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The Top Headlines of the Decade That Stopped Manhattan – and the World

By DNAinfo Staff on December 28, 2009 9:58am  | Updated on December 29, 2009 3:29pm

The body of actor Heath Ledger is removed from a Soho apartment by the NYC Medical Examiner team Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2008, in New York. Ledger, 28, an Australian-born actor, was found dead in the Manhattan residence, Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2008.
The body of actor Heath Ledger is removed from a Soho apartment by the NYC Medical Examiner team Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2008, in New York. Ledger, 28, an Australian-born actor, was found dead in the Manhattan residence, Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2008.
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(AP Photo/ Louis Lanzano)

MANHATTAN — Never in modern history did New York’s crime rate plummet so low as it did in the past decade. Despite this unparalleled achievement, which did not take into account the events of Sept. 11, 2001, Manhattan remained a place of tragic crimes, celebrity deaths and other sensational stories that captivated the world.

Carnegie Deli massacre: Sean Salley and accomplice Andre Smith shot five people in the head, killing three of them, during a May 10, 2001 robbery in an apartment above the Carnegie Deli. Among the victims was Jennifer Stahl, 39, an actress who had appeared in “Dirty Dancing” and sold marijuana from the apartment, a few blocks north of Times Square. The killers are serving 120-year prison sentences.

Van Vlaanderen, left, and Norma Collin vowed to keep vigil outside 927 Fifth Avenue, from where the nest of Pale Male and his mate Lola was moved.
Van Vlaanderen, left, and Norma Collin vowed to keep vigil outside 927 Fifth Avenue, from where the nest of Pale Male and his mate Lola was moved.
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AP Photo/Kathy Willens

City Council killing: City Councilman James Davis, a former police officer, was shot to death on July 23, 2003 in the Council’s chambers by a political rival he’d just escorted past security. The rival, Othniel Askew, was shot to death by a plainclothes police officer. Davis’ mother, Thelma, and his brother, Geoffrey, formed an anti-violence organization as a result.

The Blackout: On Aug. 14, 2003, Manhattan was caught in the largest blackout in United States history.  An electricity overload caused a circuit breakers to trip and cut off power to cities from Toronto to Detroit to New York City. Subways ground to a halt, elevators stopped and people were glued to radios for the latest word on when the lights would come back on. Mayor Michael Bloomberg told New Yorkers to treat the event like a snow day. Despite the chaos, New Yorkers endured. Some got out in the street to direct traffic. Others kept their stories open, and even cut prices on ice cream to sell it off before it melted. Power was slowly restored the following day, with much of it back up and running by that night.

The ballad of Pale Male: Manhattan’s most famous bird, Pale Male, a red-tailed hawk who’d been living in the area of Central Park since the early 1990s, found his latest mate, Lola, in 2002. They built a nest on top of a window of an upscale residential apartment building at 927 Fifth Ave., where they raised seven chicks. In December 2004, the building’s co-op board removed the nest, sparking an international outcry. Among the alleged villains was CNN anchor Paula Zahn, whose husband sat on the board. Among the heroes was Mary Tyler Moore, a resident who opposed the nest’s removal. The board relented, and the nest was restored. Their saga has inspired several books, a documentary, and legions of bird-watchers looking for hawks above the city.

Actress gunned down on Lower East Side: On Jan. 27, 2005, aspiring actress and playwright Nicole duFresne was shot in the chest during a 3 a.m. mugging on Clinton Street. The 28-year-old victim, who was from Minnesota, reportedly challenged one of her attackers by saying, “You got what you want. What are you going to do, shoot us?” The crime exposed the frictions of a gentrifying neighborhood and inspired Richard Price’s novel “Lush Life.” The killer, Rudy Fleming, is serving life in prison.

Ex-journalist tortures woman: Peter Braunstein, a former fashion writer for Women’s Wear Daily posed as a firefighter on Halloween night in 2005, then set off smoke bombs in a Chelsea apartment building hallway to trap his victim in her home. He drugged her, tied her to a bed, stripped her naked and over the next 13 hours molested and videotaped her. He was given a 20-year prison sentence, and has told a reporter that he had “no desire to try to rehabilitate myself.”

Bouncer murders grad student: Darryl Littlejohn kidnapped Imette St. Guillen, 24, at closing time at a SoHo bar on Feb. 26, 2006, then raped and strangled her and dumped her body in Brooklyn. Littlejohn was sentenced to life in prison. St. Guillen’s family is now suing the federal government for poorly supervising Littlejohn after he left prison on a robbery conviction two years before the murder.

Woman killed after night of clubbing: After leaving a Chelsea nightclub in the early morning of July 25, 2006, 18-year-old Jennifer Moore began wandering the streets of Manhattan. She was allegedly picked up by Draymond Coleman and his girlfriend, Krystal Riordan, and taken to a hotel in New Jersey, where she was beaten, raped, strangled and stuffed into suitcase. The killing was one of several attacks on Manhattan club-goers, and led to the creation of an undercover police unit that was involved in the fatal shooting of an unarmed man outside a Queens strip club later that year.

Yankee pitcher's plane flies into building: On Oct. 11, 2006, days after pitching in the American League Divisional Series, Cory Lidle died in a small plane that slammed into a building on E. 72nd Street. Lidle, 34, was in the plane with his flight instructor, but investigators never determined who was at the controls. Lidle’s widow has sued the plane’s maker, Cirrus Design Corp, citing a breakdown in the plane’s controls. The crash spurred regulators to temporarily restrict air traffic above the East River, a rule that was made permanent in August 2009, after a tourist helicopter crashed into a single-engine plane over the Hudson River, killing nine people.

Acting coach Rosalie Tenseth speaks during a memorial service for slain actress Nicole duFresne at the Angel Orensanz Foundation Center for the Arts, on New York's Lower East Side, Thursday, Feb. 3, 2005.
Acting coach Rosalie Tenseth speaks during a memorial service for slain actress Nicole duFresne at the Angel Orensanz Foundation Center for the Arts, on New York's Lower East Side, Thursday, Feb. 3, 2005.
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(AP Photo/John Marshall Mantel)

Greenwich Village gun rampage: Unarmed auxiliary police officers Nicholas Pekearo and Eugene Marshalik were shot to death near the intersection of Sullivan and Bleecker streets after confronting a gunman on March 14, 2007. The killer, David Garvin, had just shot a bartender and was trying to escape. After gunning down the officers, Garvin was shot to death by full-time NYPD officers. Pekearo, 28, was an aspiring writer whose science fiction novel was published after his death. Marshalik, 19, was a student at NYU. A battle ensued over their families’ rights to death benefits. It ended in 2008 with federal authorities allowing the payments.

The steampipe explosion: Many commuters heading home to Grand Central were sent scattering on July 18, 2007 when a steam pipe underneath Lexington Avenue at 41st Street burst, sending a geyser of scalding steam, mud and pavement into the air. One person was killed and 30 more were injured by the blast. The pipe was more than a foot and a half in diameter and was believed to have been installed in the 1920s. Officials believed the eruption occurred after cold water, perhaps rain water, touched the steam pipe. Con Edison said an inspection of the pipe earlier in the day revealed nothing wrong. Most of the injuries were the result of falling debris. Two people were severely injured after the pipe exploded in front of the truck they were driving in, showering them with steam.  The death was the result of a heart attack.  The blast also raised asbestos fears, as the pipe was encased in it, and several rounds of finger-pointing between the city and ConEd.

Ledger dies from overdose: Actor Heath Ledger, 28, was found dead in his SoHo apartment on Jan. 22, 2008 after he accidentally overdosed on prescription medications. He had just completed filming "The Dark Knight," in which he played The Joker and won a posthumous Academy Award for best supporting actor. He was also at work on Terry Gilliam’s "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus," which will be released this year.

Miracle on the Hudson: Shortly after US Airways Flight 1549 took off from LaGuardia Airport bound for Charlotte, N.C., on Jan. 15, 2009, the plane hit a flock of geese, causing it to lose power in both engines.  Unable to make it back to LaGuardia, or to any other nearby airport, Captain Chesley" Sully" Sullenberger III, 57, decided he had to land the plane on the Hudson River. What resulted has been called a miracle, and is perhaps the most sensational feel-good story of the decade, if not several recent decades. Sullenberger landed the aircraft flawlessly on the river, and all 155 people on board were safely rescued, after a flotilla of New Yorkers on watercraft converged to take them from the plane.  Ever since, Sullenberger has been hailed as a hero, and wrote a book. In September, he returned to work, flying the same route to Charlotte he was on that fateful day in January.

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      With diplomas seen in the foreground, Maureen Saint Guillen, right, is joined onstage by her daughter Alejandra, as she holds up a photo of her daughter Imette Saint Guillen during the John Jay College of Criminal Justice commencement ceremony, Monday, June 5, 2006 in New York. Imette St. Guillen, a John Jay College of Criminal Justice graduate student who was found dead in Brooklyn earlier this year was honored with a posthumous degree Monday. Her mother and sister accepted the degree at the graduation ceremony.
* * With diplomas seen in the foreground, Maureen Saint Guillen, right, is joined onstage by her daughter Alejandra, as she holds up a photo of her daughter Imette Saint Guillen during the John Jay College of Criminal Justice commencement ceremony, Monday, June 5, 2006 in New York. Imette St. Guillen, a John Jay College of Criminal Justice graduate student who was found dead in Brooklyn earlier this year was honored with a posthumous degree Monday. Her mother and sister accepted the degree at the graduation ceremony.
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(AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)