Rocky Hollow's homes and shaded sidewalks hearken back to the style of the 1920s and '30s, but they also belie the decline the entire neighborhood has seen in relatively recent years. But the old guard and newcomers alike are getting mad and don't plan to accept that decline anymore.

A Calhoun County jury Thursday found a Montgomery man, Robert Devon Jenkins, guilty in the 2011 murder of Anniston resident Marcus Marks. Jenkins, 23, shot Marks during a domestic dispute in front of Marks’ home in March 2011. Throughout the four-day trial prosecutors presented testimony from three witnesses at the scene at Marks’ house on East 22nd Street in Anniston, Calhoun County District Attorney Brian McVeigh said.

“I think this device will help, although I’ve not seen it yet,” Oxford police Chief Bill Partridge said. “Anything we can do to prevent an individual from getting behind the wheel drunk is a good thing.”

For the first time in years, Joe Sorvillo can climb a long flight of stairs. He did so Thursday morning on the steps at the Kirklin Clinic: down and up and down again, as he went from chest X-rays to the waiting room to the pharmacy and back to waiting. “I couldn’t do that before,” he said, referring to the time prior to the implant he received from Justin Sollohub.

Some residents of one of east Anniston's oldest neighborhoods are feeling the tentacles of blight and crime wrapping around their streets, but based on turnout at a community meeting, it's evident they are determined to banish that 'monster' from their midst. They'd rather fight than move, some said.

Anniston police this morning were investigating an apparent shooting at the Shell gas station at 1731 Quintard Ave. that left one man in the hospital, injured but expected to recover.

(Updated 12:30 a.m.) Police have issued an Amber Alert for a 5-year-old boy believed to be abducted from a yard near his west Anniston home. Investigators are searching for Michiri Zaquae Dabney after his mother called authorities to say her son had been kidnapped, Lt. Fred Forsythe said. Forsythe urged anyone with information about Dabney, the suspect van or the case to call the Anniston Police Department's investigative division at 256-240-4000.

She needed a cane to hobble 15 steps from her apartment to her car. She used a wheelchair for anything farther than that. At 5-foot-5, Andrea Cheeks weighed 550 pounds. The Sylacauga woman couldn’t walk, couldn’t work, couldn’t shop, couldn’t leave her home without help. Couldn’t breathe sometimes. At 43, she had high blood pressure, diabetes, sleep apnea and an ulcer eating away at her leg as a result of problems with blood circulation.