Inside Today: Turkey Day traditions run deep • Page 1B
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Saturday, November 17, 2018 • Vol. 63 • No. 42
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Skimmer scam strikes area Valero station By Adam Zuvanich azuvanich@theleadernews.com An area gas station recently fell victim to a skimmer scam. According to a Houston Police Department report in response to a Thursday night call from an employee of the Valero station at 5121 N Shepherd Dr., credit card skimmers were identified and removed at three of the store’s 12 pumps. Skimmers are small devices, often inserted into ATMs and gas pumps, used to capture and store information contained
“We always caution people who are using ATMs or any device that you’re using at a gas pump to make sure it looks and feels sturdy as you’re using the machine.” -HPD spokesman John Cannon
in a card’s magnetic stripe. “I’ve been coming here for a while. I didn’t know anything about that,” Valero customer Jesus Figueroa said
while pumping gas there Wednesday morning. “It’s kind of shocking.” HPD spokesman John Cannon said skimmers have been used at stations
Love of Country
across the city during the last several years. “It’s crooks trying to take advantage of opportunities for fraud and to steal people’s identities and/or money,” Cannon said. A store employee confirmed Monday that there were skimmers in the station’s gas pumps last week, deferring further questions to Valero’s corporate office in San Antonio. Company spokesperson Lillian Riojas did not return messages left at her office Monday and Tuesday. See Skimmer P. 8A
Photo by Landan Kuhlmann Heights quarterback Mark Castro, left, prepares to pass during Tuesday’s practice.
Hot Bulldogs seek payoff in playoffs
Jason Knebel (713)232-9712
jasonk@greenwoodking.com
GREENWOOD KING
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By Landan Kuhlmann landan@theleadernews.com
Make it a Thanksgiving Potluck: While some travel to spend the holidays with family, others are staying put and celebrating with friends.
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David and Judi Keith sat together at the TALC’s Veterans Day celebration, where they might have paid more attention to each other than the band, master of ceremonies or lunch trays at their table. “They held hands the whole time,” TALC volunteer Jo Kelly Parrish said. “It was just so cute.” Love, and not just for country and those who serve it, was a theme at the annual Veterans Day event. Two of the volunteers from the Houston Junior Forum, Carolyn Kares and Margie Koch, are bound by their children’s love for each other. Koch’s son, Travis, an Air Force fighter pilot stationed in Alaska, married Kares’ daughter, Amanda, on Veterans Day in 2000. One of the couple’s sons was born Dec. 7, the anniversary of the Pearl Harbor bombing.
Heights High School football coach Stephen Dixon had one thing in mind when creating his 2018 schedule – test an inexperienced squad from the get-go and improve its mettle for late in the season. Up until now, at least, it’s paid off. Dixon and the Bulldogs will square off against Cypress Creek in the first round of the Class 6A Division II playoffs at 1 p.m. Saturday at Delmar Stadium. They are brimming with confidence following a lateseason run. “I knew we were going to be inexperienced with guys who had played varsity ball, and I wanted them to play a tough schedule coming out of the gate,” Dixon said. “(The tough schedule) just tests our resiliency and helps see whether we’re going to break apart, but we pulled it together and got better every week,” senior running back Emunn Parker added. The Bulldogs endured a rough run in nondistrict play, opening the season 0-4 against Spring Dekaney, New Caney, Brenham and Katy Seven Lakes – three of which will join Heights in the postseason. However, the Bulldogs righted the ship just before the calendar flipped to October, winning four of their final six contests. “That development and playing against those opponents would definitely help us get ready for the playoffs and get past that first round,” Dixon said. “I think this team has a sense of urgency. We’ve gotten better as the year has moved along, and the experience of losing those games and fighting through adversity bodes well for us heading into the postseason.” Included in the late-season surge was a
See Couple P. 5A
See Bulldogs P. 5A
Photo by Adam Zuvanich World War II and Korean War veteran Carl Angelone, right, shakes hands with Heights resident David Pita as Michelle Hager looks on during a Veterans Day celebration at the All Saints Third Age Learning Center on Nov. 9.
Elderly Heights couple enjoys rare outing on Veterans Day
Leave the cooking to the pros: Instead of prepping and cooking, let the pros take over. Check out these local restaurants on turkey day.
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The last WHAM: This Friday Fresh Arts celebrates the 13th anniversary of the Winter Holiday Art Market, which will be its last.
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FIND IT. OVERFLOWING, VINTAGE AND UNIQUE ESTATE SALE BY DELINDA: Mid-Century, antiques, collectibles, furniture, military, vintage electronics, decor, appliances and lots of unusual and unique. Check it out at https://www.estatesales.net/ TX/Houston/77099/2058252. 10518 Herald Square, 77099. Thursday-Saturday, Nov. 15-17, 8 a.m. Don’t miss it!
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THE INDEX. Church....................................................... 5A Classifieds.............................................. 4B Coupons................................................... 6A Food/Drink/Art................................... 1B Obituaries............................................... 5A Opinion..................................................... 4A Public Information......................... 2A Puzzles...................................................... 4A
By Adam Zuvanich azuvanich@theleadernews.com David and Judi Keith were overdue for a date. The Heights couple celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary earlier this year but were unable to commemorate the occasion with an event or even a dinner. They had not gone out together, or seen much of each other, since David suffered a stroke in the spring. The 79-year-old retiree and Army veteran, whose family moved to Houston the same December day Pearl Harbor was bombed in 1941, spent most of the last six months rehabilitating at St. Dominic Village, a senior care community. His brother, Dennis Keith, said David mostly was apart from Judi, a 75-year-old former schoolteacher who has been coping with cognitive issues and visited him once per week.
Photo by Adam Zuvanich Pat Martin, left, and Carolyn Kares were Veterans Day volunteers from the Houston Junior Forum.
The couple enjoyed a reunion of sorts Nov. 9 at the All Saints Third Age Learning Center, which is adjacent to the Catholic church where they have long been active members.
St. Rose honors those who serve Betsy Denson betsy@theleadernews.com World War II veteran Ernest Bugaj is 94 years old, but the memories of his time with the 492nd Bomber Group that he shared at the St. Rose of Lima Veterans Day dinner are still crystal clear. Drafted to serve and selected for the Air Force because of his score on an IQ test, Bugaj was stationed at North Pickenham, England, where he flew 67 missions in 89 days over Germany and Nazi-occupied countries. It was in the Silver Witch, a modified B-24 which had a 3,000-mile range, that Bugaj flew 17 of those missions, the last of which was on June 20, 1944. Twelve men were in the group’s lead plane attacking oil refineries at Politz, Germany, when they were shot down. Leaking so much gas that a return
trip to England was impossible, Bugaj and the remaining crew voted to try and land in Sweden. The plane’s navigator didn’t think they could make it. so he ejected, becoming a prisoner of war. The bombardier was already dead. The pilot and co-pilot managed to fly the damaged plane by standing and putting all their weight on the rudder controls. The crew threw out everything they could to lighten the load. The Silver Witch made it to a field near the airport in Malmo, Sweden. Because of Sweden’s neutrality, the crew then had to make it to Scotland before they could return home to the United States. Bugaj was just 19 years old. He says the uncertainty and fear of that time never left him. “I didn’t know we were going to get shot at every time we went out,” he See Honor P. 8A
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Photo by Betsy Denson World War II veteran Ernest Bugaj was just 19 years old when his plane was shot down and had to make an emergency landing in Sweden. He now is 94.
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