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Bail bondsman charged alongside Trump in Georgia pleads guilty, becoming first defendant to do so

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

ATLANTA (AP) — A bail bondsman charged alongside former President Donald Trump and 17 others in the Georgia election interference case pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges on Friday, becoming the first defendant to accept a plea deal with prosecutors.As part of the deal, Scott Graham Hall will receive five years of probation and agreed to testify in further proceedings. He was also ordered to write a letter of apology to the citizens of Georgia and is forbidden from participating in polling activities.Hall, 59, pleaded guilty to five counts of conspiracy to commit intentional interference with performance of election duties, all misdemeanors, at a surprise court hearing. Prosecutors had accused him of participating in a breach of election equipment in rural Coffee County and initially charged him with racketeering and six conspiracy counts, all felonies.He is one of the lower-level players in the indictment filed last month alleging a wide-ranging scheme to overturn Democrat Joe Bi...

US’ only bison roundup rustles up hundreds to maintain health of the species

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

South Dakota cowboys and cowgirls rounded up a herd of more than 1,500 bison Friday as part of an annual effort to maintain the health of the species, which has rebounded from near-extinction. Visitors from across the world cheered from behind wire fencing as whooping horseback riders chased the thundering, wooly giants across hills and grasslands in Custer State Park. Bison and their calves stopped occassionally to graze on blond grass and roll on the ground, their sharp hooves stirring up dust clouds. “How many times can you get this close to a buffalo herd?” said South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks Secretary Kevin Robling, who was among 50 riders herding the animals. “You hear the grunts and the moans and (see) the calves coming and running alongside mamas.”Custer State Park holds the nation’s only Buffalo Roundup once a year to check the health of the bison and vaccinate calves, park Superintendent Matt Snyder said. As many as 60 million bison, sometimes called buffalo in th...

What do Indigenous Peoples across Canada really need and want?

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

The federal Liberal government has made a lot of promises to Indigenous Peoples. But do those promises line up with what communities on the ground really want and need, or reflect their diversity?The Canadian Press spoke with Indigenous community members and leadership to get a sense of what their priorities are and what they think Canadians can do to ensure that truth and reconciliation moves beyond aspiration and into action. Dani Lanouette, Chippewas of Nawash and Algonquins of Barriere Lake: Missing and murdered Indigenous women and girlsDani Lanouette has been following the case of the remains of two women believed to be in a Winnipeg-area landfill closely.More specifically, she has been keeping an eye on what she says is a lack of action to take the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls seriously, or seriously enough to understand the importance of bringing loved ones home to their families, regardless of the cost.The remains of Morgan Harris and Marcedes My...

South Carolina inmates want executions paused while new lethal injection method is studied

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Lawyers for six death row inmates out of appeals in South Carolina are asking the state Supreme Court to give full consideration to the state’s new lethal injection rules as well as the electric chair and firing squad before restarting executions after an unintended 12-year pause.The inmates said judges should decide now if the state’s new lethal injection protocol using just the sedative pentobarbital as well as killing prisoners by electrocution or shots fired into the heart do not violate the Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishments.“The next set of potential plaintiffs are already in line, and more will follow. Now is the time to finally resolve these questions,” attorneys for the condemned inmates wrote in court papers filed Friday.Lawyers for the prisons and Gov. Henry McMaster asked the Supreme Court on Sept. 19, the same day they announced the lethal injection drugs were available, to toss out a lower court ruling that the e...

Dad who won appeal in college admissions bribery case gets 6 months home confinement for tax offense

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

BOSTON (AP) — A former Staples Inc. executive whose fraud and bribery convictions in the sprawling college admissions cheating scandal were thrown out by an appeals court was sentenced on Friday to six months of home confinement for a tax offense. John Wilson, 64, of Lynnfield, Massachusetts, was sentenced in Boston’s federal appeals court months after the 1st U.S. Circut Court of Appeals threw out nearly all of his convictions in the so-called Operation Varsity Blues case. The appeals court upheld Wilson’s conviction on a charge of filing a false tax return.Wilson was sentenced to one year of probation, with the first six months to be served in home confinement, according to the Massachusetts U.S. attorney’s office. He was also ordered to complete 250 hours of community service and pay a $75,000 fine. Prosecutors alleged at trial Wilson paid $220,000 to have his son designated as a University of Southern California water polo recruit and an additional $1 million t...

An ex-investigative journalist is sentenced to 6 years in a child sexual abuse materials case

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — A former investigative journalist for ABC News was sentenced Friday to six years in federal prison for possessing and transporting child sexual abuse images.James Gordon Meek, of Arlington, Virginia, pleaded guilty in July, admitting in a plea agreement that he used an iPhone to exchange illicit materials during a chat session with two other people, including a video showing the sexual abuse of an infant.Court documents say an investigation began when the FBI received a tip from Dropbox about videos showing the sexual abuse of children in an account associated with Meek. An FBI affidavit said agents found dozens of child sexual abuse images and videos when they searched Meek’s home last year, going back to at least 2014.Meek joined ABC News’ Washington bureau as an investigative producer in 2013 and covered national security issues until he resigned last year. He previously worked for the New York Daily News and also served as a senior counterterrorism adviser...

Inherited Retinal Diseases: Dispelling stigma and the importance of genetic testing

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

Inherited Retinal Diseases (IRD) affect more than 20,000 Canadians and there are no treatments for the progressive conditions.They are a large group of hereditary eye conditions caused by varying gene mutations and can be diagnosed in childhood, adolescence or later in life depending on the specific disease.“I’ve had low vision since I was born …[I’m] completely night blind pretty much,” explains Ramya Amuthan, born with Leber’s Congenital Amaurosis (LCA) — one of many IRDs that result in partial or complete blindness.“My peripheral vision is very poor. I can’t see stairs and things around me and I also have central vision loss.”LCA is a recessive condition, which means both of Amuthan’s parents carry the mutated gene associated with the disease.“My brothers are both carriers, but they don’t have the eye condition. It basically runs in the family,” she says.Now an advocate for people with disabilitie...

Subway franchise owners must pay workers nearly $1M – and also sell or close their stores

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A federal court ordered the owners of 14 Subway locations north of San Francisco to pay employees nearly $1 million in damages and back pay — and also to sell or shut their businesses, with any sale proceeds going to the Department of Labor. Federal investigators said franchise owners John and Jessica Meza directed children as young as 14 to operate dangerous machinery, assigned minors work hours that violated federal law, and failed to pay their employees regularly, including by issuing hundreds of bad checks and illegally keeping tips left by customers. The Labor Department also charged that the Mezas coerced employees in an attempt to prevent them from cooperating with its investigation, sometimes threatening children who attempted to raise concerns about the work environment.According to the court order, the owners acknowledged several of the Labor Department’s findings. Messages left for the Mezas at email addresses included in the settlement were not immed...

Skilling: Beautiful weekend heading into October

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

We're just over a day away from closing the books on Sept and moving into the month of October, 2023.We're to make the transition in phenomenal meteorological fashion with a sun-filled, rain-free, unseasonably warm autumn weekend on the way.Chicago is to benefit from an abnormally warm late season pattern locked in place into mid next week by an atmospheric blocking pattern. NO RECORDS will occur here—though predicted high temps will top out just under 10-degrees from the low 90-deg records currently on the books.RECORDS ARE IN JEOPARDY in multiple states to Chicago's west.  Remarkable late season 90s in the Plains and western Midwest are likely to break some daytime high temp records in portions of 11 states there.Daytime temps in Chicago are to surge into the 80s Saturday through Wednesday---June and July level temps. Each of the coming 5 days (through Wednesday) is to post 10 to 14-deg temp surpluses.Lake breezes will blow from the southeast each day into early next week limiting...

20 years ago Friday, the Bears opened new Soldier Field opened

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:29:48 GMT

CHICAGO — When it comes to the Bears and their home stadium, things were much different 25 years ago on Friday.That's when the team was getting ready to start a new era at Soldier Field in a stadium that had undergone a massive renovation over nearly two years that still creates debate today.(JEFF HAYNES/AFP via Getty Images)On September 29, 2003, the venue had its grand reopening as the Bears hosted the Packers on Monday Night Football on a cool evening in Chicago. This came after the venue had undergone a $632 million that completely transformed the inside while adding a new look to the outside over 21 months. The latter caused plenty of controversy, with many still saying today that it looks as if a spaceship had landed inside the nearly 100-year-old venue. A number of luxury suites were added along with different decks that actually dropped the capacity of the stadium to 61,500. (Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)It was a welcome moment for the Bears, who were forced to play...