Berrien Springs

BERRIEN SPRINGS – Police say a gas leak in downtown Berrien Springs has been stopped. They say a construction crew ruptured a gas main Thursday morning. Traffic was being detoured away from the intersection of Cass and Ferry, but that intersection is now open.    

Rescuers pulled a man from the frigid St. Joseph River Monday after he jumped off a bridge in Berrien Springs. Police say it happened just before 9 a.m. when a 49-year-old man parked his car at the Chapin Bridge, on U.S. 31 near Snow Road, and jumped over the railing. It took crews 30 minutes to reach the man and pull him from the water. He was incoherent when emergency crews rushed him to the hospital, where he is listed in stable condition.

An alcohol sales compliance check by Berrien Springs-Oronoko Township Police netted the arrest of a store sales clerk. When police notified the store owner, the clerk was fired. Police Chief Milt Agay released information Monday about the March 24 compliance checks on all liquor establishments in the Village of Berrien Springs and Oronoko Township. Agay’s news release states officers used an 18-year-old decoy who had training through the Michigan Liquor Control Commission.

Two incidents of men using free Wi-Fi intended for customers of two Berrien Springs businesses prompted police to issue a warning. Case No. 1 A Berrien Springs Oronoko Township Police officer spotted a man standing in an alley behind a business about mid-day. The man was holding his laptop in one hand and masturbating with the other. Police say the man connected his computer to the Internet through the Wi-Fi offered by the business. Police seized the man’s computer after arresting him on multiple felony charges.

ST. JOSEPH — The Berrien Springs mother accused of handcuffing her son to a chair as punishment for shoplifting will not be charged with a crime, the Berrien County prosecutor’s office announced today. Her 16-year-old son told police Feb. 8 he had been directed to stay in a 6-foot by 4-foot room at their home over the past three weeks because of the shoplifting incident Jan. 17. In a news release today, Berrien County Prosecutor Art Cotter said that after interviews with the boy, along with his parents’ openness to counseling, he did not believe it to be in the best interest of the family to pursue charges.

Geston Pierre said he plans to return to Andrews University in January to continue his graduate studies in seminary. But he won’t come back to Berrien Spring empty-handed. In just a few short weeks, Pierre went from a relative unknown to a star after his six-member group, Committed, competed on and won season two of the NBC reality series "The Sing-Off," which pitted 10 a cappella groups against each other. The group was chosen as the winner on Monday night’s season finale and awarded a music contract and $100,000, after capturing America’s vote over second-place Nashville group Street Corner Symphony.

NILES — A Berrien Springs funeral home owner will be sentenced May 2 for embezzling more than $260,000 of people's prepaid funeral funds over the last several years. Matthew Purchase, 40, of East Washington Street in Berrien Springs, is the owner of Legacy Family Funeral Services in Berrien Springs. He was arrested last August on 15 embezzlement related charges and faced a March 8 trial. Thursday, Purchase pleaded guilty to two counts, one count of racketeering and conducting a criminal enterprise, a 20-year felony, and one count of attempted embezzlement over $20,000, a five-year felony.

An investigation continues into who tossed a meth lab into a grassy area on Red Bud Trail near Grange Road early Sunday morning. Berrien Springs-Oronoko Fire Department responded to a grass fire call at 3:13 a.m. After the fire was out, both fire and police determined a meth lab caused the fire.   Fortunately, no one was injured by the fire, but Berrien Springs Oronoko Township Police warn anyone seeing meth labs along road sides, trash cans, fields or anywhere, not to touch them.

BERRIEN COUNTY - A 70-year-old Berrien County masseur has been arrested after one of his clients complained he touched her inappropriately. According to investigators, Johan Albert Abrahams was operating a massage business out of his home in Berrien Springs when a 39-year-old client told police that he began touching her in inappropriate places against her will. She told police that she came forward because of what happened but also to make sure no one else became a victim.

BERRIEN SPRINGS — A Niles man is safe after jumping into Lake Chapin from the St. Joseph Valley Parkway overpass Tuesday in an apparent suicide attempt. Berrien Springs-Oronoko Township Police didn’t identify the man, 49, but said he was retrieved from the lake by a fire department rescue boat and taken to Lakeland Regional Medical Center in St. Joseph for treatment and evaluation. Police said they were dispatched to the bridge shortly before 9 a.m. where they discovered an unoccupied vehicle parked on the bridge and a man struggling to keep afloat in the lake.