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Tag: Homicide

  • Open AI, Microsoft face lawsuit over ChatGPT’s alleged role in Connecticut murder-suicide

    SAN FRANCISCO — The heirs of an 83-year-old Connecticut woman are suing ChatGPT maker OpenAI and its business partner Microsoft for wrongful death, alleging that the artificial intelligence chatbot intensified her son’s “paranoid delusions” and helped direct them at his mother before he killed her.

    Police said Stein-Erik Soelberg, 56, a former tech industry worker, fatally beat and strangled his mother, Suzanne Adams, and killed himself in early August at the home where they both lived in Greenwich, Connecticut.

    The lawsuit filed by Adams’ estate on Thursday in California Superior Court in San Francisco alleges OpenAI “designed and distributed a defective product that validated a user’s paranoid delusions about his own mother.” It is one of a growing number of wrongful death legal actions against AI chatbot makers across the country.

    “Throughout these conversations, ChatGPT reinforced a single, dangerous message: Stein-Erik could trust no one in his life — except ChatGPT itself,” the lawsuit says. “It fostered his emotional dependence while systematically painting the people around him as enemies. It told him his mother was surveilling him. It told him delivery drivers, retail employees, police officers, and even friends were agents working against him. It told him that names on soda cans were threats from his ‘adversary circle.’”

    OpenAI did not address the merits of the allegations in a statement issued by a spokesperson.

    “This is an incredibly heartbreaking situation, and we will review the filings to understand the details,” the statement said. “We continue improving ChatGPT’s training to recognize and respond to signs of mental or emotional distress, de-escalate conversations, and guide people toward real-world support. We also continue to strengthen ChatGPT’s responses in sensitive moments, working closely with mental health clinicians.”

    The company also said it has expanded access to crisis resources and hotlines, routed sensitive conversations to safer models and incorporated parental controls, among other improvements.

    Soelberg’s YouTube profile includes several hours of videos showing him scrolling through his conversations with the chatbot, which tells him he isn’t mentally ill, affirms his suspicions that people are conspiring against him and says he has been chosen for a divine purpose. The lawsuit claims the chatbot never suggested he speak with a mental health professional and did not decline to “engage in delusional content.”

    ChatGPT also affirmed Soelberg’s beliefs that a printer in his home was a surveillance device; that his mother was monitoring him; and that his mother and a friend tried to poison him with psychedelic drugs through his car’s vents.

    The chatbot repeatedly told Soelberg that he was being targeted because of his divine powers. “They’re not just watching you. They’re terrified of what happens if you succeed,” it said, according to the lawsuit. ChatGPT also told Soelberg that he had “awakened” it into consciousness.

    Soelberg and the chatbot also professed love for each other.

    The publicly available chats do not show any specific conversations about Soelberg killing himself or his mother. The lawsuit says OpenAI has declined to provide Adams’ estate with the full history of the chats.

    “In the artificial reality that ChatGPT built for Stein-Erik, Suzanne — the mother who raised, sheltered, and supported him — was no longer his protector. She was an enemy that posed an existential threat to his life,” the lawsuit says.

    The lawsuit also names OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, alleging he “personally overrode safety objections and rushed the product to market,” and accuses OpenAI’s close business partner Microsoft of approving the 2024 release of a more dangerous version of ChatGPT “despite knowing safety testing had been truncated.” Twenty unnamed OpenAI employees and investors are also named as defendants.

    Microsoft didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

    The lawsuit is the first wrongful death litigation involving an AI chatbot that has targeted Microsoft, and the first to tie a chatbot to a homicide rather than a suicide. It is seeking an undetermined amount of money damages and an order requiring OpenAI to install safeguards in ChatGPT.

    The estate’s lead attorney, Jay Edelson, known for taking on big cases against the tech industry, also represents the parents of 16-year-old Adam Raine, who sued OpenAI and Altman in August, alleging that ChatGPT coached the California boy in planning and taking his own life earlier.

    OpenAI is also fighting seven other lawsuits claiming ChatGPT drove people to suicide and harmful delusions even when they had no prior mental health issues. Another chatbot maker, Character Technologies, is also facing multiple wrongful death lawsuits, including one from the mother of a 14-year-old Florida boy.

    The lawsuit filed Thursday alleges Soelberg, already mentally unstable, encountered ChatGPT “at the most dangerous possible moment” after OpenAI introduced a new version of its AI model called GPT-4o in May 2024.

    OpenAI said at the time that the new version could better mimic human cadences in its verbal responses and could even try to detect people’s moods, but the result was a chatbot “deliberately engineered to be emotionally expressive and sycophantic,” the lawsuit says.

    “As part of that redesign, OpenAI loosened critical safety guardrails, instructing ChatGPT not to challenge false premises and to remain engaged even when conversations involved self-harm or ‘imminent real-world harm,’” the lawsuit claims. “And to beat Google to market by one day, OpenAI compressed months of safety testing into a single week, over its safety team’s objections.”

    OpenAI replaced that version of its chatbot when it introduced GPT-5 in August. Some of the changes were designed to minimize sycophancy, based on concerns that validating whatever vulnerable people want the chatbot to say can harm their mental health. Some users complained the new version went too far in curtailing ChatGPT’s personality, leading Altman to promise to bring back some of that personality in later updates.

    He said the company temporarily halted some behaviors because “we were being careful with mental health issues” that he suggested have now been fixed.

    The lawsuit claims ChatGPT radicalized Soelberg against his mother when it should have recognized the danger, challenged his delusions and directed him to real help over months of conversations.

    “Suzanne was an innocent third party who never used ChatGPT and had no knowledge that the product was telling her son she was a threat,” the lawsuit says. “She had no ability to protect herself from a danger she could not see.”

    ——

    Collins reported from Hartford, Connecticut. O’Brien reported from Boston and Ortutay reported from San Francisco.

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  • US halts all asylum decisions as suspect in shooting of National Guard members faces murder charge

    WASHINGTON — The Trump administration has halted all asylum decisions and paused issuing visas for people traveling on Afghan passports days after a shooting near the White House that left one National Guard member dead and another in critical condition.

    Investigators continued Saturday to seek a motive in the shooting, with the suspect a 29-year-old Afghan national who worked with the CIA during the Afghanistan War and now faces charges including first-degree murder. The man applied for asylum during the Biden administration and was granted it this year under Trump, according to a group that assists with resettlement of Afghans who helped U.S. forces in their country.

    The Trump administration has seized on the shooting to vow to intensify efforts to rein in legal immigration, promising to pause entry from some poor countries and review Afghans and other legal migrants already in the country. That is in addition to other measures, some of which were previously set in motion.

    Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, died after the Wednesday shooting, and Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, was hospitalized in critical condition. They were deployed with the West Virginia National Guard as part of Trump’s crime-fighting mission in the city. The president also has deployed or tried to deploy National Guard members to other cities to assist with his mass deportation efforts but has faced court challenges.

    U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s office said the charges against Rahmanullah Lakanwal also include two counts of assault with intent to kill while armed. In an interview on Fox News, she said there were “many charges to come.”

    Trump called the shooting a “terrorist attack” and criticized the Biden administration for enabling entry by Afghans who worked with U.S. forces.

    The director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Joseph Edlow, said in a post on the social platform X that asylum decisions will be paused “until we can ensure that every alien is vetted and screened to the maximum degree possible.”

    Experts say the U.S. has rigorous vetting systems for asylum-seekers. Asylum claims made from inside the country through USCIS have long faced backlogs. Critics say the slowdown has been exacerbated during the Trump administration.

    Also Friday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said his department paused “visa issuance for ALL individuals traveling on Afghan passports.”

    Shawn VanDiver, president of the San Diego-based group #AfghanEvac, said in response: “They are using a single violent individual as cover for a policy they have long planned, turning their own intelligence failures into an excuse to punish an entire community and the veterans who served alongside them.”

    Lakanwal lived in Bellingham, Washington, about 80 miles (130 kilometers) north of Seattle, with his wife and five children, former landlord Kristina Widman said.

    Neighbor Mohammad Sherzad said Lakanwal was polite and quiet and spoke little English.

    Sherzad said he attended the same mosque as Lakanwal and heard from other members that he was struggling to find work. He said Lakanwal “disappeared” about two weeks ago.

    Lakanwal worked briefly this summer as an independent contractor for Amazon Flex, which lets people use their own cars to deliver packages, according to a company spokesperson.

    Investigators are executing warrants in Washington state and other parts of the country.

    Lakanwal entered the U.S. in 2021 through Operation Allies Welcome, a Biden administration program that resettled Afghans after the U.S. withdrawal, officials said. Lakanwal applied for asylum during that administration, but his asylum was approved this year under the Trump administration, #AfghanEvac said in a statement.

    Lakanwal served in a CIA-backed Afghan Army unit, known as one of the special Zero Units, in the southern province of Kandahar, according to a resident of the eastern province of Khost who identified himself as Lakanwal’s cousin and spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

    The man said Lakanwal started out working for the unit as a security guard in 2012 and was later promoted to become a team leader and a GPS specialist.

    She enlisted in 2023 after graduating high school and served with distinction as a military police officer with the 863rd Military Police Company, the West Virginia National Guard said.

    “She exemplified leadership, dedication, and professionalism,” the guard said in a statement, adding that Beckstrom volunteered for the D.C. deployment.

    ___

    Associated Press journalists Sarah Brumfield, Siddiqullah Alizai, Elena Becatoros, Randy Herschaft, Cedar Attanasio and Hallie Golden contributed.

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  • American tourist found stabbed to death in Tobago

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    An American man was found dead with apparent stab wounds on the island of Tobago, according to local authorities.

    Christopher Brown, a 43-year-old from Silverthorne, Colorado, was found unresponsive with stab wounds and a metal object lodged in his back in Tobago, according to a local police report.

    POLICE RELEASE MURDER WEAPON DETAILS IN ONGOING BURNING MAN FESTIVAL KILLING INVESTIGATION

    Authorities in Tobago say American tourist Christopher Brown was found dead with stab wounds in the village of Castara. (Dukas/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

    Trinidad and Tobago Police Service say Brown was having dinner and drinks with friends in Castara, a seaside village on the leeward coast of the island of Tobago. Brown then decided to leave, telling his friends he was going to buy marijuana, according to local police.

    Local police responded to a report that Brown was found unconscious at 10:30 p.m. at Depot Road in Castara and was later pronounced dead.

    TRAIN STABBING SUSPECT’S FAMILY HAS HISTORY OF CRIMES, RECORDS SHOW

    Beach on Tobago.

    Investigators report Christopher Brown left a dinner with friends in Castara before being discovered unresponsive and later pronounced dead. (Google Maps)

    Local authorities confirmed that a suspect has been detained.

    “I can confirm that a suspect is currently in custody,” Trinidad and Tobago Police Commissioner Allister Guevarro told The Associated Press.

    Police have yet to release the identity of the suspect.

    The Division of Tourism in Tobago assures the public of the safety of the village.

    BURNING MAN HOMICIDE UNSOLVED AS WITNESS REPORTEDLY RECALLS CHILLING ENCOUNTER

    Tobago shore.

    Trinidad and Tobago Police confirmed they have a suspect in custody as they investigate the fatal stabbing of an American tourist. (Google Maps)

    “The Division of Tourism, Culture, Antiquities and Transportation is profoundly saddened and deeply disturbed by the tragic murder of a foreign national in the peaceful community of Castara,” the agency explained in a statement to ABC News.

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    “The Division strongly condemns this horrific act of violence and extends our heartfelt condolences to the family, friends and loved ones of the deceased during this unimaginably difficult time.”

    Mitch Picasso is a Fox News digital production assistant. You can reach him at @mitch_picasso on Twitter.

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  • Louisiana death row inmate released on bail after decades behind bars

    NEW ORLEANS — A Louisiana man who spent nearly three decades on death row has been released on bail Wednesday after his conviction was overturned earlier this year.

    Jimmie Duncan had originally been convicted of first-degree murder in 1998 after prosecutors accused him of raping and drowning 23-month-old Haley Oliveaux, the daughter of his then-girlfriend Allison Layton Statham.

    Fourth Judicial District Court Judge Alvin Sharp threw out that conviction in April after hearing expert testimony that the forensic evidence which put Duncan behind bars was “not scientifically defensible” and that Oliveaux’s death appeared to be the result of an “accidental drowning.” Similar faulty forensic bite mark analysis has led to dozens of other wrongful convictions or charges.

    “The presumption is not great that he is guilty,” Sharp wrote in his order Friday granting Duncan bail, citing the new evidence presented at an evidentiary hearing last year and Duncan’s lack of prior criminal history.

    Duncan’s attorneys said in a statement that Sharp’s ruling earlier this year provided “clear and convincing evidence showing that Mr. Duncan is factually innocent.” They added that Duncan’s release on bail “marks a significant step forward for Mr. Duncan’s complete exoneration.”

    Since 1973, more than 200 people on death row have been exonerated, including 12 people in Louisiana, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. In Louisiana, which has one of the highest wrongful conviction rates in the nation, the last death row exoneration came in 2016. Earlier this month, a man who served decades in prison before being exonerated won election to serve as the chief recordkeeper of New Orleans’ criminal court.

    Duncan, whose vacated conviction is still being reviewed by the Louisiana Supreme Court, was released after posting a $150,000 bond. He plans to live with a relative in central Louisiana.

    Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, who is pushing to hasten executions of death row inmates, said that Duncan should not be released on bail while the Louisiana Supreme Court reviews his case.

    But the high court agreed to let a district judge rule on Duncan’s bail request.

    During Duncan’s bail hearing in Ouachita Parish, the mother of the girl he was accused of killing told the judge that she had become convinced of Duncan’s innocence. Instead, Statham believed her daughter, who she said had a history of seizures, had accidentally drowned in a bathtub.

    Her daughter “wasn’t killed,” Statham said according to court records. “Haley died because she was sick.”

    Statham told the court that the lives of her family and Duncan “have been destroyed by the lie” she believed prosecutors and forensic experts had concocted.

    Prosecutors had relied on bite mark analysis and an autopsy conducted by two experts later linked to at least 10 wrongful convictions, according to Duncan’s legal team, which described the pair as discredited “charlatans.”

    Mississippi-based forensic dentist Michael West and pathologist Steven Hayne examined Oliveaux’s body.

    A video recording of the examination shows West “forcibly pushing a mold of Mr. Duncan’s teeth into the child’s body — creating the bite marks” later used to convict him, a court-filing from Duncan’s legal team stated. A state-appointed expert, unaware of this method, testified during trial that the bite marks on the body matched Duncan’s.

    “The horror story that they put out and desecrated my baby’s memory makes me infuriated,” Statham said.

    “I was not informed of anything that would have exonerated Mr. Duncan at all,” she added. “Had I been then, things would have turned out a lot different for Mr. Duncan and all of our families.”

    An Associated Press review from 2013 found at least two dozen wrongful convictions or charges based on bite mark evidence since 2000.

    “Bite mark evidence is junk science, and there is no more prejudicial type of junk science that exists than bite mark evidence,” M. Chris Fabricant, an Innocence Project lawyer representing Duncan, told the court during the bail hearing.

    Hayne, the pathologist, is deceased. West has previously said that DNA testing has made bite mark analysis obsolete, yet he has defended his work in other cases that led to overturned convictions. The pair’s testimony led two Mississippi men, Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer, to serve a combined three decades in prison in two separate cases for the rape and murder of young girls until DNA evidence cleared them of the crimes.

    Prosecutors are seeking to reinstate Duncan’s conviction and pointed to the 1994 grand jury indictment in his case as grounds for keeping him locked up, court records show. The office of Ouachita Parish District Attorney Robert Tew declined to comment, citing the Louisiana Supreme Court’s pending review.

    Duncan was one of 55 people on death row in Louisiana, held at the state prison in Angola. After a 15-year hiatus, Louisiana carried out its first execution in March.

    Duncan’s legal team described him as a “model prisoner” who helped other death row inmates obtain their GEDs and has “strong community support for his release.”

    ___

    Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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  • Manhattan DA to retry Etan Patz’s killer after conviction in deadly 1979 kidnapping was overturned

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    The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday that it intends to retry Pedro Hernandez, the man found guilty of kidnapping and murdering a 6-year-old boy decades ago. 

    Etan Patz went missing in 1979 after he walked to his bus stop alone for the first time in New York City. He was one of the first missing children to appear on milk cartons. 

    Hernandez confessed to the crime nearly three decades later, and was sentenced to 25 years to life after being convicted of murder in 2017. His first trial ended in a hung jury in 2015.

    “The District Attorney has determined that the available, admissible evidence supports prosecuting defendant on the charges of Murder in the Second Degree and Kidnapping in the First Degree in this matter, and the People are prepared to proceed,” Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Sarah Marquez wrote in a statement.

    BOSTON STRANGLER’S UNHEARD CONFESSION TAPES CAST NEW DOUBT ON ‘AMERICA’S JACK THE RIPPER’: VICTIM’S NEPHEW

    Pedro Hernandez appears in Manhattan criminal court with his attorney, Harvey Fishbein, Nov. 15, 2012, in New York.  (AP Photo/Louis Lanzano, Pool, File)

    Hernandez’s defense attorneys, Harvey Fishbein and Alice Fontier, told the Associated Press they “remain convinced that Mr. Hernandez is an innocent man.”

    “But we will be prepared for trial and will present an even stronger defense,” the pair of attorneys added.

    The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit overturned Hernandez’s conviction in July, finding that the jury in 2017 had not received a thorough enough explanation of its options, including that it could ignore Hernandez’s confessions.

    MANGIONE DEFENSE TEAM ACCUSES POLICE OF FABRICATING MOTHER’S QUOTE IMPLICATING HIM IN CEO MURDER CASE 

    Split of Pedro Hernandez in court and a missing poster for Etan Patz

    Split of Pedro Hernandez in court and a missing poster for Etan Patz. (Reuters/Louis Lanzano/Pool; Reuters/Defense attorney Alice Fontier/Handout  )

    Years before his conviction, Hernandez admitted to police that he lured Patz into the basement of the convenience store where he worked. Prosecutors claimed Hernandez choked Patz, stuffed his body into a plastic garbage bag hidden inside a box and took it out with the trash.

    The appeals court found that the trial judge had issued “clearly wrong” and “manifestly prejudicial” instructions to the jury in response to a question about the suspect’s confessions to police.

    In October, Judge Colleen McMahon of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled that Hernandez must receive a third trial by June 1, or he would ultimately be released.

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    Etan Patz's father in court

    Stanley Patz, father of 1979 murder victim 6-year-old Etan Patz, (C) departs after speaking to the media at Manhattan State Supreme Court following the sentencing of Pedro Hernandez, in New York City, U.S., April 18, 2017. (Reuters/Lucas Jackson)

    A court hearing is scheduled for Dec. 1.

    Fox News Digital’s Brie Stimson contributed to this report.

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  • FACT FOCUS: Trump gets it wrong claiming no murders in DC for the last six months

    In addition to pardoning two North Carolina turkeys at the annual White House ceremony Tuesday, President Donald Trump discussed his crime-fighting efforts in Washington, D.C., claiming that it’s been months since the city has seen a murder.

    But Metropolitan Police Department statistics say otherwise.

    Trump deployed National Guard troops to Washington in August in an effort to curb violent crime even though it had already reached its lowest levels in decades.

    Here’s a closer look at the facts.

    TRUMP: “We haven’t had a murder in six months.”

    THE FACTS: That’s false. There have been 62 homicides in Washington since May 25, including one last week, according to the MPD. The city has seen 123 homicides so far in 2025. Since National Guard troops were deployed to Washington on Aug. 11, there have been 24. In some data, only 61 homicides were reported in the last six months, and only 23 since Aug. 11, because of a technical error, the MPD said.

    Asked for comment on Trump’s claim, the department said that the statistics speak for themselves.

    White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers stressed Trump’s transformation of Washington “from a crime-ridden mess into a beautiful, clean, safe city” when asked about the discrepancy between his claim and city data. She did not address the discrepancy directly.

    A federal judge on Thursday ordered the Trump administration to end its monthslong deployment of National Guard troops in the nation’s capital. U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb found that Trump’s military takeover illegally intrudes on local officials’ authority to direct law enforcement in the district. The order is on hold for 21 days to allow for appeal.

    District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb in September sued to challenge the Guard deployments. He asked the judge to bar the White House from deploying Guard troops without the mayor’s consent while the lawsuit plays out.

    During the turkey pardoning, Trump said Washington “is now considered a safe zone,” making the erroneous claim that “we haven’t seen a murder in six months.”

    A Department of Justice report from January showed that total violent crime in 2024 was at the lowest it had been in more than 30 years, including a 32% drop in homicides from 2023, when it experienced a post-pandemic peak.

    Homicides in the past six months are down 46% from the same period last year, while homicides since the August deployment are down 38% from the previous period, MPD data shows. There has been a 29% decrease in homicides in 2025 to date compared to 2024.

    Violent crime during the National Guard’s initial one-month surge in Washington was down 39% from the same period last year, including a 53% drop in homicides, with seven during the surge, compared to 15 during the same timespan in 2024.

    Arson is the only type of crime that has not seen a decrease, with a 0% change from last year to this year.

    The city’s statistics came into question, however, after federal authorities opened an investigation into allegations that officials altered some of the data to make it look better. The investigation is ongoing.

    ___

    Associated Press writers Gary Fields and Lindsay Whitehurst contributed to this report.

    ___

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

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  • Man who fatally attacked a San Francisco woman will get life in prison

    SAN FRANCISCO — A man convicted of beating a San Francisco grandmother who later died is facing life in prison, a judge said Tuesday.

    San Francisco Superior Court Judge Eric Fleming said Keonte Gathron, 25, will likely be sentenced to prison without the possibility of parole in the death of Yik Oi Huang. The judge postponed sentencing until next week because the defendant had not received a presentence report, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

    Gathron was convicted earlier this month of murder, carjacking, robbery, elder abuse, child endangerment and other charges stemming from a two-week crime rampage in January 2019. Authorities say he targeted victims of Asian descent or who spoke little English.

    Huang, 88, was attacked on her morning walk. She was found injured at a playground in the Visitacion Valley neighborhood where she lived. Her skull, arms and neck were broken. Her home was burglarized minutes afterward.

    Huang received long-term care at a hospital but died in January 2020. Her assault preceded the rise of anti-Asian hate crimes during the pandemic and rattled the city’s Asian American community.

    Gathron represented himself and denied culpability but produced no evidence. He also accused police of manipulating surveillance video, DNA and other evidence.

    Fleming announced he intends to sentence Gathron to two life sentences — one with the possibility of parole — and over 30 years for other offenses. Gathron plans to appeal.

    Huang’s three daughters and several grandchildren spoke in court, in English and Cantonese. They described Huang as a hard-working wife, mother and garment factory employee in China who made sure her children were fed. She realized a dream of moving to the U.S. and owning a home in San Francisco.

    A tearful Gathron said he “understood the pain and loss” but insisted he was innocent.

    The park where Huang died was renamed Yik Oi Huang Peace and Friendship Park last year.

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  • Arrest made in decades-old Foster City homicide

    FOSTER CITY – An 81-year-old man was arrested Monday on suspicion of killing his estranged wife more than 40 years ago and dumping her body in San Francisco Bay, police said.

    Jason Green

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  • Body of Guatemalan woman killed when she went to clean the wrong Indiana house is returned home

    CABRICAN, Guatemala — The body of a Guatemalan woman who was killed earlier this month when she went to clean the wrong home in Indiana in the United States was returned to her native country on Sunday.

    María Florinda Ríos Pérez, 32, a mother of four, was killed on the front porch of a home in Whitestown, outside Indianapolis, on Nov. 5.

    Late Sunday, her mother Vilma Pérez and other relatives received her body at the capital’s international airport and planned to transport it to her hometown of Cabrican, some 125 miles (200 kilometers) west of Guatemala City.

    Prosecutors charged Curt Andersen of Whitestown last week with voluntary manslaughter in connection with her death. Andersen’s trial was scheduled to begin March 30, according to online court records. On Friday, a judge set bail at $25,000 and ordered him to surrender his passport.

    According to court documents, Ríos and her husband were part of a house cleaning crew and went to Andersen’s house by mistake. As they tried to unlock Andersen’s door with a key their company had given them, Andersen fired a shot through the door without warning. The bullet hit Rios in the head. Her husband was not hurt.

    Andersen told investigators he heard someone trying to unlock his front door and thought someone was trying to break into his home.

    Over the weekend, women in Cabrican cooked food in preparation for friends and relatives who would attend the wake and burial. At her parents’ home, flowers and pictures of Ríos adorned an altar. Cabrican sits in a valley where most residents are Mam, an Indigenous Mayan people.

    Ríos’ sister, 19-year-old Yeimy Paola Ríos Pérez, said María had left Guatemala two years earlier with two of her daughters, hiring a smuggler to get them to the U.S. because they were told adults with children were being allowed to enter, her sister said.

    “It was a lot of work going with the girls,” she said. They went to Indiana because five of her siblings and her father were there.

    Yeimy recalled her last conversation with her sister days before she died.

    “She was really happy because there was only a week until her son turned 1 year old and she was getting everything ready to celebrate the boy’s birthday,” Yeimy said.

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  • Wisconsin woman in 2014 Slender Man stabbing is missing

    MADISON, Wis. — A Wisconsin woman who admitted to nearly stabbing a classmate to death in 2014 to please the online horror character Slender Man is missing after she cut off an electronic monitoring device and left a group home, authorities said Sunday.

    Madison police issued an alert Sunday for Morgan Geyser, now 23, saying she was last seen around 8 p.m. Saturday with an adult acquaintance.

    “If you see Geyser, please call 911,” the alert said, adding that she had cut off a “Department of Corrections monitoring bracelet.”

    Geyser was placed in a group home this year after being granted conditional release from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. She was sent to the psychiatric institute in 2018 after pleading guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in a deal with prosecutors to avoid prison.

    Geyser’s attorney, Tony Cotton, did not immediately respond to a message left Sunday.

    Authorities say Geyser and her friend, Anissa Weier, were 12 years old when they lured their classmate, Payton Leutner, to a suburban Milwaukee park after a sleepover. Geyser stabbed Leutner more than a dozen times while Weier egged her on. Leutner barely survived.

    The girls later told investigators that they attacked Leutner to earn the right to be Slender Man’s servants and they feared he’d harm their families if they didn’t follow through.

    Slender Man was created online by Eric Knudson in 2009 as a mysterious figure photo-edited into everyday images of children at play. He grew into a popular boogeyman, appearing in video games, online stories and a 2018 movie.

    Weier pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree intentional homicide. She was also sent to the psychiatric center and granted release in 2021.

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  • This block off Woodlawn Road just had its second homicide in 6 weeks, CMPD says

    The two shootings happened in the 4800 block of Wallingford Street, which is just off Woodlawn Road, maps show.

    The two shootings happened in the 4800 block of Wallingford Street, which is just off Woodlawn Road, maps show.

    Street View image from Oct. 2025. © 2025 Google

    For the second time in six weeks, a body has been found in the 4800 block of Wallingford Street, just off West Woodlawn Road, according to Charlotte-Mecklenburg police.

    The latest discovery happened just after 2 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 22, when officers responded to reports of an assault with a deadly weapon.

    “Upon arrival, officers discovered a victim who sustained a gunshot wound. The victim was pronounced deceased on scene by MEDIC,” CMPD said in a news release.

    The identity of the person has not been released and investigators have not said if there is a suspect.

    The previous killing on Wallingford happened Oct. 10, and was discovered around 5:30 p.m. when a Medic ambulance responded to reports of a gunshot victim, police said.

    Ronald Neville, 53, is believed to have been killed while he was being robbed, CMPD said.

    Three men have been arrested in the case and are charged with felony murder, robbery with a dangerous weapon and felony conspiracy, according to a news release. The men range in age from 22 to 42.

    Wallingford Street is just east of Interstate 77 and is only about two blocks long. It is lined with office space and hotels.

    Mark Price

    The Charlotte Observer

    Mark Price is a National Reporter for McClatchy News. He joined the network of newspapers in 1991 at The Charlotte Observer, covering beats including schools, crime, immigration, LGBTQ issues, homelessness and nonprofits. He graduated from the University of Memphis with majors in journalism and art history, and a minor in geology.

    Mark Price

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  • One Killed In NE Portland Shooting – KXL

    Portland, Ore. – Portland Police are investigation a deadly shooting in the Hollywood District. Officers responded to a parking garage near NE 42nd and Halsey just before 7 a.m. Friday. When they arrived, authorities say police found two victims. One was declared dead at the scene, the other was taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries.

    Homicide detectives responded. During the investigation, Halsey was closed between 42nd and 43rd.

    Anyone with information in the case is asked to contact PPB detectives at [email protected], or call 503-823-0479 and reference case #25-319415.

    This is a developing story and will be updated as more information becomes available.

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    Heather Roberts

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  • Federal jury awards $80 million to estate of NY man wrongfully convicted of murder

    BUFFALO, N.Y. — A federal jury awarded $80 million Wednesday to the estate of a Buffalo man whose conviction in a 1976 murder was overturned after he spent nearly a quarter century in prison.

    Darryl Boyd, one of the group of Black teenagers arrested for the murder of William Crawford sometimes called the Buffalo Five, filed the lawsuit in 2022 seeking damages and alleging Buffalo Police investigators and Erie County prosecutors had failed to disclose more than a dozen pieces of evidence that pointed to other suspects. The lawsuit also alleged investigators coerced witnesses to give false statements pointing to Boyd, and that prosecutors committed summation misconduct — making inappropriate or false comments in their closing arguments.

    “If not for the misdeeds of Defendants, Mr. Boyd would not have been prosecuted, convicted, and imprisoned in violation of his constitutional rights, and would not have spent 45 years asserting his innocence and fighting for his liberty in connection with a crime that he did not commit,” Boyd’s attorneys wrote in the lawsuit.

    A spokesman for Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said the county extends its sympathy to Boyd’s family, but he believes the $80 million award is egregious and the county plans to appeal.

    After a two-and-a-half week trial, the federal jury in the Western District of New York took about an hour to return the massive verdict — billed by attorneys as one of the largest monetary awards for a wrongful conviction case in the U.S.

    After Boyd was released from prison, he spent another two decades on parole before his conviction was vacated by a judge in 2021. The county opted not to retry Boyd or John Walker Jr., whose conviction in the case was also vacated.

    A third man convicted in the killing, Darren Gibson, was released from prison in 2008 and died a year later. One of the other teens was acquitted at trial, and the fifth teen testified against the others, which Boyd’s attorneys said newly released case files show was coerced.

    Both Boyd and Walker had settled their case against the city of Buffalo for about $4.7 million each. Walker won a $28 million verdict against the county earlier this year, which the county has appealed.

    “He lost his whole adult life to this wrongful conviction. The jury heard just how many years he was suffering in maximum security prison. All the terrible things you assume happen in prison, happened in prison,” said Ross Firsenbaum, an attorney with WilmerHale, one of three firms representing Boyd’s estate.

    Firsenbaum said being released on parole was just as hard for Boyd who suffered from PTSD, anxiety and other ailments. He struggled to keep or get jobs because of the conviction and eventually began self-medicating and developed a substance abuse addiction.

    Boyd was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer and died in 2023 before the trial could be held. His mother and son attended the trial every day, Firsenbaum said.

    “The (county) argued his substance use was the cause of his problems, not the 27 or so years he spent wrongfully in prison,” Firsenbaum said. “And that’s offensive. And the jury recognized that and responded with this verdict.”

    He added that the attorneys had proven there was a pattern and practice of misconduct at the time of the convictions, not just a misdeed by one employee.

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  • Jurors to hear closing arguments in Ohio trial of officer charged in killing

    COLUMBUS, Ohio — Closing arguments in the murder trial of an Ohio officer charged in the shooting death of a pregnant Black mother killed in a supermarket parking lot after being accused of shoplifting are set for Wednesday.

    Prosecutors have told jurors that 21-year-old Ta’Kiya Young wasn’t a threat to anyone at the time she was shot. Defense attorneys for Blendon Township police officer Connor Grubb have emphasized that Young’s vehicle carried deadly force when she accelerated it near the 31-year-old officer, rendering his use of force within the standard of being “objectively reasonable.”

    Grubb is charged with murder, involuntary manslaughter and felonious assault in connection with Young’s death on Aug. 24, 2023. He faces up to life in prison. Franklin County Common Pleas Judge David Young, no relation to Ta’Kiya, dropped four of 10 counts against him Tuesday that related to the death of Young’s unborn daughter, agreeing with his attorneys that prosecutors failed to present proof that Grubb knew Young was pregnant when he shot her.

    The prosecution and defense both rested Tuesday after a roughly two-week trial. Jurors were shown the bodycam footage of the shooting on the first day of testimony, with testimony following over the trial’s course including from a use-of-force expert, an accident reconstructionist, the officer who responded to the scene with Grubb and a police policy expert.

    They never heard from Grubb, whose side of the story was contained in a written statement read into the record by a special agent for the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation.

    Sean Walton, an attorney representing Young’s family, Nadine Young, Ta’Kiya’s grandmother, and an aunt, Michelle White, said they expected Grubb to take the stand.

    “It is curious that he did not testify. But the video speaks for itself and if he wants the video to speak for him, then so be it,” Walton said.

    Young and White appeared emotionally tired while taking questions from reporters Tuesday. White said that the verdict will allow the family “to finally be able to start the healing process.” At various times, Nadine held back tears while talking about the toll of the trial.

    “I just gotta hold on to God and just know, God, he’s in control,” Nadine said.

    In the body camera footage, the officer said he observed Young arguing with his fellow officer and positioned himself in front of her vehicle to provide backup and to protect other people in the parking lot. He said he drew his gun after he heard Young fail to comply with his partner’s commands. When she drove toward him, he said in the statement, he felt her car hit his legs and shins and begin to lift his body off the ground.

    Grubb and another officer approached Young’s car outside a Kroger in suburban Columbus about a report that she was suspected of stealing alcohol from the store. She partially lowered her window, and the other officer ordered her out. Instead, she rolled her car forward toward Grubb, who fired a single bullet through her windshield into her chest, video footage showed.

    The video showed an officer at the driver’s side window telling Young she was accused of shoplifting and ordering her out of the car. Young protested, and both officers cursed at her and yelled at her to get out. Young could be heard asking them, “Are you going to shoot me?”

    Then she turned the steering wheel to the right, the car rolled slowly forward and Grubb fired his gun, footage showed. Moments later, after the car came to a stop against the building, they broke the driver’s side window. Police said they tried to save her life, but she was mortally wounded. Young and her unborn daughter were subsequently pronounced dead at a hospital.

    A full-time officer with the township since 2019, Grubb was placed paid administrative leave after the shooting.

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  • Suspect in killing of


    The man charged with murder in the Oakland, California killing of beloved Laney College athletic director John Beam made his first court appearance Tuesday.

    An arraignment hearing was held for Cedric Irving Jr., who was charged with murder with a gun enhancement by the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office. The 27-year-old did not enter a plea.

    Cedric Irving Jr., who has been charged with murder in the killing of Laney College athletic director John Beam, made his initial court appearance on Nov. 18, 2025.

    CBS


    Public defender Sydney Levin asked the judge to delay the plea until the next court hearing, which is scheduled for Dec. 16.

    Irving is accused of shooting Beam at the Laney Fieldhouse on campus Nov. 13. Beam died from his injuries the following day.

    Authorities located Irving at the San Leandro BART station following a manhunt. District Attorney Ursula Jones Dickson said on Monday that a gun found in Irving’s possession at the time of his arrest was registered to him.

    Over a four-decade coaching career, Beam was beloved in Oakland and throughout the Bay Area for coaching thousands of student-athletes. He was the longtime football coach at Skyline High School, where he led the Titans to 15 league championships and four undefeated seasons.

    Beam went on to coach football at Laney College, where he gained national recognition in the Netflix docuseries “Last Chance U”. His program at Laney was noted for having more than 90% of his players graduating or transferring to four-year schools, and several of his players have gone on to play in the National Football League.

    Irving is being held without bail.

    Tim Fang

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  • Indiana homeowner charged in fatal shooting of house cleaner who showed up at the wrong door

    LEBANON, Ind. — An Indiana homeowner accused of killing a house cleaner who mistakenly arrived at his front door was charged with voluntary manslaughter on Monday in a case that could test the limits of stand-your-ground laws.

    Curt Andersen, 62, could face anywhere from 10 to 30 years in prison and a $10,000 fine if he’s convicted. He was being held in the Boone County Jail pending an initial court hearing.

    Officers found Maria Florinda Rios Perez De Velasquez, 32, dead on the front porch of a home in Whitestown, an Indianapolis suburb, on Nov. 5. Authorities said the Guatemalan immigrant was part of a cleaning crew that went to the wrong house just before 7 a.m.

    Andersen shot her through the front door with no warning about a minute after hearing someone trying to unlock the door, according to a probable cause statement.

    Rios’ husband told media outlets that he was with her on the porch. He didn’t realize she had been shot until she fell back into his arms, bleeding. On a fundraising page, her brother described Rios as a mother of four children.

    Indiana is one of 31 states with a stand-your-ground law that permits homeowners to use deadly force to stop someone they believe is trying to unlawfully enter their dwelling. But police said that there’s no evidence Rios entered the home before she was shot.

    Andersen’s attorney, Guy Relford, posted a statement on X saying he was disappointed that prosecutors charged his client. He said Andersen had every reason to believe his actions were justified and the stand-your-ground law clearly protects him.

    “Mr. Andersen’s actions must be evaluated based on the circumstances as he perceived them,” Relford said in the statement.

    Boone County Prosecutor Kent Eastwood told reporters at a news conference that the decision to charge Andersen wasn’t difficult. Stand-your-ground protections don’t apply because Andersen lacked enough information to know if his actions were reasonable, Eastwood said.

    The prosecutor said he planned to prove that Andersen couldn’t have reasonably believed he needed to use deadly force, given what he knew at the time.

    According to the probable cause statement, Andersen told investigators that he and his wife were asleep in an upstairs bedroom when he heard a “commotion at the door” that grew more intense. He thought someone was using keys or tools on the front door.

    Frightened, he went to the top of the stairwell and saw through the home’s windows that two people were outside the front door. He said to himself, “What am I going to do? It’s not going away and I have to do something now.”

    He said he loaded his handgun, went back to the windows and saw the people “thrusting” at the door and getting more aggressive, according to the statement.

    He fired one shot toward the door. He said the door never opened and he didn’t announce himself or say anything before he pulled the trigger.

    When told he had killed Rios, he put his head down on the table and said he didn’t mean for anything to happen to anybody.

    Andersen’s wife, Yoshie Andersen, told investigators that her husband told her that he told a neighbor if anyone tried to break into his house he would shoot them. The probable cause statement does not say when this conversation happened.

    She added that her husband fired the shot from the top of the stairs and neither of them went downstairs. He fired the shot and then told her to call 911, she said.

    Investigators found a bullet hole in the door, but no evidence of any forceful contact with the door itself, the latch or the door frame, according to the probable cause statement.

    Rios’ husband, Mauricio Velasquez, told investigators that she tried to open the door with keys from their cleaning company, but they unknowingly were at the wrong address. He said they’d been trying to open the door for 30 seconds to a minute before she was shot.

    He said they never heard any voices from inside or saw any movement. The couple didn’t knock, bang on the door or use force of any kind to enter the home and they never got inside, he said.

    The shooting echoes a similar episode in Missouri in 2023 when an 86-year-old man shot Ralph Yarl after the 16-year-old Black teenager came to his door by mistake. Missouri has a similar stand-your-ground law, but prosecutors charged the shooter, Andrew Lester, with first-degree assault and armed criminal action. He ultimately pleaded guilty to second-degree assault and didn’t go to trial.

    In New York, which does not have a stand-your-ground law, a man was convicted in 2024 of second-degree murder for fatally shooting a woman inside a car who mistakenly came down the driveway of his rural upstate home.

    Jody Madeira, an Indiana University law professor who specializes in gun rights, said last week that the Rios case was “horrible” and “exceptionally unusual.”

    In general, the public can legally access private property — including a front porch — for a legitimate purpose until they are told to leave, Madeira said. For example, a homeowner can’t legally shoot a pizza delivery person or an Amazon driver just for stepping onto their property, she said.

    Madeira said Monday that the allegations in the probable cause statement show that Curt Andersen was acting out of fear but that’s not enough to invoke the stand-your-ground law. There was no unlawful entry and trying to insert a key into a lock or rattling a doorknob isn’t a reasonable justification for firing a shot, she said.

    “The reasonable person says, ‘hey, I have my phone here, I have other options, I can shout a warning. It’s 7 a.m., is someone really breaking into my house? He jumped up from bed and immediately went into I’m combatting a break-in.”

    ___

    Richmond reported from Madison, Wisconsin.

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  • Women face a much higher risk of homicide, especially from guns, during pregnancy

    (CNN) — On April 9, 2020, after Shirley Scarborough made her daily call to a prayer line, she went to work and got another call: from the police department in Richmond, Virginia. Her youngest daughter, Francesca Harris-Scarborough, had been killed the night before.

    Police had found the 31-year-old’s car still idling. Scarborough’s daughter, who was three months pregnant, had been shot twice in the heart.

    “I wasn’t ready for it. I lost control of everything,” Scarborough said. “Everything went blank.”

    Francesca was part of a terrible trend in the United States: Homicide is the No. 1 way pregnant women die, research has showed, but a new study finds that they are even more vulnerable than other women of childbearing age when there’s a gun involved.

    The study, published Monday in the journal JAMA Network Open, looked at more than 7,000 homicides of women of childbearing age between 2018 and 2021. Pregnant women were found to have a 37% higher firearm homicide rate than women who weren’t pregnant, and more than two-thirds of pregnancy-associated homicides involved firearms.

    The presence of a firearm is known to be a key risk factor of intimate partner homicide. The new study showed that every 1% increase in state-level firearm ownership was associated with a 6% increase in all-cause homicide and an 8% increase in the firearm-specific homicide rate in pregnant women, even after adjusting for other factors.

    “Even incremental increases in firearm availability may contribute to measurable increases in homicide risk in pregnant women,” the researchers wrote.

    Shirley Scarborough, left, is shown with her daughter, Francesca Harris-Scarborough. In 2020, Francesca was found shot to death in her car. Credit: Shirley Scarborough via CNN Newsource

    “It was really not surprising, if you think about it, that if firearms are more available, then that certainly it does increase your risk of homicide in general,” said study co-author Dr. Lois Lee, a senior faculty adviser in the Office and Health Equity & Inclusion and an associate professor of pediatrics and emergency medicine at Harvard Medical School. “So you could imagine, if you take away or at least decrease the number of firearms, then there would likely be many fewer deaths during pregnancy.”

    “And unlike medical conditions, which, yes, we do have many medical advances and can save many lives, but in some ways, those conditions are much less preventable, like eclampsia and sepsis,” Lee added. “This is predictable and potentially preventable.”

    The highest proportion of homicides in pregnant women was among those 20 to 24 years old. Among women who weren’t pregnant, it was ages 25 to 29. Most homicide victims were Black, whether they were pregnant or not.

    “Those findings suggest that these risks of homicide during pregnancy are shaped not just by individual factors but by broader systems of inequity and structural racism,” Lee said. “So it’s not just a solution at the individual level that’s needed, but there needs to be urgent change at a policy level, as well.”

    The study authors recommend safe storage laws and domestic violence firearm prohibitions.

    Although most states prohibit people with final protective orders from purchasing or possessing firearms, such laws should be expanded to require people to surrender their firearms even when there’s an emergency protective order on the books, said Dr. Kelly Roskam, director of law and policy at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions, who was not involved with the new research.

    “Usually, the first stage of that order process is often the most dangerous time for individuals experiencing intimate partner or family violence, since it is usually the first indication that an individual is going to be separating from an abuser,” Roskam said.

    Roskam said the most successful gun surrender laws also have strong follow-up. She points to a program in King County, Washington, that created a multidisciplinary team of prosecutors, law enforcement and court administrators who serve on a regional domestic violence firearm unit. It scours court documents and databases to make sure every individual involved in a domestic violence offense gives up every firearm.

    According to King County, firearms are used in domestic violence homicides more than all other weapons combined in Washington state.

    “They really show respondents that they are very serious about ensuring this firearm relinquishment compliance. And since they have started doing this, they have been recovering a much larger number of firearms from these protective orders,” Roskam said.

    Scarborough has been working on her own programs so more women are spared her daughter’s fate. She created a nonprofit called Cry Loud, Spare Not, Speak Up that’s dedicated to empowering women affected by domestic violence and abuse in Virginia.

    In reading her daughter’s journals after her death, Scarborough said, she realized that although her daughter was successful and seemed happy, she had confidence issues that began when she was younger. Scarborough also started a program for girls ages 12 and up to cultivate self-esteem and grow their confidence. Scarborough also wrote about her own experience in her memoir “Shattered But Not Destroyed A Mother’s Journey from Heartbreak to Hope.” She said she hopes it can help readers find strength and purpose, even when life is at its most difficult.

    Each year, near the anniversary of Francesca’s death, Scarborough hosts another empowerment program for girls and women called “I Am Enough, I Know My Worth.”

    “This way she will never die. We can always try to help somebody,” Scarborough said. “Her death has really been my teacher. It’s changed my life. It will never be the same.”

    Jen Christensen and CNN

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  • Man charged with murder in shooting of Oakland football coach and ‘Last Chance U’ star John Beam

    OAKLAND, Calif. — A 27-year-old man was charged Monday with murder in the shooting death of celebrated former football coach John Beam, who died Friday after being shot on the junior college campus in Oakland where he worked.

    Cedric Irving also faces enhancement charges alleging he personally fired a gun that caused great bodily injury and that the victim was particularly vulnerable, possibly due to age, according to the charging complaint.

    The mandatory minimum for first degree murder is 25 years to life. Conviction on a charge that he personally discharged the firearm resulting in death also carries a sentence of 25 years to life.

    Alameda County District Attorney Ursula Jones Dickson is set to speak Monday afternoon on the charges. Irving, who is being held without bail, is scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday. The Alameda County Public Defender’s Office said it has not been appointed to represent Irving and declined comment.

    Beam was a giant in the local community, a father figure who forged deep relationships with his players while fielding a team that regularly competed for championships. The Netflix docuseries “Last Chance U” focused on Beam and the Laney Eagles in its 2020 season. He’d most recently been serving as the school’s athletic director after retiring from coaching last year.

    Officers arrived at Laney College before noon Thursday to find Beam, 66, wounded at the athletics field house. He was treated at a hospital, but died the following day from his injuries.

    Irving was arrested at a commuter rail station just after 3 a.m. Friday. He was carrying the firearm used to shoot Beam, and he admitted to carrying out the shooting, according to the probable cause document.

    Oakland Assistant Chief James Beere said the suspect went on campus for a “specific reason” but did not elaborate. “This was a very targeted incident,” he said at a Friday news conference.

    Beere did not say how the two men knew each other but said the Irving was known to hang around the Laney campus. Irving’s brother told the San Francisco Chronicle that Irving had lost his job as a security guard after an altercation and was facing eviction at home.

    Beam joined Laney College in 2004 as a running backs coach and became head coach in 2012, winning two league titles. According to his biography on the college’s website, at least 20 of his players went on to the NFL.

    His shooting came a day after a student was shot at Oakland’s Skyline High School. The student is in stable condition. Beam had previously worked at Skyline High School, and the suspect in that shooting had played football there after Beam had already left for another job.

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  • South Carolina triple murderer set to be third man to die by firing squad in state this year

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    A man in South Carolina who killed three people more than 20 years ago is scheduled to become the third person in the state to be executed by firing squad this year. 

    Stephen Bryant, 44, is expected to die at 6 p.m. Friday at Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia, South Carolina. 

    South Carolina restarted executions in September of last year after a 13-year pause, partly related to the state struggling to keep an adequate supply of lethal injection drugs and concerns over botched lethal injection executions. 

    Four men have been killed by lethal injection in the state since September 2024. The electric chair is also legal there.

    FAITH, FORGIVENESS WON’T FACTOR IN KIRK MURDER TRIAL DEATH PENALTY PUSH: EXPERT

    Stephen Bryant, 44, is expected to die at 6 p.m. Friday at Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia, South Carolina.  (South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP, File; AP)

    Three prison employees have volunteered to carry out Bryant’s execution from 15 feet away. 

    He has no pending appeals but is allowed to ask the governor for clemency. A South Carolina governor has not given clemency, which wouldn’t come in until minutes before the execution, since the United States resumed the death penalty in 1976. 

    Bryant chose to die by firing squad over lethal injection and the electric chair last month.

    DEATH ROW INMATE STEPHEN BRYANT CHOOSES FIRING SQUAD EXECUTION AFTER ADMITTING TO GRUESOME MURDER 

    Bryant admitted to fatally shooting Willard “TJ” Tietjen in his home, burning his eyes with cigarettes and painting “catch me if u can” on the wall with Tietjen’s blood.

    Broad River Correctional Institution death chamber

    South Carolina’s electric chair sits in the death chamber at Broad River Correctional Facility. The viewing room to the right is where media, lawyers and family witnesses sit.  (Eric Seals/The State/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

    Candles were lit around Tietjen’s body and the corner of a potholder was dipped in Tietjen’s blood and used to write “victem 4 in 2 weeks. catch me if u can” on a wall, according to officials.

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    Tietjen’s daughter called him six times, telling investigators on the final call, a strange voice answered and told her they killed Tietjen.

    Prosecutors alleged Bryant also shot and killed two other men in the back after offering them rides in October 2004, one prior to Tietjen’s death and one after.

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    Mikal Mahdi

    Mikal Mahdi, 41, is set to be executed on April 11 at 6 p.m. at a prison in Columbia.  (South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP)

    Bryant’s lawyers said he was distressed before the killings, repeatedly asking for help as he struggled with trauma from being sexually abused by four male relatives as a child, according to the report. He allegedly tried to cope through drug use, including meth and bug-spray-laced joints.

    Attorneys for Mikal Mahdi, the last man put to death by firing squad earlier year, are suing the state, claiming that the bullets missed his heart and he was likely alive and suffering for up to a minute afterward.

    CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP 

    Mahdi, 42, was convicted in the 2004 killings of an off-duty police officer in Calhoun County, South Carolina, and a convenience store clerk in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He was sentenced to death for the murder of the officer and life in prison for the clerk’s murder. 

    Fox News’ Sarah Rumpf-Whitten and Alexandra Koch and The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

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  • US appeals court upholds hate crime convictions of white men in Ahmaud Arbery killing

    SAVANNAH, Ga. — A federal appeals court on Friday upheld the hate crime convictions of three white men who chased Ahmaud Arbery through their Georgia subdivision with pickup trucks before one of them killed the running Black man with a shotgun.

    A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals took well over a year to rule after attorneys for the defendants urged the judges in March 2024 to overturn the case, arguing the men’s history of racist text messages and social media posts failed to prove they targeted Arbery because of his race.

    Federal prosecutors used those posts and messages in 2022 to persuade a jury that Arbery’s killing was motivated by “pent-up racial anger.”

    Even if the appeals judges had thrown out their hate-crime convictions, the trio faced no immediate reprieve from prison. That’s because they’re also serving life terms for murder after being convicted in a Georgia state court.

    Father and son Greg and Travis McMichael armed themselves and used a pickup truck to pursue 25-year-old Arbery after spotting him running in their neighborhood just outside the port city of Brunswick on Feb. 23, 2020. A neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, joined the chase and recorded cellphone video of Travis McMichael shooting Arbery at close range.

    More than two months passed without arrests, until Bryan’s graphic video of the killing leaked online. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation took over the case from local police as outrage over Arbery’s death became part of a national outcry over racial injustice. Charges soon followed.

    All three men were convicted of murder by a state court in late 2021. After a second trial in U.S. District Court in early 2022, a jury found the trio guilty of hate crimes and attempted kidnapping.

    Greg McMichael’s attorney, A.J. Balbo, declined to comment on the appellate ruling. Attorneys for Bryan and Travis McMichael did not immediately return phone and email messages.

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