ReportWire

Tag: investigations

  • Shipments of contaminated waste to resume from Ohio train derailment site | CNN

    Shipments of contaminated waste to resume from Ohio train derailment site | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The Environmental Protection Agency has approved resuming shipments of contaminated liquid and soil out of East Palestine, Ohio, where a train carrying toxic chemicals derailed earlier this month.

    The EPA on Friday ordered the train’s operator, Norfolk Southern, to halt the shipments so that it could review the company’s plans for disposal, adding to the controversy surrounding the crash that has also left residents of the town worried about potential long-term health effects.

    That’s as officials in Texas and Michigan complained they didn’t receive any warning that hazardous waste from the crash would be shipped into their jurisdictions for disposal.

    Shipments now will be going to two EPA-certified facilities in Ohio, and Norfolk Southern will start shipments to these locations Monday, EPA regional administrator Debra Shore said at a news conference Sunday.

    “Some of the liquid wastes will be sent to a facility in Vickery, Ohio, where it will be disposed of in an underground injection well,” Shore said. “Norfolk Southern will also beghin shipping solid waste to the Heritage Incinerator in East Liverpool, Ohio.”

    Until Friday, Norfolk Southern was “solely responsible” for disposing of waste from the train derailment, Shore said Saturday, but waste disposal plans “will be subject to EPA review and approval moving forward.”

    All rail cars, except for those held by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), have been removed from the site of the derailment, Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Director Anne Vogel said in an update Sunday.

    The NTSB is currently holding 11 railcars as part of its investigation into the derailment, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said in a statement Sunday.

    “This is so critically important to moving on to next steps. We can now excavate additional contaminated soil and began installing monitoring wells,” Vogel said. The Ohio EPA will oversee the installation of water monitoring wells at the site of the derailment that will measure contaminant levels in the groundwater below.

    Every aspect of transporting and disposing of the hazardous waste material “from the moment trucks and rail cars are loaded until the waste is safely disposed of” will be closely regulated and overseen by federal, state, and local governments, Shore said Sunday.

    Shore detailed the federal, state, and local compliance requirements expected from Norfolk Southern.

    “These extensive requirements cover everything from waste labeling, packaging, and handling, as well as requirements for shipping documents that provide information about the wastes and where they’re going,” Shore said.

    The hazardous waste material previously sent to facilities in Michigan and Texas is now being processed at those facilities, Shore said.

    About 2 million gallons of firefighting water from the train derailment site were expected to be disposed in Harris County, Texas, with about half a million gallons already there, according to the county’s chief executive.

    Also, contaminated soil from the derailment site was being taken to the US Ecology Wayne Disposal in Belleville, Michigan, US Rep. Debbie Dingell of Michigan said Friday.

    The Michigan and Ohio facilities were, in fact, EPA approved sites, but they are not currently accepting any more shipments at this time, and the EPA is “exploring to see whether they have the capacity” to accept shipments in the future, Shore said.

    A spokesperson Gov. DeWine told CNN the governor was not briefed on where in the country the shipments would be sent. But this is typical, as the train company is responsible for the transport of material and the EPA is responsible for regulating that transport, DeWine spokesman Daniel Tierney said Saturday.

    The February 3 derailment of the Norfolk Southern train and subsequent intentional release of vinyl chloride it was hauling first forced East Palestine residents out of their homes, then left them with anxiety about health effects as reports of symptoms like rashes and headaches emerged after they returned.

    Officials have repeatedly sought to assure residents that continued air and water monitoring has found no concerns. The EPA reported last week that they have conducted indoor air testing at a total of 574 homes and detected no contaminants associated with the derailment.

    Federal teams in East Palestine have begun going door-to-door to check in with residents, conduct health surveys and provide informational flyers after President Joe Biden directed the move, a White House official told CNN.

    Also, a 19-person scientific team from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been collecting information from residents about symptoms they have experienced since the derailment, said Jill Shugart, a senior environmental health specialist for the CDC.

    The EPA also installed “sentinel wells” near the city’s municipal well field to monitor contaminants in well water as part of the agency’s long-term early detection system “to protect the city for years to come,” Vogel, head of the Ohio EPA, said Saturday.

    In a Saturday update on the removal of contaminated waste, DeWine said 20 truckloads of hazardous solid waste had been hauled away from the Ohio derailment site. Fifteen of those truckloads were disposed of at a licensed hazardous waste treatment and disposal facility in Michigan and five truckloads were returned to East Palestine.

    About 102,000 gallons of liquid waste and 4,500 cubic yards of solid waste remained Saturday in storage on site in East Palestine – not including the five truckloads returned, according to DeWine. Additional solid and liquid wastes are being generated as the cleanup progresses, he added.

    Dingell told CNN on Saturday that neither she nor Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer were aware of plans for toxic waste to be delivered to disposal sites in her district.

    “I called everybody,” Dingell said. “Nobody had really been given a heads up that they were coming here.”

    Across the country, Texas Chief Executive Lina Hidalgo expressed frustration that she first learned about the expected water shipments to her state from the news media – not from a government agency or Texas Molecular, the company hired to dispose of the water.

    She added that although there’s no legal requirement for her office to be notified, “it doesn’t quite seem right.”

    Hidalgo said Texas Molecular told her office Thursday that half a million gallons of the water was already in the county and the shipments began arriving around last Wednesday.

    On Thursday, Texas Molecular told CNN it had been hired to dispose of potentially dangerous water from the Ohio train derailment. The company said they had experts with more than four decades of experience in managing water safely and that all shipments, so far, had come by truck for the entire trip.

    Hidalgo’s office had been seeking information about the disposal, including the chemical composition of the firefighting water, the precautions that were being taken, and why Harris County was the chosen site, she said.

    According to a Thursday news release from Ohio Emergency Management Agency, more than 1.7 million gallons of contaminated liquid had been removed from the immediate site of the derailment. Of that, more than 1.1 million gallons of “contaminated liquid” from East Palestine had been transported off-site, with the majority going to Texas Molecular and the rest going to a facility in Vickery, Ohio.

    CNN asked the Ohio agency the location of the remaining 581,500 gallons which had been “removed” but not “hauled off-site” and has yet to receive a response.

    Regarding the causes of the accident, a National Transportation Safety Board preliminary report found that one of the train’s cars carrying plastic pellets was heated by a hot axle that sparked the initial fire, said Jennifer Homendy, the chair of the safety board. So far, the investigation found the three crew members on board the train did not do anything wrong prior to the derailment, though the crash was “100% preventable,” she said.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • More than 4.5 million fentanyl pills, 3,000 pounds of methamphetamine seized in Arizona investigation, DEA says | CNN

    More than 4.5 million fentanyl pills, 3,000 pounds of methamphetamine seized in Arizona investigation, DEA says | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Arizona authorities targeting the Sinaloa drug cartel have seized narcotics estimated to be worth more than $13 million, including more than 4.5 million fentanyl pills, 3,100 pounds of methamphetamine and large quantities of heroin, cocaine and fentanyl powder, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration.

    In a news release, the agency said the seizure was the culmination of a three-year-long investigation during which 150 people had so far been charged.

    “The fentanyl seized represents more than 30 million potentially lethal doses,” the DEA said, announcing the seizure in partnership with the Tempe Police Department and Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes.

    Authorities displayed some of the recovered narcotics at a joint news conference Thursday, attended by CNN affiliate KNXV.

    “The sample you see here today is staggering. There are over 4.5 million fentanyl pills, over 140 pounds of fentanyl powder, over 135 kilos of cocaine, over 3,000 pounds of methamphetamine, 35 kilos of heroin, 49 firearms and over $2 million in cash,” Interim Tempe Police Chief Josie Montenegro told reporters.

    Montenegro said the substances recovered “would be poisoning members of our community, including our youth and vulnerable population,” had the seizures not been made.

    “In addition, the dangers and crimes associated with illegal drugs would be plaguing our community,” Montenegro added.

    According to authorities, “numerous” people were taken into custody in the bust. At this time, authorities do not plan on releasing the names of those involved because it is a continuing investigation, according to Montenegro.

    Phoenix DEA Special Agent in Charge Cheri Oz said investigators are “laser-focused” on the Sinaloa cartel.

    “I want to be crystal clear, the drugs in this room and the drugs that are flooding Arizona every single day are sourced primarily by one evil as the Sinaloa drug cartel,” she said at the news conference. “We are laser-focused on the Sinaloa drug cartel and we will defeat them. We will not stop.”

    Oz also praised the efforts of DEA agents and other officers over the last three years. “Their hard work and tenacity is responsible for removing these deadly drugs before they poisoned our family, our friends and our neighborhoods,” she said.

    The country is struggling with a decades-long opioid epidemic in which fentanyl has become the most commonly used drug involved in overdoses.

    Pharmaceutical fentanyl is a synthetic opioid intended to help patients manage severe pain. It is 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine, and typically prescribed in the form of skin patches or lozenges. But most recent cases of fentanyl-related harm, overdose, and death in the United States are linked to illegally made fentanyl, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

    Deaths involving synthetic opioids increased by 22% in 2021, according to CDC data, and in 2022, there were about 181,806 nonfatal opioid overdoses recorded in the United States.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Texas and Michigan officials say they didn’t know water, soil from Ohio train wreck would be transported into their jurisdictions | CNN

    Texas and Michigan officials say they didn’t know water, soil from Ohio train wreck would be transported into their jurisdictions | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Officials in Texas and Michigan are complaining they didn’t receive any warning that contaminated water and soil from the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, would be shipped into their jurisdictions for disposal.

    About 2 million gallons of firefighting water from the train derailment site are expected to be disposed in Harris County, Texas, with about half a million gallons already there, according to the county’s chief executive.

    “It’s a very real problem, we were told yesterday the materials were coming only to learn today they’ve been here for a week,” Judge Lina Hidalgo said Thursday.

    Contaminated soil from the derailment site is being taken to the US Ecology Wayne Disposal in Belleville, Michigan, US Rep. Debbie Dingell of Michigan said Friday.

    “We were not given a heads up on this reported action,” Dingell said in a news release on Friday. “Our priority is to always keep the people we represent safe.”

    Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said 4,832 cubic yards of soil have been removed from the ground in East Palestine and about six truckloads were on the way to Michigan.

    The complaints widen the controversy caused by the February 3 train derailment that left residents complaining about feeling sick after hazardous chemicals seeped into the air, water and soil.

    A National Transportation Safety Board preliminary report found that one of the train’s cars carrying plastic pellets was heated by a hot axle that sparked the initial fire, according to Jennifer Homendy, the chair of the safety board.

    Residents worry rashes and headaches may be tied to chemicals from train crash

    As the temperature of the bearing got hotter, the train passed by two wayside defect detectors that did not trigger an audible alarm message because the heat threshold was not met at that point, Homendy explained. A third detector eventually picked up the high temperature, but it was already too late by then.

    “This was 100% preventable. … There is no accident,” Homendy said during a news conference Thursday.

    Residents in East Palestine frustrated by lack of answers

    In a news conference Thursday, Hidalgo expressed frustration that she first learned about the expected water shipments Wednesday from the news media – not from a government agency or Texas Molecular, the company hired to dispose of the water.

    Hidalgo said Texas Molecular told her office Thursday that half a million gallons of the water was already in the county and the shipments began arriving around last Wednesday.

    She added that although there’s no legal requirement for her office to be notified, “it doesn’t quite seem right.”

    Texas Molecular is receiving the water from trucks, but it’s unclear if trucks are used for the entire trip, Hidalgo said. The company told her office they’re receiving about 30 trucks of water a day, she said.

    Texas Molecular said Friday that all shipments, so far, have come by truck for the entire trip.

    “Texas Molecular neither transports nor selects the mode of transportation for the water,” Jimmy Bracher, vice president of Sales for VLS Environmental Solutions, which owns Texas Molecular, told CNN in a statement Friday evening.

    “The company that generates the waste will determine/select who ships the wastewater and they must be DOT and EPA approved transporters,” Bracher said.

    On Thursday, Texas Molecular told CNN it has been hired to dispose of potentially dangerous water from the Ohio train derailment. The company said they are experts with more than four decades of experience in managing water safely.

    Hidalgo’s office is seeking information about the disposal, including the chemical composition of the firefighting water, the precautions that are being taken, and why Harris County was the chosen site, she said.

    “There’s nothing right now to tell me – to tell us – there’s going to be an accident in transport, that this is being done in such a way that is not compatible with the well, that there’s a nefarious reason why the water is coming here and not to a closer site,” Hidalgo said. “But it is our job to do basic due diligence on that information.”

    More than 1.7 million gallons of contaminated liquid has been removed from the immediate site of the derailment, according to a Thursday news release from the Ohio Emergency Management Agency. Of this, more than 1.1 million gallons of “contaminated liquid” from East Palestine has so far been transported off-site, with the majority going to Texas Molecular and the rest going to a facility in Vickery, Ohio.

    CNN has asked the Ohio agency the location of the remaining 581,500 gallons which has been “removed” but not “hauled off-site” and has yet to receive a response.

    Wayne County, Michigan, officials have been in contact with officials with a variety of federal and state agencies, along with the train company involved in the derailment since learning of the transportation of the contaminated materials, Wayne County Executive Warren C. Evans said in a news conference on Friday evening. Evans said the county did not receive a call from anyone that this was happening.

    The

    Professor: Independent expert needed in toxic spill response

    “Doing it in a way that doesn’t let citizens of Wayne County know that it’s coming just looks nefarious to me,” Evans said.

    Officials are not aware if this move was done “maliciously or not” but says there are “disconnects,” Evans said.

    “We learned about it via the grapevine and then saw Governor DeWine announced it on his site,” Dingell said in a news conference.

    Five trucks have been transported to the area so far, 99% with contaminated water and 1% with contaminated soil, according to Dingell. The truck containing soil could have been transported to the area as early mid-week, Dingell added.

    The transportation of the materials to the facility in Michigan has been paused and another site is likely to be found, Dingell and Evans said.

    CNN has reached out to the EPA and Norfolk Southern, the company that owns the derailed train, for comment.

    The 149-car train operated by Norfolk Southern had three employees on board: a locomotive engineer, a conductor and a trainee who were all in the head end of the locomotive, Homendy told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Thursday.

    So far, the investigation found the crew did not do anything wrong prior to the derailment, though the crash was “100% preventable,” she said.

    The next phase of the investigation will examine the train’s wheelset and bearing as well as the damage from the derailment, the NTSB report noted. The agency will also focus on the designs of tank cars and railcars, along with maintenance procedures and practices.

    Investigators will also review the train operator’s use of wayside defect detectors and the company’s railcar inspection practices. More specifically, determining what caused the wheel bearing failure will be key to the investigation, Homendy said.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • A first report on the Ohio toxic train wreck was released. Here’s what it found — and what investigators are still looking into | CNN

    A first report on the Ohio toxic train wreck was released. Here’s what it found — and what investigators are still looking into | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    After federal officials released an initial report concluding that this month’s toxic train wreck in Ohio was completely preventable, investigators will begin examining procedures, practices and design prior to the derailment that has sparked long-term concerns among hundreds of frustrated residents.

    The National Transportation Safety Board on Thursday released its preliminary report on the investigation into the February 3 train crash in East Palestine, Ohio, where residents have been complaining about feeling sick after hazardous chemicals seeped into the air, water and soil.

    Ohio environmental officials made a civil referral this week asking the state attorney general’s office to begin “legal and/or equitable civil actions” against Norfolk Southern, which could result in a civil complaint if negotiations with the company were to fail.

    The NTSB report found that one of the train’s cars carrying plastic pellets was heated by a hot axle that sparked the initial fire, according to Jennifer Homendy, the chair of the safety board. As the temperature of the bearing got hotter, the train passed by two wayside defect detectors that did not trigger an audible alarm message because the heat threshold was not met at that point, Homendy explained. A third detector eventually picked up the high temperature, but it was already too late by then.

    “This was 100% preventable. … There is no accident. Every single event that we investigate is preventable,” Homendy said during a news conference Thursday. “The NTSB has one goal, and that is safety and ensuring that this never happens again.”

    The next phase of the investigation will examine the train’s wheelset and bearing as well as the damage from the derailment, the NTSB report noted. The agency will also focus on the designs of tank cars and railcars along with maintenance procedures and practices.

    Plus, investigators will review the train operator’s use of wayside defect detectors and the company’s railcar inspection practices. More specifically, determining what caused the wheel bearing failure will be key to the investigation, Homendy said.

    On Friday, Homendy said on “CNN This Morning” that she’s concerned politics could cloud the investigation and prevent safety improvements. Former President Donald Trump visited the site of the train derailment on Wednesday where he criticized President Joe Biden’s administration’s handling of the railway disaster.

    “This is not a time for politics,” Homendy said. “There is a time for politics. It is not this.”

    On Thursday, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg also visited the derailment site, and when asked how political figures like Trump could help, Buttigieg addressed the former president directly saying he could “express support for reversing the deregulation that happened on his watch.”

    Another key aspect of the investigation will focus on the response to the chemical disaster, particularly the manual detonations of tanks carrying toxic chemicals.

    Five of the 38 derailed train cars were carrying more than 115,000 gallons of vinyl chloride, according to the NTSB’s report. Exposure to high levels of vinyl chloride can increase cancer risk or cause death.

    Those five cars “continued to concern authorities because the temperature inside one tank car was still rising,” indicating a polymerization reaction which could have resulted in an explosion, the report said. To help prevent a potentially deadly blast of vinyl chloride, crews released the toxic chemical into a trench and burned it off on February 6 — three days after the derailment.

    Since then, some East Palestine residents have said they are experiencing headaches, dizziness, nausea and bloody noses — a host of health issues they say they did not have prior to the crash.

    At the same time, officials have been adamant in reassuring residents of the air’s safety and the municipal water supply.

    Around 2 million gallons of firefighting water from the train derailment site are expected to be disposed in Harris County, Texas, according to the county’s chief executive.

    Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said her office was told by Texas Molecular on Thursday that the shipments began arriving around last Wednesday, she said.

    Texas Molecular was hired to dispose of the potentially dangerous water from the train derailment, the company, which said it has more than four decades of experience in managing water safely, has told CNN.

    The company told Hidalgo’s office Thursday that half a million gallons was already in the county.

    Hidalgo expressed frustration that she first learned about the water shipments from the news media – not from a government agency or Texas Molecular,

    “It’s a very real problem we were told yesterday the materials were coming only to learn today they’ve been here for a week,” Hidalgo said.

    She added that although there’s no legal requirement for her office to be notified, “It doesn’t quite seem right.”

    Texas Molecular is receiving the water from trucks, but it’s unclear if trucks are used for the entire trip, Hidalgo said. The company told her office they’re receiving about 30 trucks of water a day, she said.

    CNN is seeking comment from Texas Molecular about how the water is being transported.

    Hidalgo said her office is looking for information about the disposal, including the chemical composition of the firefighting water, the precautions that are being taken, and why Harris County was the chosen site.

    “There’s nothing right now to tell me – to tell us – there’s going to be an accident in transport, that this is being done in such a way that is not compatible with the well, that there’s a nefarious reason why the water is coming here and not to a closer site,” Hidalgo said. “But it is our job to do basic due diligence on that information.”

    A total of 1.7 million gallons of contaminated liquid has been removed from the immediate site of the derailment, according to a Thursday news release from the Ohio Emergency Management Agency.

    More than 1.1 million gallons of “contaminated liquid” from East Palestine has been transported off-site so far, with the majority going to Texas Molecular and the rest going to a facility in Vickery, Ohio.

    CNN has asked the Ohio agency the location of the remaining 581,500 gallons which have been “removed” but not “hauled off-site.”

    Congresswoman Debbie Dingell of Michigan said she was “not given a heads up” that contaminated soil from East Palestine would be transported to the US Ecology Wayne Disposal in Belleville, Michigan.

    “We were not given a heads up on this reported action,” Dingell said in a press release on Friday, “Our priority is to always keep the people we represent safe.”

    Dingell said inquires to the EPA, Department of Transportation, Norfolk Southern, US Ecology, the state of Ohio and others involved are in the process.

    On Friday afternoon, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine released an update on the removal of the contaminated site in East Palestine, saying that soil would be transported to Michigan.

    So far, 4,832 cubic yards of soil have been removed from the ground in East Palestine. Approximately six truckloads of that contaminated soil are on their way to the hazardous waste disposal facility in Michigan, according to a press release from DeWine.

    The 149-car train operated by Norfolk Southern on February 3 had three employees on board: a locomotive engineer, a conductor and a trainee who were all in the head end of the locomotive, Homendy told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Thursday.

    So far, the investigation found the crew did not do anything wrong prior to the derailment, though the crash was “100% preventable,” Homendy said.

    Video of the train before the derailment showed what appeared to be an overheated wheel bearing, according to the NTSB report. Footage showed sparks flying from underneath the train.

    NTSB investigators are now focusing on one train car’s wheel set and bearing to figure out what may have caused the overheating, Homendy said.

    “We have a lot of questions about that,” she said Friday, including the “thresholds and why they vary so much between railroads.”

    Ultimately, it’s the railroads that set the temperature thresholds for the detectors, Homendy said.

    Releasing publicly a probable cause or causes for the derailment could take 12 to 18 months, Homendy said during the news conference.

    “We are very deliberative. We are the gold standard when it comes to investigations globally, and we are methodical in our approach,” Homendy said. “But if we see a safety issue that we need to be addressed immediately, something systemic, we will not hesitate to issue an urgent safety recommendation.”

    In the meantime, here’s what the NTSB preliminary report found so far:

    • One wheel bearing’s temperature reached a “critical” level — 253 degrees Fahrenheit above the ambient temperature — and prompted an audible alarm that instructed “the crew to slow and stop the train to inspect a hot axle,” the report says.
    • The train’s engineer applied the train’s brakes and additional braking after the alert of an overheating axle, the report states. “During this deceleration, the wheel bearing failed,” Homendy explained. “Car 23 derailed, and the train initiated an emergency brake application and came to a stop.”

    Even after reading the preliminary NTSB report, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost told “CNN This Morning” that there’s still a lot of facts he doesn’t know.

    Among his biggest questions are: “Had the train been shorter, had there been additional staff, could this have been averted? Based on the alerts that occurred, how long is the reaction time and how is that influenced by the size of the train?” Yost told CNN.

    The US Environmental Protection Agency has ordered Norfolk Southern to cover the full cost of cleaning up the aftermath of the train crash.

    “EPA has special authority for situations just like this where we can compel companies who inflict trauma and cause environmental and health damage to communities, like Norfolk Southern has done, to completely clean up the mess that they’ve caused and pay for it,” EPA administrator Michael Regan said.

    Norfolk Southern will be required to:

    • Provide a descriptive work plan on how they intend to clean up the water, soil and debris
    • Reimburse the EPA for providing residents a cleaning service of their homes and businesses
    • Show up to public meetings and explain their progress

    If the company does not follow the order, the EPA will step in to complete the duties, while fining Norfolk Southern up to $70,000 a day, Regan said Wednesday during a CNN town hall.

    “And the law gives us the authority to charge Norfolk Southern up to three times the amount that the cleanup will cost us,” he said.

    The company plans to take a series of measures moving forward to minimize the long-term impacts of chemicals on the land and groundwater, including ripping up the tracks where the train derailed and removing soil underneath, Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw said.

    Shaw added his company is working with the Environmental Protection Agency on a “long-term remediation plan.”

    Yost, who received the referral from the Ohio EPA to initiate necessary legal civil actions against Norfolk Southern this week, told CNN any criminal referral in Ohio regarding the derailment would be a decision made by local prosecutors.

    “We’ve been in contact with the local county prosecutor, and … we may be assisting him, but at this point, he has not empaneled a grand jury, to my understanding,” he said Friday on “CNN This Morning.”

    Ohio environmental officials made a civil referral Tuesday asking Yost’s office to “initiate all necessary legal and/or equitable civil actions” and “seek appropriate penalties” against Norfolk Southern, according to a copy of the referral provided by the attorney general’s office.

    “I respectfully request that this referral result in the filing of a civil complaint in the appropriate court if efforts on your part to resolve this matter through negotiation fail,” Ohio Environmental Protection Agency Director Anne Vogel wrote in a letter to Yost.

    Vogel cited potential violations of state laws regarding air and water pollution and solid and hazardous waste.

    Expanding the definition of a high-hazard flammable train – a standard the derailed train did not meet, despite sparking a major fire – is among the changes NTSB advocated for in the past, Homendy said Friday.

    NTSB urged regulators to include in the classification “a broad array of flammable materials,” rather than focusing on crude oil, she said.

    Additionally, NTSB will look at whether vinyl chloride needs to be carried in more fortified cars, Homendy said.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Alex Murdaugh takes the stand to testify in his double murder trial | CNN

    Alex Murdaugh takes the stand to testify in his double murder trial | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    [Breaking news update at 10:45 a.m. ET]

    Alex Murdaugh took the stand to testify in his double murder trial Thursday morning, as he and his defense attorneys work to convince a jury he is innocent in the June 2021 killings of his wife Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh and 22-year-old son Paul Murdaugh.

    [Previous story, published at 10:19 a.m. ET]

    Alex Murdaugh will testify in his double murder trial, he told the judge Thursday, as he and his attorneys work to convince a jury he is innocent in the June 2021 killings of his wife Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh and 22-year-old son Paul Murdaugh.

    “I am going to testify,” Murdaugh told Judge Clifton Newman when asked if he had made a decision on taking the stand. “I want to testify.”

    Murdaugh announced his decision soon after his defense attorneys again asked the judge to limit the scope of questioning Murdaugh would face under cross-examination, specifically in regard to his alleged financial crimes, which the state has pointed to as a possible motive for the killings.

    Newman denied the request, echoing his decision a day prior when he ruled not to issue a blanket order limiting the state’s questions, saying it was “unheard of to me.”

    FOLLOW LIVE UPDATES: Alex Murdaugh will testify in murder trial

    Murdaugh has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder and two weapons charges in the killings of his wife son at the family’s estate in Islandton, South Carolina.

    Prosecutors accuse Murdaugh of killing his wife and son to distract from an array of financial misconduct allegations against him, while his defense attorneys argue he is a caring father who has been wrongly accused after a mishandled investigation.

    The now-disbarred lawyer is separately facing 99 charges stemming from those alleged financial schemes, including money laundering, insurance fraud and forgery.

    The judge previously ruled to allow prosecutors to present evidence related to Murdaugh’s alleged financial crimes, which the defense has argued are irrelevant to the murder case.

    The state, however, contends the purported misconduct was about to be revealed at the time of the killings and provided Murdaugh with a motive to fatally shoot his wife and son by the family’s dog kennels that night.

    Prosecutors rested their case last week after calling more than 60 witnesses to the stand. In the absence of direct DNA or eyewitness evidence connecting Murdaugh to the killings, they have attempted to show Murdaugh lied to investigators and was at the scene just minutes before the fatal shootings.

    Murdaugh has repeatedly denied being at the scene for the fatal shootings. He told investigators he had gone to visit his mother that evening and found the bodies by the kennels when he returned home later that night.

    So far, the defense has called witnesses including the county coroner, one of Murdaugh’s former law partners, forensics experts and his surviving son, Buster Murdaugh, in their effort to reveal flaws in the investigation and paint Murdaugh as shocked and devastated on the night of the fatal shootings.

    Buster Murdaugh testified that his father was “destroyed” by the killings of Paul and Maggie.

    “He was heartbroken. I walked in the door and saw him, gave him a hug,” he said of seeing his father in the hours after learning of the deaths of his brother and mother. Alex Murdaugh was “just broken down,” Buster said, adding his father was crying and couldn’t really speak.

    Buster’s testimony was intended to undermine statements made by a state witness who previously testified he believed Alex Murdaugh had made an inadvertent confession to investigators.

    The witness, South Carolina Law Enforcement Division Special Agent Jeff Croft, said he believed Murdaugh said “I did him so bad” in reference to Paul’s body during an emotional interview with investigators on June 10, 2021.

    The defense has argued Murdaugh actually said, “They did him so bad” – a claim Buster supported. The son said he heard his father use the phrase more than once on the night of the killings.

    Murdaugh’s former law partner, Mark Ball, also supported that interpretation in his testimony. He said Alex Murdaugh was “devastated” the night of the killings and told Ball, “Look at what they did. Look at what they did to them.”

    Ball also testified that Murdaugh repeatedly said he had not been at the kennels before finding the bodies that night. But he said he now thinks that is not true after hearing Murdaugh’s voice in the background of a video that was filmed on Paul’s phone minutes before the state says the killings occurred.

    In the video, which appears to have been taken at the kennels, three voices can be heard in the background, which family friends have testified belong to Alex, Maggie and Paul Murdaugh.

    Ball said he has “no doubt” it is Alex Murdaugh’s voice that is heard in the footage. At least nine witnesses have identified Murdaugh’s voice on the video, recorded at the scene at 8:44 p.m., around the time of the shootings.

    The defense also used Ball’s testimony to support their argument the investigation and crime scene were mishandled. When Ball arrived at the Murdaugh’s home the night of the killings, he testified, there were no barricades or police tape to prevent people from entering the property and walking around the scene.

    He said the coroner, citing instructions from South Carolina Law Enforcement Division investigators, asked people to gather inside the family’s house, where people began cleaning up. This concerned Ball, who worried whether it was safe and whether the house was part of the crime scene, wondering if their presence there might impede the investigation.

    Mark Ball, a former legal partner of Alex Murdaugh, testifies about the crime scene and Murdaugh's statements the night of the killings

    Ball also recalled watching the rain that was falling that evening drip onto Paul’s body, which was covered by a sheet, and pool around it. Maggie’s body was covered and under a tent, he said.

    When he returned to the property the next day – after he’d been told investigators had released the scene, he said – he looked into the feed room where Paul was shot and saw “a piece of Paul’s skull about the size of a baseball laying there,” he said. “It just infuriated me that this young man had been murdered and there was still his remains there.”

    Correction: An earlier version of this story misspelled Alex Murdaugh’s last name.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • House January 6 investigator says it’s ‘likely’ 2020 election subversion probes will produce indictments | CNN Politics

    House January 6 investigator says it’s ‘likely’ 2020 election subversion probes will produce indictments | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The top investigator on the House committee that probed the January 6, 2021, US Capitol attack said Wednesday it is “likely” that the Georgia and federal investigations into efforts to subvert the 2020 presidential election will produce indictments.

    Timothy Heaphy told CNN’s Kate Bolduan on “Erin Burnett OutFront” that “unless there is information inconsistent, which I don’t expect, I think there will likely be indictments both in Georgia and at the federal level.”

    In Georgia, the foreperson of the Atlanta-based grand jury that investigated former President Donald Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election told CNN on Tuesday that the panel is recommending multiple indictments and suggested “the big name” may be on the list.

    The grand jury met for about seven months in Atlanta and heard testimony from 75 witnesses, including some of Trump’s closest advisers from his final weeks in the White House.

    Now that the grand jury is finished, it’s up to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to review the recommendations and make charging decisions. Willis’ decisions in this case will reverberate in the 2024 presidential campaign and beyond.

    Trump, who has launched his 2024 campaign for the White House, denies any criminal wrongdoing.

    At the federal level, special counsel Jack Smith is overseeing parts of the criminal investigation into the Capitol attack and has subpoenaed members of Trump’s inner circle. On Wednesday, the New York Times reported that Smith had subpoenaed the former president’s daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner for testimony.

    “I think it could be very important,” Heaphy said of the pair’s potential testimony.

    “They were present for really significant events. The special counsel will want to hear about the president’s understanding of the election results and also what happened on January 6. And they both had direct communications with him about the events preceding the riot at the Capitol,” he said.

    The special counsel has a massive amount of evidence already in-hand that it now needs to comb through, including evidence recently turned over by the House January 6 committee, subpoena documents provided by local officials in key states and discovery collected from lawyers for Trump allies late last year in a flurry of activity, at least some of which had not been reviewed as of early January, sources familiar with the investigation told CNN at the time.

    “He will not stop because of a family relationship, because of purported executive privilege,” Heaphy said of Smith. “He believes that the law entitles him to all of that information, and he’s determined to get it.”

    Ivanka Trump and Kushner previously testified to the House select committee, which expired in January after Republicans took control of the House. The panel had referred the former president to the Justice Department on four criminal charges in December, and while largely symbolic in nature, committee members stressed those referrals served as a way to document their views given that Congress cannot bring charges.

    This story has been updated with additional information Wednesday.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Murder of Vermont woman solved after more than 50 years using DNA found on a cigarette and the victim’s clothing | CNN

    Murder of Vermont woman solved after more than 50 years using DNA found on a cigarette and the victim’s clothing | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    More than 50 years after Rita Curran’s roommate found her strangled to death in her room, police in Vermont say they have identified the killer using DNA found on a cigarette butt and Curran’s clothing.

    Investigators identified William DeRoos, a man who lived in Curran’s Burlington apartment building, as the person responsible with the help of advances in DNA technology and genetic genealogy, police in Vermont’s most populous city announced Tuesday.

    DeRoos died of a drug overdose in San Francisco in 1986, police said. The case is now closed.

    On the night of the July 1971 killing, DeRoos, who lived with his wife two floors above Curran, had a fight with his spouse and left their apartment to “cool down,” according to a Burlington police investigation report.

    Curran, 24, was later found dead, severely beaten after apparently having put up a “vicious struggle,” a detective wrote at the time. Investigators are now “unanimously certain” DeRoos was responsible, the report released Tuesday says.

    But when investigators questioned DeRoos and his wife the next morning, the couple said they had been together all night and didn’t hear or see anything. After police left, DeRoos told his wife if they were questioned again, she should not admit that he had left the apartment “or they would go after him” because he had a criminal history, police said during a news conference Tuesday.

    A break in the case finally came in 2014 when a DNA profile was extracted from a cigarette butt that had been found next to Curran’s body, Detective Lt. James Trieb said at the news conference. Though the profile was submitted to a national criminal database for DNA, he said, no matches were made. That meant the person with that DNA likely never had genetic material entered into the database, possibly because the person didn’t have a felony conviction.

    In 2019, Trieb reopened the case and decided to take a new approach.

    Instead of having a single detective work the cold case alone – the department’s usual strategy – he treated the crime as if it had just been committed, bringing in a team of detectives and expert technicians to review and discuss it, his investigation report says.

    The team began retesting evidence, Trieb said, and decided to analyze the cigarette DNA using genetic genealogy – a process that uses DNA databases for genealogy research to identify possible family members of the person whose DNA is unmatched.

    An outside genetic genealogy expert then concluded that the cigarette DNA had strong connections to relatives of DeRoos, both on the paternal and maternal sides.

    “She was certain that it was William DeRoos” who put his DNA on the cigarette, the police report says.

    cnn world rugby bryan habana dnafit rugby spc_00013322.jpg

    Why your DNA may be solving cold cases

    Investigators then found a living half-brother of DeRoos who was willing to provide a DNA sample, and that sample bolstered the conclusion that the cigarette DNA belonged to DeRoos, the report says.

    Finally, investigators found that DNA left on Curran’s ripped house coat also matched the DNA on the cigarette butt, the report reads. Investigators re-interviewed his then-wife, who admitted that she had lied about DeRoos’ alibi.

    At the news conference, acting Burlington Police Chief Jon Murad said the day was “filled with mixed emotions.”

    “Ultimately, those emotions are ones of relief, of pride for me (and) for this department, but mostly of gratitude to a family that has been through an incredible ordeal for more than half a century,” he said.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Why the US is accusing Russia of crimes against humanity and what that means | CNN Politics

    Why the US is accusing Russia of crimes against humanity and what that means | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]

    A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    A year into Russia’s brutal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, the US has seen enough.

    “In the case of Russia’s actions in Ukraine, we have examined the evidence, we know the legal standards, and there is no doubt: These are crimes against humanity,” Vice President Kamala Harris said at the Munich Security Conference this weekend.

    “To all those who have perpetrated these crimes, and to their superiors who are complicit in those crimes, you will be held to account.”

    The declaration marks the strongest accusation yet from the US as it seeks to punish Moscow for its war of aggression.

    The US government declared last March that members of the Russian armed forces had committed war crimes in Ukraine. President Joe Biden has gone as far as saying that atrocities at the hands of Moscow’s troops qualify as “genocide.”

    While the “crimes against humanity” determination is significant, it remains largely symbolic for now. It does not immediately trigger any specific consequences, nor does it give the US the ability to prosecute Russians involved with perpetrating crimes.

    However, it could provide international bodies, such as the International Criminal Court, with evidence to effectively try to prosecute those crimes.

    Here’s what you need to know about how these kinds of crimes are prosecuted on the international stage.

    A crime against humanity is defined by the International Criminal Court as an act “committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack.”

    This can include, among other things, murder, extermination, torture, enslavement, sexual violence, deportation or forcible transfer of population or other inhumane acts.

    “We reserve crimes against humanity determinations for the most egregious crimes,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement Saturday. “These acts are not random or spontaneous; they are part of the Kremlin’s widespread and systematic attack against Ukraine’s civilian population.”

    Harris in her speech outlined specific instances that have peppered news clips and official reports.

    “First, from the starting days of this unprovoked war, we have witnessed Russian forces engage in horrendous atrocities and war crimes,” Harris said.

    “Russian forces have pursued a widespread and systemic attack against a civilian population – gruesome acts of murder, torture, rape, and deportation. Execution-style killings, beating and electrocution,” she added.

    “Russian authorities have forcibly deported hundreds of thousands of people from Ukraine to Russia, including children. They have cruelly separated children from their families.”

    Harris’ speech cited evidence of indiscriminate Russian attacks that deliberately targeted civilians, including the bombing of a maternity hospital that killed a pregnant mother and of a theater in Mariupol, where hundreds were killed.

    The vice president spoke of the horrific images out of Bucha that showed men and women shot and left to rot in the streets and reports by the United Nations of a 4-year-old girl who was sexually assaulted by a Russian soldier.

    As it was when the US government declared that Russia committed war crimes last March, it remains to be seen whether there will be any accountability and whether Russian President Vladimir Putin himself will be forced to bear any responsibility.

    “We will continue to support the judicial process in Ukraine and international investigations because justice must be served. Let us all agree, on behalf of all the victims, known and unknown: Justice must be served,” Harris said.

    Located in The Hague, Netherlands, and created by a treaty called the Rome Statute first brought before the United Nations, the International Criminal Court operates independently.

    Most countries on Earth – 123 of them – are parties to the treaty, but there are very large and notable exceptions. That’s key for this story, as neither Russia nor Ukraine — nor for that matter, the US — are part of the agreement.

    The court tries people, not countries, and focuses on those who hold the most responsibility: leaders and officials. While Ukraine is not a member of the court, it has previously accepted its jurisdiction. Accused Russian officials could theoretically be indicted by the court. However, the ICC does not conduct trials in absentia, so they would either have to be handed over by Russia or arrested outside of Russia. This seems unlikely.

    An ICC investigation could affect any diplomatic space for negotiations, with Putin and other accused perpetrators not wanting to risk arrest if they travel outside the country. It could also weaken Putin’s popularity at home, with Russians losing faith in his ability to lead.

    If justice in general moves slowly, international justice barely moves at all. Investigations at the ICC take many years. Only a handful of convictions have ever been won.

    A preliminary investigation into the hostilities in eastern Ukraine lasted more than six years – from April 2014 until December 2020. At the time, the prosecutor said there was evidence of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Next steps were slowed by the Covid-19 pandemic and a lack of resources at the court, which is conducting multiple investigations.

    Anatoly Antonov, Russia’s ambassador to the United States, cast the crimes against humanity accusation as an attempt to “demonize” Russia, according to state news agency TASS.

    “We consider such insinuations as an attempt, unprecedented in terms of its cynicism, to demonize Russia,” Antonov said this weekend.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Special prosecutor in ‘Rust’ case drops firearm enhancement charge against Alec Baldwin | CNN

    Special prosecutor in ‘Rust’ case drops firearm enhancement charge against Alec Baldwin | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The manslaughter charges against Alec Baldwin relating to the 2021 fatal shooting on the set of the movie “Rust” have been downgraded by prosecutors in New Mexico, which will reduce the prison time the actor could face in the death of the movie’s cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins.

    The move comes after attorneys for Baldwin filed a motion this past month to have the firearm enhancement charge dropped, arguing prosecutors were incorrect.

    A statement released by Heather Brewer, a spokeswoman for the New Mexico First Judicial District Attorney’s Office, said the enhancement charge was being dropped “to avoid further litigious distractions by Mr. Baldwin and his attorneys,” adding that “the prosecution’s priority is securing justice, not securing billable hours for big-city attorneys.”

    The decision to drop that charge reduces the prison time Baldwin could face by at least five years.

    Baldwin was formally charged in the case back in February, along with set’s armorer, Hannah Guiterrez Reed. The charges included two counts of involuntary manslaughter, the DA’s office said at the time.

    Attorneys for both defendants previously insisted their respective clients are innocent.

    Hutchins was struck and killed by a live round of ammunition fired from a prop gun that was being held by Baldwin, who maintains he did not pull the gun’s trigger.

    The movie’s director Joel Souza was also shot and injured.

    Earlier this month, the parents and sister of Hutchins sued Baldwin, as well as the movie’s production company and others over her death.

    In January, a production attorney told CNN that Baldwin intends to complete the film and continue to star in the lead role.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • How the prosecution of Alex Murdaugh has tried to overcome a lack of direct evidence | CNN

    How the prosecution of Alex Murdaugh has tried to overcome a lack of direct evidence | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    In opening statements of Alex Murdaugh’s murder trial, the prosecution went into a lengthy defense of the value and importance of circumstantial evidence.

    “A lot of times people hear, ‘Oh, it’s just a circumstantial case,’ but the law says otherwise,” prosecutor Creighton Waters told the jury. “The law says circumstantial evidence is just as good as direct evidence.”

    The lines were a preview of what has become clear through three weeks of the trial: There is no direct evidence – no witnesses, no smoking guns, no blood-soaked clothes – tying the disgraced former South Carolina attorney to the murders of his wife, Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh, and son, Paul Murdaugh.

    Instead, the prosecution’s case against Alex Murdaugh has focused on circumstantial evidence about his opportunity and motive. In particular, they have tried to prove he was at the crime scene that night, worked to show he lied to investigators and painted a picture of a fraudster who killed his wife and son as a desperate bid to distract the investigations into his actions.

    For the defense, that evidence amounts to little more than “speculation” and “conjecture,” attorney Dick Harpootlian argued. They have highlighted Murdaugh’s loving relationships with his family and ridiculed the prosecution’s focus on irrelevant financial misconduct.

    “They’ve got a whole lot more evidence about financial misconduct than they have about a murder and evidence of guilt in a murder case,” defense lawyer Jim Griffin said in court during a debate on the relevance of this testimony.

    Murdaugh, 54, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder and weapons charges. Separately, he faces 99 charges for an array of alleged financial misconduct that will be adjudicated at a future trial.

    Legal experts who have followed the trial told CNN the prosecution’s lack of direct evidence makes it harder to convict – though certainly not impossible.

    “It does make the case more difficult,” said trial attorney Misty Marris. “But at some point, if the prosecutors have enough evidence that they can put together that story, and show motive and opportunity, it can certainly rise to the level needed to get a conviction.

    Sara Azari, a defense attorney who has followed the case, has been unimpressed by much of the evidence presented.

    “Jurors want science, jurors want DNA, jurors want something that’s persuasive,” Azari said. “But because (prosecutors) lack it … their focus is now on the tenuous motive and the lies after the fact, but neither of those things … substitute the evidence that they need.”

    With the prosecution having wrapped its case, here’s a closer look at the prosecution’s three main arguments to convict.

    Trial witness: ‘100% certain’ Murdaugh’s voice is on video made before killings

    One of the prosecution’s most compelling pieces of evidence is recorded audio that they say places Murdaugh at the crime scene on the night of the murders.

    A video, just short of a minute long, was filmed on Paul’s phone starting at 8:44 p.m. on June 7, 2021, just minutes before Paul and Maggie were shot dead, according to Lt. David Britton Dove, a supervisor in the computer crimes center at the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division.

    The video focuses on one of their dogs and appears to have been recorded at the kennels at their family home in Islandton. In the background, three different voices can be heard in the footage, and family friends identified those voices as that of Paul, Maggie and Alex Murdaugh.

    Alex Murdaugh’s presence there contradicted his assertion to police that he was not at the kennels that night, prosecutors said.

    Murdaugh “told anyone who would listen he was never there,” the prosecution said in opening statements. “The evidence will show that he was there. He was at the murder scene with the two victims.”

    In his own opening statement, Harpootlian said the audio simply showed Murdaugh and his wife having a “normal discussion” with “no animosity.” Paul is “very happy,” Harpootlian said. “Nobody’s down there threatening him. Daddy is not pulling out a shotgun and killing him.”

    In the aftermath of the murders, as seen on police body-cam footage, Murdaugh told investigators that he was asleep at his home and went to visit his mother in Alameda at the time of the killings.

    The prosecution has used the video from Paul’s phone to try to disprove his assertion that he was asleep, and other testimony has also cut into his claims about how long he had been with his mother.

    “It’s up to you,” Waters, the prosecutor, said, “to decide whether or not he’s trying to manufacture an alibi.”

    Shelly Smith, a home care worker who was taking care of Murdaugh’s mother, testified that Murdaugh indeed visited his mother’s home for about 15 to 20 minutes on the night of the murders. A few days later, they again saw each other and Murdaugh insisted that he had been there 30 to 40 minutes on the night of the murders, she testified.

    “Was he there 30 or 40 minutes that night?” asked the prosecutor.

    “Not to my recall,” Smith replied.

    Other evidence focused on the series of calls and texts Murdaugh made to his wife after the killings. A tech expert testified that those calls were missing from Murdaugh’s call log, indicating they had been manually deleted.

    Alex Murdaugh is interviewed by authorities June 8, 2021, after his wife and son were found killed.

    Father charged with killing his wife and son. See his interview with investigators

    Finally, state prosecutors have tried to put forth an adequate explanation of why Murdaugh – described as a loving and devoted family man – would slaughter his wife and son.

    A series of witnesses have accused Murdaugh of extensive financial wrongdoing at his namesake law firm and presented evidence that he had lied to nearly everyone around him in a yearslong fraud. A “day of reckoning” was coming from several different angles, so he killed his family to distract and delay those financial investigations, the prosecution has argued.

    Two investigations in particular that could have exposed Murdaugh’s wrongdoing were coming to a head at the time of the killings.

    For one, the chief financial officer of his law firm testified she had confronted Murdaugh about missing funds on the morning of June 7, 2021, hours before the killings. After the murders, the internal investigation into the funds took a backseat.

    “We weren’t going to go in there and harass him about money when we were worried about his mental state and the fact that his family had been killed,” the CFO, Jeanne Seckinger, testified.

    Second, Murdaugh was facing a lawsuit from the family of Mallory Beach, a 19-year-old who was killed in February 2019 when a boat, owned by Murdaugh and allegedly driven by Paul, crashed. A hearing in that civil case was scheduled for June 10, 2021, and had the potential to reveal his financial problems, prosecutors argued.

    Indeed, that “day of reckoning” didn’t come for another three months, when his law firm again confronted him about misappropriated funds, leading to his resignation, a bizarre murder-for-hire and insurance scam plot, a stint in rehab for a drug addiction, dozens of financial crimes, his disbarment and, ultimately, the murder charges.

    Though this financial evidence is not directly related to the murder charges, the judge overseeing the case ruled to allow it in, saying it was “so intimately connected” with the state’s case “that proof of it is essential to complete the story.” He has instructed jurors to only consider this financial evidence as part of the motive and not as a broader criticism of the defendant’s character.

    That’s easier said than done, Marris, the legal expert, told CNN.

    “There will be an instruction (to the jury) that – ‘just because he’s a liar … doesn’t mean he committed murder,’ but in real life, the jury is hearing what it’s hearing,” she said. “They’re going to be considering one of the prosecution’s key themes, is that Alex Murdaugh was lying right from the beginning of this to cover his tracks.”

    Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated Alex Murdaugh’s age. He is 54.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Exclusive: Attorney for Gaetz’s ex-girlfriend says prosecutors didn’t have credible evidence to charge | CNN Politics

    Exclusive: Attorney for Gaetz’s ex-girlfriend says prosecutors didn’t have credible evidence to charge | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    A defense attorney who represented the former girlfriend of Rep. Matt Gaetz says that prosecutors made the right decision not to charge the Florida Republican after a yearslong federal sex trafficking investigation.

    Attorney Tim Jansen told CNN on Saturday that Justice Department prosecutors were aggressive with his client. She was initially approached as a possible target in the sex-trafficking investigation but eventually agreed to cooperate and testified before an Orlando grand jury hearing evidence in the case last year.

    The ex-girlfriend, whom CNN has not named, is not the underage woman at the center of the sex-trafficking investigation.

    Jansen, who said the DOJ thoroughly pursued leads against Gaetz, disputed the notion that the congressman was cleared because he was in a powerful position, arguing that the evidence against Gaetz simply wasn’t credible and couldn’t hold up in court.

    “They turned over every stone. And I think they ultimately made a decision that they didn’t have evidence to prove a crime,” Jansen said. “And I know critics think that the congressman somehow bought it off or somehow used his power, but I found (federal prosecutor) Todd (Gee) very responsible. He was very organized. He had evidence that he believed that he was following, and they made a determination that they weren’t going to charge.”

    CNN has reached out to the Justice Department for comment.

    CNN first reported this week that the Justice Department had informed lawyers for Gaetz and several witnesses that it would not prosecute the GOP lawmaker.

    Last fall, investigators working on the case recommended not bringing charges amid concerns that the central witnesses in the case would not be perceived as credible, including Joel Greenberg, a former Seminole County, Florida, tax collector who pleaded guilty to six federal crimes, including sex trafficking, and agreed to cooperate with the government.

    The DOJ’s formal decision not to charge Gaetz, who has been serving in Congress since 2017, marks the end of a long-running investigation into allegations that the congressman violated federal law by transporting underage girls across state lines for sex.

    Gaetz has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.

    Jansen told CNN that his client was initially threatened with prosecution by federal investigators as part of the investigation. Her phone was seized, and she was told she could be a target in the investigation. She ultimately became a witness, Jansen said.

    But Jansen said the problems with Greenberg’s credibility and the inconsistencies in the testimony of the women ultimately prompted Gee, a deputy chief of the Justice Department’s public integrity section, not to charge Gaetz.

    “In order to prosecute a case, you have to have credible evidence, either tangible witnesses, and in this case, there was no credible evidence of any wrongdoing,” Jansen said. “Joel Greenberg was somebody who (you) couldn’t put on the witness stand, as a prosecutor. I believe these women; none of them believed they were victims of any crime.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Biden’s former executive assistant agrees to interview with House panel in documents investigation | CNN Politics

    Biden’s former executive assistant agrees to interview with House panel in documents investigation | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Kathy Chung, President Joe Biden’s former executive assistant, has agreed to sit for an interview with the House Oversight Committee as part of its investigation into classified documents found at Biden’s home and office, CNN has learned.

    The Republican-led committee sent a letter to Chung last month demanding information related to the classified documents and communications with the Biden family dating back more than 10 years.

    CNN has reached out to the House Oversight Committee for comment.

    Chung was one of the staffers who packed Biden’s belongings and documents at the end of his time as vice president, according to people familiar with the matter.

    Those boxes eventually ended up at the Penn Biden Center and are now at the center of a special counsel investigation into the possible mishandling of classified info. A source close to Chung says she feels partly responsible for the situation.

    Chung’s lawyer, Bill Taylor, told CNN, they have been in discussions with the Oversight Committee over the past week and have agreed to provide the committee with much of what it requested in a letter last month.

    “She is happy to sit for an interview with the committee,” Taylor told CNN.

    The committee made a broad request that asks for materials well beyond the Biden document investigation including all communications with the Biden family dating back to 2009. The panel also demanded all documents and communications “related to then-Vice President Biden’s departure from office in 2017, including communications regarding Penn Biden Center,” the letter notes.

    Chung’s lawyer says there are limits on what they are willing to provide: “She is not agreeing to produce everything in the letter but would provide documents related to the movement of documents from the White House to the Penn Biden Center.”

    Taylor has proposed several dates for a possible interview, but the final date has not been set.

    Chung, who now works at the Pentagon, was interviewed last month in the Justice Department probe of classified documents found in Biden’s home and office.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Feds are sending medical experts to Ohio toxic train wreck site as residents’ safety concerns simmer | CNN

    Feds are sending medical experts to Ohio toxic train wreck site as residents’ safety concerns simmer | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The Biden administration said it has deployed federal medical experts to help assess what dangers remain at an Ohio village where a train carrying hazardous materials derailed this month, a ramp-up of federal support at the governor’s request as anxious residents point to signs of adverse effects.

    Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine on Thursday asked the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the US Department of Health and Human Services to send teams to East Palestine, where the train derailed February 3 and sparked a dayslong blaze.

    “This request for medical experts includes, but is not limited to, physicians and behavioral health specialists,” DeWine wrote in a letter to the CDC. “Some community members have already seen physicians in the area but remain concerned about their condition and possible health effects – both short- and long-term.”

    The Biden administration approved the request and began deploying teams from both federal agencies in part for public health testing and assessments, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Thursday.

    That is in addition to aid the Federal Emergency Management Agency is providing, according to Jean-Pierre, who noted Thursday that the train derailment situation is “much more expansive” than what FEMA can offer.

    The federal support boost to a community of some 5,000 people along the Ohio-Pennsylvania state line comes amid some residents’ growing concerns that some areas may not be safe to live in.

    An evacuation order that was in place for areas near the crash site was lifted February 8 after officials said air and water sample results led them to deem the area safe, officials said.

    But a chemical stench lingered in areas, with some residents saying the odor left them with headaches and pains in their throat. Plus, officials estimate thousands of fish were killed by contamination washing down streams and rivers.

    Further spurring residents’ questions about safety – some of which were expressed at an emotional community meeting Wednesday – were crews’ decision to conduct controlled detonations February 6 of some tanks carrying toxic chemicals to prevent a more dangerous explosion. Though a larger blast was averted, the detonations essentially released chemicals into the air, including vinyl chloride that at high levels could kill and increase cancer risk.

    On Thursday, the head of the federal Environmental Agency Administration visited East Palestine and vowed to use the agency’s enforcement authority to hold the train operator, Norfolk Southern, accountable.

    “I want the community to know that we hear you, we see you, and that we will get to the bottom of this,” EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan said Thursday during a news conference. “We are testing for all volatile organic chemicals. We’re testing for everything. We’re testing for everything that was on that train. So, we feel comfortable that we are casting a net wide enough to present a picture that will protect the community.”

    During the visit, Regan observed some of the ongoing remediation efforts following the hazardous train derailment. While the state EPA has the primary responsibility over the scene, Regan noted the federal arm is ready to provide aid when needed.

    Regan also noted that Norfolk Southern has signed a notice of accountability, acknowledging the company will be responsible for the cleanup.

    Meanwhile, another train operated by Norfolk Southern derailed Thursday morning in Michigan’s Van Buren Charter Township, and local officials said there was no evidence the area was exposed to hazardous materials.

    First responders arrived at the crash location around 8:30 a.m. and found around 30 rail cars had derailed. One of the overturned rail cars contained agricultural grain while the other overturned cars were empty, Van Buren Township Public Safety said.

    One rail car contained liquid chlorine, but it was not part of the overturned section and was removed from the scene, officials added.

    CNN has reached out to Norfolk Southern for comment on the train derailment in Michigan.

    Federal transportation investigators are working vigorously to determine what caused the 100-car freight train to crash in Ohio, the head of the National Transportation Safety Board said Thursday in a thread of tweets.

    “You have my personal commitment that the NTSB will CONTINUE to share all information publicly as soon as possible following our analysis,” board chairwoman Jennifer Homendy wrote. “Next: NTSB investigators will thoroughly examine the tank cars once decontaminated. As always, we’ll issue urgent safety recommendations as needed.”

    One of the elements under scrutiny is an apparent overheated wheel bearing seen on video before the derailment, the NTSB has said. The apparent overheating began at least 43 minutes before the train derailed, according to a CNN analysis of surveillance videos the network obtained.

    At around 8:12 p.m. on February 3, sparks from an apparent wheel bearing overheating were visible as the train passed through Salem, Ohio, two surveillance videos obtained by CNN show. Bright light and sparks are seen emanating from one of the rail cars.

    No sparks were seen in surveillance video taken 14 minutes earlier as the train passed through Alliance, Ohio.

    The train derailed in East Palestine around 8:55 p.m., about 43 minutes after the sparks were seen in Salem.

    It remains unclear what caused the overheating and whether it is linked to the derailment.

    Homendy, whose agency is responsible for investigating various transportation crashes from aviation to railways, implored the public on Twitter not to speculate about the cause of the crash.

    The train was carrying a range of toxic materials, including vinyl chloride, ethylene glycol monobutyl ether, ethylhexyl acrylate, isobutylene and butyl acrylate, the US Environmental Protection Agency has said.

    Of those, the vinyl chloride gas that caught fire could break down into compounds including hydrogen chloride and phosgene, a chemical weapon used during World War I as a choking agent, according to the EPA and the CDC. Vinyl chloride – a volatile organic compound, or VOC, and the most toxic chemical involved in the derailment – is known to cause cancer, attacking the liver, and can also affect the brain, Maria Doa of the Environmental Defense Fund told CNN.

    It’s the dangers these chemicals pose that has put East Palestine residents on edge over the past two weeks.

    During an intense community town hall meeting Wednesday in a high school gym, East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway addressed the February 6 controlled detonations, saying the only option was to release the chemicals manually or risk greater danger to residents.

    “There (were) two options: We either detonate those tanks, or they detonate themselves,” Conaway told a group of reporters at Wednesday’s meeting.

    “Yes, harmful chemicals went into the air. I am truly sorry, but that is the only option we had. If we didn’t do that, then they were going to blow up, and we were going to have shrapnel all across this town.”

    Jami Cozza, an East Palestine resident who attended the meeting and was vocal about the issues her family have been facing since the train derailed, said she will not return home until it’s safe. Cozza told CNN she’s staying at a hotel paid for by the train company due to toxicity in her home cause by the derailment.

    Cozza explained the train company told her it was safe to return home after conducting air testing. However, she insisted the company run soil and water tests, and only then did a toxicologist deem her house unsafe.

    “Had I not used my voice, had I not thrown a fit, I would be sitting in that house right now, when they told me that it was safe,” Cozza said Thursday, adding she’s worried that not all residents are receiving the proper level of testing.

    Cozza noted the company has also offered to pay all of her moving expenses. “It’s not about the money. It’s about our house,” she said.

    Representatives of the train’s operator, Norfolk Southern, did not attend the community meeting Wednesday, citing safety concerns after it said employees were threatened, further escalating tensions.

    Despite the company’s absence, the mayor said the operator has been collaborating with local officials “tremendously.”

    Earlier this week, Norfolk Southern said it plans to create a $1 million charitable fund to support the East Palestine community.

    The company initially said it would make $1,000 payments to residents who lived within a mile of the spill evacuation zone. But the company has since decided to pay each resident in the entire 44413 ZIP code that money, a spokesman for the company told CNN.

    As of Tuesday evening, Norfolk Southern has distributed more than $1.5 million in direct financial assistance to more than 1,000 families and some businesses to cover costs related to the evacuation, the company said Wednesday in a news release.

    Those payments are in addition to the company’s offer to reimburse expenses related to residents evacuating during the incident, which includes the costs of hotels stays, food and more, company spokesperson Connor Spielmaker said.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • DOJ prosecutors in DC take over corruption probe into Texas attorney general | CNN Politics

    DOJ prosecutors in DC take over corruption probe into Texas attorney general | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Justice Department prosecutors in Washington, DC, have taken over the corruption investigation into Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

    State prosecutor Kent Schaffer, who is separately investigating Paxton, told CNN in an interview that the Justice Department notified him of the change. The yearslong corruption investigation had, until now, been under the control of federal prosecutors in Texas.

    The recent takeover by federal prosecutors at Justice Department headquarters in Washington is the most recent development in the investigation of the Texas attorney general, which was initiated after several aides accused Paxton of bribery, abuse of office and other potentially criminal offenses in 2020. It also comes just days after Paxton agreed to a tentative $3.3 million settlement with four of the aides who made the public accusation.

    Paxton has repeatedly denied allegations of wrongdoing. In a statement to CNN after the settlement was announced last week, Paxton said he had “chosen this path” to “put this issue to rest.”

    The investigation will now be handled by the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section, according to Schaffer. The Public Integrity Section handles high profile prosecutions of government officials, including in cases of bribery and corruption.

    It is not clear what prompted the move to replace the federal prosecutors in Texas on the case.

    A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment.

    Paxton’s attorney Dan Cogdell told The Associated Press, which first reported the development, that he had previously asked for prosecutors from the Western District of Texas to be off the case because they had “an obvious conflict,” but that he had not personally been notified of the move. Cogdell did not immediately respond to a request for comment from CNN.

    CNN has also reached out to Paxton’s office for comment.

    In an interview with CNN, Schaffer said that “there is no reason in the world that [the Texas prosecutors] couldn’t have continued with the prosecution.” He said he worries “Ken Paxton has committed a crime … and he won’t have to answer for it.”

    He continued: “This cat’s got nine lives, and it looks like he’s used up about seven or eight of them.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Trump’s former national security adviser Robert O’Brien appears before federal grand jury | CNN Politics

    Trump’s former national security adviser Robert O’Brien appears before federal grand jury | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Former national security adviser Robert O’Brien is appearing Thursday before a grand jury in the federal courthouse in Washington, DC, where several Trump-related investigations are being conducted.

    O’Brien had been subpoenaed by special counsel Jack Smith as part of investigations both into classified documents found at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence and the probe related to efforts to overturn the 2020 election, CNN previously reported.

    CNN spotted two grand juries meeting at the DC federal courthouse on Thursday – one of which has heard testimony related to the documents probe, while the other has been handling the investigation into efforts by Trump and his allies to undermine the election results.

    It is not clear which grand jury O’Brien is appearing in front of, or whether he is scheduled to testify before both grand juries. O’Brien identified himself to a CNN reporter but did not disclose any other details about his testimony.

    O’Brien could have knowledge of how classified documents were stored at Mar-a-Lago because the National Security Council should be involved in handling those documents at the end of a presidency.

    According to CNN reporting, O’Brien considered resigning over Trump’s response to the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol but ultimately decided not to.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • ‘Does that mean that I am a suspect?’ Footage shows investigator asking Alex Murdaugh if he killed his wife and son | CNN

    ‘Does that mean that I am a suspect?’ Footage shows investigator asking Alex Murdaugh if he killed his wife and son | CNN

    [ad_1]

    Editor’s Note: The HBO docuseries “Low Country: The Murdaugh Dynasty” chronicles the family’s influence in South Carolina. It airs on CNN Sunday, February 19, at 8 p.m. ET.



    CNN
     — 

    The jury in Alex Murdaugh’s double murder trial saw footage Wednesday from a crucial interview he had with state investigators where he was asked for the first time if he killed his wife and son.

    The interview on August 11, 2021, was the third Murdaugh had with the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division, which was investigating the murders of his wife, Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh, and grown son, Paul Murdaugh, two months earlier, according to testimony Wednesday by SLED agent Lt. David Owen.

    The interview was about to end when Owen told Murdaugh he had “a few more questions.”

    “Did you kill Maggie?” Owen asked, according to the footage played in court.

    “No,” Murdaugh said. “Did I kill my wife? No, David.”

    “Do you know who did?”

    “No, I do not know who did,” Murdaugh said.

    “Did you kill Paul?”

    “No, I did not kill Paul,” Murdaugh said.

    “Do you know who did?”

    “No, sir, I do not know who did,” Murdaugh said. “Do you think I killed Maggie?”

    “I have to go where the evidence and the facts take me,” Owen said.

    “I understand that. And you think I killed Paul?”

    “I have to go where the evidence and the facts take me,” Owen said again. “And I don’t have anything that points to anybody else at this time.”

    “So does that mean that I am a suspect?”

    Owen told Murdaugh he was “still in this,” adding, “I have to put my beliefs aside, and go with the facts.”

    Owen’s testimony Wednesday comes as the state nears the end of its case, in which prosecutors contend Murdaugh killed his wife and son to distract from a mountain of alleged financial crimes he had committed and to stave off a “day of reckoning” when those crimes might come to light.

    The defense maintains Murdaugh – who has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder and two weapons charges in the killings – was a loving father and husband who called 911 the night of the killings after he found his wife and son shot at the family’s estate in Islandton, South Carolina, a property known as Moselle.

    At the time of the August 11, 2021, interview, Murdaugh was “the only known suspect” in the murders, Owen testified Wednesday.

    The case was transferred that same day from the local solicitor to the Attorney General’s Office, which has been prosecuting the case due to the Murdaugh family’s long ties with the local solicitor: Three generations of Murdaughs served as the 14th Circuit Solicitor over about 87 years.

    Murdaugh’s statements during the August 2021 interview were voluntary, Owen testified Wednesday. Murdaugh wanted to ask SLED agents questions about the investigation, Owen said, and the agent told him he wanted to ask Murdaugh some questions, too. Murdaugh indicated he was comfortable answering the agents’ questions.

    Murdaugh claimed to law enforcement he last saw Maggie and Paul earlier in the evening of the murders. They ate dinner together before Murdaugh took a nap and then drove to Almeda to visit his mother. He discovered the bodies of his wife and son, he said, when he returned home and called 911 at 10:07 p.m.

    The footage played in court Wednesday showed SLED agents confronting Murdaugh about evidence that appeared to contradict his earlier statements to law enforcement.

    It was the first time, Owen testified, that Murdaugh was confronted with the fact that Paul’s friend, Rogan Gibson, said he heard Murdaugh’s voice in the background of a phone call he had with Paul that night, shortly before the murders took place.

    “You were heard in the background, and that was prior to 9 p.m. … Was it you?” Owen asked Murdaugh, per the footage shown in court Tuesday.

    “At nine o’clock? No, sir,” Murdaugh said, “not if my times are right.”

    “Who do you think it could have been?”

    “I have no idea.”

    “And Rogan’s been around your family for pretty much all his life,” Owen said, something Murdaugh agreed with. “And he recognizes your voice, and you have a distinct voice. Can you think of anybody else that has a voice similar to yours that he may have misinterpreted?”

    “No, sir.”

    Months later, investigators discovered a video on Paul’s phone that he filmed immediately after that call, at 8:44 p.m. in the area of the family’s dog kennels, near where the bodies were found. Multiple witnesses at trial have identified Murdaugh’s voice, along with Maggie’s and Paul’s, in that video, contradicting Murdaugh’s statements to investigators he had not gone to the kennels before finding the bodies.

    The footage played Wednesday also showed the agents confront Murdaugh about another piece of footage filmed by Paul the night of the killings: A Snapchat video showing Murdaugh looking at a sapling on the family’s property. In it, Murdaugh is seen wearing pants and a blue shirt. But later, he was wearing shorts and a white T-shirt.

    “There’s a video on Paul’s phone of you and him on the farm that night. You’re wearing khaki pants and a dress shirt … When I met you that night, you were in shorts and a T-shirt,” Owen said. “At what point in the evening did you change clothes?”

    “I’m not sure,” Murdaugh said. “What time of day was that? I would have thought I would have already changed.”

    Testimony in recent days similarly undermined statements Murdaugh made to SLED during the August 2021 interview – namely, that Maggie decided to go to Moselle the night of the killings because she was worried about him and his father, whose health was deteriorating.

    Two witnesses disagree: On Tuesday, Maggie’s sister testified it was Murdaugh who wanted Maggie to come to Moselle. Maggie was staying in the family’s Edisto Beach property and did not want to go to Islandton, Marian Proctor said, recalling a conversation they had the day of the murders.

    Proctor encouraged Maggie to go, she said, breaking down in court.

    Blanca Simpson, a family housekeeper, similarly testified last week that Maggie told her the day of the murders that Alex had asked both Maggie and Paul to come to Moselle that night.

    During cross-examination, defense attorney Jim Griffin noted that investigators had the Snapchat video in July, but did not ask Murdaugh about the whereabouts of the blue shirt and pants he was seen wearing in that footage. Owen testified that he never asked Murdaugh for those clothes.

    “And the reason you didn’t, (was because) you weren’t concerned about those clothes. Your investigation had been focused since early June on the T-shirt he was wearing, the shorts he was wearing and shoes he was wearing at the time he called 911,” Griffin said.

    “Yes,” Owen replied.

    Owen testified that he had told a county grand jury that an expert found multiple particles of blood spatter on the front of the T-shirt, and it was sent to a lab for testing. The test, however, found no blood on the shirt.

    “Y’all completely overlooked the fact that when you did a HemaTrace test to confirm whether there’s blood, it came up negative. Wasn’t that overlooked?” asked Griffin.

    “I had never seen that report,” responded Owen, who admitted he did not see it until November 2022, just months before the trial began.

    “Whoever killed Maggie and Paul would likely have biological material on them from the blasts that killed the two victims, right?,” Griffin asked Owen.

    “They would have some, yes,” Owen answered.

    Griffin established that Murdaugh’s mother’s property in Almeda was not searched until months after the killings, in September 2021. No weapons were found on that property, Owen testified.

    Owen also testified that nearby waterways and the route from Moselle to Almeda was “driven several times,” but not walked over.

    At one point Wednesday, Judge Clifton Newman ruled against allowing testimony about a roadside shooting that injured Murdaugh in September 2021. Authorities have alleged that Murdaugh arranged for another man, Curtis Edward Smith, to shoot him so his surviving son could obtain millions of dollars in life insurance.

    But the judge later Wednesday decided to allow that testimony after Smith was brought up during Owen’s cross-examination.

    Griffin seemed to suggest the killings could have been related to a money dispute with a drug gang, telling the court that Murdaugh was buying $50,000 worth of drugs each week from Smith. Owen agreed, testifying that he has been told the same.

    Griffin said Smith owed a lot of money to a drug gang, and Owen testified that he was told the gang was not worried about the money because it knew it was going to get paid.

    Owen testified that Smith was brought into the investigation on September 4, 2021, the day of the roadside incident. Before that, Murdaugh had never mentioned his involvement with Smith in relation to Maggie’s and Paul’s killings, according to Owen.

    “Prior to that day, had Alex Murdaugh ever mentioned to you Curtis Edward Smith or anyone else that might have been involved in his son’s or his wife’s murder?” prosecutor John Meadors asked.

    “No, sir,” responded Owen.

    Asked if a cell phone analysis had been performed to see if any of the drug gang members were in the area the night of the killings, Owen said drug gang members typically use burner phones, and he didn’t have their phone numbers. But state investigators performed an analysis around Moselle and had identified only first responders as coming to the scene, Owen said.

    The defense attorney also asked Owen if any DNA analysis had been done to match a small amount of unknown male DNA found under Maggie Murdaugh’s fingernail. Owen said no.

    The drug investigation is ongoing, Owen testified.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Pence says he’s willing to take fight against DOJ subpoena in Trump probe to Supreme Court | CNN Politics

    Pence says he’s willing to take fight against DOJ subpoena in Trump probe to Supreme Court | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Former Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday that he is willing to take his fight against a subpoena for his testimony in the Justice Department’s 2020 election subversion investigation all the way to the Supreme Court.

    “I am going to fight the Biden DOJ subpoena for me to appear before the grand jury because I believe it’s unconstitutional and unprecedented,” Pence told reporters after making a speech in Iowa.

    He said he expects former President Donald Trump to bring his own challenge to the subpoena that will raise executive privilege claims. Pence, however, intends to fight the subpoena under the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause, which shields legislators from certain law enforcement actions targeting conduct related to their legislative duties.

    While other witnesses have raised Speech or Debate Clause argument in efforts to resist subpoenas in the DOJ probe and in the other investigations into January 6, 2021, Pence plans to invoke the clause in relation to his role as president of the Senate – which is believed to be untrod legal ground.

    In that role, he presided over Congress’ certification of the 2020 election results on January 6, 2021.

    “On the day of January 6, I was acting as President of the Senate, presiding over a Joint Session, described in the Constitution itself,” Pence said. “And so, I believe that that Speech and Debate Clause of the Constitution actually prohibits the executive branch from compelling me to appear in a court, as the Constitution says, or in any other place. And we’ll stand on that principle and we’ll take that case as far as it needs to go, if need be to the Supreme Court of the United States, because to me, it’s – it’s an issue of the separation of powers.”

    He said that over the last “several months,” his team had made it clear to the Justice Department that he believed the Speech or Debate Clause precluded a subpoena for his testimony.

    CNN previously reported on Pence’s plans to raise claims under the Speech or Debate Clause.

    Pence also noted that he has written and spoken publicly about the events leading up to the January 6 certification vote. But, he said, “if we were to accede to accept a subpoena for appearance before a grand jury or a trial, I believe that would diminish the privileges enjoyed by any future vice president, either Democrat or Republican. I simply will not do that.”

    Pence first spoke publicly about his plans to fight the subpoena at an event in Minneapolis earlier Wednesday, saying that his fight was about ” separation of powers” and “defending the prerogatives that I had as president of the Senate.”

    “My fight is on the separation of powers. My fight against the DOJ subpoena very simply is on defending the prerogatives that I had as president of the Senate to preside over the Joint Session of Congress on January 6,” Pence told reporters in Minneapolis.

    “For me this is a moment where you have to decide where you stand and I stand on the Constitution of the United States,” he added.

    Pence is one of several former members of Trump’s inner circle whose testimony federal investigators have sought, as they scrutinize the events leading up to and during the January 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol. That probe, as well as the federal investigation into Trump’s handling of documents from his White House that were found at Mar-a-Lago, have taken a more aggressive tack since special counsel Jack Smith took over both investigations.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Family of unarmed Black man sues the Louisiana officer who killed him while waiting for release of body-camera video | CNN

    Family of unarmed Black man sues the Louisiana officer who killed him while waiting for release of body-camera video | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The family of an unarmed Black man who was shot and killed by a Shreveport, Louisiana, police officer has filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit against the officer.

    The lawsuit filed Saturday in the Western District of Louisiana alleges the officer violated Alonzo Bagley’s Fourth Amendment rights.

    Bagley, 43, was shot and killed earlier this month after police responded to a domestic disturbance call at an apartment complex, Louisiana State Police said in a statement. When two officers arrived around 10:50 p.m. on February 3, Bagley jumped down from an apartment balcony and fled, said the statement from state police, which is the agency investigating the shooting.

    After a short foot pursuit, an officer “located Mr. Bagley as he rounded a building corner and fired one shot from his service weapon, which struck Mr. Bagley in the chest,” state police said. Bagley later was pronounced dead at a hospital.

    Detectives did not find any weapons on or near Bagley when they processed the scene, Louisiana State Police Superintendent Col. Lamar Davis said.

    The “use of lethal force against an unarmed man who posed no threat is objectively unreasonable, excessive and wholly without justification,” the lawsuit alleges.

    The family is seeking more than $10 million in damages, according to the lawsuit.

    The officer who shot Bagley was identified by state police as Alexander Tyler.

    Tyler is currently on paid administrative leave pending results of the state police investigation, the Shreveport Police Department told CNN. The officer has been with the department since May 2021, Chief Wayne Smith said.

    The investigation into Bagley’s shooting death comes as police use of force against people of color, particularly Black Americans, is under intense scrutiny nationwide, including the brutal beating death of Tyre Nichols by Memphis officers conducting what police said was a traffic stop.

    In Louisiana, four state troopers and another law enforcement officer were indicted on charges last year stemming from the in-custody killing of 49-year-old Ronald Greene, a Black man violently beaten by officers during an arrest.

    “I am asking for the community to remain patient as we continue to conduct a very thorough investigation,” Davis said following Bagley’s death. “Transparency in the investigation is a priority for our agency.”

    Investigators are reviewing body-worn and dashboard camera videos and hope to release them to the public, Davis has said.

    “The family hopes to view the video before (Bagley’s) funeral,” Ronald Haley, the family’s attorney, told CNN, noting the funeral is scheduled for Saturday.

    State police declined Tuesday to say when the video would be released.

    “Further information will be released in coordination with the District Attorney’s Office. We do not have a timeline at this time,” Nick Manale, a spokesperson for state police, told CNN via email.

    The Caddo Parish District Attorney’s Office told CNN it has not received any investigative materials from investigators.

    “Louisiana State police has the case under investigation,” Laura Fulco, the first assistant district attorney for Caddo Parish, said. “It is still under investigation.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Pence to fight subpoena on separation of powers grounds because he was president of Senate | CNN Politics

    Pence to fight subpoena on separation of powers grounds because he was president of Senate | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Former Vice President Mike Pence is expected to fight a recent subpoena from the special counsel based on the grounds that he was president of the Senate at the time and therefore shielded from the order, sources familiar with the matter tell CNN.

    Pence is expected to address the subpoena and his response to it during a trip to Iowa on Wednesday, according to a source familiar with his plans.

    Pence has been subpoenaed by the special counsel investigating former President Donald Trump and his role in January 6, 2021, a source familiar with the matter told CNN. Special counsel Jack Smith’s office is seeking documents and testimony, the source said. Investigators want the former vice president to testify about his interactions with Trump leading up to the 2020 election and the day of the attack on the US Capitol.

    The subpoena marks an important milestone in the Justice Department’s two-year criminal investigation, now led by the special counsel, into the efforts by Trump and allies to impede the transfer of power after he lost the 2020 election. Pence is an important witness who has detailed in a memoir some of his interactions with Trump in the weeks after the election, a move that likely opens the door for the Justice Department to override at least some of Trump’s claims of executive privilege.

    This story has been updated with additional details.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • 6 North Carolina officers are on administrative leave after man dies in police custody | CNN

    6 North Carolina officers are on administrative leave after man dies in police custody | CNN

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Six Raleigh, North Carolina, police officers are on administrative leave and an investigation is underway after a man died in their custody last month, according to statements and newly released videos from the Raleigh Police Department.

    Darryl Tyree Williams, 32, died in a Raleigh hospital in the early hours of January 17 after a scuffle with police during which he was tased multiple times by police officers and arrested.

    The North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation is conducting an independent criminal investigation and will present its findings to the Wake County District Attorney, Raleigh Police Chief Estella Patterson said in a memo to City Manager Marchell Adams-David several days after Williams’ death.

    A Wake County judge authorized Friday’s release of footage from the officers’ body cameras, as well as area surveillance footage and patrol vehicle dash camera videos connected to the incident.

    According to the memo and body camera footage, officers were conducting “proactive patrols” of businesses in an area that police said has a history of criminal violations, at roughly 1:55 a.m.

    In the video, officers J.T. Thomas and C.D. Robinson are seen pulling into the parking lot before approaching a vehicle and speaking to its occupants.

    Robinson then walks across the parking lot to another vehicle occupied by two people, including Williams, who was in the driver’s seat.

    The officer then opens the passenger door and questions what the occupants are doing before asking Williams and the passenger to exit the vehicle. According to the memo, Robinson allegedly saw an open container of alcohol and marijuana in the car.

    In the video, Williams and the unidentified passenger can be heard repeatedly asking Robinson why they were being removed from the car.

    “What’s going on?” Williams asked several times as Robinson positioned him against his car to conduct a full body search.

    “Keep both of your hands on the car. If you can’t listen to my instructions, I’m going to put you in handcuffs,” Robinson says in the video. “I’m not trying to put you in handcuffs.”

    By that point – about a minute into the encounter – Robinson had not told Williams why he was being searched.

    Moments later, Robinson is seen pulling a folded dollar bill out of Williams’ side pocket, and indicates in the video he has detected a white powdery substance folded into the bill.

    According to the memo, Robinson decided to arrest Williams for possession of a controlled substance, based upon his findings at the scene.

    Williams is heard asking “why” and “what’s going on” as Robinson attempts to place him in handcuffs. Another officer attempts to help Robinson and Thomas detain Williams, as they yell at him to “get on the ground” while another officer calls for back-up.

    Robinson then deployed his taser, which contacted Williams as he attempted to flee, while the other officers continue to yell at him to put his hands behind his back.

    Another taser was deployed but did not make contact, according to police.

    After a physical scuffle, Williams tried to escape the officers again but lost his balance and fell while attempting to run across the parking lot.

    A taser was deployed again at this point, which police said also did not contact Williams.

    An officer is heard yelling at Williams to “get on the f***king ground” while officers appeared to put their body weight on top of him to prevent the man from getting up.

    Robinson and Thomas deployed two separate tasers in “drive stun mode” which both contacted Williams in about a 50-second time span, police said.

    According to the memo, the taser deployed by Thomas contacted Williams’ side while Robinson’s taser contacted the left side of Williams’ back.

    Williams appeared to be audibly and visibly in distress as the officers continued yelling at him to stay on the ground with his hands behind his back, the video shows.

    “Put your hands behind your back or you’re gonna get tased,” one of the officers said.

    At this point, Williams is heard saying he has “heart problems” as he begged for officers to stop.

    An officer then counted down from three before deploying his taser again.

    Williams is then heard screaming and seen wriggling underneath the officers who were still yelling at him to put his hands behind his back.

    At that point, officers put Williams in handcuffs as an “unintended Taser activation” is heard but did not make contact, according to police.

    Robinson is heard telling the other officers to pat down Williams as officers attempt to reposition him into a “recovery” position.

    Another officer is heard telling Williams to “relax.”

    Police then requested EMS response at 2:02 a.m., which is in accordance with policy, the memo said.

    Moments later, an officer is heard asking if Williams is “still good” and if he’s “still breathing.”

    An officer is heard saying he doesn’t feel Williams’ pulse as other officers attempted to wake him.

    “He’s breathing,” one officer is heard saying. “He’s good.”

    Officers then removed the taser probes from Williams’ body before asking again if he was breathing.

    Officers did not detect a pulse and began performing CPR on Williams.

    They then made another call to dispatch requesting expedited EMS response at 2:06 a.m.

    Raleigh Fire Department responders then arrived on scene and took over performing CPR, according to the video.

    The video footage ends before the ambulance arrived on scene.

    It’s unclear if police were able to locate the passenger of the vehicle, who appeared to flee the scene.

    “Mr. Williams was transported by EMS to a local hospital where he was later pronounced deceased at 3:01 a.m. The cause of Mr. Williams’ death, including toxicology results, will be part of the ongoing investigations,” according to the memo.

    Police recovered two firearms, marijuana and suspected controlled substances from Williams’ vehicle, the memo reads.

    Officers Robinson, Thomas, D.L. Aquino, J.R. Scott, D.L. Grande and B.L. Ramge have been placed on administrative leave, according to the memo.

    In a statement to CNN, Dawn Blagrove, the executive director of Emancipate NC, a legal advocacy group representing Williams’ family, said the family “demands undelayed justice.”

    “That’s what his mother wants the world to know. Justice, not just for Darryl Tyree Williams but, for all the victims of state sanctioned violence across the nation,” Blagrove said.

    “Now is the time for the city of Raleigh and all of America to reckon with the trauma and harm that policing causes to Black, Brown and marginalized communities,” Blagrove told CNN.

    CNN has reached out to the Raleigh Police Department, the North Carolina Bureau of Investigation, and the Wake County Medical Examiner’s Office on Saturday.

    The Raleigh Police Protective Association, which represents two of the officers involved in the incident, told CNN in a statement its “prayers and thoughts are with the Williams family,” and that it has reviewed the video of the “tragic incident.”

    “At this point we could not determine any criminal actions or policy violations of the officers involved. We respect the process and recognize this incident is currently under investigation by the SBI,” RPPA Vice President Rick Armstrong said in the Saturday statement.

    [ad_2]

    Source link