Intercontinental to pay $8.2B for NYSE

The IntercontinentalExchange has agreed to buy rival exchange NYSE Euronext for $8.2 billion, as it moves to create one of the top futures markets in Europe and position the combined group to challenge arch rival CME Group.

The two exchanges said in an emailed statement on Thursday ICE had agreed to pay $33.12 a share for NYSE Euronext made up of one third cash and two thirds ICE shares.

NYSE Euronext shares were up more than 30 percent on the news while IntercontinentalExchange Inc. shares reversed earlier declines and were recently up more than 2 percent.

The multi-billion dollar deal designed to push it into the big league of European derivatives and take on arch rival CME Group.

ICE may consider a spin-off or sale of NYSE's stock markets, a source told Reuters. As well as the 200-year old New York exchange, the NYSE also owns bourses in Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels and Lisbon.

"We can't exclude any option at this stage. It's all down to what regulators will require to get the deal approved, and to the timeframe they will give ICE to meet these targets," a source familiar with the situation told Reuters, adding that a deal was expected to be announced later on Thursday.

ICE has proposed buying NYSE, which also owns derivatives market Liffe, for $33 per share, a 37 percent premium to its Wednesday closing price, CNBC said.

One-third of the deal would be funded by cash and the rest in stock, the source confirmed.

NYSE and ICE representatives declined to comment.

Analysts said a deal would give Atlanta-based ICE a strategic boost with control of Liffe, Europe's second-largest derivatives market, helping it compete against U.S.-based CME Group Inc., owner of the Chicago Board of Trade.

"ICE is after Liffe, that is the crown jewel of NYSE Euronext. ICE could potentially sell the U.S. and European equities business, but could struggle to find a buyer. A spin-off of this business could be more likely," said Peter Lenardos, analyst at RBC Capital Markets.

"Strategically it makes sense for ICE to enter the European derivatives space in a meaningful way, but paying $10 billion -- with debt -- to do so sounds generous for NYSE shareholders and expensive for ICE shareholders.

At the close of trading on Wednesday, NYSE was worth about $5.8 billion, indicating that ICE may be willing to pay roughly $8 billion for the owner of the world's largest stock market.

NYSE shares jumped 12 percent in after-hours trading to $26.96. ICE shares rose 3.1 percent to $132.32.

REGULATORY THUMBS-UP

An ICE-NYSE Euronext tie-up would leap-frog Deutsche Boerse to become the world's third-largest exchange group with a combined market value of $15.2 billion. CME Group, ICE's largest U.S.-based rival, has a market value of $17.5 billion, Thomson Reuters data shows.

Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing is the world's largest exchange group with a market capitalization of $19.5 billion.

ICE's main operations are in energy futures trading and unlike NYSE Euronext, it has steered clear of stocks and stock-options trading, so there is not much business overlap between the two groups, making it more likely competition authorities would approve a tie-up.

Last year, the U.S. Justice Department blocked a $11 billion joint hostile bid by ICE and Nasdaq OMX Group for NYSE Euronext on concerns the tie-up would dominate U.S. stock listings.

If that bid had succeeded, ICE planned to buy NYSE Euronext derivatives business while Nasdaq would have taken control of the stock exchanges.

A rival $9.3 billion bid by German exchange operator Deutsche Boerse also ran afoul of regulators.

"I doubt the competition authorities will have a problem with it, there's only a modest overlap between the businesses," said Richard Perrott, an analyst at Berenberg Bank.

"The rationale for the deal will be the same as that with Deutsche Boerse -- migrate the clearing of Liffe derivatives to ICE's services in London and scale up to attract OTC (Over The Counter) derivatives clearing. There could be more than $300 million in cost savings in the deal."

Before the latest ICE offer emerged, NYSE Euronext's shares had fallen by nearly a third since ICE and Nasdaq launched their thwarted joint bid.

The New York Stock Exchange, known as the Big Board and the symbol of U.S. capitalism, has seen its clout fade as new technology and the rise of private trading venues run by Wall Street banks and brokers cut its margins.

Founded in 2000 as a U.S. electricity trading platform backed by Wall Street banks and energy traders, ICE is the product of a string of acquisitions, from the London-based International Petroleum Exchange in 2001 through the New York Board of Trade and, most recently, a handful of smaller deals, including a climate exchange and a stake in a Brazilian clearing house.

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Snow, high winds -- but maybe a white Christmas, too

A snow storm is headed for the Chicago area and WGN's Tom Skilling tells you what you can expect. (Posted Dec. 19th, 2012)

A winter storm whipped by high winds is expected to hit the Chicago area just in time for the evening rush hour Thursday, dumping up to 4 inches here but maybe a foot or more in Wisconsin where a blizzard warning has been issued.

But on the bright side (for some, at least), the National Weather Service is giving us a 30 percent chance of a white Christmas next week.

Thursday will begin with rain but that will change to snow around 6 p.m. as temperatures plunge. Winds will gust at 50 mph and wind chills will drop into the single digits, according to the weather service. There could even be thunder snow, it said.

The snow will continue past midnight and there could still be flurries for the morning commute Friday.

Chicago and most of the collar counties could see 2 to 4 inches of snow, with 1 to 2 inches south of Joliet and 4 to 6 inches near Rockford and Dixon, the weather service said. This would be the first measurable snowfall for Chicago this season -- and the latest it has ever occurred.

The worst of the storm will be north and west of Chicago: Both the Davenport and Milwaukee offices of the weather service have issued blizzard warnings.

“Winter’s held off so long, it’s going to come here with a bang,” weather service meteorologist Jamie Enderlen said.

In Wisconsin, the heaviest snow is expected to arrive after midnight and continue throughout the day on Thursday. Wind gusts of up to 45 mph by Thursday afternoon should make travel treacherous.

The weather service posted blizzard warnings for at least eight south central counties for Thursday afternoon. Forecasters say it could be the biggest snowstorm to hit the state since the Groundhog Day blizzard last year. That storm dumped 1 to 2 feet of snow in southeastern Wisconsin.

WGN-Channel 9 meteorologist Tom Skilling warns that the lack of snow to date over a wide swath of the Midwest, including Chicago, means there's no residual ice-deterring chemicals on the road which "could lead to especially icy road surfaces, producing hazardous travel conditions."

Skilling also reports that Chicago's first measurable snow of the season is usually a minor event, totaling just a few tenths of an inch and not causing any problems. But a check of the city's snow archives dating back to 1884 found that Chicago has logged 12 first measurable snowfalls of 3 inches or more.

The largest was 4.8 inches on Nov. 15, 1940 that helped boost that month to the city's snowiest November on record. The month ended with 14.8 inches of snow. The 1940-41 snow season went on to produce a robust 52.5 inches, well above the city's current 36.7 inch normal.

The forecast for next week is a little cheerier. For Christmas Day, the weather service says it will be in the middle 30s with a 30 percent chance of light snow.

chicagobreaking@tribune.comTwitter: @chicagobreaking

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“Best Funeral Ever” premiere delayed after Newtown school shootings

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Fans of death-centric reality TV will have to wait a little longer to dig into TLC‘s “Best Funeral Ever.”

TLC has pushed back the premiere of the special to January 6 at 10/9c in light of the school shootings in Newtown, Conn. last week.

“Best Funeral Ever” was initially scheduled to premiere on December 26 at 8/7c.

“Best Funeral Ever” centers around the Golden Gate Funeral Home in Dallas, which specializes in elaborate specialty funerals catering to the deceased’s interest. In the special, a doo-wop singer famous for his rib-sauce jingle receives a barbecue-themed sendoff, while a disabled man who was unable to ride roller coasters in mortal life receives a State Fair-themed funeral.

Since last Friday’s horrific shootings, a number of programs and other entertainment-related events have been moved out of sensitivity. Syfy, for one, decided not to air its scheduled episode of “Haven” on Friday night, because it contained elements of fictionalized school violence.

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U.S. to sell GM stake in 15 months

The Treasury plans to sell its remaining stake in General Motors over the next 15 months, allowing the automaker to shed the stigma of being partly owned by the U.S. government.

GM said Wednesday it will spend $5.5 billion to buy back 200 million shares of its stock from the Treasury by the end of this year. The government, in turn, plans to sell its remaining stake of 300 million shares on the open market over the next 12 to 15 months.

GM will pay $27.50 for each share, about an 8 percent premium over Tuesday's closing price of $25.49. The shares shot up more than 8 percent in premarket trading to $27.57.

The deal almost certainly means that the government will lose billions on a $49.5 billion bailout that saved GM from being auctioned off in pieces during the financial crisis in 2008 and 2009. GM's buyback will cut the Treasury's stake to 19 percent from 26.5 percent. For it to break even, Treasury would have to sell the remaining 300 million shares for average of about $70.

For GM, getting the government out of its business removes a major business obstacle. GM Chief Financial Officer Dan Ammann told reporters that GM has market research showing that government ownership has held down sales of the company's cars and trucks.

"This is fundamentally good for the business," he said at a hastily called news conference Wednesday morning.

The government got its stake as part of the bailout of GM that began nearly four years ago.

The Treasury Department said in a statement that it would sell the remaining 19 percent stake "in an orderly fashion" within the next 12 to 15 months, subject to market conditions.

Treasury said it will have recovered more than $28.7 billion of its investment through repayments of loans, sales of stock, dividends, interest and other income after GM buys back the 200 million shares. But that leaves Treasury about $21 billion short of recouping its investment.

In 2008 and 2009, the U.S. Treasury bailed out GM to help stabilize and restructure the company at the trough of the financial crisis. The bailouts of GM and Chrysler were part of the $700 billion Trouble Asset Relief Program created by Congress during the financial crisis in the fall of 2008.

"The auto industry rescue helped save more than a million jobs during a severe economic crisis," said Timothy Massad, Treasury's assistant secretary for financial stability. "The government should not be in the business of owning stakes in private companies for an indefinite period of time."

Massad said that exiting the GM investment "is consistent with our dual goals of winding down TARP as soon as practicable and protecting taxpayer interests."

Although GM is paying a premium for the government shares, Ammann said it's still a good deal for GM shareholders. The number of shares on the market will reduced about 11 percent, which should increase the value of the remaining shares.

The move was approved by the GM board on Tuesday evening after the company got opinions from its management and financial advisers, GM said.

Government-ordered pay restrictions will remain in effect. But a ban on corporate jet ownership and requirements on manufacturing a certain percentage of GM cars and trucks in the U.S. will be lifted. GM says it already has exceeded the manufacturing requirements and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

The company said it has no immediate plans to buy or lease corporate jets.

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2 inmates escape from Loop's Metropolitan Correctional Center: cops

Two convicted bank robbers, including the Second-Hand Bandit found guilty just last week, escaped from the Metropolitan Correctional Center in the Loop this morning, police said.

Authorities discovered them missing from their cell at the federal jail at 71 W. Van Buren around  8:45 a.m., according to Central District Police Sgt. Michael Lazzaro.

The inmates were last checked at 5 a.m., he said.

A tan rope could be seen dangling from about 15 stories up along the south side of the MCC, but police would not say whether it was involved in the escape. The rope appeared to be pieces tied together.

Police have cardoned off the building with yellow crime scene tape.

The two are believed to be traveling together and were reportedly last seen earlier this morning in the Tinley Park area, according to the FBI. It said they should be considered armed and dangerous.

One of the inmates is Joseph Banks, known as the Second-Hand Bandit who was convicted last week of two bank robberies and two attempted holdups, according to Lazzaro. He made off with a combined nearly $600,000 in the heists, authorities said.

The other suspect was identified as Ken Conley, who pleaded guilty last October to robbing nearly $4,000 from a Homewood bank last year.

Conley was arrested after showing up at a Chicago Heights strip club where he worked dressed in the same black suit and white tie the bank robber wore and flashing a wad of cash, authorities said.

He had lived in Tinley Park.

rsobol@tribune.com

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Xbox SmartGlass updated with second-screen ESPN and NBA Game Time app experiences

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Florida man sentenced to 10 years in “hackerazzi” case

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A Florida man who pleaded guilty to hacking into the email accounts of celebrities to gain access to nude photos and private information was sentenced to 10 years in prison by a federal judge in Los Angeles on Monday.

Former office clerk Christopher Chaney, 36, said before the trial that he hacked into the accounts of film star Scarlett Johansson and other celebrities because he was addicted to spying on their personal lives.

Prosecutors said Chaney illegally gained access to email accounts of more than 50 people in the entertainment industry, including Johansson, actress Mila Kunis, and singers Christina Aguilera and Renee Olstead from November 2010 to October 2011.

Chaney, who was initially charged with 28 counts related to hacking, struck a plea deal with prosecutors in March to nine felony counts, including wiretapping and unauthorized access to protected computers.

“I don’t know what else to say except I’m sorry,” Chaney said during his sentencing. “This will never happen again.”

Chaney was ordered to pay $ 66,179 in restitution to victims.

Prosecutors recommended a 71-month prison for Chaney, who faced a maximum sentence of 60 years.

TEARFUL JOHANSSON

Prosecutors said Chaney leaked some of the private photos to two celebrity gossip websites and a hacker.

Johansson said the photos, which show her topless, were taken for her then-husband, actor Ryan Reynolds.

In a video statement shown in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, a tearful Johansson said she was “truly humiliated and embarrassed” when the photos appeared online, asking Judge S. James Otero to come down hard on Chaney.

Prosecutors said Chaney also stalked two unnamed Florida women online, one since 1999 when she was 13 years old.

Chaney, a native of Jacksonville, Florida, was arrested in October 2011 after an 11-month FBI investigation dubbed “Operation Hackerazzi” and he continued hacking after investigators initially seized his personal computers.

Shortly after his arrest, Chaney told a Florida television station that his hacking of celebrity email accounts started as curiosity and later he became “addicted.”

“I was almost relieved months ago when they came in and took my computer … because I didn’t know how to stop,” he said.

(Reporting by Eric Kelsey; Editing by Jill Serjeant and Andrew Hay)

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The Doctor’s World: BMJ’s Holiday Tradition of Lighthearted, but Rigorous, Scholarship

LONDON — Dutch and Norwegian scientists say they have solved a glowing mystery: why Rudolph the reindeer’s nose is red.

By traveling to the Arctic and using video-microscope and thermal imaging technology, the scientists showed that the glow is from tiny blood vessels that are more abundant in the noses of reindeer than in humans’. Yes, seriously. The findings are being reported next week in BMJ, formerly known as The British Medical Journal, a publication with a quirky holiday tradition.

For the past 30 years, BMJ has devoted its Christmas-week issue to a lighter and sometimes brighter side of medicine, publishing unusual articles that vary from simply amusing to bizarre to creative or potentially important. All are based on methodologically sound science.

Alongside Rudolph on the cover of this year’s holiday issue is Cliff, a 2-year-old beagle who was trained by another Dutch team to accurately sniff out the sometimes fatal bacterial bowel infection Clostridium difficile and make the diagnosis in minutes — days faster than standard laboratory tests. The Christmas tradition began in 1982, originally intended as a one-time effort to give readers a break from stodgy scientific reports written in technical jargon. The editor then, Dr. Stephen P. Lock, recalled in an interview that he wanted to present “another side of medicine” by offering lighter reading: research oddities, bizarre stories and history. But this was no April fools’ issue: Dr. Lock insisted that the articles meet the same rigorous criteria as research published in regular issues.

Indeed, some articles in the holiday issue are also suitable for regular issues, said Dr. Tony Delamothe, the BMJ deputy editor who has overseen the last eight Christmas issues. “We are on an incessant search for novelty,” he said.

Over the years, BMJ Christmas reports have demolished myths, including a Danish one that people could get drunk by absorbing alcohol through the feet. After soaking their feet for three hours in a basin containing three bottles of vodka and measuring their blood alcohol levels, three Danish scientists found no such absorption.

The first Christmas issue included an account of a resuscitation from 1650 that still astounds today. An unwed 22-year-old mother in Oxford was condemned to death after being accused of murdering her premature, stillborn son and concealing his body. She was executed by hanging by the neck for half an hour while people present jerked her up and down.

At the time, the bodies of executed prisoners were given to doctors for anatomical dissection. Two doctors who opened the woman’s coffin were startled to hear raspy breaths. They revived her, and she went on to recover her memory and live another 15 years, marrying and giving birth to three children. The 17th-century doctors’ report met the criteria for a modern case report, wrote J. Trevor Hughes, the author of the 1982 article.

Dr. Lock, the editor, also encouraged historical back stories. In 1984, Dr. Charles Fletcher wrote about how he tested ways to safely administer the first precious batches of penicillin in 1941. The initial full test was on a 43-year-old British policeman who developed the widespread bacterial infection septicemia. He showed striking improvement from small doses of the antibiotic, but he died after the scarce supply — much of it recycled from his urine — ran out.

Many Christmas issue accounts would have upset earlier BMJ editors “like mad,” Dr. Lock said. “But so what?” he added. “It was fun.” Now there is so much competition for a spot in the issue that some authors submit papers early in the year and request publication at Christmastime.

Some articles poke fun at hoary traditions, such as diagnosing ailments in historical figures despite the lack of medical evidence. Mozart is a special favorite of armchair diagnosticians, Dr. Lucien R. Karhausen wrote in 2010 after tabulating articles reporting 140 possible causes of death and 27 mental disorders in the composer. Many, he said, were based on shoddy medical interpretations, undocumented “eyewitness accounts” or the ignoring of criteria that separate normal and abnormal behavior.

“Some causes are plausible,” Dr. Karhausen wrote, “only a few — maybe one, or maybe none of them — can be true, so most if not all are false.”

In 2006, BMJ reported on the results of a questionnaire sent to 110 members of the Sword Swallowers’ Association International. Forty-six members responded; they reported having swallowed more than 2,000 swords in the three preceding months. Sore throats (“sword throats”) were common during the learning phase, and after frequent repeated performances. Swallowers rarely sought medical advice. Of six who perforated their pharynx or esophagus, three needed surgery. No deaths were reported.

Still other articles play on the vanity of doctors, many of whose names are attached to instruments and syndromes. An article in 2010 extended the list to food products developed by doctors, including Kellogg’s Corn Flakes, various cookies, and Penfolds and Lindeman’s, the Australian wines.

As for the animals featured in this year’s holiday issue: The story of the infection-sniffing beagle began with a report from a nurse in the Netherlands, who mentioned that a patient’s stool had the distinctive odor of C. difficile — a bacterium that is causing serious and growing public-health problems in many countries, including the United States.

A team led by Dr. Marije K. Bomers at the VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam reasoned that it might be possible to train dogs to detect the infection, and Cliff the beagle did just that.

Cliff was trained to sit or lie down when he smelled C. difficile in the air walking by a patient’s bedside, and he also quickly and accurately identified all 50 stool samples with C. difficile and 25 of 30 infected patients — along with 50 stool samples free of the bacteria and 265 of 270 uninfected patients.

And the Dutch team that studied reindeer, working with researchers at the University of Tromso in the Norwegian Arctic, used a hand-held video microscope to observe the deer’s nasal capillaries as they ran on a treadmill.

The capillaries are arranged in circular clusters at different locations through the nose. Those in reindeer noses are 25 percent thicker than those observed in the human nose and are believed to perform critical roles like heating, delivering oxygen and humidifying inhaled air to keep the animal’s nose from freezing. (The leader of the team, Can Ince, a physiologist at Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam, says he has a financial interest in the company that manufactures the technology, which is used to monitor reactions to various drugs and therapies among critically ill human patients.)

By showing that a large number of red blood cells flowed through the small nasal vessels, the scientists said they had unlocked the mystery of Rudolph’s red nose. May it long glow.

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McDonald's urging franchisees to open on Christmas

McDonald's Corp. is urging U.S. restaurant owners to take the unusual step of opening on Christmas Day to deliver the world's biggest hamburger chain with the gift of higher December sales, AdvertisingAge reported Monday.

The request -- which comes as McDonald's tangles with resurgent rivals such as Wendy's, Burger King and Yum Brands' Taco Bell chain -- would be a break from company tradition of closing on major holidays.

"Starting with Thanksgiving, ensure your restaurants are open throughout the holidays," Jim Johannesen, chief operations officer for McDonald's USA, wrote in a Nov. 8 memo to franchisees -- one of two obtained by AdvertisingAge.

"Our largest holiday opportunity as a system is Christmas Day. Last year, (company-operated) restaurants that opened on Christmas averaged $5,500 in sales," Johannesen said.

"The decision to open our restaurants on Christmas is in the hands of our owner/operators," McDonald's spokeswoman Heather Oldani told Reuters.

Don Thompson took over as chief executive at McDonald's in July and has the difficult task of growing sales from last year's strong results in a significantly more competitive environment.

McDonald's monthly global sales at established restaurants fell for the first time in nine years in October, but unexpectedly rebounded in November.

The November surprise was partly due to a 2.5 percent rise in sales at U.S. restaurants open at least 13 months.

"Our November results were driven, in part, by our Thanksgiving Day performance," Johannesen wrote in a Dec. 12 memo to franchisees.

Oldani said 1,200 more McDonald's restaurants were open on Thanksgiving this year versus last year -- not 6,000 more as AdvertisingAge reported.

Still, the company has a high hurdle when it comes to posting an increase in restaurant sales this month because its U.S. same-restaurant sales jumped 9.8 percent in December 2011.

"It's an act of desperation. The franchisees are not happy," said Richard Adams, a former McDonald's franchisee who now advises the chain's owner/operators.

The push to open on the holidays goes against McDonald's cultural history, said Adams. In his first published operations manual, McDonald's Corp. founder Ray Kroc said the company would close on Thanksgiving and Christmas to give employees time with their families, Adams said.

"We opened for breakfast on Thanksgiving the last couple years I was a franchisee. It was easy to get kids to work on Thanksgiving because they want to get away from their family, but not on Christmas," Adams said.

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Funerals today for first 2 Newtown school shooting victims

A grieving Connecticut town is bracing itself today to bury the first two of the 20 small victims of an elementary school gunman and debated when classes could resume — and where, given the carnage in the building and the children's associations with it.

The people of Newtown weren't yet ready to address the question just three days after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, and a day after President Barack Obama pledged to seek change in memory of the children and six adults ruthlessly slain by a gunman packing a high-powered rifle.

"We're just now getting ready to talk to our son about who was killed," said Robert Licata, the father of a student who escaped harm during the shooting. "He's not even there yet."

Newtown officials couldn't say whether Sandy Hook Elementary, where authorities said all the victims were shot at least twice, would ever reopen. State police Lt. Paul Vance said Monday at a news conference that it could be months before police turn the school back over to the district.

Monday classes were canceled and Newtown's other schools were to reopen Tuesday. The district was making plans to send surviving Sandy Hook students to a former school building in a neighboring town, but they didn't say when that would happen.

The gunman, 20-year-old Adam Lanza, was carrying an arsenal of hundreds of rounds of especially deadly ammunition, authorities said Sunday — enough to kill just about every student in the school if given enough time, raising the chilling possibility that the bloodbath could have been even worse.

The shooter decided to kill himself when he heard police closing in about 10 minutes into Friday's attack, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said on ABC's "This Week."

'These tragedies must end'

At the interfaith service in Newtown on Sunday evening, Obama said he would use "whatever power this office holds" to engage with law enforcement, mental health professionals, parents and educators in an effort to prevent more tragedies like Newtown.

"What choice do we have?" Obama said on a stark stage that held only a small table covered with a black cloth, candles and the presidential podium. "Are we really prepared to say that we're powerless in the face of such carnage, that the politics are too hard?"

The president first met privately with families of the victims and with the emergency personnel who responded to the shooting. Police and firefighters got hugs and standing ovations when they entered for the public vigil, as did Obama.

"We needed this," said the Rev. Matt Crebbin, senior minister of the Newtown Congregational Church. "We need to be together here in this room. ... We needed to be together to show that we are together and united."

As Obama read some of the names of victims early in his remarks, sobs resonated throughout the hall. He closed by slowly reading the first names of each of the 20 children.

"God has called them all home," he said. "For those of us who remain, let us find the strength to carry on and make our country worthy of their memory."

"We can't tolerate this anymore. These tragedies must end. And to end them, we must change," Obama said.

First funerals today

The first funerals were planned Monday for Jack Pinto, a 6-year-old New York Giants fan who might be buried in wide receiver Victor Cruz's jersey, and Noah Pozner, a boy of the same age who liked to figure out how things worked mechanically.

Funeral services for Pinto will take place at 1 p.m. at Honan Funeral Home, 58 Main St. in Newtown. Burial will follow at Newtown Village Cemetery, 22 Elm Drive, Newtown. The wake will be private. Funeral services for Pozner will take place at 1 p.m. from the Abraham L. Green and Son Funeral Home, 88 Beach Road, Fairfield, with burial following at B'nai Israel Cemetery on Moose Hill Road in Monroe.

"He was just a really lively, smart kid," said Noah's uncle Alexis Haller, of Woodinville, Wash. "He would have become a great man, I think. He would have grown up to be a great dad."

With more funerals planned this week, the road ahead for Newtown — which had already started purging itself of Christmas decorations in a joyful season turned mournful — was clouded.

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