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Tag: Criminal investigations

  • Former veteran California FBI agent convicted of bribery

    Former veteran California FBI agent convicted of bribery

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    LOS ANGELES — A former FBI agent in Northern California who handled national security issues was convicted Tuesday of accepting at least $150,000 in gifts and cash bribes to provide confidential information to a man with organized crime ties, prosecutors said.

    Babak Broumand, 56, of Lafayette, was found guilty in Los Angeles of conspiracy, bribery of a public official and monetary transactions in property derived from unlawful activity, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a statement.

    He could face 15 to 45 years in federal prison when he is sentenced in January.

    Broumand, who joined the FBI in 1999, worked until 2018 in the bureau’s San Francisco office, where he was responsible for national security investigations, prosecutors said.

    Prosecutors said from 2015 to 2018, Broumand accepted “cash, checks, private jet flights, a Ducati motorcycle, hotel stays, escorts, meals, and other items of value” in return for searching law enforcement databases to help a self-proclaimed lawyer and his criminal associates learn if they were under investigation and avoid prosecution.

    Court documents refer to the lawyer only as “E.S.” but his name was Edgar Sargsyan, who earlier pleaded guilty to bribing Broumand and another federal agent and testified at his trial.

    The two men were introduced at a Beverly Hills cigar club.

    Sargsyan has admitted making a fortune by stealing identities, making credit card charges and taking out bank loans in their names, and while he falsely claimed to be an attorney he acknowledged actually paying a friend to take the bar exam under his name, the Los Angeles Times reported.

    “To conceal the nature of their corrupt relationship, Broumand made it falsely appear that E.S. was working as an FBI source” and wrote false reports stating he was making legitimate database queries, according to the Department of Justice.

    One involved Levon Termendzhyan, whom prosecutors described as an Armenian organized crime figure for whom Sargsyan had worked.

    Termendzhyan was convicted in 2020 in a Utah federal court of involvement in a $1 billion fraud scheme involving renewable fuel tax credits, prosecutors said. He awaits sentencing.

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  • Detroit police release body cam video of fatal shooting

    Detroit police release body cam video of fatal shooting

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    DETROIT — Police body camera footage showed officers pleading with Porter Burks to drop the knife he was carrying on the dimly lit Detroit street.

    “Drop the knife for me, man. Come here real quick. You’re OK,” said a member of the Detroit Police Department’s crisis intervention team about 5 a.m. EDT Sunday on the city’s west side. “You’re not in any trouble. Can you just talk to me and drop the knife?”

    “You’re not in any trouble, OK?” the officer continued. “I just want to help you. I just want to help you, man. OK? Can you just drop the knife for me please? Please? Whatever you’re going through I can help you.”

    But Burks — who had a history of struggling with mental illness — didn’t drop the knife and after pacing in the middle of the street suddenly sprinted toward officers, who fired 38 shots in three seconds. Burks was pronounced dead at a hospital.

    On Tuesday, Detroit police showed the footage to reporters. Police Chief James White called the shooting a “very tragic situation.”

    “Not the desired outcome. This is not what we wanted,” said White who later added “our mental health crisis in this country is real. Our mental health crisis in our city is real.”

    Burks suffered from schizophrenia, police said Tuesday.

    Officers initially were called to a home on the west side about a knife-wielding man who was having a mental health crisis and spoke to a man who identified himself as Burks’ brother. The man said Burks had slashed the tires on his car.

    Burks later was found walking along a nearby street. Officers can be heard on the body camera footage telling him not to approach the officers and to put the folding knife down.

    Burks replied: “No, I am not,” minutes before sprinting toward the officers.

    Five fired their weapons. Burks suffered about 15 wounds, according to police.

    White defended the officers’ response, saying it’s part of their training.

    “The officers had to stop a threat. They felt threatened,” he said. “There’s no time in three seconds — and someone charging at you with a knife — to look over to see what other people are doing. You, as a trained police officer, are trained to stop the threat.”

    Officers intended to get Burks “some help … to get him secured and to a hospital,” White said.

    It was not Burks’ first contact with Detroit police.

    On June 26, he was admitted to a Detroit hospital psychological ward after he was found walking in his neighborhood “looking to fight someone,” police said.

    Burks escaped two days later in hospital garb and was arrested by officers as he ran in and out of traffic.

    In August 2020, he stabbed his 7-year-old stepsister in the neck. That March he stabbed his sister in the neck and his brother in the head.

    “This is not just a police matter,” White said. “We need help with this system. The officers are routinely put into this mode, and candidly, we’re seeing more and more violent episodes.”

    Advocates for people with mental illness say they face greater risk of a police encounter resulting in their death.

    Hannah Wesolowski, chief advocacy officer of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, told The Associated Press for a story last month that many communities lack a mental health crisis infrastructure, and that nearly 130 million people in the United States live in areas with a shortage of mental health providers.

    The Treatment Advocacy Center said in a 2015 report that people with untreated mental illness are 16 times more likely to be killed during a police encounter than other people approached by law enforcement.

    The officers who fired shots Sunday at Burks have been placed on administrative leave.

    State police are investigating Sunday’s shooting and will submit their findings to the Wayne County prosecutor’s office. Meanwhile, Detroit police are conducting an internal administrative probe.

    On Monday, attorney Geoffrey Fieger said his firm had been retained by the Burks’ family and was working to obtain evidence from the shooting.

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  • 2 South American researchers killed in Missouri

    2 South American researchers killed in Missouri

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    KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Missouri homicide and arson detectives are investigating the deaths of two South American researchers whose bodies were found after a weekend apartment fire near the Kansas City biomedical research center where they worked.

    Kansas City police identified the victims as Camila Behrensen, 24, of Buenos Aires, Argentina, and Pablo Guzmán Palma, 25, of Santiago, Chile.

    The Stowers Institute for Medical Research said in a tweet Tuesday that both Behrensen and Palma were predoctoral researchers there.

    “Our deepest sympathies are with their families,” the tweet said. “During this difficult time, and most importantly, out of respect to the two families, we want to honor and remember the joy, optimism, and exceptional work these two individuals embodied and all that they have accomplished.”

    Behrensen and Palma were suffering from what police described as “apparent trauma” when fire crews responded Saturday and extinguished the blaze. Both were declared dead at the scene.

    Police released few details but said there is a $25,000 reward for information leading to an arrest. They asked Tuesday for help from anyone with surveillance video.

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  • Former Northeastern employee charged in campus bomb hoax

    Former Northeastern employee charged in campus bomb hoax

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    BOSTON — A former Northeastern University employee who said he was injured when a package he was opening on the Boston campus exploded last month was charged Tuesday with fabricating the incident.

    Jason Duhaime, formerly the new technology manager and director of the university’s Immersive Media Lab, was charged with “conveying false and misleading information related to an explosive device” and then lying to federal investigators, federal authorities said.

    “This alleged conduct is disturbing to say the least,” U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins said at a news conference. “Our city, more than most, knows all too well that a report or threat of an explosion is a very serious matter and necessitates an immediate and significant law enforcement response, given the potential devastation that can ensue.”

    Duhaime told investigators that the hard plastic case exploded when he opened it on Sept. 13, causing “sharp” objects to fly from the case and injure his arms, but his arms only had superficial marks and there was no damage to his shirt, investigators said.

    According to an FBI affidavit, “The inside and outside of the case did not bear any marks, dents, cracks, holes, or other signs that it had been exposed to a forceful or explosive discharge of any type or magnitude.”

    The case also contained a rambling typed note full of misspellings and exclamation points that railed against virtual reality, referenced Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, and threatened to “destroy” the lab.

    “It has come to our attention that this VR lab is trying to change us as a world,” the note said.

    The letter also said: “We know you are working with Mr. Mark Zuckerberg and the U.S. government.”

    It later said: “We know you are working on a secret flying project to scan buildings across the world so Mark can take over google maps,” and “the robots your (sic) building are walking around NEU, MIT and into Harvard yard.”

    The FBI affidavit said the letter was “pristine” and “bore no tears, holes, burn marks, or any other indication that it had been near any sort of forceful or explosive discharge.”

    Investigators also discovered a word-for-word, electronic copy of the letter stored in a backup folder on a university computer in Duhaime’s office that had been written just hours before he called 911.

    Authorities said they could not comment on the specific motive because of the ongoing investigation.

    “In this case, we believe Mr. Duhaime wanted to be the victim but instead victimized his entire community by instilling fear at college campuses in Massachusetts and beyond,” Joseph Bonavolonta, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Boston office said.

    Duhaime, who lives in Texas, was scheduled to make an initial court appearance Tuesday afternoon in San Antonio.

    An attorney for Duhaime did not immediately respond to a telephone message and an email seeking comment. Duhaime has previously denied staging the incident, saying in an interview with The Boston Globe that it was “very traumatic.”

    “I did not stage this … No way, shape or form … they need to catch the guy that did this,” he told the newspaper.

    Northeastern is a private university with about 16,000 students. The school in a statement Tuesday said Duhaime no longer works there.

    The reported explosion led to swarms of police including two bomb squads descending on the school, forced the evacuation of several campus buildings, and put the campus on edge even after reassurances from the school that it was safe.

    “His alleged actions diverted significant law enforcement resources away from essential public safety matters and caused fear and panic not only on campus, but also in the homes of the families and friends and loved ones of Northeastern students, faculty and staff,” Rollins said.

    It marked one of the first big scares in Boston since 2013, when two bombs planted near the finish line of the Boston Marathon killed three spectators and wounded more than 260 others.

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  • UN, abuse survivor groups seek Vatican investigation of Belo

    UN, abuse survivor groups seek Vatican investigation of Belo

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    VATICAN CITY — The United Nations and advocacy groups for survivors of clergy sexual abuse are urging Pope Francis to authorize a full investigation of Catholic Church archives on three continents to ascertain who knew what and when about sexual abuse by Nobel Peace Prize-winning Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, the revered independence hero of East Timor.

    The Vatican’s sex abuse office said last week that it had secretly sanctioned Belo in 2020, forbidding him from having contact with minors or with East Timor, based on misconduct allegations that arrived in Rome in 2019. That was the year Francis approved a new church law that required all cases of predator prelates to be reported in-house and established a mechanism to investigate bishops, who had long escaped accountability for abuse or cover-up during the church’s decades-long scandal.

    But a brief statement by the Vatican, issued after Dutch magazine De Groen Amsterdammer exposed the Belo scandal by quoting two of his alleged victims, didn’t reveal what church officials might have known before 2019.

    Belo won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996 with fellow East Timorese independence icon Jose Ramos-Horta for campaigning for a fair and peaceful solution to conflict in their home country as it struggled to gain independence from Indonesia. He is revered in East Timor and was celebrated abroad for his bravery in calling out human rights abuses by Indonesian rulers despite threats against his life.

    But six years after winning the prize, in 2002, Belo suddenly retired as the head of the church in East Timor, a former Portuguese colony. At 54, he was two decades shy of the normal retirement age for bishops, and he never held an episcopal appointment after that.

    He has said he retired for health reasons and because of stress and to give the newly independent East Timor different church leadership. But within a year of his retirement, Belo had been sent by the Vatican and his Salesian missionary order to another former Portuguese colony, Mozambique, to work as a missionary priest. There, he has said, he spent his time “teaching catechism to children, giving retreats to young people.”

    He is currently in Portugal, where the Salesians have said they took him in at the request of their superiors. His whereabouts are unclear, and he didn’t respond when contacted by Portuguese media.

    Advocates for survivors cite the in-house investigation that Francis authorized and published in 2020 into defrocked American Cardinal Theodore McCarrick in calling for a similar forensic study of church archives for Belo.

    The McCarrick investigation, which began after new allegations surfaced in 2018 that McCarrick sexually abused a teenage altar boy, exposed how a series of bishops, cardinals and even popes over two decades dismissed or downplayed reports that he slept with his seminarians and allowed him to rise through the church hierarchy.

    There is no indication yet that Francis is prepared to authorize a similar investigation into Belo. There doesn’t appear to be any groundswell of indignation within East Timor’s Catholic community, as there was among U.S. Catholics over McCarrick. On the contrary, in the impoverished, overwhelmingly Catholic country, where the church holds enormous influence, many rallied behind Belo despite the allegations.

    Francis did meet Saturday with his ambassador to Portugal as well as the head of the Portuguese Bishops Conference, who himself is reportedly accused of covering up for other abuser priests.

    Anne Barrett-Doyle, of the online resource Bishop Accountability, called for Francis to order a “full and sweeping investigation of the Belo case including past and present church officials from all ranks and dicasteries and from every relevant region, from East Timor to Portugal to Rome to Mozambique.”

    She noted that Belo’s Salesian superiors as well as Vatican officials, up to and including even Pope John Paul II, would have been involved in his 2002 retirement and subsequent transfers. East Timor is and was then under the jurisdiction of the powerful Vatican Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, which handles all church matters in mission territories in Africa, Asia and some other regions. But ultimately a pope decides when bishops retire and whether they are subject to any sanction.

    “The Vatican’s suggestion that it first learned of the allegations in the last few years doesn’t pass the smell test. It is wholly implausible,” Barrett-Doyle said in an email. “Signs point to the real possibility that Belo is another McCarrick – an acclaimed churchman whose predations were known to many church officials.”

    The United Nations’ spokesman, Stephane Dujarric, also backed a full investigation.

    “These allegations are truly shocking and need to be fully investigated,” he told The Associated Press. The United Nations organized a referendum on East Timor’s independence in 1999 and then provided a U.N. peacekeeping force to quell widespread violence that broke out until independence was finally declared in 2002.

    The main U.S.-based advocacy group for survivors of priestly sex abuse, SNAP, joined the call for a more thorough inquest, especially given that Belo was allowed to continue ministering to children while in Mozambique.

    “We learn from many allegations of sexual abuse against children that there are often more victims. In this tragedy, the Vatican set Belo free to have access to potentially more victims,” said SNAP communications manager, Mike McDonnell.

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  • Police: Teen saw father shoot, kill mother in California

    Police: Teen saw father shoot, kill mother in California

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    LOS ANGELES — The Southern California teenager killed this week alongside her father in a shootout with law enforcement was with him a day earlier when he fatally shot her mother, police said Thursday.

    Savannah Graziano, 15, was in the back of her father’s pickup truck when he gunned down her mother, Tracy Martinez, on Monday, according to Fontana police. Witnesses and two videos — one from a bystander and another from a doorbell — show she stayed still as her mother screamed.

    “She’s just sitting in the backseat,” Sgt. Christian Surgent said in a phone interview Thursday.

    Authorities had previously said the teen was somewhere else during her mother’s killing and was later abducted by her father, Anthony Graziano. But the two videos obtained Wednesday showed her inside the truck between 30 and 60 seconds before the gunfire began, police said.

    Witnesses did not report seeing Savannah get out of the vehicle, Surgent said, as Martinez tried to escape and Graziano — her estranged husband — jumped out wielding a handgun.

    Graziano, 45, shot Martinez multiple times and also turned and fired on a nearby car. No one else was hurt.

    Martinez was able to identify her killer as Graziano before she died, Surgent said, but never mentioned her daughter being there. Neither video showed the shooting.

    Savannah and her father were both killed a day later after a long chase along an desert interstate east of Los Angeles in Hesperia — about 35 miles (56.33 kilometers) north of the homicide scene. Rifle shots were fired at the pursuing officers from Graziano’s pickup truck, which became disabled after driving off the highway. The shooter put several rounds through a patrol car’s windshield and later disabled a second pursuing vehicle, authorities said.

    Graziano died in the truck while Savannah, wearing tactical gear and a helmet, was fatally shot as she ran toward deputies amid a hail of gunfire. Authorities are investigating whether she was shot by deputies, her father, or both.

    The California Department of Justice is reviewing the teen’s death under a state law requiring the agency to investigate police shootings involving the death of unarmed civilians. Meanwhile, detectives in Fontana still have not determined a motive for the slaying.

    Investigators later searched the family’s Fontana home — which Graziano and his daughter moved out of weeks prior — and Graziano’s storage unit. Inside the storage pod they found numerous AR-15-style rifles, handguns, thousands of rounds of ammunition, smoke grenades and other tactical gear, Surgent said.

    The firearms were legally owned by Graziano, who was not or probation or parole. Savannah’s younger brother told investigators that the siblings grew up around guns.

    Authorities have said they have police video showing the freeway shootout but have not made that public, nor did they release the two videos showing Savannah in the pickup truck just before her mother was killed.

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  • NOT REAL NEWS: A look at what didn’t happen this week

    NOT REAL NEWS: A look at what didn’t happen this week

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    A roundup of some of the most popular but completely untrue stories and visuals of the week. None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media. The Associated Press checked them out. Here are the facts:

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    IRS special agent job ad misrepresented online

    CLAIM: An online job ad shows that all new employees that the IRS intends to hire after a funding boost in the Inflation Reduction Act will be required to carry a firearm and use deadly force if necessary.

    THE FACTS: The job description does not apply to most potential new employees that the IRS will hire in the coming years, and the vast majority of IRS workers are not armed. A legitimate job ad for special agents within the small law enforcement division of the IRS that works on criminal investigations was misrepresented online following the passage this month of a $740 billion economic package that includes nearly $80 billion for the IRS. Many posts in recent days shared a screenshot that features the IRS logo and the text, “Major Duties.” The listed duties on the image include being able to “carry a firearm and be willing to use deadly force, if necessary.” Social media users claimed that the image was a job ad for thousands of new IRS employees that will be hired as a result of the bill. “The IRS is looking to fill 87,000 positions,” one Facebook user who shared the image wrote. “Requirements include working min ‘50 hours per week, which may include irregular hours, and be on-call 24/7, including holidays and weekends’ and ‘Carry a firearm and be willing to use deadly force, if necessary.’” Another Twitter user wrote: “Want to be one of the new 87,000 IRS agents? Are you willing to carry a firearm and use DEADLY FORCE? This is not at all concerning.” These social media users are falsely depicting a legitimate job ad for a special agent with IRS Criminal Investigation as a generic ad for all new positions. While that language does not currently appear on the IRS web page advertising the special agent role, a search of the Internet Archive shows that the same language can be found on the page as recently as Aug. 11. Justin Cole, a spokesperson for IRS Criminal Investigation, told the AP that the screenshots circulating online appear to show the special agent web page and confirmed that the language had been on the site but was removed. He said it was removed in error amid the spate of misinformation about IRS employees carrying weapons, but the language will be added back to the web page. Special agents with IRS Criminal Investigation, who investigate criminal tax violations and other related financial crimes, are the only IRS employees who carry firearms, according to Anny Pachner, a spokesperson for the division. Special agents compose a small sliver of the IRS workforce. There are about 2,000 special agents within the agency, which has roughly 80,000 total employees. The division dates back to 1919 and has always employed armed agents. The agency is currently hiring 300 special agents, according to the online job posting. Among the agents’ duties are executing search and arrest warrants, as well as seizures, per the posting. This is very different from the work of other IRS employees. For instance, revenue agents work on complex audits of corporations, while customer service representatives answer tax-related questions, according to the IRS. Neither roles are law enforcement positions. The claim that the IRS is going to hire 87,000 new agents in general due to the Inflation Reduction Act is also misleading, as the AP has previously reported. The figure comes from a prior Treasury Department proposal to hire roughly that many IRS employees over the next decade, but there is no explicit mandate for such a workforce in the act, officials and experts say. Many new IRS hires will replace employees who are expected to retire or quit, and not all of them will be auditors, nor will a majority of them be gun-carrying agents.

    — Associated Press writer Josh Kelety in Phoenix contributed this report.

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    Post falsely claims NYC tap water contaminated with polio

    CLAIM: Polio has been found in New York City tap water.

    THE FACTS: The virus that causes polio has been detected in New York sewage samples, not tap water. After the New York City and New York state health departments announced last week that poliovirus has been found in city sewage samples, a post claiming that polio had been found in the city’s tap water began spreading on social media. “Under Biden, they are now finding Polio in tap water,” reads the post, which received more than 112,000 likes on Instagram. It includes a screenshot of a tweet featuring a promotional video in which Mayor Eric Adams touts the city’s tap water. The tweet captions the Adams video: “Do you all remember that time when Mayor Adam’s told everyone in New York City to drink the tap water? Anyways, they found Polio in the New York City water.” But poliovirus was found in sewage samples, not tap water, and people cannot contract polio by drinking the city’s tap water, multiple city and state officials said. “New Yorkers should know that wastewater is not the same as drinking water, and it cannot be a source of infection or transmission,” Samantha Fuld, a spokesperson for the New York State Department of Health, told the AP in an email. Wastewater — used water from toilets, sinks, showers and household appliances — does not come in contact with the city’s drinking water, she said, adding there are no plans to test tap water for poliovirus. Edward Timbers, director of communications for the city’s Department of Environmental Protection, confirmed to the AP in an email that the city’s wastewater cannot end up in its tap water and that the presence of poliovirus in sewage samples does not imply that the virus is also in drinking water. “There are two separate systems in NYC,” he said. New York City drinking water is treated with purifying agents to ensure that it is safe to consume and free of pathogens, according to the city’s 2021 Drinking Water Supply and Quality Report. Polio can be spread through water contaminated with feces from an infected person, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, though it typically spreads through person-to-person contact. The state Department of Health began monitoring wastewater for signs of poliovirus through repeated sampling after a Rockland County, New York, resident developed paralysis as a result of poliovirus earlier this summer, Fuld said. According to the state agency, the CDC has confirmed the presence of poliovirus in sewage samples from New York City, Rockland County and New York’s Orange County. Dr. Kimberly Thompson, a polio expert and president of health nonprofit Kid Risk, Inc., explained that repeated samples of poliovirus found in wastewater are indicators that the virus is spreading, since it can be transmitted through an infected person’s feces. A similar false claim purporting monkeypox was found in Georgia drinking water also spread on social media this month.

    — Associated Press writer Melissa Goldin in New York contributed this report.

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    Posts misrepresent failed attempt to recall Los Angeles District Attorney

    CLAIM: Los Angeles County disqualified nearly 30% of recall ballots or ballot signatures in the attempted recall of the county’s progressive District Attorney George Gascón.

    THE FACTS: The county didn’t disqualify ballots or ballot signatures. It disqualified nearly 200,000 of about 716,000 signatures on petitions calling for a vote to recall Gascón. Los Angeles County election officials on Monday said that a proposal to recall the county’s progressive DA had failed after recall organizers did not gather enough valid petition signatures to schedule an election. Recall organizers needed to gather nearly 570,000 valid petition signatures to schedule an election, but county officials found only about 520,000 were valid after disqualifying nearly 200,000 signatures turned in. That news was misrepresented online this week when Donald Trump Jr. and others falsely claimed that the county had disqualified “ballots” or “ballot signatures.” The former president’s son made both claims, one on Twitter and one on his father’s Truth Social platform. “So in Los Angles they just disqualified almost 30% of ballot signatures BUT they expect you to believe that LESS THAN 1% of Ballots were faulty in the 2020 Presidential Election!” Trump Jr. tweeted Monday, misspelling Los Angeles. The petition signatures that the county deemed invalid were collected in the community to try to demonstrate voter support for scheduling a recall election. A Monday news release from the county said the signatures were found to be invalid for various reasons, including signers not being registered to vote, signing more than once, listing different addresses than their voter registrations, using signatures that didn’t match their voter registration signatures, and living outside the county. The recall committee said it would review rejected signatures and the verification process and “seek to ensure no voter was disenfranchised.” Joshua Spivak, an expert on recall elections and a senior fellow at the Hugh L. Carey Institute at Wagner College, said the signature rejection rate was “within the range” of past California recalls. He pointed out that most of the rejections happened not because of the signatures themselves, but because the signers were not registered voters or signed multiple times. A representative for the Trump Organization did not respond to a request for comment.

    — Associated Press writer Ali Swenson in New York contributed this report. ___

    Denmark didn’t ‘ban’ COVID-19 vaccines for children

    CLAIM: Denmark has banned COVID-19 vaccines for children.

    THE FACTS: Danish residents under the age of 18 will no longer be automatically eligible for COVID-19 vaccines, but there is no overall ban for that age group, as minors who are at high risk will still be able to get the shots after a medical assessment. Social media users are misrepresenting changes to the Danish Health Authority’s fall and winter vaccine program for those under 18 as a “ban.” “Denmark coming clean that kids shouldn’t be vaccinated with a TOTAL BAN on Covid vax for kids,” a Twitter user falsely claimed. But Denmark’s guidance around COVID-19 vaccines for children is only being modified. The agency’s vaccine program states that since children and young people “very rarely become seriously ill” from the COVID-19 omicron variant, those under the age of 18 will no longer receive the first dose beginning July 1. Starting Sept. 1, youths will no longer get the second dose, although those who are at risk of developing serious illness can still get the vaccine after a medical assessment. “The Danish Health Authority does not currently plan on recommending vaccination to persons under the age of 18 as a group,” Lotte Bælum, a spokesperson for the agency, told the AP in an email. “Children and young people who are at increased risk of a serious course of covid-19 will continue to have the option of vaccination after individual assessment.” The country will begin the fall and winter COVID-19 vaccination program in October. Around 81% of Denmark’s population of 5.8 million has received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine and nearly 62% have received a booster, according to the Danish Ministry of Health. In April, the AP reported that due to Denmark’s high vaccine coverage, the country was ending broad vaccination efforts, but people over the age of 50 or older will receive invitations to receive a vaccine. The Danish Health Authority still recommends that people who are completely unvaccinated receive primary vaccination.

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    Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck

    ___

    Follow @APFactCheck on Twitter: https://twitter.com/APFactCheck

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  • Who is David Weiss, the US attorney overseeing Hunter Biden criminal probe? | CNN Politics

    Who is David Weiss, the US attorney overseeing Hunter Biden criminal probe? | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The Donald Trump-appointed US attorney leading the investigation into President Joe Biden’s son Hunter has decades of experience as a federal prosecutor.

    David Weiss, the Delaware US attorney, met in April with Hunter Biden’s attorneys, who had requested a routine status update on the investigation. The long-running probe, which began as early as 2018, at one time concerned multiple financial and business activities in foreign countries dating to when Joe Biden was vice president.

    On Tuesday, the Justice Department said in court filings that Biden will plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors and struck a deal with federal prosecutors regarding a felony gun charge.

    In 2018, the Senate confirmed Weiss to serve as US attorney for the District of Delaware. At the time of his nomination, he was serving as the acting US attorney for the district and was one of nine candidates whom Trump said shared his “vision for ‘Making America Safe Again.’”

    The Philadelphia native is a member of the Delaware and Pennsylvania bars.

    A Washington University in St. Louis and Widener University School of Law graduate, Weiss began his career in law in 1984 as a clerk to Justice Andrew D. Christie of the Delaware Supreme Court, according to his Justice Department biography.

    Following his clerkship, Weiss prosecuted violent crimes and white-collar offenses as an assistant US attorney before joining firm Duane Morris, where he was a commercial litigation associate and eventually became a partner. He later served as chief operating officer and senior vice president at The Siegfried Group, a financial services firm, according to his biography.

    He served as the first assistant US attorney starting in 2007.

    Weiss’ investigation into Hunter Biden continued into the Biden administration, prompting Attorney General Merrick Garland to stress during a March Senate committee hearing that he would not interfere with the investigation. Weiss, he reiterated at the time, had “full authority” to carry out the investigation and to bring in another jurisdiction if necessary.

    Garland said Weiss was “not to be denied anything that he needs.”

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  • Inside the long and winding road to Trump’s historic indictment | CNN Politics

    Inside the long and winding road to Trump’s historic indictment | CNN Politics

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    CNN
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    The New York grand jury hearing the case against Donald Trump was set to break for several weeks. The former president’s lawyers believed on Wednesday afternoon they had at least a small reprieve from a possible indictment. Trump praised the perceived delay.

    Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg had other plans.

    Thursday afternoon, Bragg asked the grand jury to return an historic indictment against Trump, the first time that a current or former US president has been indicted. The surprise move was the final twist in an investigation that’s taken a long and winding road to the history-making charges that were returned this week.

    An indictment had been anticipated early last week – including by Trump himself, who promoted a theory he would be “arrested” – as law enforcement agencies prepared for the logistics of arraigning a former president. But after the testimony of Robert Costello – a lawyer who appeared on Trump’s behalf seeking to undercut the credibility of Trump’s former attorney and fixer Michael Cohen – Bragg appeared to hit the pause button.

    Costello’s testimony caused the district attorney’s office to reassess whether Costello should be the last witness the grand jury heard before prosecutors asked them to vote on an indictment, multiple sources told CNN.

    So they waited. The next day the grand jury was scheduled to meet, jurors were told not to come in. Bragg and his top prosecutors huddled the rest of the week and over the weekend to determine a strategy that would effectively counter Costello’s testimony in the grand jury.

    They called two additional witnesses. David Pecker, the former head of the company that publishes the National Enquirer, appeared on Monday. The other witness, who has still not been identified, testified on Thursday for 35 minutes in front of the grand jury – just before prosecutors asked them to vote on the indictment of more than 30 counts, the sources said.

    Trump and his attorneys, thinking Bragg might be reconsidering a potential indictment, were all caught off-guard, sources said. Some of Trump’s advisers had even left Palm Beach on Wednesday following news reports that the grand jury was taking a break, the sources added.

    After the indictment, Trump ate dinner with his wife, Melania, Thursday evening and smiled while he greeted guests at his Mar-a-Lago club, according to a source familiar with the event.

    The Manhattan district attorney’s investigation into Trump has been ongoing for years, dating back to Bragg’s predecessor, Cy Vance. Its focus shifted by mid-2020 to the accuracy of the Trump Org.’s financial statements. At the time, prosecutors debated legal theories around the hush money payments and thought they were a long shot. At several points, the wide-ranging investigation seemed to have been winding down – to the point that prosecutors resigned in protest last year. One even wrote a book critical of Bragg for not pursuing charges against Trump released just last month.

    The specific charges against Trump still remain under seal and are expected to be unveiled Tuesday when Trump is set to be arraigned.

    There are questions swirling even among Trump critics over whether the Manhattan district attorney’s case is the strongest against the former president amid additional investigations in Washington, DC, and Georgia over both his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents at his Florida resort.

    Trump could still face charges in those probes, too, which are separate from the New York indictment.

    But it’s the Manhattan indictment, dating back to a payment made before the 2016 presidential election, that now sees Trump facing down criminal charges for the first time as he runs again for the White House in 2024.

    It was just weeks before the 2016 election when Cohen, Trump’s then-lawyer, paid adult film actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 to keep silent about an alleged affair with Trump. (Trump has denied the affair.) Cohen was later reimbursed $420,000 by the Trump Organization to cover the original payment and tax liabilities and to reward him with a bonus.

    That payment and reimbursement are keys at issue in the investigation.

    Cohen also helped arrange a $150,000 payment from the publisher of the National Enquirer to Karen McDougal to kill her story claiming a 10-month affair with Trump. Trump also denies an affair with McDougal. During the grand jury proceedings, the district attorney’s office has asked questions about the “catch and kill” deal with McDougal.

    When Cohen was charged by federal prosecutors in New York in 2018 and pleaded guilty, he said he was acting at the direction of Trump when he made the payment.

    At the time, federal prosecutors had determined they could not seek to indict Trump in the scheme because of US Justice Department regulations against charging a sitting president. In 2021, after Trump left the White House, prosecutors in the Southern District of New York decided not to pursue a case against Trump, according to a recent book from CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig.

    But then-Manhattan District Attorney Vance’s team had already picked up the investigation into the hush money payments and begun looking at potential state law violations. By summer 2019, they sent subpoenas to the Trump Org., other witnesses, and met with Cohen, who was serving a three-year prison sentence.

    Vance’s investigation broadened to the Trump Org.’s finances. New York prosecutors went to the Supreme Court twice to enforce a subpoena for Trump’s tax records from his long-time accounting firm Mazars USA. The Trump Org. and its long-time chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg were indicted on tax fraud and other charges in June 2021 for allegedly running an off-the-books compensation scheme for more than a decade.

    Weisselberg pleaded guilty to the charges last year and is currently serving a five-month sentence at Rikers Island. Prosecutors had hoped to flip Weisselberg to cooperate against Trump, but he would not tie Trump to any wrongdoing.

    Disagreements about the pace of the investigation had caused at least three career prosecutors to move off the investigation. They were concerned that the investigation was moving too quickly, without clear evidence to support possible charges, CNN and others reported last year.

    Vance authorized the attorneys on the team to present evidence to the grand jury near the end of 2021, but he did not seek an indictment. Those close to Vance say he wanted to leave the decision to Bragg, the newly elected district attorney.

    Bragg, a Democrat, took office in January 2022. Less than two months into his tenure, two top prosecutors who had worked on the Trump case under Vance abruptly resigned amid a disagreement in the office over the strength of the case against Trump.

    On February 22, 2022, Bragg informed the prosecution team that he was not prepared to authorize charges against Trump, CNN reported. The prosecutors, Carey Dunne and Mark Pomerantz, resigned the next day.

    In his resignation letter, Pomerantz said he believed Trump was guilty of numerous felonies and said that Bragg’s decision to not move forward with an indictment at the time was “wrong” and a “grave failure of justice.”

    “I and others believe that your decision not to authorize prosecution now will doom any future prospects that Mr. Trump will be prosecuted for the criminal conduct we have been investigating,” Pomerantz wrote in the letter, which was reviewed by CNN.

    At that point, the investigation was focused on Trump’s financial statements and whether he knowingly misled lenders, insurers, and others by providing them false or misleading information about the value of his properties.

    Prosecutors were building a wide-ranging falsified business records case to include years of financial statements and the hush money payments, people with direct knowledge of the investigation told CNN. But at the time, those prosecutors believed there was a good chance a felony charge related to the hush money payment would be dismissed by a judge because it was a novel legal theory.

    Dunne and Pomerantz pushed to seek an indictment of Trump tied to the sweeping falsified business records case, but others, including some career prosecutors, were skeptical that they could win a conviction at trial, in part because of the difficulty in proving Trump’s criminal intent.

    Despite the resignations of the prosecutors on the Trump case, Bragg’s office reiterated at the time that the investigation was ongoing.

    “Investigations are not linear so we are following the leads in front of us. That’s what we’re doing,” Bragg told CNN in April 2022. “The investigation is very much ongoing.”

    At the same time that Bragg’s criminal investigation into Trump lingered last year, another prosecution against the Trump Org. moved forward. In December, two Trump Org. entities were convicted at trial on 17 counts and were ordered to pay $1.6 million, the maximum penalty, the following month.

    Trump was not personally charged in that case. But it appeared to embolden Bragg’s team to sharpen their focus back to Trump and the hush money payment.

    Cohen was brought back in to meet with Manhattan prosecutors. Cohen had previously met with prosecutors in the district attorney’s office 13 times over the course of the investigation. But the January meeting was the first in more than a year – and a clear sign of the direction prosecutors were taking.

    As investigators inched closer to a charging decision, Bragg was faced with more public pressure to indict Trump: Pomerantz, the prosecutor who had resigned a year prior, released a book about the investigation that argued Trump should be charged and criticized Bragg for failing to do so.

    “Every single member of the prosecution team thought that his guilt was established,” Pomerantz said in a February interview on “CNN This Morning.”

    Asked about Bragg’s hesitance, Pomerantz said: “I can’t speak in detail about what went through his mind. I can surmise from what happened at the time and statements that he’s made since that he had misgivings about the strength of the case.”

    Bragg responded in a statement saying that more work was needed on the case. “Mr. Pomerantz’s plane wasn’t ready for takeoff,” Bragg said.

    Prosecutors continued bringing in witnesses, including Pecker, the former head of American Media Inc., which publishes the National Enquirer. In February, Trump Org. controller Jeffrey McConney testified before the grand jury. Members of Trump’s 2016 campaign, including Kellyanne Conway and Hope Hicks, also appeared. In March, Daniels met with prosecutors, her attorney said.

    And Cohen, after his numerous meetings with prosecutors, finally testified before the grand jury in March.

    The second week of March, prosecutors gave the clearest sign to date that the investigation was nearing its conclusion – they invited Trump to appear before the grand jury.

    Potential defendants in New York are required by law to be notified and invited to appear before a grand jury weighing charges.

    Behind the scenes, Trump attorney Susan Necheles told CNN she met with New York prosecutors to argue why Trump shouldn’t be indicted and that prosecutors didn’t articulate the specific charges they are considering.

    Trump, meanwhile, took to his social media to predict his impending indictment. In a post attacking Bragg on March 18, Trump said the “leading Republican candidate and former president of the United States will be arrested on Tuesday of next week.”

    “Protest, take our nation back,” Trump added, echoing the calls he made while he tried to overturn the 2020 election.

    Trump’s prediction would turn out to be premature.

    Trump’s call for protests after a potential indictment led to meetings between senior staff members from the district attorney’s office, the New York Police Department and the New York State Court Officers – who provide security at the criminal court building in lower Manhattan.

    Trump’s lawyers also made a last-ditch effort to fend off an indictment. At the behest of Trump’s team, Costello, who advised Cohen in 2018, provided emails and testified to the grand jury on Monday, March 20, alleging that Cohen had said in 2018 that he had decided on his own to make the payment to Daniels.

    Costello’s testimony appeared to delay a possible indictment – for a brief time at least.

    During the void, Trump continued to launch verbal insults against Bragg, calling him a “degenerate psychopath.” And four Republican chairmen of the most powerful House committees wrote to Bragg asking him to testify, which Bragg’s office said was unprecedented interference in a local investigation. An envelope containing a suspicious white powder and a death threat to Bragg was to delivered to the building where the grand jury meets – the powder was deemed nonhazardous.

    The grand jury would not meet again until Monday, March 27, when Pecker was ushered back to the grand jury in a government vehicle with tinted windows in a failed effort to evade detection by the media camped outside of the building where the grand jury meets.

    Pecker, a longtime friend of Trump’s who had a history of orchestrating so-called “catch and kill” deals while at the National Enquirer, was involved with the Daniels’ deal from the beginning.

    Two days after Pecker’s testimony, there were multiple reports that the grand jury was going into a pre-planned break in April. The grand jury was set to meet Thursday but it was not expected to hear the Trump case.

    Instead, the grand jury heard from one last witness in the Trump case on Thursday, whose identity is still unknown. And then the grand jury shook up the American political system by voting to indict a former president and 2024 candidate for the White House.

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  • Whistleblowers say IRS recommended far more charges, including felonies, against Hunter Biden | CNN Politics

    Whistleblowers say IRS recommended far more charges, including felonies, against Hunter Biden | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Two whistleblowers told Congress that IRS investigators recommended charging Hunter Biden with attempted tax evasion and other felonies, which are far more serious crimes than what the president’s son has agreed to plead guilty to, according to transcripts of their private interviews with lawmakers.

    The IRS whistleblowers said the recommendation called for Hunter Biden to be charged with tax evasion and filing a false tax return – both felonies – for 2014, 2018 and 2019. The IRS also recommended that prosecutors charge him with failing to pay taxes on time, a misdemeanor, for 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019, according to the transcripts, which were released Thursday by House Republicans.

    It appears that this 11-count charging recommendation also had the backing of some Justice Department prosecutors, but not from more senior attorneys, according to documents that the whistleblowers provided to House investigators.

    In a deal with prosecutors announced earlier this week, Hunter Biden is pleading guilty to just two tax misdemeanors.

    The allegations come from Gary Shapley, a 14-year IRS veteran, who oversaw parts of the Hunter Biden criminal probe, and an unnamed IRS agent who was on the case nearly from its inception. Shapley approached Congress this year with information that he claimed showed political interference in the investigation. He and the entire IRS team were later removed from the probe.

    “I am alleging, with evidence, that DOJ provided preferential treatment, slow-walked the investigation, did nothing to avoid obvious conflicts of interest in this investigation,” Shapley told lawmakers.

    David Weiss, the Trump-appointed US attorney in Delaware who oversaw the Hunter Biden criminal probe, eventually reached a plea deal where the president’s son will plead guilty to two misdemeanors for failing to pay taxes on time. The plea agreement will also resolve a separate felony gun charge, if Hunter Biden abides by certain court-imposed conditions for a period of time.

    Hunter Biden isn’t pleading guilty to any felonies, and he wasn’t charged with any tax felonies. CNN reported that prosecutors are expected to recommend no jail time. He is scheduled to appear in federal court in Delaware on July 26.

    It isn’t uncommon for there to be internal disagreements among investigators over which charges to file against the target of an investigation, much like the disagreements that the IRS whistleblowers described. CNN reported last year that some FBI and IRS investigators were at odds with other Justice Department officials over the strength of the case, and that there were discussions over which types of charges were appropriate and whether further investigation was needed.

    Sources familiar with the criminal probe told CNN in April that prosecutors were still actively weighing a felony tax charge against Hunter Biden. And it is common for prosecutors to strike deals with defendants where they plead guilty to a small subset of the possible charges they could’ve faced.

    The Justice Department probe into Hunter Biden was opened in November 2018, and was codenamed “Sportsman.” According to Shapley’s testimony, federal investigators knew as early as June 2021 that there were potential venue-related issues with charging Hunter Biden in Delaware. Under federal law, charges must be brought in the jurisdiction where the alleged crimes occurred.

    If the potential charges couldn’t be brought in Delaware, then Weiss would need help from his fellow US attorneys. He looked to Washington, DC, where some of Hunter Biden’s tax returns were prepared, and the Central District of California, which includes the Los Angeles area where Hunter Biden lives.

    But Shapley told the committee that the US attorneys in both districts wouldn’t seek an indictment.

    A second whistleblower, an IRS case agent who also testified to the committee but hasn’t been publicly identified, also told lawmakers that this is what happened. He agreed that Weiss was “was told no” when he tried to get the cooperation of the US attorneys in in DC and Los Angeles, who are Biden appointees.

    Hunter Biden’s eventual plea agreement was filed in Weiss’ jurisdiction, in Delaware.

    Shapley contends in his interview that Attorney General Merrick Garland was not truthful when he told Congress that Weiss had full authority on the investigation.

    Shapley recounted a meeting on October 7, 2022, where, according to Shapley’s notes memorializing the meeting, Weiss said, “He is not the deciding person on whether charges are filed” against Hunter Biden. This undermines what Weiss and Garland have publicly said about Weiss’ independence on the matter.

    Shapley also testified to committee investigators that it was during this October 2022 meeting that he learned for the first time that Weiss had requested to be named as a special counsel, but was denied.

    In testimony to Congress in March, Garland said Weiss was advised “he is not to be denied anything he needs.”

    Regarding the claims of political interference with the Hunter Biden criminal probe, Weiss told House Republicans in a recent letter that Garland granted him “ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges.”

    After the transcripts were released Thursday, spokespeople for the US attorney’s offices in DC and Los Angeles issued near-identical statements reiterating that Weiss “was given full authority to bring charges in any jurisdiction he deemed appropriate.” The Justice Department echoed those comments in a statement saying Weiss “needs no further approval” to bring charges wherever he wants.

    The whistleblowers also allege that at multiple key junctures, investigators were thwarted in their efforts because prosecutors were concerned about interfering in the 2020 presidential election.

    In 2020, IRS investigators sought to conduct search warrants and take other overt steps. But according to Shapley, several weeks before the election, in September 2020, a Justice Department prosecutor questioned the optics of searching Hunter Biden’s residence and Joe Biden’s guest home.

    Later that year, other planned searches were delayed because then-President Donald Trump was refusing to concede and was continuing to contest the results.

    Republicans have slammed the plea agreement Hunter Biden struck as a “sweetheart deal,” and said it amounted to “a slap on the wrist.”

    House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith said earlier Thursday that the transcripts reveal “credible whistleblower testimony alleging misconduct and abuse” at the Justice Department that “resulted in preferential treatment for the president’s son.”

    The Missouri Republican highlighted the whistleblowers’ allegations that the Justice Department “overstepped” in their efforts to intervene in the Hunter Biden criminal probe.

    “The testimony … details a lack of US attorney independence, recurring unjustified delays, unusual actions outside the normal course of any investigation, a lack of transparency across the investigation and prosecution teams, and bullying and threats from the defense counsel,” Smith said.

    Democrats on the committee said the transcripts were “a premature and incomplete record” of what happened with the Hunter Biden probe and accused the GOP of a “stunning abuse of power.”

    Hunter Biden’s lawyer pushed back in a statement Friday against the whistleblowers claims, saying it was “preposterous and deeply irresponsible” to suggest that federal investigators “cut my client any slack” during their “extensive” five-year probe.

    “A close examination of the document released publicly yesterday by a very biased individual raises serious questions over whether it is what he claims it to be,” attorney Chris Clark said. “It is dangerously misleading to make any conclusions or inferences based on this document.”

    Shapley, the IRS supervisor-turned-whistleblower, told House lawmakers that Justice Department prosecutors denied requests to look into messages allegedly from Hunter Biden where he used his father as leverage to pressure a Chinese company into paying him.

    “I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,” according to a document Shapley gave to Congress, which quotes from texts that are allegedly from Hunter Biden to the CEO of a Chinese fund management company.

    The message continues: “Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand. And now means tonight.” The message goes onto say, “I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction. I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father.”

    The second, unnamed IRS whistleblower also testified to lawmakers about this alleged WhatsApp message, saying prosecutors questioned whether they could be sure Hunter Biden was telling the truth that his father was actually in the room in the messages. The unnamed whistleblower testified that they did not know whether the FBI investigated the message.

    Shapley told House investigators that a Justice Department attorney insisted that the FBI not ask directly about Joe Biden when doing interviews. But the FBI did manage to ask one key witness about Joe Biden, and Shapley said the witness told investigators that some suggestions of the president’s involvement were overstated.

    An email sent among business partners of Hunter Biden said an equity stake should be held “for the big guy,” an apparent reference to Joe Biden, who was vice president at the time. But one of the associates told the FBI that it was probably just “wishful thinking or maybe he was just projecting” that Joe Biden would get involved if he did not run for president in 2016.

    Joe Biden has repeatedly denied having any involvement in his son’s overseas business dealings, where he made millions of dollars from China, Ukraine and other countries. House Republicans have used their oversight probes to look for evidence that Joe Biden was actually involved.

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • Biden to allow US to share evidence of Russian war crimes with International Criminal Court | CNN Politics

    Biden to allow US to share evidence of Russian war crimes with International Criminal Court | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    President Joe Biden has decided to allow the US to cooperate with the International Criminal Court’s investigation of Russian war crimes in Ukraine, two US officials and a source familiar with the matter told CNN.

    The decision comes after months of internal debate and marks a historic shift, as it would be the first time the US has agreed to share evidence with the court as part of a criminal probe into a country that is not a member of the ICC. Neither the US nor Russia are members of the court.

    “It could be deeply consequential,” one of the sources said, adding that the US government now has “a clear green light” to share information and evidence with the ICC.

    What information the US shares will ultimately depend on what the ICC prosecutor requests for the investigations, the source explained.

    A National Security Council spokesperson would not comment directly on the decision, but said in a statement that Biden “has been clear: there needs to be accountability for the perpetrators and enablers of war crimes and other atrocities in Ukraine.”

    “We have been clear that we support a range of international mechanisms to identify and hold accountable those responsible, including through the Office of the Ukraine Prosecutor General, the Joint Investigative Team through Eurojust, the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission, the Expert Missions established under the OSCE’s ‘Moscow Mechanism,’ and the International Criminal Court among others,” the spokesperson added.

    The New York Times first reported on Biden’s order.

    Over the course of the war, Biden administration officials have obtained evidence of alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine, through intelligence gathering mechanisms among other channels, officials told CNN. But the administration debated for months internally over whether to share that evidence with the court, as officials grappled with the possibility that doing so could set a precedent that could one day be used against the United States, officials explained.

    The Pentagon was the most concerned about cooperating with the court, officials said, and worried that doing so might set a precedent for the ICC to investigate alleged war crimes carried out by Americans in Iraq. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin raised his concerns with the president earlier this year, but told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer earlier this month that the Defense Department would cooperate with whatever policy decision was made by the president.

    The NSC spokesperson noted that the US has already “deployed teams of international investigators and prosecutors to assist Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor General in documenting, preserving, and preparing war crimes cases for prosecution, and the Department of Justice has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding to cooperate with Ukraine on investigations and prosecutions of war crimes committed during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”

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  • Microsoft under European antitrust investigation over Teams | CNN Business

    Microsoft under European antitrust investigation over Teams | CNN Business

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    European officials are investigating whether Microsoft’s practice of bundling its Teams software with Office 365 is anticompetitive, the European Commission said Thursday.

    The EU probe follows a formal complaint by Microsoft’s rival, the Salesforce-owned Slack, in 2020, alleging that Microsoft has illegally circumvented competition.

    By packaging Teams together with its “well-entrenched” productivity suite, including apps such as Word and Outlook, Microsoft could be effectively blocking customers from seeking out rival collaboration tools, the Commission said. Antitrust officials are also concerned about interoperability issues between Microsoft’s software and third-party products, it added.

    “These practices may constitute anti-competitive tying or bundling and prevent suppliers of other communication and collaboration tools from competing,” the Commission said in a statement.

    Microsoft said in a statement it is cooperating with the probe.

    “We respect the European Commission’s work on this case and take our own responsibilities very seriously,” said a Microsoft spokesperson. “We will continue to cooperate with the Commission and remain committed to finding solutions that will address its concerns.”

    In a press briefing Thursday, EU spokesperson Arianna Podesta told reporters that “at this stage, possible commitments [by Microsoft to resolve the concerns] are too early to be discussed. We first need to identify indeed if there is a breach of antitrust considerations.”

    The in-depth investigation reflects rising EU antitrust scrutiny for Microsoft, which was last fined on a competition violation in 2013 for not honoring a commitment to give European consumers a choice in web browsers.

    Slack’s initial EU complaint alleged that Microsoft forces Teams onto millions of customers, “blocking its removal, and hiding the true cost to enterprise customers.”

    A Slack executive at the time argued that Microsoft sells a closed ecosystem of its own products, while Slack provides customers with more freedom to mix and match services.

    “This is a proxy for two very different philosophies for the future of digital ecosystems, gateways versus gatekeepers,” said Slack’s VP of communications and policy, Jonathan Prince.

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  • What to know about the Florida grand jury in the Trump documents probe | CNN Politics

    What to know about the Florida grand jury in the Trump documents probe | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    We learned this week that special counsel Jack Smith, who is investigating former President Donald Trump for potentially mishandling classified documents, is using a second grand jury in Miami to gather new evidence.

    The development comes after a period of escalating activity in the federal criminal probe, which has focused around Trump having dozens of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort after he left the White House.

    Up until this point, Smith has been using a federal grand jury in Washington, DC, but the panel hasn’t been observed meeting since early May. It’s unclear why he has now decided to use a second grand jury in Miami, as he appeared to be reaching the final stages of his probe and is weighing possible indictments. (Trump denies all wrongdoing and says the probe is political.)

    Here’s a breakdown of what’s going on Florida and what we know about the fast-developing situation.

    Smith is investigating Trump’s handling of national security records at his Mar-a-Lago resort and elsewhere. His team is trying to determine if Trump or his aides committed crimes by keeping the documents after his presidency. Those were sensitive government documents that Trump had no legal right to hold onto, prosecutors have said in court filings.

    Prosecutors are also investigating whether Trump or his allies obstructed the investigation.

    It’s common for ex-presidents to accidentally keep some classified documents when they move out of the White House.

    Notably, President Joe Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence both found classified papers at their homes, from their time as vice president. But Trump’s case appears to be far more serious, because of the sheer volume of classified records involved, and because of his repeated efforts to stymie federal officials who tried to claw back the materials.

    As part of the inquiry, witnesses have testified to Smith’s grand juries in DC and Miami, according to CNN’s reporting.

    The newly revealed grand jury in Florida has raised a host of questions about the endgame of Smith’s investigation.

    Legal experts have speculated that the development might indicate that Smith is exploring bringing parts or all of a criminal case in Florida federal court instead of DC federal court, or possibly in addition to DC. Prosecutors can’t simply file charges wherever they please – they need to establish that they have the proper venue, and they need to connect part of the crime to where the case is filed.

    A significant amount of the conduct under investigation occurred in Mar-a-Lago, located in Palm Beach.

    A top prosecutor from special counsel Robert Mueller’s team previously co-wrote an analysis of the hurdles Smith would need to clear if he wants to bring the case in DC instead of Florida, where the jury pool might be more friendly to Trump.

    Former Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich, who now runs a pro-Trump super PAC, appeared before the Florida-based grand jury Wednesday and testified for less than an hour. After he left the courthouse, he tweeted that he “fulfilled a legal obligation to testify in front a federal grand jury” and that he “answered every question honestly.”

    He is the first person to be publicly named as testifying before Smith’s grand jury in Florida. However, CNN previously reported that “multiple witnesses” have gone before the Florida grand jury in recent weeks, and at least one more is expected after Budowich.

    Prosecutors revealed the specific statutes that they were investigating when they searched Mar-a-Lago last year, a search that uncovered dozens of classified documents, even after Trump’s team swore they turned everything over.

    However, that was before Smith took over the probe as special counsel, and it doesn’t mean these are the only possible crimes he’s examining. But it provides a roadmap of possible charges – because when seeking the Mar-a-Lago search warrant, prosecutors needed to convince a judge there was probable cause that they’d find evidence of these crimes.

    The first is 18 USC 793, which is part of the Espionage Act. That federal law deals with the illegal retention of “national defense information,” a broad term that encompasses classified documents and other sensitive government materials. This law can apply to people who are authorized to handle classified information but knowingly kept the material in an unsecured location, or to people who aren’t supposed to possess the information in the first place.

    The second is 18 USC 2071, which deals with the illegal removal of government records from US custody.

    The third is 18 USC 1519, which is obstruction of justice. This could come into play if prosecutors conclude that Trump or his aides intentionally tried to impede their inquiry – by moving boxes around so prosecutors wouldn’t find classified documents, by possibly questioning complying with subpoenas including for surveillance tapes that prosecutors believe captured the movement of the boxes, by failing to fully comply with a subpoena, or by falsely swearing that all classified files had been returned.

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  • Timeline: The special counsel inquiry into Trump’s handling of classified documents | CNN Politics

    Timeline: The special counsel inquiry into Trump’s handling of classified documents | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The federal criminal investigation into former President Donald Trump’s potential mishandling of classified documents escalated in stunning fashion this week with Trump’s indictment.

    The indictment hasn’t been unsealed yet, so details of the charges aren’t publicly available. But the investigation – led by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith – revolves around sensitive government papers that Trump held onto after his White House term ended in January 2021. The special counsel has also examined whether Trump or his aides obstructed the investigation.

    Federal authorities have recovered more than 325 classified documents from Trump. He has voluntarily given back some materials, his lawyers turned over additional files after a subpoena, and the FBI found dozens of classified records during a court-approved search of his Mar-a-Lago home last summer.

    Trump has denied all wrongdoing and claims the investigation is a politically motivated sham, intended to derail his ongoing campaign to win the Republican 2024 nomination and return to the White House.

    Here’s a timeline of the important developments in the blockbuster investigation.

    An official from the National Archives and Records Administration contacts Trump’s team after realizing that several important documents weren’t handed over before Trump left the White House. In hopes of locating the missing items, NARA lawyer Gary Stern reaches out to someone who served in the White House counsel’s office under Trump, who was the point of contact for recordkeeping matters. The missing documents include some of Trump’s correspondence with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, as well as the map of Hurricane Dorian that Trump infamously altered with a sharpie pen.

    In a taped conversation, Trump acknowledges that he still has a classified Pentagon document about a possible attack against Iran, according to CNN reporting. The recording, which was made at Trump’s golf club in New Jersey, indicates that Trump understood that he retained classified material after leaving the White House. The special counsel later obtained this audiotape, a key piece of evidence in his inquiry.

    NARA grows frustrated with the slow pace of document turnover after several months of conversations with the Trump team. Stern reaches out to another Trump attorney to intervene. The archivist asks about several boxes of records that were apparently taken to Mar-a-Lago during Trump’s relocation to Florida. NARA still doesn’t receive the White House documents they are searching for.

    After months of discussions with Trump’s team, NARA retrieves 15 boxes of Trump White House records from Mar-a-Lago. The boxes contained some materials that were part of “special access programs,” known as SAP, which is a classification that includes protocols to significantly limit who would have access to the information. NARA says in a statement that some of the records it received at the end of Trump’s administration were “torn up by former President Trump,” and that White House officials had to tape them back together. Not all the torn-up documents were reconstructed, NARA says.

    NARA asks the Justice Department to investigate Trump’s handling of White House records and whether he violated the Presidential Records Act and other laws related to classified information. The Presidential Records Act requires all records created by a sitting president to be turned over to the National Archives at the end of their administration.

    NARA informs the Justice Department that some of the documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago included classified material. NARA also tells the department that, despite being warned it was illegal, Trump occasionally tore up government documents while he was president.

    On April 7, NARA publicly acknowledges for the first time that the Justice Department is involved, and news outlets report that prosecutors have launched a criminal probe into Trump’s mishandling of classified documents. Around this time, FBI agents quietly interview Trump aides at Mar-a-Lago about the handling of presidential records as part of their widening investigation.

    The FBI asks NARA for access to the 15 boxes it retrieved from Mar-a-Lago in January. The request was formally transmitted to NARA by President Joe Biden’s White House Counsel’s office, because the incumbent president controls presidential documents in NARA custody.

    The Justice Department sends a letter to Trump’s lawyers as part of its effort to access the 15 boxes, notifying them that more than 100 classified documents, totaling more than 700 pages, were found in the boxes. The letter says the FBI and US intelligence agencies need “immediate access” to these materials because of “important national security interests.” Also on this day, Trump lawyers ask NARA to delay its plans to give the FBI access to these materials. Trump’s lawyers say they want time to examine the materials to see if anything is privileged, and that they are making a “protective assertion of executive privilege” over all the documents.

    Trump’s lawyers write again to NARA, and ask again that NARA postpone its plans to give the FBI access to the materials retrieved from Mar-a-Lago.

    Debra Steidel Wall, the acting archivist of the United States, who runs NARA, informs Trump’s lawyers that she is rejecting their claims of “protective” executive privilege over all the materials taken from Mar-a-Lago and will therefore turn over the materials to the FBI and US intelligence agencies, in a four-page letter.

    The Justice Department subpoenas Trump, demanding all documents with classification markings that are still at Mar-a-Lago. At some point after receiving the subpoena, Trump asks his lawyer Evan Corcoran if there was any way to fight the subpoena, but Corcoran tells him he has to comply, according to notes Cochran took and later gave to investigators. Also after getting the subpoena, Trump aides are captured on surveillance footage moving document boxes into and out of a basement storage room – which has become a major element of the obstruction investigation.

    News outlets report that investigators subpoenaed NARA for access to the classified documents they retrieved from Mar-a-Lago. The subpoena is the first public indication of the Justice Department using a grand jury in its investigation.

    As part of the effort to comply with the subpoena, Corcoran searches a Mar-a-Lago storage room and finds 38 classified documents. According to a lawsuit that the former president later filed, Trump invites FBI officials to come to Mar-a-Lago to retrieve the subpoenaed materials.

    Federal investigators, including a top Justice Department counterintelligence official, visit Mar-a-Lago to deal with the subpoena for remaining classified documents. The investigators meet with Trump’s attorneys, including Corcoran, and look around the basement storage room where the documents were stored. Trump briefly stops by the meeting to say hello to the officials, but he does not answer any questions. Corcoran hands over the 38 classified documents that he found. Trump lawyer Christina Bobb signs a sworn affidavit inaccurately asserting that there aren’t any more classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

    Trump’s attorneys receive a letter from federal investigators, asking them to further secure the room where documents are being stored. In response, Trump aides add a padlock to the room in the basement of Mar-a-Lago.

    Federal investigators serve a subpoena to the Trump Organization, demanding surveillance video from Mar-a-Lago. Trump’s company complies with the subpoena and turns over the footage. CNN has reported that this was part of an effort to gather information about who had access to areas at the club where government documents were stored.

    The FBI executes a court-approved search warrant at Mar-a-Lago – a major escalation of the investigation. The search focused on the area of the club where Trump’s offices and personal quarters are located. Federal agents found more than 100 additional classified documents at the property. The search was the first time in American history that a former president’s home was searched as part of a criminal investigation.

    Trump sends a message through one his lawyers to Attorney General Merrick Garland, saying he has “been hearing from people all over the country about the raid” who are “angry,” and that “whatever I can do to take the heat down, to bring the pressure down, just let us know,” according to a lawsuit he later filed. Hours later, after three days of silence, Garland makes a brief public statement about the investigation. He reveals that he personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant, and that the Justice Department will continue to apply the law “without fear or favor.” Garland also pushes back against what he called “unfounded attacks on the professionalism of the FBI and Justice Department.”

    Federal Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart approves the unsealing of the Mar-a-Lago search warrant and its property receipt, at the Justice Department’s request and after Trump’s lawyers agree to the release. The warrant reveals the Justice Department is looking into possible violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records, as part of its investigation.

    Trump files a federal lawsuit seeking the appointment of a third-party attorney known as a “special master” to independently review the materials that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. In the lawsuit, Trump’s lawyers argue that the Justice Department can’t be trusted to do its own review for potentially privileged materials that should be siloed off from the criminal probe.

    In a major ruling in Trump’s favor, Federal District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, grants Trump’s request for a special master to review the seized materials from Mar-a-Lago. She says the special master will have the power to look for documents covered under attorney-client privilege and executive privilege.

    The Justice Department appeals Cannon’s decision in the special master case.

    Cannon appoints senior Judge Raymond Dearie to serve as the special master and sets a November 30 deadline for the Brooklyn-based federal judge to finish his review of the seized materials.

    A maintenance worker drains the swimming pool at Mar-a-Lago, which ends up flooding a room where there are computer severs that contain surveillance video logs, according to CNN reporting. It’s unclear if the flood was accidental or on purpose, and it’s possible that the IT equipment wasn’t damaged, but federal prosecutors found the incident to be suspicious.

    Former Trump administration official Kash Patel testifies before the federal grand jury in the classified documents investigation. A Trump loyalist, Patel had publicly claimed that Trump declassified all the materials that ended up at Mar-a-Lago, even though there is no evidence to back up those assertions.

    Garland announces that he is appointing special counsel Jack Smith to take over the investigation.

    A federal appeals court shuts down the special master review of the documents that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. The appeals panel rebuked Cannon’s earlier decisions, writing that she essentially tried to “interfere” with the criminal probe and had created a “special exception” in the law to help Trump.

    Trump attorney Timothy Parlatore testifies before the special counsel’s grand jury, where he described how Trump’s lawyers scoured his properties for classified materials. He later left Trump’s legal team.

    Trump’s legal team searches four of his properties in Florida, New York and New Jersey for additional classified material. They find two more classified files in a Florida storage unit, and give them to the FBI. Around this time, Trump’s team also finds additional papers with classification markings at Mar-a-Lago, and they give those materials to the Justice Department. They also turn over a laptop belonging to a Trump aide who had copied those documents onto the computer, not realizing they were classified.

    A string of key witnesses testify before the special counsel’s grand jury in Washington, DC. This includes Trump administration officials Robert O’Brien and Ric Grenell, who handled national security and intelligence matters; Margo Martin, a communications aide who continued working for Trump after he left the White House; and Matthew Calamari Sr. and his son, Matthew Calamari Jr., longtime Trump employees who oversee security for the Trump Organization.

    In response to a new subpoena from the special counsel, Trump’s lawyers turn over some material related to a classified Pentagon document that he discussed at a recorded meeting in 2021. However, Trump’s team wasn’t able to find the specific document – about a potential US attack on Iran – that prosecutors were looking for.

    Corcoran, the lead Trump attorney, testifies before the grand jury in Washington, DC. This occurred after a federal judge ordered him to answer prosecutors’ questions, ruling that attorney-client privilege did not shield his discussion with Trump because Trump might been trying to commit a crime through his attorneys. Corcoran later recused himself from handling the Mar-a-Lago matter.

    The first public indications emerge that the special counsel is using a second grand jury in Miami to gather evidence. Multiple witnesses testify in front of the Miami-based panel, CNN reported.

    Trump lawyers meet with senior Justice Department officials – including special counsel Smith – to discuss the Mar-a-Lago investigation. The sitdown lasted about 90 minutes, and Trump’s team raised concerns about the probe, which they have called an “unlawful” and “outrageous” abuse of the legal system.

    News outlets report that the Justice Department recently sent a “target letter” to Trump, formally notifying him that he’s a target of the investigation into potential mishandling of classified documents.

    News outlets report that Trump has been indicted in connection with the classified documents investigation. Trump also says in a social media post that the Justice Department informed his attorneys that he was indicted – and called the case a “hoax.”

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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