'Dear, sweet' mom of four gunned down in Philly

'Dear, sweet' Kathryn Berry

PHILADELPHIA, PA -- A "dear, sweet," mother-of four was gunned down as she walked her dog near a Philadelphia park.
Kathryn Berry, 42, never had issues with anyone or received any threats, family members told NBC Philadelphia.
"She was a dear, sweet woman," said James Graves, a relative of Berry's. "She was a good heart."
Berry was shot in the forehead and the leg by a man who investigators describe as "heavy set" with a grey and black beard, standing between five-foot-11 and six-feet. He was carrying a silver handgun, they said. 
Berry who was found by her daughter moments after the shooting, later died of her injuries. 

PHILLY HOUSE OF HORRORS: EXCLUSIVE FIRST PICS

THESE are the first shocking pictures of the House of Horrors where four mentally disabled people were forced to live by monsters, who cops allege wanted to cash their social security checks. 

As we reported yesterday three men and a woman, each with the mental capacity of no more than 10, were found living in squalid conditions, behind a locked steel door, in the sub-basement of an apartment building. 

WHO MURDERED IRIS TYSON ON MOTHER'S DAY?

IRIS TYSON was a pretty blonde, 23-year-old Philadelphia woman who was close to her family and friends. But this past Mother's Day, while looking for a gift for her mom she was murdered.
Her grandma Florence Murtha said: "She said I'll be right back. I'm gonna go get a mother's day gift."
But she never came home and after a massive search of her south Philly neighborhood, her body was found in a vacant lot. She had been bludgeoned to death. Her grandma said: "I remember driving around looking for her and thinking 'you're so close, but where?' You need me and I'm not there to help you. And I apologized to her for that. That I wasn't there to help you." But so far, there have been no arrests and cops are not saying if there are even any

REBECCA OLENCHOCK GETS LIFE FOR MURDERING MOM

HER MOTHER was holding Rebecca Olenchock back--so she killed her. And now, the 25-year-old Pennsylvania woman is going to spend the rest of her life behind bars for the bludgeoning/burning murder. On Oct. 17, 2010, attack. Olenchock repeatedly hit her sleeping mother, Kimberly Venose, with a bat in the crude hut where they had lived for two years in the woods of lower Bucks County, outside Philadelphia.  Thinking her mother was dead, Olenchock set a fire at the foot of Venose's bed and locked the door of the hut. She then drove to Tennessee to meet up with a boyfriend she had met online. The mother refused to work, spent all of Olenchock's money and would not move out of the woods.
She told cops: "I wanted a new life and I wanted to take her with me, but she wouldn't go." MORE IN THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER

TEEN HELPED JIHAD JANE PLOT VIOLENT TERROR: FBI

SHE WAS the notorious Big Mama of the terror set. He was a Maryland teen, new to America and on his way to university--now that appears to be jail. The Philadelphia Inquirer says a 17-year-old teen conspired with Colleen LaRose--AKA Jihad Jane, pictured right--to solicit money and recruits for violent jihad in America. The boy--known only as Mohammed K.-- came from Pakistan four years ago.
Mohammed's arrest came six months after LaRose, who called herself "Jihad Jane" on websites, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to provide material support to

GERALD CHRISTOPHER TERRIFIED BEFORE HE VANISHED

GERALD CHRISTOPHER doesn't look like the kind of guy who scares easily. Standing 6’4 and at over 200lbs – he had an imposing presence. Yet, in the days before his disappearance, Christopher was seriously spooked. The Philadelphia-area personal trainer told his fiancé that they were in danger, and that they should flee the country.
His behaviour became even stranger when, at a friend’s barbeque, he was introduced to a woman who for an unknown reason caused him to freak out. After shaking her hand he ran to his car and sped away, according to his fiancé Roxy Merat. Two days later – he’d disappeared – sneaking out of his apartment leaving his keys, wallet and cell.
Radnor police said that Christopher (known to friends as ‘Chris’) does not have

WEATHERMAN JOHN BOLARIS' SCAMMERS PLEAD GUILTY

TWO EASTERN European bar girls have pleaded out to slipping Philly weatherman John Bolaris a roofie and robbing him of $50,000 in South Beach. The two sultry svetlanas plied the handsome Fox 29 meteorologist with booze and also slipped him a roofie. Two days later he came to in the back of a taxi with a massive hangover, a huge loss and a huge painting of a woman's face. His lawyer said: "The fact remains. that John is one of several victims, and he feels vindicated by these pleas of guilty. It's been a long ordeal."

The embarassed broadcaster told Miami cops he met the two b-girls, Anna Kilimatova and Marina Turcina at a bar, where they approached him.  He

MOB CHIEF JOE LIGAMBI HIT WITH BIG INDICTMENT

THE PHILADELPHIA mob has again been thrown into turmoil with the arrest of Mafia kingpin Joseph "Uncle Joe" Ligambi, 71. More of the Angelo Bruno style than Crazy Nicky Scarfo, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer, Ligambi was reluctant to use violence because it interferrred with his money making schemes. The arrest Monday could signal the end of his run and further imperil the Philadelphia mob. The gentleman gangster and others were hammered with a 50-count indictment that focuses on racketeering, loan-sharking and gambling. But curiously missing is any semblance of violence, of course there are

PHILLY COPS BAFFLED BY BRUTAL IRIS TYSON MURDER

WHO killed Iris Tyson? That's a question cops in Philadelphia would like to answer. The pretty blonde 23-year-old was found bludgeoned to death in an overgrown lot on Sunday.
A cousin told the Philadelphia Daily News: "My cousin would never come here on her own."
Tyson vanished on Mother's Day after telling her parents she was going out to buy a card and a gift for her mom. By evening she hadn't returned and her parents filed a missing persons report and plastered the neighborhood with posters, hoping someone saw something.
But on Sunday, their hopes were crushed when a person collecting bottles discovered her body in tall weeds next to an abandoned home in South

FRIENDS, FAMILY SAY GOODBYE TO SKYLAR KAUFFMAN

IT WILL be a sad day in suburban Philadelphia today as friends and family say goodbye to Skylar Kauffman. The pretty 9-year-old was raped and murdered, allegedly by a neighbor, last week after she disappeared from the parking lot where she was playing.
Her funeral will be held today in suburban Montgomery County. Last night the Grade 3 student was remembered fondly as a little girl who loved swimming and dancing and always had a big smile.
Family friend Lana Goldstein said: "She was just a happy, great, fun loving, little girl. She used to come to Lutheran Community and visit

TWISTED TATTOOIST WALTER MEYERLE: 200 SEX VICTIMS

TWISTED tattoist Walter Meyerle traded ink for dink with scores of underage girls. Ohhhh, that Walter. Yep. The one who was busted in March and charged with giving a girl, 14, in exchange for sex. Now, cops say it wasn't just the one incident. The suburban Philadelphia sicko has been charged with sex crimes with more than a dozen other children--some of them as young as 4. Most of the victims were children of friends and girlfriends. The errant inker now faces somewhere in the vicinity of 200 sex crime charges. Tally? Two adults and 14 kids. The assaults took place over the last 13 years and involved children ranging in age from 4 to 17-years-old, law enforcement sources said.
Public safety director Fred Harran said: "My only hope is that this guy gets

SKYLAR KAUFFMAN: TROUTMAN LOCKED HER IN HIS APT.

KILLER?

TERRIFIED and surrounded by pictures of naked women Skylar Kauffman and her friend realized her alleged murderer, James Troutman had locked them in his apartment after offering to: "show them his bird."
But three weeks to the day before her death, the nine-year-old and her pal were able to escape from his Philadelphia, PA apartment where cops later found a pool of her blood and a single shoe of hers. The girls went willingly, but when they saw the pictures, when Troutman offered to show them his "bird," and when they

SKYLAR KAUFFMAN MURDER: JAMES TROUTMAN NABBED

P.M. UPDATE: POLICE in Pennsylvania have charged a 24-year-old man with first-degree murder in the sickening sex slaying of 9-year-old Skylar Kauffman. Sources say James Lee Troutman, a neighbor, confessed to the murder. The little girl went missing Monday and her body was found around midnight, wrapped in a blanket and dumped in a trash bin. She had been sexually abused and strangled. Police sources say Troutman wasn't very hard to find: he was in the vicinity and had blood on his shoes.

MURDER OF SKYLAR KAUFFMAN, 9, 'TERRIBLY VIOLENT'

A SEARCH for a 9-year-old Philadelphia-area girl has ended in heartbreak. The body of Skylar Kauffman was discovered in a  dumpster around midnight Monday after detectives followed a bloody trail. Cops have arrested a 40-year-old neighbor and expect him to be charged within hours in the "terribly violent" slaying.
Skylar had been playing outside her parents apartment in suburban Souderton Monday when she disappeared. But when the man grabbed her in the sex-fuelled attack, cops say she put up a heroic struggle that may ultimately send her killer to his death.
Police chief James P. O'Leary told Fox 29: