improve maternal and child health.

Working there, in the early 1990s, it struck him that there were no programs for fathers.

So in 1992, Jones started the Men's Services program at the Department of Health, and the experience led him to found his nonprofit seven years later.

"It's my way of giving back ... in ways in which I took from my community many years ago," Jones said.

Now married, he's raised two children with his wife and has been able to repair his relationship with his eldest son Trey. Today, they often go to baseball games together, along with Jones' youngest son.

Jones' turnaround is an inspiration to Dixon and the other men in his program.

"When I learned Joe's story, (it) pretty much blew me away," Dixon said. "And look what he has obtained. So nothing's impossible.

"He's more than a role model. He's that North Star."

Now Dixon feels confident that he can follow Jones' example.

"Joe allowed me to find and restore my dignity," he said. "That's one of the greatest things that you can offer anyone."

"You can't become a better father without being a better man."

Dayton Man Pleads Guilty to Being an Armed Career Criminal

DAYTON—Mickey Allen Fugate, Jr., 40, of Dayton, Ohio, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to one count of interference with commerce by threats or violence (Hobbs Act) and one count of possession of a firearm following three or more violent felony convictions (Armed Career Criminal Act). If the court accepts the terms of the plea agreement, Fugate will serve at least 20 and up to 30 years in prison.
Carter M. Stewart, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio; Kevin R. Cornelius, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation; and Dayton Police Chief Richard Biehl announced the pleas entered today before U.S. District Judge Walter H. Rice.
According to court documents, Fugate robbed at gunpoint the Kwik-n-Kold convenience store on Wyoming Street in Dayton on November 14, 2009. During the robbery, Fugate shot and wounded one of the employees and fled with less than $500 in cash.
Officers with the FBI Dayton Safe Streets Task Force recovered a 9mm firearm loaded with nine rounds of ammunition, the store’s cash register tray, a tip jar, and approximately $168 from a residence to which Fugate fled following the robbery. Fugate was arrested and has been in custody since his arrest.
Fugate’s criminal record includes prior federal convictions for bank robbery, use of firearms in a crime of violence and attempted escape, and two burglary convictions in state court. Under federal law, this qualifies Fugate as an armed career criminal.
The court will conduct a pre-sentence investigation and determine whether or not to accept the terms of the plea agreement.
U.S. Attorney Stewart commended the cooperative investigation by special agents of the FBI and Dayton Police, as well as Assistant U.S. Attorneys Vipal Patel and Mary Beth Young, who are prosecuting the case.