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Tag: Juries

  • Donald Trump wants his election subversion trial moved out of Washington. That won’t be easy

    Donald Trump wants his election subversion trial moved out of Washington. That won’t be easy

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    WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON (AP) — Donald Trump and his legal team face long odds in their bid to move his 2020 election conspiracy trial out of Washington, arguing the Republican can’t possibly get a fair trial in the overwhelmingly Democratic nation’s capital.

    Criminal defendants routinely try to have their cases moved to increase their chances of getting a favorable jury. Trump and his attorney say they’re eying West Virginia, which Trump easily won in 2020.

    But there’s a notoriously high bar for proving the jury pool is so biased or tainted by pretrial publicity that the trial must be moved. Such efforts have failed in some of the most high-profile American trials in recent memory. And judges appointed by presidents of both political parties in Washington’s federal court — including the judge overseeing Trump’s trial — have repeatedly rejected similar attempts by many of the more than 1,000 Trump supporters charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.

    “Jurors’ political leanings are not, by themselves, evidence that those jurors cannot fairly and impartially consider the evidence presented and apply the law as instructed by the court,” U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, the judge appointed to Trump’s case, wrote last year in denying one Jan. 6 defendant’s bid to change venue.

    Trump’s defense team has yet to formally make such a request in the case accusing Trump of conspiring with allies to overturn his 2020 presidential election defeat. But Trump’s lawyer, John Lauro, said on CBS News on Sunday that it “absolutely” plans to do so.

    “The president, like everyone sitting in this room, is entitled to a fair trial, and we’re going to get that,” Lauro said.

    Trump faces charges including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and obstruction of Congress in the first case that seeks to hold the former president criminally responsible for his efforts to cling to power after he lost to Democrat Joe Biden. He has denied any wrongdoing, and he claims that special counsel Jack Smith is targeting him in an effort to hurt his 2024 campaign.

    If Trump’s case stays in Washington, his trial will take place less than a mile (1.6 kilometers) from where the Capitol was attacked on Jan. 6 by an angry mob whipped up by his election lies and intent on stopping the certification of Biden’s electoral victory. The courthouse, which has a view of the Capitol dome from its windows, has already been the site of several high-profile Jan. 6 trials, including the seditious conspiracy cases against leaders of the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers extremist groups.

    Even in some of the most intensely publicized and politically charged cases in U.S. history, judges have ruled that fair and impartial jurors can be found — with proper questioning — in the communities where the alleged crimes occurred.

    Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was tried about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from where he and his brother placed bombs near the finish line. Zacharias Moussaoui, the only man convicted in a U.S. court for a role in the Sept. 11 attacks, was tried in Virginia, not far from the Pentagon. Those charged in the Watergate scandal were tried in Washington.

    One of the rare federal defendants who had a trial relocated was Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh. The trial was moved to Colorado after the judge ruled it was impossible for McVeigh to get a fair trial anywhere in Oklahoma. He was ultimately put to death in 2001 for the bombing, which killed 168 people and injured hundreds more.

    Changes of venue can make sense in cases that are particularly notorious in a community, but Trump’s fame or infamy is hardly limited to the District of Columbia, said Vida Johnson, a Georgetown University law professor who previously worked as a public defender in D.C. Superior Court.

    “There’s just no real basis for it,” she said of Trump’s suggestions to move the trial. “You’re looking for an unbiased jury, but he’s just as well known in any place.”

    A slew of Jan. 6 rioters who have unsuccessfully tried to get their cases relocated have claimed they can’t get a fair trial in a district where 92% of voters cast ballots for Biden in 2020. In trying to make the case his trial should be moved to Virginia, a lawyer for an Oath Keepers associate claimed that D.C. residents “have shown that their powers of intelligent, rational thinking are suspended when Trump is involved.”

    Chutkan — an appointee of President Barack Obama who has a reputation for being one of the toughest punishers of Jan. 6 defendants — last year rejected claims by Capitol riot defendant Russell Dean Alford that an impartial jury can’t be empaneled in Washington. Careful questioning of prospective jurors can root out any biases, Chutkan said, citing a 1976 ruling that found no basis for moving a Watergate-related case out of Washington.

    Even so, Chutkan agreed to send a written questionnaire to prospective jurors before Alford’s trial to “screen for prejudice.” On the first day of his trial, Alford’s lawyers again pressed to move the proceedings elsewhere, citing the jury pool’s answers to the questionnaire. But Chutkan said there’s no evidence “people wouldn’t have equally strong views” in another district.

    “What we’re looking for is not people without opinions,” she said. “What we’re looking for is people who are able to put aside their opinion and focus their decision solely on the evidence presented in this courtroom.”

    In the Justice Department’s massive prosecution of the Jan. 6 attack, only two defendants so far have been fully acquitted of all charges. And those were bench trials decided by judges, not juries.

    But prosecutors don’t have an unblemished trial record. Juries or judges have acquitted at least 39 riot defendants of one or more charges, according to an Associated Press review of court records. In one of the most high-profile Jan. 6 trials yet — against Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and associates — only two of five defendants were convicted of seditious conspiracy, even though all were found guilty of serious charges.

    Johnson, who tried dozens of cases in front of D.C. juries, said the high number of well-educated jurors with college degrees and advanced degrees in Washington can actually help defendants.

    “I think you’re more likely to find jurors that actually really understand the legal concepts that would benefit a defendant in a criminal trial, like the burden of proof, the concept of reasonable doubt,” she said. “So I actually think that, in some ways, this is a better place for a defendant to get a fair trial.”

    ___

    Richer reported from Boston.

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  • Trump lawyers urge judge to narrow proposed rules on evidence sharing in election subversion case

    Trump lawyers urge judge to narrow proposed rules on evidence sharing in election subversion case

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    Donald Trump’s legal team told a judge overseeing the election conspiracy case against him on Monday that prosecutors’ proposed protective order aimed at preventing the public disclosure of evidence is too broad and would restrict his First Amendment rights.

    Lawyers for the early 2024 Republican presidential primary front-runner said the judge should impose a more limited order that would bar the public release only of materials deemed “sensitive” — such as grand jury documents — rather than all evidence handed over by the government in the case accusing Trump of conspiring to overturn his 2020 election loss.

    Prosecutors have said a protective order — not unusual in criminal cases — is particularly important in Trump’s case because of his penchant for using social media. They have expressed concern that Trump could improperly share sensitive case information online that could have a “harmful chilling effect on witnesses.”

    In their filing Friday seeking the order, prosecutors included a screenshot of a post from Trump’s Truth Social platform that same day in which he wrote, in all capital letters, “If you go after me, I’m coming after you!”

    Trump’s lawyers said that citing that post to claim there’s a danger Trump might publish grand jury information was “a provocative claim when searching for headlines, perhaps, but one that falters under minimal scrutiny.”

    The former president’s legal team said his post was “generalized political speech” and had nothing to do with the case. A Trump spokesperson said last week that the post was in response to “dishonest special interest groups and Super PACs.”

    Trump’s lawyers, who have characterized the case brought by special counsel Jack Smith as an attack on his right to free speech, told the judge that the need to protect sensitive information about the case “does not require a blanket gag order over all documents produced by the government.”

    “In a trial about First Amendment rights, the government seeks to restrict First Amendment rights,” Trump’s lawyers wrote. “Worse, it does so against its administration’s primary political opponent, during an election season in which the administration, prominent party members and media allies have campaigned on the indictment and proliferated its false allegations.”

    Trump’s lawyers accused President Joe Biden of trying to capitalize on the indictment in posting what they called a “thinly veiled reference” to Trump’s prosecution just hours before Trump’s court appearance last week. They included a screenshot in their court filing of a tweet from from Biden’s campaign account, which included a video of the president drinking from a mug emblazoned with “Dark Brandon” — a meme featuring Biden with lasers for eyes — and the caption: “A cup of Joe never tasted better.”

    The defense filing was in response to the request Friday from Smith’s team for the protective order, which would impose rules on what Trump and his defense team can do with evidence shared with them by the government as they prepare for trial in the case unsealed last week.

    Trump’s lawyers on Saturday had asked for an extra three days to respond to prosecutors’ request for the protective order, saying they needed more time for discussion. But Judge Tanya Chutkan, who was nominated to the bench by former President Barack Obama, swiftly denied that request.

    Prosecutors said that they are ready to hand over a substantial amount of evidence to Trump’s legal team and that much of it includes sensitive and confidential information.

    The prosecutors’ proposed order seeks to prevent Trump and his lawyers from disclosing materials provided by the government to anyone other than people on his legal team, possible witnesses, the witnesses’ lawyers or others approved by the court. It would put stricter limits on “sensitive materials,” which prosecutors said would include grand jury witness testimony and materials obtained through sealed search warrants.

    Trump has denied any wrongdoing in the case, as well as another prosecution brought by Smith that accuses him of illegally hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida.

    He has has characterized all the cases against him as an effort to take down his 2024 campaign. His legal team has indicated that it will argue that he had relied on the advice of attorneys around him in 2020 and that Trump had a right to challenge an election that he believed had been stolen.

    Trump pleaded not guilty last week to four felony counts, including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and conspiracy to obstruct Congress’ certification of Biden’s electoral victory. The charges could lead to a lengthy prison sentence in the event of a conviction, with the most serious counts calling for up to 20 years.

    It’s the third criminal case brought this year against the the early front-runner in the 2024 Republican presidential primary. But it’s the first case to try to hold him responsible for his efforts to remain in power during the chaotic weeks between his election loss and the attack by his supporters on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

    Smith also charged Trump in June with dozens of felony counts alleging the former president illegally kept classified records after he left the White House and obstructed government efforts to get them back. A new indictment recently unsealed in that case accuses Trump of scheming with Mar-a-Lago staffers to try to delete security footage sought by investigators.

    Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart in that case imposed a similar protective order in June that prohibits Trump and his legal team from publicly disclosing evidence turned over to them by prosecutors without prior approval.

    ____

    Richer reported from Boston.

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  • Prosecutors may be aiming for quick Trump trial by not naming alleged conspirators, experts say

    Prosecutors may be aiming for quick Trump trial by not naming alleged conspirators, experts say

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    WASHINGTON — By not naming or charging six alleged co-conspirators in the indictment this week of former President Donald Trump, federal prosecutors may be signaling their desire to expeditiously put the Republican presidential front-runner on trial for seeking to overturn the 2020 election.

    More defendants mean more defense lawyers, and more legal motions and more delays, according to legal scholars and former prosecutors. Such a large cast of defendants would make it extremely difficult for Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith to get Trump in front of a jury before the final stretch in the 2024 campaign, the experts said.

    “This keeps it pretty streamlined,” said Christopher Ott, a former federal prosecutor. “All of those motions by defendants affect all of the defendants, including Trump. It would slow things down. If you don’t name and charge them, you don’t have that trouble.”

    Trump, 77, was indicted by a federal grand jury in Washington on Tuesday on felony charges of seeking to illegally overturn the results of the 2020 election and block the peaceful transfer of power to President Joe Biden.

    The four-count indictment chronicles a months-long campaign by Trump and six unnamed co-conspirators to spread lies about the election results — falsehoods that resulted in a violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

    It includes charges of conspiring to defraud the U.S., conspiring to obstruct an official proceeding and obstructing an official proceeding. It also alleges Trump violated an 1800s law that makes it a crime to conspire to violate rights guaranteed by the Constitution — in this case, the right to vote.

    It is the third time this year that Trump has been charged with a criminal offense. He was indicted by a federal grand jury in Miami on charges of illegally retaining top secret documents. In New York, Trump faces criminal charges in a hush money case and a civil trial over his business practices.

    He could face further charges in Georgia, where a county district attorney is investigating efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn his 2020 election loss in the state.

    The indictment Tuesday alleges that Trump was aided in his efforts to overturn the election by six unnamed co-conspirators. The Associated Press has identified five of them through court and Congressional records and other means:

    — “Co-Conspirator 1” and “Co-Conspirator 2” are lawyers Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman. Giuliani, one of Trump’s attorneys, is described in the indictment as “an attorney who was willing to spread knowingly false claims” about the election. Eastman “advised and attempted to implement a strategy,” the indictment said, that would have seen former Vice President Mike Pence reject the certification of the electoral vote.

    — “Co-Conspirator 3,” attorney Sidney Powell, pushed election conspiracies that even Trump privately conceded sounded “crazy,” the indictment alleged.

    — “Co-Conspirator 4” is Jeffrey Clark, a Justice Department official who championed Trump’s false claims of election fraud.

    — “Co-Conspirator 5” is lawyer Kenneth Chesebro, whom the indictment alleges “assisted in devising and attempting to implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding.”

    — “Co-Conspirator 6” is an unknown political consultant who also assisted with the fake electors plan.

    In deciding not to charge those six individuals, legal scholars said, Smith and his prosecutors were not just thinking about how to move quickly before the 2024 election. They may also be feeling pressure to win a conviction before Trump or another Republican might capture the presidency and order a stop to the prosecution.

    Smith may have been trying to find ways to simplify the unprecedented trial of a former president accused in the indictment of assaulting the “bedrock function of the United States federal government: the nation’s process of collecting, counting, and certifying the results of the presidential election.”

    “Four counts, one defendant, that’s it,” said Jimmy Gurulé, a law professor at Notre Dame.

    Not indicting the alleged conspirators doesn’t mean they won’t face charges. Legal scholars, in fact, said they believed the alleged conspirators stand a strong chance of being indicted and going on trial, perhaps after Trump faces a jury.

    “It doesn’t mean they are off the hook,” said Randall Eliason, a former federal prosecutor who is a George Washington University law professor. “It’s just a question of timing and tactics. … The prosecution is very clearly saying, ‘I’ve got you in my sights.’”

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  • Jury reaches decision on death penalty or life in prison for Pittsburgh synagogue gunman

    Jury reaches decision on death penalty or life in prison for Pittsburgh synagogue gunman

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    A jury has reached a decision on whether the man who killed 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue should be sentenced to death or life in prison without parole

    ByPETER SMITH Associated Press

    U.S. Attorney Eric Olshan argues before a federal jury that 2018 Pittsburgh synagogue attack defendant Robert Bowers should receive the death penalty, Monday July 31, 2023. Bowers, wearing green, was previously found guilty of killing 11 people in the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. (Dave Klug via AP)

    The Associated Press

    PITTSBURGH — A jury has reached a decision on whether the man who killed 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue should be sentenced to death or life in prison without parole.

    Robert Bowers perpetrated the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history when he stormed the Tree of Life synagogue in 2018 and opened fire, killing members of three congregations who had gathered for Sabbath worship and study.

    The same federal jury that convicted Bowers in June on 63 criminal counts said Wednesday that it has reached a decision on the sentence. The decision will be announced shortly. The jury must be unanimous in order to impose a death sentence. Otherwise, Bowers will be sentenced to life without parole.

    In closing arguments Monday, prosecutors said the 50-year-old truck driver was clearly motivated by religious hatred, reminding jurors that Bowers had spread antisemitic content online before the attack and has since expressed pride in the killings. They urged jurors to impose a death sentence.

    Bowers’ lawyers asked jurors to spare his life, asserting that he acted out of a delusional belief that Jewish people were helping to bring about a genocide of white people. They said he has severe mental illness and endured a difficult childhood.

    Bowers, who was armed with an AR-15 rifle and other weapons, also shot and wounded seven people, including five responding police officers.

    The jury began deliberating around 9:30 a.m. Tuesday.

    ___

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Jury begins weighing death penalty or life in prison for Pittsburgh synagogue shooter

    Jury begins weighing death penalty or life in prison for Pittsburgh synagogue shooter

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    A jury is deliberating whether the man who killed 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue should receive the death penalty or life in prison without parole

    U.S. Attorney Eric Olshan argues before a federal jury that 2018 Pittsburgh synagogue attack defendant Robert Bowers should receive the death penalty, Monday July 31, 2023. Bowers, wearing green, was previously found guilty of killing 11 people in the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. (Dave Klug via AP)

    The Associated Press

    PITTSBURGH — A jury is deliberating whether the man who killed 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue should receive the death penalty or life in prison without parole.

    Robert Bowers perpetrated the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history when he stormed the Tree of Life synagogue in 2018 and opened fire, killing members of three congregations who had gathered for Sabbath worship and study.

    The same jury that convicted Bowers in June on 63 criminal counts began deliberating his sentence around 9:30 a.m. Tuesday morning, and returned to the courtroom soon after to look at guns that were used in the attack.

    In closing arguments Monday, prosecutors said the 50-year-old truck driver was clearly motivated by religious hatred, reminding jurors that Bowers had spread antisemitic content online before the attack and has since expressed pride in the killings. They urged jurors to impose a death sentence.

    Bowers’ lawyers asked jurors to spare his life, asserting that he acted out of a delusional belief that Jewish people were helping to bring about a genocide of white people. They said he has severe mental illness and endured a difficult childhood.

    Bowers, who was armed with an AR-15 rifle and other weapons, also shot and wounded seven, including five responding police officers.

    U.S. District Judge Robert Colville thanked the jurors for their service before sending them out to deliberate.

    A short time later, as jurors huddled around the courtroom display of weapons, they asked questions of the U.S. marshal who was standing there. Bowers’ attorneys objected, and the judge instructed the jury to refrain from speaking with him and to disregard everything he told them about the weapons. Colville rejected a defense request for a mistrial.

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  • Mar-a-Lago property manager is the latest in line of Trump staffers ensnared in legal turmoil

    Mar-a-Lago property manager is the latest in line of Trump staffers ensnared in legal turmoil

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    NEW YORK — A longtime Mar-a-Lago staffer who spent years fetching luxury cars for wealthy club members is the latest person to be ensnared in former President Donald Trump ‘s ballooning legal troubles.

    Carlos De Oliveira appeared in court Monday to face charges connected to what prosecutors allege was a scheme directed by the former president and current GOP frontrunner to try to erase security footage after it was subpoenaed by a grand jury. De Oliveira is also charged with lying to investigators, according to a new indictment unveiled last week.

    De Oliveira is now the second little-known Trump employee charged in connection to his alleged hoarding of classified documents at his Palm Beach, Florida, club. His case highlights the collateral damage of Trump’s mounting legal woes, as he leaves a trail of co-conspirators and allies accused of lying or committing other crimes on his behalf. Some of those finding themselves under legal scrutiny depend on Trump for their livelihood — and now to pay their mounting legal bills.

    Trump has adamantly denied any wrongdoing and accused President Joe Biden’s Justice Department of targeting him to damage his campaign.

    “They’re trying to intimidate people so that people go out and make up lies about me. Because I did nothing wrong,” he told conservative radio host John Fredericks last week. “But these are two wonderful employees. They’ve been with me for a long time and they’re great people. And they want to destroy their lives.”

    The White House has repeatedly denied any suggestion that Biden has sought to influence investigations related to Trump.

    De Oliveira’s appearance Monday marked not only the public’s first glimpse of Trump’s co-defendant, but an introduction for many who frequent the club. Unlike Nauta, who is a constant presence by Trump’s side, even current and former Trump staffers and allies said after the indictment was unsealed they were unfamiliar with De Oliveira and didn’t recognize his name. Several asked whether a reporter might have a photograph to help jog their memories.

    Mar-a-Lago is staffed by more than 150 workers, from full-time staff to seasonal employees, and many were among those called to appear before the grand jury, according to people familiar with the appearances, who, like others, spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the case. They are just some of the dozens of staff, aides, public officials and attorneys who have been caught up in overlapping investigations into the documents as well as Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

    De Oliveira, according to the indictment and public records, has worked at Mar-a-Lago for more than 20 years, beginning as a valet who earned just $12,000 in 2010. He was promoted to the club’s property manager in January 2022.

    One club member who requested anonymity to talk about staff described De Oliveira as a friendly face who ran the valet parking operation. The club member said it was hard to imagine Trump having any kind of lengthy conversations with someone in his position, as the indictment alleges. Others, however, noted Trump has a tendency to talk to everyone, including staff, and pays very close attention to his properties, pointing out issues like chipped paint, and directing maintenance workers to quickly attend to them.

    Trump also has a longtime pattern of elevating low-level staffers, building intense loyalty in the process. They pointed to people like Dan Scavino, a former golf caddy who became one of Trump’s most trusted aides, serving as a White House deputy chief of staff for communications and one of the few people entrusted to issue tweets under his name.

    While those who have been elevated by Trump are among his most loyal defenders, others who have turned against the former president described a pattern of young staffers and low-level employees becoming enthralled with Trump and the trappings of power — first at the White House, with its rides aboard Air Force One, and now at Mar-a-Lago where dues-paying members burst into applause every time he enters a room. Trump, they say, has a knack for making people feel like they are special, and, from some, earns blind loyalty in return.

    Stephanie Grisham, a onetime press secretary and aide to the former first lady, who is now a vocal Trump critic, said she was initially enamored by it all.

    “I used to be in awe of that very thing,” she said. “He makes you feel important.”

    De Oliveira and his attorney, John Irving, didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment and nobody answered the door at the home he rents in a working-class suburban community close to the highway between Jupiter and West Palm Beach. In 2012, records show, he filed for bankruptcy.

    “The Justice Department has unfortunately decided to bring these charges against Mr. De Oliveira,” Irving said after the court appearance Monday. “They don’t stop to put their money where their mouth is. I am looking forward to seeing what discovery is.”

    De Oliveira joins a long line of former Trump associates, employees and supporters who have faced potential jail time or served time behind bars. They include Walt Nauta, the Navy valet who fetched Trump’s Diet Cokes at the White House before joining him as a personal aide, and was charged last month alongside Trump for his role in the alleged scheme. Both he and Trump have pleaded not guilty to the charges.

    Allen Weisselberg, a Trump Organization executive, served three months in jail after pleading guilty to receiving $1.7 million in unreported job perks; and Michael Cohen, Trump’s longtime lawyer and fixer, who spent more than 13 months behind bars over payouts he helped arrange during the 2016 presidential race to keep women from going public about alleged sexual encounters with Trump. Trump has since been charged in connection to the payments.

    Others have recently been implicated. In Michigan last month, 16 Republicans who acted as fake electors to help Trump overturn the results of the 2020, were charged with felonies. And more than 1,000 people so far have been charged with federal crimes in connection with storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2001, driven by Trump’s like of a stolen election.

    The document unveiled last week alleges that, the day after the Trump organization was informed of a draft grand jury subpoena asking for security camera footage from Mar-a-Lago, Trump called De Oliveira, and they spoke for approximately 24 minutes. A day later, Nauta — who was scheduled to travel with Trump to Illinois — changed his arrangements and instead made plans to travel to Palm Beach.

    At the club, Nauta met with De Oliveira and the two “went to the security guard booth where surveillance video is displayed on monitors, walked with a flashlight through the tunnel where the Storage Room was located, and observed and pointed out surveillance cameras.”

    Two days later, De Oliveira allegedly asked “Trump Employee 4” — a man identified as information technology worker Yuscil Taveras — how long security footage was saved on the club’s server and said “the boss” wanted the server deleted. When the employee responded that he would not know how to do that and didn’t have the right to, De Oliveira allegedly “insisted to TRUMP Employee 4 that ‘the boss’ wanted the server deleted and asked, what are we going to do?’”

    It remains unclear whether the men succeeded in preventing investigators from accessing any footage. Prosecutors, in their interviews, had asked about potential gaps or missing footage but the indictments make ample reference to movement caught on tape and Trump has insisted nothing was deleted.

    Another notable scene unfolded two weeks after the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago search. The indictment alleges that Nauta called another Trump employee and said words to the effect of, “someone just wants to make sure Carlos is good.” The employee allegedly responded that De Oliveira was loyal and would not do anything to affect his relationship with the former president — and later confirmed that in a Signal chat. Later that day, Trump allegedly called De Oliveira and told the property manager that he would get him an attorney.

    Trump’s political operation has paid tens of millions of dollars on legal fees for associates, including De Oliveira, and recently created a new legal defense fund to help cover costs.

    “In order to combat these heinous actions by Joe Biden’s cronies and to protect these innocent people from financial ruin and prevent their lives from being completely destroyed, a new legal defense fund will help pay for their legal fees to ensure they have representation against unlawful harassment,” said Trump spokesman Steven Cheung.

    Grisham said the help made it harder to turn on Trump.

    “If he’s looking out into the world right now, he’s not seeing that anyone whose turned on Trump has been real successful. And he’s getting his lawyers paid for … so I think he traps you in that regard too… You’re trapped financially, you’re trapped emotionally and you dig yourself into a hole you cannot get out of, thinking: ‘What is the upside for me to tell the truth?’… At the end of the day you have to feed yourself and your family.”

    ___ Associated Press writers Adriana Gomez Licon in Miami and Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, and Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.

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  • Jury poised to deliberate death penalty or life sentence for gunman in Pittsburgh synagogue massacre

    Jury poised to deliberate death penalty or life sentence for gunman in Pittsburgh synagogue massacre

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    PITTSBURGH — A jury is set to deliberate whether to impose the death penalty or a sentence of life in prison without parole on a man who spewed antisemitic hate before fatally shooting 11 worshippers at a synagogue in the heart of Pittsburgh’s Jewish community.

    The same jurors who convicted 50-year-old Robert Bowers in June on 63 criminal counts listened to closing arguments Monday in the penalty phase of his federal trial, held nearly five years after the truck driver from suburban Baldwin perpetrated the deadliest attack on Jews in U.S. history.

    Bowers defiled a place of worship when he entered the Tree of Life synagogue on Oct. 27, 2018, and opened fire with an AR-15 rifle, shooting everyone he could find in a mass murder clearly motivated by religious hatred, said U.S. Attorney Eric Olshan.

    Bowers raved incessantly on social media about his hatred of Jewish people — using a slur for Jewish people some 400 times on a social media platform favored by the far right — and remains proud that he killed Jews, the prosecutor reminded jurors,

    “Do not be numb to it. Remember what it means. This defendant targeted people solely because of the faith that they chose,” Olshan said.

    He added: “This is a case that calls for the most severe punishment under the law: the death penalty.”

    The defense was expected to deliver its closing argument later Monday.

    Bowers’ attorneys have argued that he has schizophrenia, a serious brain disorder whose symptoms include delusions and hallucinations, and that Bowers attacked the synagogue out of a delusional belief that Jews were helping to bring about a genocide of white people by coming to the aid of refugees and immigrants. The defense has also presented evidence of Bowers’ difficult childhood.

    Olshan disputed the defense experts’ diagnosis of schizophrenia, asserting Bowers was not suffering psychosis but had chosen to believe white supremacist rhetoric. And while acknowledging there’s no question that Bowers was a depressed, neglected child, Olshan downplayed the significance of it, noting that Bowers had held jobs, paid bills, and was an otherwise functioning adult.

    “He was not a child, he was a grown man. He was responsible for his actions, not his family and things that happened decades earlier. He was, he is responsible for his actions,” Olshan said.

    In order to impose death, jurors must find that aggravating circumstances, which make the crime especially heinous, outweigh mitigating factors that could be seen as diminishing his culpability. Those aggravating circumstances could include the vulnerability of Bowers’ elderly and disabled victims and his targeting of Jewish people.

    Olshan played a composite of 911 calls made from inside the synagogue, including audio of people being shot and a survivor’s horrified screams.

    He said Bowers had taken “11 people, 11 full lives, 11 people who loved their families, 11 people who loved their friends, 11 people who were loved. … How do you measure the impact of all of that loss?”

    The prosecutor spoke about 75-year-old Joyce Fienberg’s care for her family and 65-year-old Richard Gottfried’s devotion to his faith. He said Dr. Jerry Rabinowitz, 66, had the ethos of a country doctor: “He loved delivering babies but he never delivered judgment.” David Rosenthal, 54, and Cecil Rosenthal, 59, intellectually disabled brothers, “loved life,” Olshan said. “But maybe more than anything, they loved Tree of Life.”

    The other deceased victims were Rose Mallinger, 97; Bernice Simon, 84, and her husband, Sylvan Simon, 86; Dan Stein, 71; Melvin Wax, 87; and Irving Younger, 69.

    The attack also wounded seven people, including five responding police officers. Bowers was shot three times before surrendering when he ran out of ammunition.

    ___

    Rubinkam reported from northeastern Pennsylvania.

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  • UK jury acquits Kevin Spacey of sexual assault charges based on allegations by 4 men over 20 years

    UK jury acquits Kevin Spacey of sexual assault charges based on allegations by 4 men over 20 years

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    LONDON — A jury in London acquitted Kevin Spacey of sexual assault Wednesday after the Oscar winner’s star turn as a witness in his own defense spared him a possible prison term and offered him hope of a career comeback after six years without a job.

    Tears rolled down Spacey’s cheeks as the final “not guilty” verdict was read. The Oscar winner looked at the jury, placed his hand over the lapel of his blue suit and pink shirt, and mouthed “thank you.” It was his 64th birthday.

    “I imagine that many of you can understand that there’s a lot for me to process after what has just happened today,” a humbled Spacey said outside Southwark Crown Court after thanking a handful of jurors in the lobby. “I am enormously grateful to the jury for having taken the time to examine all of the evidence and all of the facts carefully before they reached their decision.”

    Spacey’s two days of testimony culminated with him choking up as he spoke of his six years without work since the sex abuse allegations against him surfaced in 2017.

    “My world exploded,” Spacey testified. “There was a rush to judgment and before the first question was asked or answered, I lost my job, I lost my reputation, I lost everything in a matter of days.”

    Three men accused Spacey of aggressively grabbing their crotches, describing him as “vile” and a “slippery, snaky” predator. A fourth, an aspiring actor, said he awoke to the actor performing oral sex on him after falling asleep or passing out in Spacey’s London apartment where he had gone for career advice and a beer.

    Spacey said he was a “big flirt” who had consensual flings with men and whose only misstep was touching a man’s groin while making a “clumsy pass.”

    Defense lawyer Patrick Gibbs said three of the men were liars and that their encounters had been “reimagined with a sinister spin.” He accused them of hopping on a #MeToo “bandwagon” in the hope of striking it rich. Two of the men have sued Spacey.

    Prosecutor Christine Agnew called Spacey a “sexual bully” who preyed on younger men. She said he was shielded by a “trinity of protection” — he knew men were unlikely to complain; they wouldn’t be believed if they did complain; and if they did complain, no action would be taken because he was powerful.

    Spacey had faced nine charges, including multiple counts of sexual assault and one count of causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without consent. Jurors deliberated for 12.5 hours over three days before reaching their verdict.

    Spacey had viewed the London case as a chance for redemption, telling German magazine Zeit last month that there were “people right now who are ready to hire me the moment I am cleared of these charges in London.”

    During deliberations, jurors asked Justice Mark Wall to summarize the testimony of a man who said the actor grabbed his crotch so forcefully while he was driving to a gala at Elton John’s that he almost ran off the road.

    In a cameo appearance, the rock star and his husband, David Furnish, testified by video from Monaco and offered a timeline that cast doubt on the driver’s account. They said Spacey didn’t attend the White Tie & Tiara Ball the year the man said, but had been a surprise guest three or four years earlier in 2001.

    That was significant because the man said he had begun working with Spacey in the early 2000s and suffered from unwanted fondling for years. He said the incident in the car was the final straw and he avoided the star afterwards.

    The accusations dated from 2001 to 2013 and included a period when Spacey — after winning Academy Awards for “The Usual Suspects” and “American Beauty” — had returned to the theater. He served as artistic director of the Old Vic Theatre in London for most of that time.

    The men came forward after an American actor accused Spacey of sexual misconduct as the #MeToo movement heated up in 2017.

    One of the men called his encounter with Spacey “completely traumatic and life-ruining.” One said he sought solace by working out and drinking more. Several said they couldn’t bear to watch productions starring the actor.

    With the confidence of a seasoned performer, Spacey took his seat in the witness box in what had to be the smallest stage of his career — a laminated oak desk at the front of a brightly lit courtroom.

    He spoke in the warm, rich, calming voice that most audiences would instantly recognize. When pressed by Agnew, he did not take the menacing, cold tone of some of his characters, but maintained his composure and showed only flashes of indignation delivered with a flourish.

    Asked about grabbing the genitals of a man backstage at a charity event, he snapped: “Absolute bollocks!”

    As laughter rose in the gallery, Agnew retorted: “That’s exactly where you did grab him, isn’t it?”

    “Really?” Spacey said as he looked up at Wall in disbelief.

    He then denied the act and later dismissed the prosecution case as weak.

    Jurors laughed and smiled at parts of his testimony and Wall occasionally had to rein him in when he strayed into seemingly irrelevant anecdotes.

    Spacey sounded like a regular guy at times, speaking of how he liked to smoke marijuana but was incapable of rolling a joint, and acknowledging that he sought sex during lonely periods, quipping “welcome to life.” He said being promiscuous does not make him a bad person.

    At other moments, he illustrated his life as an award-winning actor. He talked about performing in high school with Val Kilmer, buying the most expensive Mini Cooper ever at Elton John’s charity gala, and how he taught Judi Dench to play table tennis while filming “The Shipping News” and later bought her a ping pong table.

    Gibbs said Spacey was “monstered” on the internet and became toxic in the entertainment industry.

    Spacey was booted from the runaway Netflix success, “House of Cards,” and his scenes in “All the Money in the World,” were scrubbed and he was replaced by Christopher Plummer. Aside from some small projects, he has barely worked as an actor in six years.

    The court victory is his second since he beat a $40 million lawsuit last fall in New York brought by “Star Trek: Discovery” actor Anthony Rapp.

    Prosecutors in Massachusetts dropped charges when the alleged victim suddenly refused to testify.

    Los Angeles prosecutors declined to bring charges after the death of a massage therapist who said Spacey forced him to touch the actor’s genitals during a rub down at Spacey’s home in Malibu in 2016.

    Spacey said that being out of work had left him with bills he’s still paying.

    An arbitrator in LA ordered Spacey to pay nearly $31 million to the makers of “House of Cards” for violating his contract by sexually harassing crew members.

    Spacey can now resume his career “without a stain on his character” said Mark Stephens, a London media lawyer.

    “These were allegations made at the height of the #MeToo allegations in Hollywood, and out of an abundance of caution, essentially Kevin Spacey was canceled by Hollywood,” Stephens said. “I suspect he’ll be snapped up by Hollywood producers desperate to get on and make new movies.”

    ___

    Associated Press reporter Jill Lawless and Cristina Jaleru contributed to this report.

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  • Jury acquits Kevin Spacey in London on sexual assault charges dating back to 2001

    Jury acquits Kevin Spacey in London on sexual assault charges dating back to 2001

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    LONDON — A London jury acquitted Kevin Spacey on sexual assault charges on Wednesday after a four-week trial in which the actor said he was a “big flirt” who had consensual flings with men and whose only misstep was touching a man’s groin while making a “clumsy pass.”

    Three men accused the Oscar winner of aggressively grabbing their crotches. A fourth, an aspiring actor seeking mentorship, said he awoke to the actor performing oral sex on him after going to Spacey’s London apartment for a beer and either falling asleep or passing out.

    All the men said the contact was unwanted but Spacey testified that the young actor and another man had willingly participated in consensual acts. He said a third man’s allegation that he grabbed his privates like a striking “cobra” backstage at a theater was “pure fantasy.”

    He said he didn’t remember a fourth incident at a small party at a home he rented in the country but accepted that he touched the groin of a man he had met at a pub during a night of heavy drinking. He said he had misread the man’s interest in him and said he had probably made an awkward pass.

    Defense lawyer Patrick Gibbs said three of the men were liars and incidents had been “reimagined with a sinister spin.” He accused most of them of hopping on a “bandwagon” of complaints in the hope of striking it rich.

    Prosecutor Christine Agnew told jurors that Spacey was a “sexual bully” who took what he wanted when he wanted. She said he was shielded by a “trinity of protection”: he knew men were unlikely to complain; they wouldn’t be believed if they did complain; and if they did complain, no action would be taken because he was powerful.

    Spacey, who turned 64 on Wednesday, faced nine charges, including multiple counts of sexual assault and one count of causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without consent.

    The accusations date from 2001 to 2013 and include a period when Spacey — after winning Academy Awards for “The Usual Suspects” and “American Beauty” — had returned to the theater, his first love. During most of that period he was artistic director of the Old Vic Theatre in London.

    The men came forward after an American actor accused Spacey of an incident of sexual misconduct as the #MeToo movement heated up in 2017.

    Several of the men said they had been haunted by the abuse and couldn’t bear to watch Spacey’s films.

    One of the men broke down when speaking with police as he provided details in a videotaped interview about the oral sex incident that he said he’d never told anyone before. Another man said he was angry about the abuse that occurred sporadically over several years and began to drink and work out more to cope with it.

    Spacey choked up and became teary eyed in the witness box as he described the emotional and financial turmoil that the U.S. accusations brought and the barrage of criticism that followed on social media.

    “My world exploded,” Spacey testified. “There was a rush to judgment and before the first question was asked or answered I lost my job, I lost my reputation, I lost everything in a matter of days.”

    Gibbs said Spacey was being “monstered” on the internet every night and became toxic in the industry.

    Spacey was booted from “House of Cards” and his scenes in “All the Money in the World,” were scrubbed and he was replaced by Christopher Plummer. Aside from some small projects, he has barely worked as an actor in six years.

    A New York jury last year swiftly cleared Spacey in a $40 million lawsuit by “Star Trek: Discovery” actor Anthony Rapp on allegations dating back three decades.

    Spacey had viewed the London case as a chance for redemption, telling German magazine Zeit last month that there were “people right now who are ready to hire me the moment I am cleared of these charges in London.”

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  • Prosecutors say FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried is harassing a key witness at his upcoming trial

    Prosecutors say FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried is harassing a key witness at his upcoming trial

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    NEW YORK — FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried is harassing a key witness against him at his upcoming trial by giving a newspaper personal things she wrote while she was the chief executive of his cryptocurrency hedge fund trading firm, prosecutors say.

    They asked a judge late Thursday to order trial participants not to make statements that might taint the yet-to-be-chosen jury in a criminal case over allegations that Bankman-Fried and other top executives cheated investors and looted FTX customer deposits, in part to fund lavish lifestyles.

    In a letter to Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, prosecutors said Bankman-Fried gave some of Caroline Ellison’s personal correspondence to The New York Times. They said that had the effect of harassing her and seemed designed to deter other potential trial witnesses from testifying.

    They called it an effort to “publicly discredit a government witness” and interfere with an Oct. 2 trial.

    Ellison, 28, was CEO of Alameda Research, a cryptocurrency hedge fund trading firm that was an offshoot of FTX.

    FTX entered bankruptcy in November when the global exchange ran out of money after the equivalent of a bank run.

    Ellison pleaded guilty in December to criminal charges that carry a potential penalty of 110 years in prison. She has agreed to testify against Bankman-Fried, 31, as part of a deal that could result in leniency.

    Prosecutors said lawyers for Bankman-Fried confirmed that their client had shared documents that were not currently part of trial evidence with The New York Times before it published an article Thursday with the headline: “Private Writings of Caroline Ellison, Star Witness in the FTX Case.”

    According to the article, Ellison wrote that she did not think she was well suited to running Alameda or decisive as a leader, and the doubts occurred as she coped with the breakup of a sporadic romantic relationship with Bankman-Fried.

    The Times reported that in April 2022, Ellison wrote in a Google document that an earlier breakup with Bankman-Fried had “significantly decreased my excitement about Alameda” and that life at the hedge fund “felt too associated with you in a way that was painful.”

    Lawyers for Ellison and for Bankman-Fried did not return emails seeking comment Friday. A spokesperson for prosecutors declined comment.

    In their letter to Kaplan, prosecutors stopped short of asking the judge to jail Bankman-Fried in the weeks before his trial.

    They said Ellison was expected to testify at trial that she agreed with Bankman-Fried to defraud FTX’s customers and investors and Alameda’s lenders.

    Prosecutors accused Bankman-Fried of trying to “cast Ellison in a poor light, and advance his defense through the press and outside the constraints of the courtroom and rules of evidence: that Ellison was a jilted lover who perpetrated these crimes alone.”

    They said they expect “overwhelming evidence to give the lie to this defense,” and they called it improper and prejudicial for Bankman-Fried to malign Ellison’s credibility before the trial.

    Prosecutors also wrote that lawyers for potential trial witnesses, including some who live abroad, said their clients were hesitant to testify in a case with persistent media attention.

    “These witness concerns will only be heightened if witnesses are made to fear that a consequence of testifying against the defendant may include personal humiliation and efforts to discredit their reputation that go beyond what the rules of evidence might permit during cross examination,” prosecutors wrote.

    Earlier this year, Kaplan had suggested that jailing Bankman-Fried was possible after prosecutors complained that he found ways to get around limits placed on his electronic communications as part of a $250 million personal recognizance bond issued after his December arrest that requires him to live with his parents in Palo Alto, California.

    In February, prosecutors said he might have tried to influence a witness when he sent an encrypted message in January over a texting app to a top FTX lawyer, saying he “would really love to reconnect and see if there’s a way for us to have a constructive relationship, use each other as resources when possible, or at least vet things with each other.”

    At a February hearing, the judge said prosecutors described things Bankman-Fried had done after his arrest “that suggests to me that maybe he has committed or attempted to commit a federal felony while on release.”

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  • Las Vegas police officer found guilty in string of brazen casino heists could get life sentence

    Las Vegas police officer found guilty in string of brazen casino heists could get life sentence

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    LAS VEGAS — A federal jury convicted a Las Vegas police officer Friday on all counts of stealing nearly $165,000 during a trio of casino heists, including one where he was armed with a department-issued weapon that was loaded.

    Caleb Rogers, 35, faces life in prison upon sentencing because he brandished a revolver during the third casino heist he carried out in February 2022. U.S. District Judge Andrew Gordon set his sentencing for October.

    The jury reached a verdict after just over three hours of deliberation.

    Jurors used common sense to decide the case, Lloyd Dickerson, one of the 12, told The Associated Press.

    “Everything kind of added up,” Dickerson said outside the courthouse. “It took all of the evidence and all of the testimony from everybody to come to this conclusion.”

    Seated next to his attorney, Rogers showed no emotion as the verdict was read in the courtroom. Richard Pocker told AP they planned to appeal the conviction.

    Rogers, who was employed as an active-duty patrol officer at the time of the heists, has been on unpaid leave without police powers since his arrest. A spokesperson for the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department said after the verdict that Rogers’ future at the department “will be determined at the conclusion” of an internal investigation. The department said it had no comment on Rogers’ conviction.

    The case went to the jury Thursday shortly after Rogers’ younger brother testified against him for more than three hours, painting a clear picture for the jurors of how the two successfully pulled off the first heist in the series. Josiah Rogers said he participated only in that robbery. Caleb Rogers carried out the other two heists alone, prosecutors said.

    Throughout the weeklong trial, prosecutors had portrayed Rogers as a gambling addict who had grown increasingly desperate under a crush of debt when the robberies targeting casinos off the Las Vegas Strip began. They said he had a unique set of skills and knowledge about robberies as a law enforcement officer and used that to his advantage.

    Jurors also heard from casino employees who said they are still haunted by their encounters with the robber. A security guard wrestled with the suspect for his loaded weapon during one of the heists. He said he couldn’t stop thinking about how he might not have made it home to his family that day. And a 63-year-old cashier said she still looks over her shoulder when she handles cash at work.

    Assistant U.S. attorney David Kiebler said in his closing argument Thursday that the evidence in all three robberies pointed to the same man: Caleb Rogers.

    But Pocker, the officer’s lawyer, called the bulk of the government’s evidence circumstantial and convenient for a police department that already had been trying for months — to no avail — to solve the other robberies when Rogers was arrested.

    “They tried too hard here,” Pocker said in his closing argument. “It’s just too coincidental.”

    Rogers’ trial came to a head Thursday when his brother took the stand.

    Josiah Rogers was granted immunity from prosecution in exchange for his testimony. Jurors scribbled notes and darted glances between the brothers as Josiah Rogers recounted the details. He said they rehearsed for their casino heist in November 2021. They used code words in an encrypted messaging app to communicate, he said. They returned home to their shared apartment after successfully robbing the Red Rock Casino’s cashier cage and spread the money across their dining table, counting out $73,810.

    Josiah Rogers said he took his $30,000 cut and moved back to their hometown of Columbus, Ohio, a week after the robbery.

    Before he took the stand, the government’s evidence had been mostly focused on the third robbery in February 2022, when Caleb Rogers was arrested outside the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino.

    Prosecutors said Caleb Rogers stormed that casino’s sportsbook, shoved a cashier in her 60s out of his way, and threatened to use a gun while he shoveled $79,000 into a drawstring bag hidden inside his jacket. Within minutes, prosecutors said, the robber was tackled by a group of security guards outside the casino, sending a wig he’d been wearing flying off his head.

    Police lapel video played during the trial showed Caleb Rogers identifying himself as a police officer as he was folded into the back of a patrol car outside the casino.

    Casino heists are hard to pull off, said Mehmet Erdem, a professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, whose expertise includes hotel and casino operations.

    “The chances you get caught and are identified is very high,” he said, because of a combination of robust casino security teams with uniformed guards and plainclothes officers and advancements in security technology, including facial recognition software and high-definition cameras.

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  • Trump asks top Georgia court to disqualify election probe prosecutor and toss grand jury report

    Trump asks top Georgia court to disqualify election probe prosecutor and toss grand jury report

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    Lawyers for former President Donald Trump are asking Georgia’s highest court to prevent the district attorney who’s been investigating his actions in the wake of the 2020 election from prosecuting him

    ByKATE BRUMBACK Associated Press

    Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, right, and Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney speak in the Fulton county courthouse, Tuesday, July 11, 2023, in Atlanta. A grand jury being seated Tuesday in Atlanta will likely consider whether criminal charges are appropriate for former President Donald Trump or his Republican allies for their efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss in Georgia. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

    The Associated Press

    ATLANTA — Lawyers for former President Donald Trump are asking Georgia’s highest court to prevent the district attorney who has been investigating his actions in the wake of the 2020 election from prosecuting him and to throw out a special grand jury report that is part of the inquiry.

    Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has been investigating since early 2021 whether Trump and his allies broke any laws as they tried to overturn his narrow election loss in Georgia to Democrat Joe Biden. She has suggested that she is likely to seek charges in the case from a grand jury next month.

    Trump’s Georgia legal team on Friday filed similar petitions in the Georgia Supreme Court and Fulton County Superior Court naming Willis and Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, who oversaw the special grand jury, as respondents. A spokesperson for Willis declined to comment. McBurney did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

    Trump’s legal team — Drew Findling, Jennifer Little and Marissa Goldberg — acknowledged that the filings are unusual but necessary given the tight time frame. Willis has indicated she will use the special grand jury report to seek an indictment “within weeks, if not days.” Two new regular grand juries were seated this week, and one is likely to hear the case.

    “Even in an extraordinarily novel case of national significance, one would expect matters to take their normal procedural course within a reasonable time,” the filings say. “But nothing about these processes have been normal or reasonable. And the all-but-unavoidable conclusion is that the anomalies below are because Petitioner is President Donald J. Trump.”

    The petitions seek to bar Willis and her office from continuing to prosecute the case. It also asks that the report produced by the special grand jury that had ben seated in the case be tossed out and that prosecutors be prevented from presenting any evidence from the panel’s investigation to a regular grand jury.

    The filings ask that the courts stop “all proceedings related to and flowing from the special purpose grand jury’s investigation until this matter can be resolved.”

    In a previous filing in March, Trump’s lawyers made similar requests and asked that a judge other than McBurney hear their claims. Willis rejected the arguments as being without merit. McBurney kept the case and has yet to rule on the Trump team’s requests.

    That has left Trump “stranded between the Supervising Judge’s protracted passivity and the District Attorney’s looming indictment” with no choice other than to seek action from the Supreme Court, his lawyers wrote.

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  • Jury decides 2014 document found in Aretha Franklin’s couch is a valid will

    Jury decides 2014 document found in Aretha Franklin’s couch is a valid will

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    PONTIAC, Mich. — A document handwritten by singer Aretha Franklin and found in her couch after her 2018 death is a valid Michigan will, a jury said Tuesday, a critical turn in a dispute that has turned her sons against each other.

    It’s a victory for Kecalf Franklin and Edward Franklin whose lawyers had argued that papers dated 2014 should override a 2010 will that was discovered around the same time in a locked cabinet at the Queen of Soul’s home in suburban Detroit.

    The jury deliberated less than an hour after a brief trial that started Monday. After the verdict was read, Aretha Franklin’s grandchildren stepped forward from the first row to hug Kecalf and Edward.

    “I’m very, very happy. I just wanted my mother’s wishes to be adhered to,” Kecalf Franklin said. “We just want to exhale right now. It’s been a long five years for my family, my children.”

    Aretha Franklin was a global star for decades, known especially for hits like “Think,” “I Say a Little Prayer” and “Respect.” She did not leave behind a formal, typewritten will when she died five years ago at age 76.

    But documents, with scribbles and hard-to-decipher passages, emerged in 2019 when a niece scoured the home for records.

    In closing arguments, lawyers for Kecalf and Edward Franklin said the fact that the 2014 papers were found in a notebook in couch cushions did not make them less significant.

    “You can take your will and leave it on the kitchen counter. It’s still your will,” Charles McKelvie told the jury.

    Another lawyer, Craig Smith, pointed to the first line of the document, which was displayed on four large posters in front of the jury.

    “Says right here: ‘This is my will.’ She’s speaking from the grave, folks,” Smith said of Franklin.

    Kecalf and Edward had teamed up against brother Ted White II, who favored the 2010 will. White’s attorney, Kurt Olson, noted the earlier will was under lock and key. He said it was much more important than papers found in a couch.

    “We were here to see what the jury would rule. We’ll live with it,” Olson said after the verdict.

    The jury found that the 2014 version was signed by Aretha Franklin, who put a smiley face in the letter ‘A.’

    Olson said there still could be discussions with the judge over whether some provisions of the 2010 will should be fulfilled.

    Franklin’s estate managers have been paying bills, settling millions in tax debts and generating income through music royalties and other intellectual property. The will dispute, however, has been unfinished business.

    There are differences between the 2010 and 2014 versions, though they both appear to indicate that Franklin’s four sons would share income from music and copyrights.

    But under the 2014 will, Kecalf Franklin and grandchildren would get his mother’s main home in Bloomfield Hills, which was valued at $1.1 million when she died but is worth much more today.

    The older will said Kecalf, 53, and Edward Franklin, 64, “must take business classes and get a certificate or a degree” to benefit from the estate. That provision is not in the 2014 version.

    White, who played guitar with Aretha Franklin, testified against the 2014 will, saying his mother typically would get important documents done “conventionally and legally” and with assistance from an attorney. He did not immediately comment after the verdict.

    The sharpest remarks of the trial came from Smith, who represented Edward Franklin. He told the jury White “wants to disinherit his two brothers. Teddy wants it all.”

    Kecalf Franklin sat near White during the trial but they did not appear to speak to each other.

    “I love my brother with all my heart,” Kecalf said outside court when asked if there was a rift.

    Aretha Franklin had a fourth son, Clarence Franklin. He lives under guardianship in an assisted living center and did not participate in the trial.

    ___

    Follow Ed White on Twitter at http://twitter.com/edwritez

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  • Michigan jury finds handwritten document found in singer Aretha Franklin’s couch is a valid will

    Michigan jury finds handwritten document found in singer Aretha Franklin’s couch is a valid will

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    Michigan jury finds handwritten document found in singer Aretha Franklin’s couch is a valid will

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  • Jury seated in trial over singer Aretha Franklin’s handwritten wills

    Jury seated in trial over singer Aretha Franklin’s handwritten wills

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    PONTIAC, Mich. — A Michigan judge narrowed the issues Monday in a dispute over Aretha Franklin‘s estate, saying the only task for jurors is to decide whether a 2014 document handwritten by the Queen of Soul and found in couch cushions can be accepted as a valid will.

    The stipulation was made by attorneys for Franklin’s sons before a jury was seated in Oakland County Probate Court.

    Franklin died in 2018 at age 76. But five years later, the music superstar’s estate remains unsettled. A son, Ted White II, believes a 2010 handwritten will should mainly control the estate, but two other sons, Kecalf Franklin and Edward Franklin, are in favor of a 2014 document.

    Both were found in 2019, months after Franklin died. The 2014 document was under cushions at Franklin’s home in suburban Detroit.

    The brothers sat shoulder to shoulder behind their lawyers in Judge Jennifer Callaghan’s courtroom. Another brother, Clarence Franklin, is under a guardianship and apparently is not participating in the trial.

    There are differences between the documents, though they both appear to indicate the sons would share income from music and copyrights, which seems to make that issue less contentious than a few others.

    The 2014 version crossed out White’s name as executor and has Kecalf Franklin in his place. Kecalf Franklin and grandchildren would get his mother’s main home in Bloomfield Hills, which was valued at $1.1 million when she died but is worth much more today.

    For five years, Aretha Franklin’s estate has been handled at different times by three executors, known under Michigan estate law as a personal representative. A niece, Sabrina Owens, quit in 2020, citing a “rift” among the sons.

    The last public accounting filed in March showed the estate had income of $3.9 million during the previous 12-month period and a similar amount of spending, including more than $900,000 in legal fees to various firms.

    Overall assets were pegged at $4.1 million, mostly cash and real estate, though Franklin’s creative works and intellectual property were undervalued with just a nominal $1 figure.

    ___

    Follow Ed White on Twitter at http://twitter.com/edwritez

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  • Authorities charge 5 more in probe of child sexual abuse among Jehovah’s Witnesses in Pennsylvania

    Authorities charge 5 more in probe of child sexual abuse among Jehovah’s Witnesses in Pennsylvania

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    PHILADELPHIA — A Pennsylvania grand jury investigating child sexual abuse in the Jehovah’s Witnesses community has charged another five people with raping or molesting children as young as 4, the latest developments in an ongoing probe that has identified 14 suspects.

    Pennsylvania Attorney General Michelle Henry, at a Friday news conference, said that while the misconduct dates back years or even decades, “the trauma endures for these victims.”

    Henry did not address the church’s handling of complaints, but said the investigation would continue.

    Critics say that Jehovah’s Witnesses elders have treated child sexual abuse as a sin rather than a crime, documenting complaints in internal files but not reporting them to authorities. And they say the church often required a second witness to substantiate a complaint, a standard that can be impossible to meet when perpetrators often isolate their victims.

    Mark Haugh of York Haven, Pa., a former elder who left the church in 2016 and now advocates for survivors of abuse in the church, applauded investigators.

    “I hope elders are arrested who knew about child abuse and covered it up and then it happened again,” said Haugh, who testified to the grand jury about the church’s structure and about his own daughter’s abuse within a Jehovah’s Witnesses congregation.

    He also hopes organizational leaders are called to account, “because it’s not just a Pennsylvania problem, it’s a national problem.”

    Church spokesman Jarrod Lopes has challenged the criticisms, saying that elders comply with reporting requirements and that members are also free to report sexual assault to authorities. He has also said the second-witness rule applies only to internal church discipline. Lopes did not immediately return a message seeking comment Friday.

    The grand jury probe of Jehovah’s Witnesses began with a referral from a county prosecutor who felt the state should take a broader look at the issue. Dozens of witnesses then testified before the secret grand jury in Harrisburg or provided information to the attorney general’s office.

    In the charges announced Friday, Henry said that the men had groomed or gained access to the children through the church, sometimes when the child’s family took the person into their home. One person said that she was raped 50 or more times between the ages of 7 and 12 by a church member who was 18 when the assaults began. Others involved less serious charges of inappropriate touching.

    The five charged were David Balosa, 62, of Philadelphia; Errol William Hall, 50, of Delaware County; Shaun Sheffer, 45, of Butler County; Terry Booth, 57, of Panama City, FL; and Luis Ayala-Velasquez, 55, of Berks County. Four were taken in custody, while Balosa was being sought. It was not immediately clear if any of them had lawyers representing them.

    One of the nine earlier defendants killed himself before he was arrested, Henry said.

    Attorney Matt Haverstick, who has represented Pennsylvania congregations in the state’s investigation, did not immediately return a call for comment on Friday.

    In a case with some parallels, a state grand jury investigation into child sexual abuse by Catholic priests culminated in a lengthy 2018 report that concluded hundreds of priests had abused children in Pennsylvania over seven decades and church officials had covered it up. More recently, a similar report was issued in Maryland.

    The Jehovah’s Witnesses, an international Christian denomination founded in the Pittsburgh area more than a century ago and headquartered in New York state, claims 8.7 million members worldwide, including 1.2 million in the United States.

    Members will not bear arms, salute a national flag or participate in secular politics. Believers are known for their evangelistic efforts, including knocking on doors and distributing literature in public spaces.

    ___

    Smith, a religion writer, reported from Pittsburgh and videojournalist Tassanee Vejpongsa contributed to this report from Philadelphia.

    ___

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Aretha Franklin’s sons battle over handwritten wills 5 years after her death

    Aretha Franklin’s sons battle over handwritten wills 5 years after her death

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    PONTIAC, Mich. — Five years after her death, the final wishes of music superstar Aretha Franklin are still unsettled. An unusual trial begins next Monday to determine which of two handwritten wills, including one found in couch cushions, will guide how her estate is handled.

    The Queen of Soul, who had four sons, did not have a formal, typewritten will in place, despite years of health problems and efforts to get one done. But under Michigan law, it’s still possible to treat other documents — with scribbles, scratch-outs and hard-to-read passages — as her commands.

    The dispute is pitting a son against other sons. Ted White II believes papers dated in 2010 should mainly control the estate, while Kecalf Franklin and Edward Franklin favor a 2014 document. Both were discovered in Franklin’s suburban Detroit home, months after her death from pancreatic cancer in 2018 at age 76.

    “Does it surprise me that someone passed away before they had their ducks in a row? The answer is never,” said Pat Simasko, who specializes in wills and estates and teaches elder law at Michigan State University College of Law.

    “This can be settled any time, on the steps, halfway through trial,” he said. “And hopefully it will be. Going to a jury trial is a war.”

    Here’s a look at the case:

    FRANKLIN’S DEATH

    Franklin was a global star for decades, known especially for hits like “Think,” “I Say a Little Prayer” and “Respect.” She was treated like royalty in death, her body transported in a 1940 Cadillac hearse to a Detroit museum where thousands of people visited in August 2018.

    “She was the people’s diva,” sociologist Michael Eric Dyson said at the time.

    It was immediately known that Franklin had died without a will, which meant her four sons likely would share assets worth millions, including real estate in suburban Detroit, furs, gowns, jewelry and future royalties from her works. A niece, Sabrina Owens, agreed to be personal representative or executor.

    “My advice? Go slow, be careful and be smart,” Franklin’s friend, businessman Ron Moten, told the sons at the funeral.

    WAIT — WHAT’S THIS?

    Months later, in spring 2019, the estate was turned upside down. Owens reported that a handwritten will dated 2010 was found in a cabinet and another handwritten will, dated 2014, was discovered inside a notebook under cushions at Franklin’s home.

    There are differences between the documents, though they both seem to indicate the sons would share income from music and copyrights. The older will lists White and Owens as co-executors and says Kecalf and Edward Franklin “must take business classes and get a certificate or a degree” to benefit from the estate.

    But the 2014 version crosses out White’s name as executor and has Kecalf Franklin in his place. There’s no mention of business classes. Kecalf Franklin and grandchildren would get his mother’s main home in Bloomfield Hills, which was valued at $1.1 million when she died but is worth much more today.

    “It’s the crown jewel,” said Craig Smith, attorney for Edward Franklin

    Aretha Franklin wrote in 2014 that her gowns could be auctioned or go to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. She indicated in both papers that oldest son, Clarence, who lives under a guardianship, must be regularly supported.

    “Two inconsistent wills cannot both be admitted to probate. In such cases the most recent will revokes the previous will,” Charles McKelvie, a lawyer for Kecalf Franklin, said in a court filing in favor of the 2014 document.

    But White’s attorney, Kurt Olson, said the 2010 will was notarized and signed, while the later version “is merely a draft.”

    “If this document were intended to be a will there would have been more care than putting it in a spiral notebook under a couch cushion,” Olson said.

    INTENT IS KEY

    Simasko, the law instructor, said final wishes can be fulfilled in Michigan through an informal will.

    “If you’re sitting there on a Sunday afternoon and you start handwriting your own wishes, the law allows it as long as the rules are followed: It’s in your handwriting, it’s dated and it’s signed,” he said.

    For five years, Aretha Franklin’s estate has been handled at different times by three executors. Owens quit in 2020, citing a “rift” among the sons.

    She was succeeded by Reginald Turner, a local lawyer who also served as president of the American Bar Association. His last accounting in March showed the estate had income of $3.9 million during the previous 12-month period and a similar amount of spending, including more than $900,000 in legal fees to various firms.

    Overall assets were pegged at $4.1 million, mostly cash and real estate, though Franklin’s creative works and intellectual property were undervalued with just a nominal $1 figure.

    The estate since 2020 has paid at least $8.1 million to the Internal Revenue Service, which had a claim for taxes after the singer’s death, court filings show.

    “The IRS claims took priority. The estate wasn’t going anywhere until the IRS got paid off,” Smith said.

    ___

    Follow Ed White on Twitter at http://twitter.com/edwritez.

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  • The American flag wasn’t always revered as it is today. At the beginning, it was an afterthought

    The American flag wasn’t always revered as it is today. At the beginning, it was an afterthought

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    PHILADELPHIA (AP) — In the bedroom of the Betsy Ross House, a reconstruction of where the upholsterer worked on her most famous commission, a long flag with a circle of 13 stars hangs over a Chippendale side chair and extends across the floor. Over the weeks in 1776 needed to complete the project, Ross would have likely knelt on the flag, stood on it and treated it more like an everyday banner — not with the kind of reverence we’d expect today.

    “She would not have worried about it touching the floor or violating any codes,” says Lisa Moulder, director of the Ross House. “The flag did not have any kind of special symbolism.”

    Flags proliferate every July 4. But unlike the right to assemble or trial by jury, their role was not prescribed by the founders. They would have been rare during early Independence Day celebrations. Only in the mid-19th century does the U.S. flag become a permanent fixture at the White House, scholars believe; only in the mid-20th century was a federal code established for how it should be handled and displayed; only in the 1960s did Congress pass a law making it illegal to “knowingly” cast “contempt” on the flag.

    The man accused in the fatal shooting spree in Philadelphia that left five people dead and four others wounded left a will at his house, and according to roommates had acted agitated and wore a tactical vest around his house in the days before the shooting, prosecutors said Wednesday.

    Police on the scene of a shooting Monday, July 3, 2023 in Philadelphia. Police say a gunman in a bulletproof vest has opened fire on the streets of Philadelphia, killing several people and wounding two boys before he surrendered to responding officers. (Steven M. Falk/The Philadelphia Inquirer via AP)

    A 40-year-old killed one man in a house before fatally shooting four others on the streets of a Philadelphia neighborhood, then surrendering along with a rifle, a pistol, extra magazines, a police scanner and a bulletproof vest, police said.

    Moms for Liberty founders Tiffany Justice, right, and Tina Descovich speak at the Moms for Liberty meeting in Philadelphia, Friday, June 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

    The “parental rights” group Moms for Liberty is looking to expand its efforts to elect school board candidates in 2024 and beyond, as well as get involved in other education races.

    FILE - President Barack Obama poses for a photo during a visit with service members at the White House Independence Day celebration July 4, 2012, on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari, File)

    Through history, the Fourth of July has been a day for some presidents to declare their independence from the public.

    The flag’s evolution into sacred national symbol, and the ongoing debates around it that inspire so much passion and anger, reflect the current events of a given moment and the country’s transformation from a loose confederation of states into a global superpower.

    ‘AN AFTERTHOUGHT’

    “The flag was really an afterthought,” says Scot Guenter, author of “The American Flag, 1777-1924” and a professor emeritus of American Studies at San Jose State University. In the beginning, Guenter says, the Continental Congress was more concerned about developing a “Great Seal” because it was needed for papers it would issue.

    Congress passed its first flag act on June 14, 1777: “Resolved, that the Flag of the thirteen United States shall be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the Union be thirteen stars, white on a blue field, representing a new constellation.” But the flag is otherwise peripheral to the country’s beginnings.

    A spokesman for Independence Hall in Philadelphia says no records exist of a U.S. flag being present for the signing of the Constitution in 1787, or any indications that a national flag would have flown during the following decade at what is now called Congress Hall — a decade when Philadelphia was the country’s capital. Researchers at George Washington’s home have no evidence that the flag was displayed there in his lifetime. (Volunteers there now regularly raise and lower U.S. flags, which are sold at the gift shop as having “flown over Mount Vernon”).

    According to the White House Historical Association, no precise date exists for when the flag first had a permanent home at the presidential residence. Researchers at the historical association say the best guess is June 29, 1861, early in the Civil War, when President Lincoln dedicated a flagpole on the South Grounds.

    The Civil War, followed by the country’s centennial in 1876, helped mythologize the flag. Americans were in the mood for a good story, and William J. Canby, grandson of Betsy Ross, had one. In a speech given to the Pennsylvania Historical Society, Canby drew upon family memories in narrating the quiet, heroic tale of Betsy Ross, who had died little known beyond her immediate community.

    “As an example of industry, energy and perseverance, and of humble reliance upon providence, though all the trials, which were not few, of her eventful life, the name of Elizabeth Claypoole (her married name at the time of her death) is worthy of being placed on record for the benefit of those who should be similarly circumstanced,” Canby stated.

    LEGEND OUTWEIGHS FACT

    The Ross House bills itself as “the birthplace of the American Flag,” but its origins are uncertain. We have no definitive account. Many credit Francis Hopkinson, a congressman from New Jersey, but others, including Ross, may have added details — and, unlike the Declaration of Independence, we have no original artifact. Whether Ross or another produced the first one, its ultimate destination is unknown.

    “We think it would have ended up on a ship mast, to signify that it was an American ship,” Moulder says.

    Ross’ place in history also remains in question, even among government institutions. An essay entitled “The Legend of Betsy Ross,” on the website for the Smithsonian National Postal Museum, says her tale is “shrouded in as much legend as fact,” with no substantial evidence of her involvement. Says the museum: “While it makes for a nice story, sadly, it is most likely false.”

    Ross, who died in 1836, left behind no diary or contemporary accounts of her whereabouts, officials at the Ross House acknowledge. But she was very much a real person who produced various flags before and after the alleged time she was approached by a commission that included George Washington and asked to sew a flag to represent the new country. Officials at the Ross house have no direct proof of Washington contacting Ross in 1776, but they note that a ledger unearthed in 2015 revealed Washington had engaged in business two years earlier with Ross and her husband and fellow upholster, John Ross.

    “We know that Washington wanted the Rosses to make bedrooms curtains for his home in Mount Vernon,” Moulder says. “And curtains are the kind of job that Betsy would have taken on.”

    As the country grew more nationalized and nationalistic, Ross was added to the early pantheon and the flag’s presence expanded like so much territory across the continent — into state ceremonies and buildings, sporting events, schools and private homes.

    THE FLAG TAKES CENTER STAGE

    In the midst of fierce labor battles and rising fears of immigration, the minister Francis Bellamy composed the Pledge of Allegiance in 1892. It was tied to the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’ landing but also, as historian Richard White has written, addressed “a time of intense social conflict in an increasingly diverse nation” and was intended ”as a hopeful affirmation of America’s future.”

    Throughout the 20th century, regulations were proposed and enacted. The first national flag code was drafted in 1923 and signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II, with recommendations on everything from how to salute the flag to how to carry it. In the mid-1950s, President Dwight Eisenhower endorsed legislation adding “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance, a Cold War action with origins 20 years earlier.

    “In the 1930s, you had conservatives arguing that the New Deal represented slavery and that the counterpoint was freedom under God,” says Kevin M. Kruse, a professor of history at Princeton University whose books include “One Nation Under God,” published in 2015. “So there was a corporate-fueled drive against the regulatory state and it takes on religious tones. In the 1950s, that gets appropriated by the anti-communists.”

    Burning American flags dates back at least to the Civil War. But only in July 1968, in response to Vietnam War protesters, did Congress pass legislation making it illegal (the Supreme Court overturned the ban in 1989) and adding other restrictions against “publicly mutilating” the flag. Three months later, the radical activist Abbie Hoffman was arrested for wearing a Stars and Stripes shirt, charges later dropped on appeal.

    “He showed up in the shirt for a meeting of the House Committee on Un-American Activities,” says Mark Kurlansky, author of “1968: The Year That Rocked the World,” a social history. “He just thought it would be funny.”

    Last month, the Biden administration hosted a Pride Day gathering on the White House South Lawn and hung a Pride Progress flag between U.S. flags on the Truman balcony. Rep. Mike Collins, a Georgia Republican, denounced the prominence of an “alphabet cult battle flag.” Other Republicans alleged that Biden officials had broken federal regulations, which call for the American flag to be “at the center and at the highest point” when grouped with other flags. Defenders of Biden noted that a U.S. flag was flying above from atop the White House.

    “The flag is so important because it helps define what we believe in. You have Democrats and Republicans trying to attach meaning to it,” Guenter says. “The flag can intersect with issues of gender and race and sexuality. There’s so much there to think about, and it reveals so much about who we are.”

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  • Rapper Travis Scott will not face criminal charges in deadly crowd surge at Texas festival

    Rapper Travis Scott will not face criminal charges in deadly crowd surge at Texas festival

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    HOUSTON — A Texas grand jury declined to indict rap superstar Travis Scott in a criminal investigation of a deadly crowd surge at the 2021 Astroworld festival, where some spectators were packed so tightly they could not move their arms or even breathe, his attorney and prosecutors said Thursday.

    Lawyer Kent Schaffer confirmed that the Harris County grand jury had met and decided not to indict his client on any criminal charges stemming from the concert.

    “He never encouraged people to do anything that resulted in other people being hurt,” Schaffer said, adding that the decision is “a great relief.”

    Circumstances of the deaths limited what charges prosecutors were able to present before the grand jury, eliminating potential counts such as murder, manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide, said Alycia Harvey, an assistant district attorney with the Harris County District Attorney’s Office.

    That left prosecutors to focus on possible counts of endangering a child in connection with the deaths of the two youngest concertgoers, ages 9 and 14, she added.

    “”The grand jury … found that no crime did occur, that no single individual was criminally responsible,” Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said.

    The Nov. 5, 2021, crowd surge in Houston killed 10 young festivalgoers who ranged in age from 9 to 27. The official cause of death was compression asphyxia, which an expert likened to being crushed by a car.

    Roughly 300 people were injured and treated at the scene, and 25 were taken to hospitals.

    Houston police and federal officials have been investigating whether Scott, concert promoter Live Nation and others had sufficient safety measures in place.

    During a news conference Thursday afternoon after the grand jury’s decision, police presented various details from their investigation including a timeline of events during Scott’s performance, the location at the concert site where the deaths occurred and video showing areas where crowds of people collapsed on each other.

    But Police Chief Troy Finner declined to say what the overall conclusion of his agency’s investigation was or whether police should have stopped the concert sooner. Finner said police plan to make the more than 1,000-page report in the case public so people can read all the information investigators reviewed.

    “The chief of police is not going to get up here and point fingers at anybody. I respect the grand jury’s decision. I simply want people to read (the offense report), read the entire investigation and everybody will see, very, very complicated,” Finner said.

    Schaffer said he feels sympathy for those who were killed at the festival and their families.

    “But Travis is not responsible,” Schaffer said. “Bringing criminal charges against him will not ease their pain.”

    The grand jury declined to indict five other people, including festival manager Brent Silberstein. An attorney for Silberstein did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

    More than 500 lawsuits were filed over the deaths and injuries at the concert, including many against Live Nation and Scott. Some have since been settled.

    Kevin Haynes, a Houston attorney whose firm is representing hundreds of people injured at the concert, said he was disappointed by the grand jury’s decision but the civil cases will continue “to ensure responsible parties are held accountable in the ongoing pursuit of justice.”

    About 50,000 people attended the festival.

    A 56-page event operations plan for the event had detailed protocols for various dangerous scenarios including a shooting, bomb or terrorist threats and severe weather. But it did not include information on what to do in the event of a crowd surge.

    In November, a task force unveiled a new agreement that local officials, public safety agencies and promoters said will clearly outline the responsibilities of all parties involved in such events to ensure they are safe.

    Finner said Thursday that elevated platforms are now mandatory at such shows and they will be staffed by Houston police, firefighters and others who will all have authority to halt an event if they see problems.

    Similar crushes have happened all over the world, from a soccer stadium in England to the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia to Halloween festivities in the South Korean capital. Most people who who die in crowd surges suffocate.

    ___

    Find the AP’s coverage of the Astroworld festival: https://apnews.com/hub/astroworld-festival-deaths

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  • Superfund town’s health clinic accused of submitting false asbestos claims

    Superfund town’s health clinic accused of submitting false asbestos claims

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    MISSOULA, Mont. — A major U.S. railroad found liable for spreading hazardous asbestos that killed hundreds of people in a Montana town is trying to convince a federal jury that a local clinic submitted hundreds of asbestos claims for people who weren’t sick, earning them lifetime government benefits and bilking taxpayer funds.

    The case focuses on the Center For Asbestos Related Disease in Libby, Montana, and the health clinic’s high-profile doctor, Brad Black, who has been at the forefront of efforts to help residents of the town, which came to national prominence when it was declared a deadly Superfund site in 2000.

    Since 2003, Black and the CARD clinic have certified more than 3,400 people, primarily from the Libby area, with asbestos-related diseases.

    BNSF Railway — controlled by billionaire Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate — has alleged during a trial taking place in Missoula that more than half the certifications were based on false medical submissions from CARD. The railway shipped asbestos-tainted vermiculite through Libby.

    Closing arguments in the case were scheduled for Wednesday.

    CARD and its attorneys deny the claims, arguing the clinic made its diagnoses in line with requirements of the 2009 Affordable Care Act, which included special provisions for the Libby victims.

    Asbestos-related diseases can range from a thickening of a person’s lung cavity, hampering breathing, to deadly cancer. Under the health law, victims of asbestos exposure in the Libby area are eligible for taxpayer-funded services including Medicare, housekeeping, travel to medical appointments, and disability benefits for those who can’t work.

    Former Democratic U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, of Montana, authored the Libby provision in the health law. He said in depositions with attorneys that the clinic’s practice of diagnosing some patients without waiting for secondary confirmation, such as X-ray results, was legitimate.

    However, Judge Dana Christensen barred Baucus’s statements from being introduced, saying it was the court’s role to decide whether the law had been followed.

    BNSF sued the clinic in 2019 under the False Claims Act, which allows private parties to sue on the government’s behalf. It was kept sealed under a court order for two years until the U.S. attorney’s office of Montana declined prosecute the fraud claims. Officials have not given a reason.

    The outcome could have major implications for the clinic, which could face penalties of $5,000 or more for each instance of fraud that is verified. A victory by BNSF also could help it fend off lawsuits from Libby residents seeking damages for the railway’s mishandling asbestos-tainted vermiculite from a nearby mine.

    At least 400 people have been killed by asbestos-related disease in the Libby area, according to health officials. Because of the long latency period for those diseases, symptoms can take decades to develop.

    The tainted vermiculite came from a mine owned by the Maryland-based chemical company W.R. Grace. It polluted the Libby area over decades, including at a BNSF railway yard in the heart of the town of about 3,000 people.

    Cleanup work began in 2000 after media reports of widespread health problems led to Libby’s designation as a federal Superfund program contaminated site. In 2009, the EPA declared a public health emergency for the town.

    Scientists say exposure to even a minuscule amount of asbestos can cause lung problems. Vermiculite from Libby was used as construction material in town, and it was shipped across the country as insulating material used in millions of homes.

    A 2020 Montana Supreme Court ruling said BNSF should be held liable for its role in the contamination, but didn’t specify how.

    Other lawsuits against companies and officials over the contamination in Libby have resulted in large settlements for victims.

    More than 2,000 Montana residents reached settlements with the state totaling $68 million in 2011 and 2017 for failing to warn them about the dangers of asbestos exposure. In February 2022, a jury awarded an Oregon man $36.5 million in a lawsuit against W.R. Grace’s workers’ compensation insurer from 1963-1973 because the company did not warn workers of those dangers.

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