A Connecticut judge on Friday dismissed criminal charges against three current and former New Haven police officers who were accused of mistreating prisoner Richard “Randy” Cox after he was paralyzed in the back of a police van in 2022.
Judge David Zagaja dropped the cases against Oscar Diaz, Jocelyn Lavandier and Luis Rivera after granting them a probation program that allows charges to be erased from defendants’ records, saying their conduct was not malicious. Two other officers, Betsy Segui and Ronald Pressley, pleaded guilty last year to misdemeanor reckless endangerment and received no jail time.
Cox, 40, was left paralyzed from the chest down on June 19, 2022, when the police van, which had no seat belts, braked hard to avoid an accident, sending him head-first into a metal partition while his hands were cuffed behind his back. He had been arrested on charges of threatening a woman with a gun, which were later dismissed.
“I can’t move. I’m going to die like this. Please, please, please help me,” Cox said in the van minutes after being injured, according to police video. He later was found to have broken his neck.
Diaz, who was driving the van, brought Cox to the police department, where officers mocked Cox and accused him of being drunk and faking his injuries, according to surveillance and body-worn camera footage. Officers dragged Cox out of the van and around the police station before placing him in a holding cell before paramedics brought him to a hospital.
Before pulling him out of the van, Lavandier told Cox to move his leg and sit up, according to an internal affairs investigation report. Cox says “I can’t move” and Lavandier says “You’re not even trying.”
New Haven State’s Attorney John P. Doyle Jr.’s office said prosecutors and Cox did not object to the charges being dismissed.
Defense lawyers said that while the officers were sympathetic to what happened to Cox, they did not cause his injuries or make them worse. The three officers whose cases were dismissed were scheduled to go on trial next month.
“We don’t think that there was sufficient evidence to prove her guilt or any wrongdoing,” said Lavandier’s attorney, Dan Ford. “This is a negotiated settlement that avoids the risk of having go through the emotional toll of a trial.”
Rivera’s lawyer, Raymond Hassett, called the decision to charge the officers “unjust and misplaced.”
“The actions of the Police Chief and City Mayor in targeting the officers were a misguided effort to deflect attention from the police department shortcomings in managing the department and ensuring proper protocols were in place and followed,” Hassett said in a statement.
Attorneys for Cox and Diaz did not immediately return phone and email messages Friday. Cox’s lawyer, Louis Rubano, has said Cox and his family hoped the criminal cases would end quickly with plea bargains.
New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker said city officials disagreed with the judge’s decision to dismiss the charges.
“What happened to Randy was tragic and awful,” he said in a statement.
The case drew outrage from civil rights advocates including the NAACP, along with comparisons to the Freddie Gray case in Baltimore. Cox is Black, while all five officers who were arrested are Black or Hispanic. Gray, who also was Black, died in 2015 after he suffered a spinal injury while handcuffed and shackled in a Baltimore police van.
New Haven police fired Segui, Diaz, Lavandier and Rivera for violating police conduct policies, while Pressley retired and avoided an internal investigation. Diaz appealed his firing and got his job back. Segui lost the appeal of her firing, while appeals by Lavandier and Rivera remain pending.
Guthrie lives on nearly an acre, in a brown-brick, ranch-style house with an attached garage, a short gravel driveway, and desert landscaping. She has been there since the mid-seventies. (Her husband died in 1988.) Her neighbors live within easy walking distance but their homes are barely visible, one to the next, because of folds in the hills and the density of trees and cacti. A sheriff’s cruiser was stationed in Guthrie’s driveway, its lights flashing. At the foot of the driveway, someone had erected a large sign, covered in protective plastic, that read “Dear Guthrie Family, your neighbors stand with you.” A painted stone read “Please pray.” Visitors were leaving potted plants and grocery-store flowers, many of them yellow, symbolizing hope for a safe return. Whenever someone new arrived at the tribute point, reporters pounced on them for comment.
By then, investigators had checked Guthrie’s flat, whitewashed roof and probed her septic tank with a long pole. They had towed away her car. They had searched Annie’s home, and re-searched Nancy’s. Two drones buzzed overhead, and a chopper was up. The public had been fed aerial views of the property: a tidy back-yard parabola of green grass that led to a gated swimming pool and aqua chaise longues; blue planters; an orange tree; a patio with string lights.
John Voorhies, a Tucsonian of sixty-two years, was standing in front of Guthrie’s home, watching the activity. He’d come with a friend—a paralegal and a TikToker who had driven seven hours, from Huntington Beach, California, to see the crime scene and opine about it. Voorhies, wearing an earpiece in his right ear, was listening to this friend live-stream while strolling up and down the street. Eventually, the TikToker stopped and pointed his cellphone camera at Guthrie’s home. The sobering details of the case included the fact that her doorbell camera was disconnected at 1:47 A.M., and that at 2:12 A.M. software detected motion, though it was unclear which software, or what this meant. At 2:28 A.M., Guthrie’s pacemaker disconnected from the app that monitored it, providing an important clue to when she was taken.
Leising described five reasons someone might commit a kidnapping: financial gain, ideology, domestic discord, exploitation (for example, sex trafficking), and “delusion,” or mental illness. One could not help wondering whether Savannah Guthrie’s prominence—at a time when President Donald Trump has spent the better part of a decade calling journalists “the enemy of the American people”—was a factor. Tucson is Savannah’s home town; she went to college and got her start in broadcasting here. In November, in a “Today” show feature, she included her sister and mother in a scene at El Charro, a historic restaurant, where she asked Guthrie what she likes about where she lives. Guthrie mentioned “the air, the quality of life—it’s laidback and gentle.” They toasted with prickly-pear margaritas.
On Monday, Savannah had posted another video on social media. This time she appeared alone, speaking extemporaneously as her family entered “another week of this nightmare.” Her hair and makeup were done. She was composed. The media was reporting that there was a 5 P.M. deadline for delivering six million dollars’ worth of bitcoin referenced in one of the so-called ransom notes. Savannah again mentioned faith, telling viewers that their prayers are “lifting” their mother, “even in this moment, and in this darkest place.” The Guthries believed that Nancy was “still out there.” Savannah begged the public for help: “We are at an hour of desperation.”
The images from the doorbell camera show the intruder approaching the alcoved entryway of Guthrie’s house with his head down, walking hunched over, as if trying to avoid his face being seen. In addition to the balaclava, gloves, and backpack, he’s got on a holster that is too big for what looks like a handgun inside it. He’s positioned the holster over his crotch—almost like you’d wear an athletic cup—which anyone with firearms training would recognize as amateurish. (“Tactically, it’s ridiculous,” Miller, the former F.B.I. official, said.) Reflector strips on his backpack catch a bit of ambient light, though the overhead porch light is off. He steps onto Guthrie’s doormat, reaches for the camera, and tries to cover it with his right hand. Then he turns and bends, looking for something on the ground, in the alcove, before stepping onto the front walkway and plucking stems and leaves from a withered plant in the landscaping. He walks back to the camera, with what appears to be a small flashlight between his lips, and tries to obscure the lens with that clump of dead greenery.
BOSTON — New England Patriots wide receiver Stefon Diggs is scheduled to be arraigned Friday in Massachusetts on felony strangulation and other criminal charges stemming from an alleged dispute with his personal chef.
The arraignment at Dedham District Court was postponed until after Super Bowl LX so Diggs could play in the NFL championship game.
According to court records, the woman told Dedham officers she and Diggs argued about money he owed her for her work as his private chef. During the Dec. 2 encounter at his home, she said, he “smacked her across the face” and then “tried to choke her using the crook of his elbow around her neck,” leaving her feeling short of breath.
Diggs’ arraignment was originally slated for Jan. 23 but was moved to Feb. 13 — five days after the Patriots’ 29-13 loss to the Seattle Seahawks — to accommodate his playing schedule.
Diggs’ attorney has said he “categorically denies these allegations,” calling them unsubstantiated and motivated by a financial dispute. The Patriots released a statement saying they support him.
Investigators allege the woman first reported the incident to police on Dec. 16, two weeks after it occurred; she initially hesitated to file charges but later chose to do so, according to court documents.
The arraignment Friday will be the first court appearance in the case. The judge is expected to address bail conditions and set future hearing dates.
Ring has canceled its partnership with Flock Safety, after receiving backlash for running a Super Bowl ad touting its Search Party feature. If you’ll recall, Ring revealed back in October 2025 that it was entering a partnership with the surveillance company, which would make it possible for law enforcement to ask smart doorbell owners for videos captured by their devices. In its announcement, the company said that the “planned Flock Safety integration would require significantly more time and resources than anticipated.” The decision to call off the partnership was mutual, Ring added, and Flock Safety’s integration was never launched. Apparently, no Ring customer footage was ever sent to Flock.
Under the partnership, law enforcement agencies using Flock’s Nova platform or FlockOS would have been able to use Ring’s Community Requests to ask for doorbell videos from users. They would have been asked to specify the location and timeframe of the incident, as well as provide a unique investigation code and the details about what is being investigated. Their requests would then be forwarded to relevant users, who could choose to share footage from their doorbell. Ring said the whole process would have been anonymous and optional.
Ring was known to have shared security cam videos to law enforcement without a court order or the device owner’s consent at least 11 times in the past. In 2024, however, it seemed to have walked back its police-friendly stance and said that it would stop sharing videos with the police without a warrant. This alliance with Flock would have marked a return to police collaboration after the company distanced itself from law enforcement. Flock is known for its automatic license plate readers and for centralizing the information it collects into a database that police can search without a warrant. While law enforcement says the system can help them solve crimes like kidnapping. 404Media reported last year that ICE has been using the database, citing immigration-related reasons.
While Ring’s official reason was that the Flock partnership would need more resources than expected, it’s worth noting that the company recently got flak for its Super Bowl Search Party ad. Ring touted it as a way to find lost dogs by using its cameras’ AI to identify pets running across their field of vision and then pooling feeds together to identify missing pets. While Search Party isn’t new and was announced last year, the ad sparked concerns about surveillance and how the tech could be misused, leading users to disable the feature for their cameras altogether.
AT THIS HOUR, AUTHORITIES IN ARIZONA ARE ASKING FOR ANY KIND OF VIDEO THAT COULD LEAD THEM TO NANCY GUTHRIE. ONE QUESTION IN THIS INVESTIGATION IS, WAS SHE KIDNAPED FOR RANSOM? THERE HAVE BEEN REPORTS OF RANSOM NOTES, BUT IT’S NOT CLEAR IF THE GUTHRIE FAMILY HAS PAID ANYTHING AT THIS POINT. WESH 2’S LINDSEY TALKED WITH A FORMER FBI AGENT ON HOW THAT COULD BE A CRITICAL PART OF THE INVESTIGATION. VERY VALUABLE TO US, AND WE WILL PAY THE MAJORITY OF US. WATCH THAT VIDEO POSTED BY SAVANNAH GUTHRIE AND HER SIBLINGS SATURDAY. AND ALL WE COULD THINK IS THAT POOR FAMILY. BUT LAW ENFORCEMENT AND TECH EXPERTS LIKE KYLE ARMSTRONG ALSO SEE AN OPPORTUNITY THERE TO BRING NANCY GUTHRIE HOME. THE PAYMENT IS MADE AND IT GOES THE BLOCKCHAIN WORLD. AT SOME POINT IT WILL BE CASHED OUT FOR FIAT CURRENCY. AND THAT’S THE OPPORTUNITY THAT LAW ENFORCEMENT WILL LOOK FOR. WHAT IS THE BLOCKCHAIN? ARMSTRONG, A FORMER FBI AGENT, NOW WORKS FOR TRM LABS, WHICH SPECIALIZES IN BLOCKCHAIN INTELLIGENCE. ANYTIME THERE’S A BITCOIN TRANSACTION, THAT TRANSACTION IS PUBLISHED ON THE OPEN INTERNET, AND THE BLOCKCHAIN IS ESSENTIALLY THE RECORDING OF THAT TRANSACTION. TRANSACTIONS ARE FROM ONE ADDRESS TO ANOTHER. AND ANONYMOUS, OFTEN 20 PLUS CHARACTERS ALPHANUMERIC THAT ARE HARD TO CRACK. THEY ARE COMPANY WORKS TO US TO FOLLOW THOSE TRANSACTIONS, TO MAKE IT EASY TO GRAPH THOSE TRANSACTIONS, AND SIMPLER TO EXPLAIN. BUT HOW QUICKLY CAN YOU TRACK IT? ONCE A TRANSACTION IS HAS BEEN MADE AND THERE IS A RECIPIENT ADDRESS, THEN YOU CAN BASICALLY FLAG THAT ADDRESS. AND THEN ANYTIME THE ASSETS MOVE, THAT FLAG WILL CARRY WITH THEM IN THE IN OUR INTERNAL SOFTWARE. AND SO EVEN IF IT MOVES TEN TIMES IN A CIRCUITOUS MANNER, WHEN THE FUNDS EVENTUALLY HIT ONE OF THESE EXCHANGES, THEY WILL KNOW. SO KYLE ARMSTRONG SAYS IF A SUSPECT DOES TRY TO WITHDRAW THAT MONEY, THE EXCHANGE WOULD THEN FREEZE IT AND IMMEDIATELY CONTACT POLICE. THAT IS REALLY INTERESTING. BUT WHAT HAPPENS IF THEY DON’T TRY TO WITHDRAW IT AND THEY TRY TO DO SOMETHING ELSE, OR BUY SOMETHING ELSE? REALLY GOOD QUESTION. BUT THINK ABOUT THIS. YOU CAN’T REALLY GO OUT RIGHT NOW AND BUY A CAR OR A HOME WITH BITCOIN. MAYBE THAT COULD HAPPEN IN THE FUTURE. EVENTUALLY YOU HAVE TO CASH SOMETHING OUT. AND IN FACT, ARMSTRONG POINTED TO A 2016 NEW YORK CASE WHERE IT’S BELIEVED A COUPLE STOLE CRYPTO BUT COULD NOT ACTUALLY SPEND IT. SO THEY STARTED BUYING UP GIFT CARDS. THE MOMENT THEY DID THAT, THERE WAS A RECORD. AND HE SAYS, YOU WILL BE
Nancy Guthrie disappearance: Former FBI agent weighs in on tracking ransom money
A former FBI agent who worked 14 years investigating illicit finance cases said the ransom note could be the opportunity to find “Today” show anchor Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy.It’s unclear if the Guthrie family has agreed to pay anyone, but there were reports of two ransom notes demanding payment in Bitcoin. Kyle Armstrong, who worked for the FBI, now works for a blockchain intelligence company called TRM Labs. “If a ransom is paid, I’m certain that there will be several investigators,” Armstrong said. “When money goes in, there’s not a lot of retail use of cryptocurrency, especially a sizable amount. You really can’t buy cars. You can’t go to fancy vacations. You can’t do a lot of retail things with crypto. Ultimately, you have to exchange the cryptocurrency, primarily for fiat currency, for regular U.S. dollars, euros, whatever it is. That presents, usually, the opportunity for law enforcement to learn who is controlling this account.”When there’s a transaction, it’s from one address to another that is anonymous, but TRM Labs has a tool that can help law enforcement decipher that. “Anytime there’s a Bitcoin transaction, that transaction is published on the open Internet, and the blockchain is essentially the recording of that transaction. Our company works to follow those transactions, to make it easy to graph those transactions and simpler to explain. And then ultimately, we try to identify who’s controlling the addresses,” Armstrong said. He said there are cases where they can even flag the transaction so it can follow multiple movements. “Anytime the assets move, that flag will carry with them in the internal software. So even if it moves 10 times in a circuitous manner, when the funds eventually hit one of these exchanges, and they will know those funds have been identified by law enforcement as illicit,” Armstrong said.
A former FBI agent who worked 14 years investigating illicit finance cases said the ransom note could be the opportunity to find “Today” show anchor Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy.
It’s unclear if the Guthrie family has agreed to pay anyone, but there were reports of two ransom notes demanding payment in Bitcoin.
Kyle Armstrong, who worked for the FBI, now works for a blockchain intelligence company called TRM Labs.
“If a ransom is paid, I’m certain that there will be several investigators,” Armstrong said. “When money goes in, there’s not a lot of retail use of cryptocurrency, especially a sizable amount. You really can’t buy cars. You can’t go to fancy vacations. You can’t do a lot of retail things with crypto. Ultimately, you have to exchange the cryptocurrency, primarily for fiat currency, for regular U.S. dollars, euros, whatever it is. That presents, usually, the opportunity for law enforcement to learn who is controlling this account.”
When there’s a transaction, it’s from one address to another that is anonymous, but TRM Labs has a tool that can help law enforcement decipher that.
“Anytime there’s a Bitcoin transaction, that transaction is published on the open Internet, and the blockchain is essentially the recording of that transaction. Our company works to follow those transactions, to make it easy to graph those transactions and simpler to explain. And then ultimately, we try to identify who’s controlling the addresses,” Armstrong said.
He said there are cases where they can even flag the transaction so it can follow multiple movements.
“Anytime the assets move, that flag will carry with them in the internal software. So even if it moves 10 times in a circuitous manner, when the funds eventually hit one of these exchanges, and they will know those funds have been identified by law enforcement as illicit,” Armstrong said.
BRUSSELS — Prosecutors have opened an investigation into the European Commission’s sale of 23 of its buildings to Belgium where it has dozens of premises, the European Union’s executive branch said on Thursday.
Belgium’s sovereign wealth fund SFPIM bought the buildings for around 900 million euros ($1 billion) in 2024 to help transform the European quarter of the capital, Brussels, “into a modern, attractive and greener area,” according to the European Commission.
The commission said in a statement that “the sale of the buildings followed established procedures and protocols, and we are confident that the process was conducted in a compliant manner.” It didn’t provide details about the investigation.
The institution underlined that it “is committed to transparency and accountability,” and promised to fully cooperate with the European Prosecutor’s Office, or EPPO, which investigates crimes against the EU’s financial interests.
The commission, which proposes EU laws and supervises the way they are applied, promised to provide “any information and assistance needed to ensure a thorough and independent investigation into this matter,” including with Belgian authorities.
The EPPO also declined to provide details about the inquiry so as “not to endanger the ongoing procedures and their outcome.” Spokesperson Lidija Globokar said only that prosecutors were “conducting evidence-collecting activities in an ongoing investigation.”
The Financial Times, citing “two people familiar with the operation,” reported that Belgian police conducted searches of different commission premises on Thursday, including the EU executive branch’s budget department.
The commission, which employs more than 30,000 people, still owns around 60 buildings in Brussels.
There are just 16 Flock Safety cameras in Thornton.
But those electronic eyes, mounted to poles at intersections throughout this city of nearly 150,000, brought out dozens of people to the Thornton Community Center for a discussion on how the controversial license plate-reading cameras are being used — and whether they should be used at all.
Law enforcement agencies cite the automatic license-plate readers, or ALPRs, as a powerful tool that bolsters their ability to locate and stop suspects who may be on their way to committing their next assault or robbery.
But Meg Moore, a six-year resident of the city who is helping spearhead opposition to Flock cameras, said she worries about how the rapidly spreading surveillance system is impacting residents’ privacy and Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures. Thornton’s Flock camera data can be seen by more than 1,600 other law enforcement agencies across the country.
“We want to make sure this is truly safe and effective,” she said in an interview.
The debate over Atlanta-based Flock Safety’s cameras, which not only can record license plate numbers but can search for the specific characteristics of a vehicle linked to an alleged crime, has been picking up steam in recent years. The discussions have largely played out in metro Denver and Front Range cities in recent months, but this year they reached the state Capitol, where lawmakers are pitching a couple of bills to tighten up rules around surveillance.
In Denver, Mayor Mike Johnston has been butting heads with the City Council over the issue. Johnston is so convinced of Flock’s value in combating crime that in October, he extended the contract with the company against the wishes of much of the council. Denver has 111 Flock cameras.
In Longmont, elected leaders took a different approach. Its City Council voted in December to pause all sharing of Flock Safety data with other municipalities, declined an expansion of its contract with the company and began searching for an alternative.
Louisville beat its Boulder County neighbor to the punch by several months, disabling its Flock cameras at the end of June and removing them by the start of October. City spokesman Derek Cosson said privacy concerns from residents largely drove the city’s decision.
Steve Mathias, a Thornton resident for nearly a decade, would like to see Flock’s cameras gone from his city. Short of that, he said, reliable controls on how the streetside data is collected, stored and shared are paramount.
“In our rush to make our community safe, we’re not getting the full picture of the risks we’re facing,” he said. “We’re making ourselves safe in some ways by making ourselves less safe in others.”
The hot-button debate in Thornton played out at last month’s community meeting and continued at a City Council meeting last week, where the city’s Police Department gave a presentation on the Flock system.
Cmdr. Chad Parker laid out several examples of Flock’s cameras being instrumental in apprehending bad actors — in cases ranging from homicide to sex assault to child exploitation to a $5,700 theft at a Nike store.
As recently as Monday, Thornton police announced on X that investigators had tracked down a man suspected of hitting and killing a 14-year-old boy who was riding a small motorized bike over the weekend. The agency said a Flock camera in Thornton gave officers a “strong lead” in identifying the hit-and-run suspect within 24 hours.
At the Feb. 3 council study session, police Chief Jim Baird described Flock’s camera system as “one of the best tools I’ve seen in 32 years of law enforcement.”
But that doesn’t sway those in Thornton who are wary of the camera network.
“I’m not a fan of building toward a surveillance state,” Mathias said.
The hazards of a system like Flock, he said, lie not just in the pervasive data-collection methods the company uses but also in who eventually might get to see and use that data — be it a rogue law enforcement officer or a hacker who manages to break into Flock’s database.
“A person who wants us to do us harm with this system will have as much capability as the police have to do good,” he said.
A Flock Safety license plate recognition camera is seen on a street light post on Ken Pratt Boulevard near the intersection with U.S. 287 in Longmont on Dec. 10, 2025. (Matthew Jonas/Daily Camera)
Crime-fighting tool or prone to misuse?
In November, a Columbine Valley police officer was disciplined after he accused a Denver woman of theft based in large part on evidence from Flock cameras, according to reporting from Fox31. The officer mistakenly claimed the woman had stolen a $25 package in a nearby town and said he’d used Flock cameras to track her car.
“It’s putting too much trust in the hands of people who don’t know what they’re doing,” DeFlock’s Will Freeman said of so many police agencies’ adoption of the technology.
Last summer, 9News reported that the Loveland Police Department had shared access to its Flock camera system with U.S. Border Patrol. That came two months after the station reported that the department gave the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives access to its account, which ATF agents then used to conduct searches for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Parker, the Thornton police commander, said any searches connected to immigration cases or to women from out of state who are seeking an abortion in Colorado — another scenario that’s been raised — “won’t ever touch our system.” State laws restrict cooperation with federal immigration authorities and with other states’ abortion-related investigations.
“Any situation I feel uncomfortable about or that might be in conflict with our policies or with Colorado law, I will revoke their access — no problem,” he said.
Thornton deputy city attorney Adam Stephens said motorists’ Fourth Amendment rights are not being violated by the city’s Flock camera network. During last week’s meeting, he cited several recent court cases that, in essence, determined that there is no right to privacy while driving down a public roadway.
In an interview, Stephens said Thornton was “in compliance with the law.”
Flock spokesman Paris Lewbel wrote in an email that the company was “proud to partner with the Thornton Police Department to provide technology used to investigate and solve crimes and to help locate missing persons.”
Lewbel provided links to two news stories about minor children who were abducted and then found with the help of Flock’s cameras in Thornton and elsewhere.
At the council’s study session last week, Parker provided more examples of Flock’s role in fighting crime and finding missing people in Thornton. They included police nabbing a suspect who had hit and killed a pedestrian, locating a burglar who was suspected of robbing several dispensaries, and tracking down an 89-year-old man with dementia who had gotten into his car and gotten lost.
“It allows us to find vehicles in a manner we weren’t able to previously,” Parker said of the camera network.
Thornton installed its first 10 Flock cameras in 2022 and then added five more — plus a mobile unit — two years later. The initial deployment was in response to a spike in auto thefts in the city, which peaked at 1,205 in 2022 (amid an overall surge in Colorado). Thornton recorded 536 auto thefts last year.
The city says Flock cameras have been involved in 200 cases that resulted in an arrest or a warrant application in Thornton over the last three years.
Thornton police have access to nearly 2,200 other agencies’ Flock systems across the United States, while nearly 1,650 law enforcement agencies can access Thornton’s Flock data, according to data provided by the city.
For Anaya Robinson, the public policy director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado, the networked nature of Flock cameras across wide geographies is a big part of the problem. By linking one police agency’s Flock technology with that of thousands of other police departments, it “creates a surveillance environment that could violate the Fourth Amendment.”
The sweeping nature of Flock’s surveillance is also worrisome, Robinson said.
“You’re not just collecting the data of vehicles that ping (a police department’s) hot list (of suspicious vehicles), you’re collecting the data of every vehicle that is caught on a Flock camera,” he said.
And because the technology is relatively inexpensive — Thornton pays $48,500 to Flock annually for its system — it’s an affordable crime-fighting tool for most communities. But that doesn’t mean it should be deployed, DeFlock’s Freeman said.
Fight remains a largely local one
State lawmakers are crafting bills this session to limit the reach of surveillance technologies like Flock’s.
Senate Bill 70 would put limits on access to databases and the sharing of information. It would prohibit a government from accessing a database that reveals an individual’s or a vehicle’s historical location information, and it would prohibit sharing that information with third parties or with government agencies outside the controlling entity’s jurisdiction. Certain exceptions would apply.
Senate Bill 71 would direct a “law enforcement agency to use surveillance technology only for lawful purposes directly related to public safety or for an active investigation.” It also would forbid the use of facial-recognition technology without a warrant and would place limits on the amount of time data can be retained.
Both bills await their first committee hearings.
Thornton says it doesn’t use facial recognition technology. Its Flock data is retained for 30 days.
Regardless of what passes at the state Capitol, the real fight over license plate readers of any type will likely continue to happen at the local level. Thornton’s council plans further discussions on Flock next month.
For Moore, the resident who is leading the charge against the cameras, potential surveillance of the immigrant community is what troubles her the most.
“We want to make sure we’re operating this so that it’s safe for all of our residents,” she said. “Getting rid of the cameras altogether is a tough sell. But there needs to be a conversation about guardrails.”
Mayor Pro Tem Roberta Ayala, a Thornton native, said she has heard a wide array of opinions from her constituents about the advantages and potential downsides of the technology.
“Could it be misused? Yes. Do we want to stop that? Yes,” she said.
But as a victim of crime herself, Ayala also knows the immense damage and disruption that crime causes victims and their families, be it a stolen vehicle or something much worse. And as a teacher, Ayala is concerned about achieving justice for the families of children who are harmed or abused.
“If it can save even five kids,” she said, “I want the cameras.”
Jalin Seabron, 23, died after Douglas County Deputy Nicholas Moore shot at him nine times while responding to reports of an active shooter at Main Event, striking him with seven bullets in the back and side. Seabron was not the shooter, but he was armed.
Seabron had pulled the gun out to defend his friends and family, who were celebrating his birthday with him at the arcade, 64 Centennial Blvd., according to the lawsuit.
A woman can also be heard in the video, crying out for Moore not to shoot.
The warnings to drop the weapon happened over roughly three seconds. When Seabron didn’t immediately respond and turned his head toward Moore, not appearing to raise his weapon from his side, the deputy started shooting.
“At the time Moore opened fire, Mr. Seabron still had his back to the deputy and had just barely started to turn his head in reaction to the yelled commands,” the lawsuit stated.
Moore “wrongly assumed” Seabron was the shooter and shot him without “verifying whether Mr. Seabron actually posed a threat, or providing Mr. Seabron a reasonable opportunity to comply with commands,” the lawsuit alleges. Seabron didn’t have time to process the orders, let alone obey them, the document claims.
George Brauchler, the 23rd Judicial District Attorney, declined to file criminal charges against Moore in April 2025, after a month-long investigation into the police shooting by the district’s critical incident response team, according to a decision letter he sent to Douglas County Sheriff Darren Weekly.
The deputy gave Seabron several commands to drop his gun, but the commands all happened within three seconds, according to the decision letter. Moore did not verbally identify himself as law enforcement, and did not use his sirens while responding to the scene, the letter confirms.
State law allows a police officer to forgo that announcement if they believe doing so “would unduly place peace officers at risk or would create a risk of death or injury to other persons,” Brauchler said during an April news conference.
The shooting inside the Highlands Ranch arcade started as a fight in the bathroom between Seabron’s stepsister, 23-year-old Nevaeha Crowley-Sanders, and a friend she had known since high school. Authorities said Crowley-Sanders pulled out a handgun and shot at the 22-year-old victim, her friend, eight times.
Crowley-Sanders was assaulted by a group of women in the restroom and fired her gun in self-defense, ending the altercation, according to the lawsuit. The woman shot by Crowley-Sanders survived her injuries, and Crowley-Sanders was charged with attempted murder.
The first calls to 911 about the shooting came in just before midnight on Feb. 8, 2025.
When Moore arrived, roughly 90 seconds later, “no one was running, as the shooting itself was over,” the lawsuit stated. Seabron had his gun in his hand to defend himself and his group against a woman involved in the bathroom fight who had come outside after, also armed with a gun that she pointed at Seabron.
“It was clear there was no active or ongoing threat,” the lawsuit alleges. “It was apparent that the person Deputy Moore killed was not the shooter.”
The civil lawsuit filed Monday in Douglas County District Court is seeking compensation for Moore’s use of excessive force and battery causing wrongful death. Moore is listed as the sole defendant in the complaint.
OOLTEWAH, Tenn. — A former New York Jets first-round draft pick was arrested in Tennessee and charged with first-degree murder in the death of his girlfriend.
Darron Lee was identified Thursday as the suspect and taken into custody at the scene, according to the Hamilton County sheriff’s office.
The victim’s identity was not released.
The 31-year-old Lee played 58 games with the Jets, Kansas City and Buffalo from 2016 through the 2020 seasons. The former Ohio State linebacker was the 20th overall pick in 2016 by the Jets. He was the defensive MVP of the 2015 Sugar Bowl.
Lee was charged with first-degree murder and tampering with evidence. Additional charges could be pending following the outcome of the investigation, the sheriff’s office said.
Upon arrival, first responders located a female victim and attempted life-saving measures.
“Due to the condition of the victim and the residence, HCSO Criminal Investigative Services Detectives responded. Preliminary findings indicate the victim’s death was the result of a homicide,” the Hamilton County sheriff’s office said in a statement.
Christopher P. Moynihan, 35, also agreed to serve three years of probation. During a hearing in the town court in Clinton, New York, he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor harassment charge, and sentencing was set for April 2.
Moynihan’s public defender did not immediately return an email seeking comment Thursday night. A message also was left at an email address in public records for Moynihan. A phone number for Moynihan in public records was not in service.
Moynihan, of Pleasant Valley, New York, was accused of sending a text message to another person in October about Jeffries’ appearance in New York City that week.
“I cannot allow this terrorist to live,” Moynihan wrote, according to a report by a state police investigator. Moynihan also wrote that Jeffries “must be eliminated” and texted, “I will kill him for the future,” the police report says.
Moynihan was originally charged with a felony, making a terrorist threat, but pleaded to a lesser crime.
“Threats against elected officials are not political speech, they are criminal acts that strike at the heart of public safety and our democratic system,” Dutchess County District Attorney Anthony Parisi said in a statement.
Moynihan was sentenced to nearly 2 years in prison for joining a mob’s Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. In January 2025, he was among hundreds of convicted Capitol rioters who were pardoned on the Republican president’s first day back in the White House.
A spokesperson for Jeffries, a New York Democrat, did not immediately return an email message Thursday night.
Eight people from metro Denver were indicted on federal charges related to drug trafficking, weapons and money laundering, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Colorado said Thursday.
The suspects — all current or former residents of Denver, Aurora, Commerce City and Wheat Ridge — are facing charges of conspiracy to distribute and possession with intent to distribute meth, fentanyl and cocaine, federal officials said in a news release.
Law enforcement officers arrested Dario Perez Quintero, 34; Guadalupe Mendoza Martinez, 46; Pedro Mendoza Martinez, 54; Abimael Felix Luque, 32; David Uvaldo Mora Sanchez, 32; Hector Joel Quijada Portillo, 30; Oscar Noel Ruelas Molina, 44; and Jose Alexis Guzman Felix, 30, this week, according to court records.
The indictment, filed Tuesday, includes additional charges related to drug possession and distribution, illegal firearm possession and money laundering, but it does not detail how investigators determined the eight suspects were identified as being involved in the scheme.
They face up to life in prison if convicted on the first count of conspiracy to distribute and possession with intent to distribute, federal officials said.
The case was investigated by multiple federal agencies through the Homeland Security Task Force, including Homeland Security Investigations, the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. — A police officer was killed and another was critically wounded Sunday in a shootout at a hotel in suburban Atlanta.
Gwinnett County police said in a statement that gunfire broke out early Sunday after two officers were dispatched on a call reporting fraud at the address of a hotel near Stone Mountain, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) northeast of Atlanta.
When the officers arrived, police said, they encountered a person who drew a gun and shot both officers. The officers returned fire, wounding the suspect. One of the officers was killed, the police statement said, and the other was hospitalized Sunday in critical but stable condition.
Police said the suspect was also being treated for a gunshot wound. No other injuries were reported.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp said he was mourning the death and praying for the recovery of the second officer.
“This is the latest reminder of the dangers law enforcement face on a daily basis, and we are grateful for every one that puts themselves in harm’s way to protect their fellow Georgians,” Kemp said on the social platform X.
Police did not immediately release any further information, including the names of the officers or the suspect.
The shooting investigation was turned over to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which typically handles shootings involving police officers in Georgia.
A man was sentenced four years in federal prison Friday after he admitted to lighting a Molotov cocktail and throwing it at Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies during a protest last year against immigration raids.
Emiliano Garduño Gálvez, 23, pleaded guilty in October to one count each of possessing an unregistered destructive device and obstructing law enforcement during a civil disorder. Federal authorities said Gálvez is an immigrant from Mexico in the U.S. illegally, having entered more than a decade ago and staying beyond the time permitted in his visa.
“This defendant’s reckless behavior threatened the lives and safety of law enforcement officers and that of a lawful protester,” Bill Essayli, the first assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, said in a statement. “My office remains steadfast in its efforts to prosecute and punish those who commit acts of violence against others.”
The events occurred in June, when Border Patrol agents convened near Home Depot in Paramount, drawing protesters.
According to the U.S. attorney’s office, the group threw objects like rocks and cinder block chunks at federal and local law enforcement officers, and set off fireworks. Authorities declared the protest an unlawful assembly.
The U.S. attorney’s office said Gálvez was hiding behind a stone wall when he lit and threw a Molotov cocktail toward sheriff’s deputies, who were engaging in crowd control. The incendiary device landed in a grassy area near a protester’s foot, about 15 feet from sheriff’s deputies. Gálvez then fled the area.
Federal prosecutors had argued in a sentencing memorandum for Gálvez to serve a longer sentence — more than seven years — because of the seriousness of his offenses. Video recordings appear to show that the flaming wick separated from the bottle after he threw it.
“Defendant endangered everyone — law enforcement and civilians in the area — and is lucky that, despite his actions, no one was injured,” the prosecutors’ sentencing memo said.
Gálvez’s federal public defenders asked for a more lenient sentence of three years, saying in a sentencing memo that he was “caught up in a historic social movement and under the influence of Brandy and nitrous oxide,” and now “readily admits and acknowledges how serious his actions were and the harm that could have ensued.”
COLORADO CITY, Ariz. — The prairie dresses, walled compounds and distrust of outsiders that were once hallmarks of two towns on the Arizona-Utah border are mostly gone.
These days, Colorado City, Arizona, and neighboring Hildale, Utah, look much like any other town in this remote and picturesque area near Zion National Park, with weekend soccer games, a few bars, and even a winery.
Until courts wrested control of the towns from a polygamous sect whose leader and prophet, Warren Jeffs, was imprisoned for sexually assaulting two girls, youth sports, cocktail hours and many other common activities were forbidden. The towns have transformed so quickly that they were released from court-ordered supervision last summer, almost two years earlier than expected.
It wasn’t easy.
“What you see is the outcome of a massive amount of internal turmoil and change within people to reset themselves,” said Willie Jessop, a onetime spokesman for the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints who later broke with the sect. “We call it ‘life after Jeffs’ — and, frankly, it’s a great life.”
Some former members have fond memories of growing up in the FLDS, describing mothers who looked out for each other’s kids and playing sports with other kids in town.
But they say things got worse after Jeffs took charge following his father’s death in 2002. Families were broken apart by church leaders who cast out men deemed unworthy and reassigned their wives and children to others. On Jeffs’ orders, children were pulled from public school, basketball hoops were taken down, and followers were told how to spend their time and what to eat.
“It started to go into a very sinister, dark, cult direction,” said Shem Fischer, who left the towns in 2000 after the church split up his father’s family. He later returned to open a lodge in Hildale.
Church members settled in Colorado City and Hildale in the 1930s so they could continue practicing polygamy after the sect broke away from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the mainstream Mormon church that renounced plural marriage in 1890.
Stung by the public backlash from a disastrous 1953 raid on the FLDS, authorities turned a blind eye to polygamy in the towns until Jeffs took over.
After being charged in 2005 with arranging the marriage of a teenage girl to a 28-year-old follower who was already married, Jeffs went on the run, making the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list before his arrest the next year. In 2011, he was convicted in Texas of sexually assaulting two girls ages 12 and 15 and sentenced to life in prison.
Even years after Jeffs’ arrest, federal prosecutors accused the towns of being run as an arm of the church and denying non-followers basic services such as building permits, water hookups and police protection. In 2017, the court placed the towns under supervision, excising the church from their governments and shared police department. Separately, supervision of a trust that controlled the church’s real estate was turned over to a community board, which has been selling it.
The towns functioned for 90 years largely as a theocracy, so they had to learn how to operate “a first-generation representative government,” Roger Carter, the court-appointed monitor, pointed out in his progress reports.
The FLDS had controlled most of the towns’ land through a trust, allowing its leaders to dictate where followers could live, so private property ownership was new to many. People unaccustomed to openness and government policies needed clarification about whether decisions were based on religious affiliation.
Although the towns took direction from the sect in the past, their civic leaders now prioritize residents’ needs, Carter wrote before the court lifted the oversight last July.
With its leader in prison and stripped of its control over the towns, many FLDS members left the sect or moved away. Other places of worship have opened, and practicing FLDS members are now believed to account for only a small percentage of towns’ populations.
Hildale Mayor Donia Jessop, who was once distantly related to Willie Jessop through marriage, said the community has made huge strides. Like others, she has reconnected with family members who were divided by the church and quit talking to each other.
When a 2015 flood in Hildale killed 13 people, she was one of many former residents who returned to help look for missing loved ones. She got a chance to visit with a sister she hadn’t seen in years.
“We started to realize that the love was still there — that my sister that I hadn’t been able to speak to for in so many years was still my sister, and she missed me as bad as I missed her,” the mayor said. “And it just started to open doors that weren’t open before.”
Longtime resident Isaac Wyler said after the FLDS expelled him in 2004, he was ostracized by the people he grew up with, a local store wouldn’t sell him animal feed, he was refused service at a burger joint and police ignored his complaints that his farm was being vandalized.
Things are very different now, he said. For one thing, his religious affiliation no longer factors into his encounters with police, Wyler said. And that feed store, burger joint and the FLDS-run grocery store have been replaced by a big supermarket, bank, pharmacy, coffee shop and bar.
“Like a normal town,” he said.
People with no FLDS connections have also been moving in.
Gabby Olsen, who grew up in Salt Lake City, first came to the towns in 2016 as an intern for a climbing and canyoneering guide service. She was drawn to the mountains and canyons, clean air and 300 days of sunshine each year.
She said people asked “all the time” whether she was really going to move to a place known for polygamy, but it didn’t bother her.
“When you tell people, ‘Hey, we’re getting married in Hildale,’ they kind of chuckle, because they just really don’t know what it’s about,” said Olsen’s husband, Dion Obermeyer, who runs the service with her. “But of course when they all came down here, they’re all quite surprised. And you’re like, ‘Oh yeah, there’s a winery.’”
Even with the FLDS’ influence waning, it’s not completely gone and the towns are dealing with some new problems.
Residents say the new openness has brought common societal woes such as drug use to Hildale and Colorado City.
And some people are still practicing polygamy: A Colorado City sect member with more than 20 spiritual “wives,” including 10 underage girls, was sentenced in late 2024 to 50 years in prison for coercing girls into sexual acts and other crimes.
Briell Decker, who was 18 when she became Jeffs’ 65th “wife” in an arranged marriage, turned her back on the church. These days, she works for a residential support center in Colorado City that serves people leaving polygamy.
Now 40 and remarried with a child, Decker said she thinks it will take several generations to recover from the FLDS’ abuses under Jeffs.
“I do think they can, but it’s going to take a while because so many people are in denial,” Decker said. “Still, they want to blame somebody. They don’t really want to take accountability.” ___
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.
ESSEX — For Maureen Flatley , there is possibly no task greater than protecting children.
Flatley, who has lived in Essex since 2002, was recently named president of the Washington, D.C.-based organization Stop Child Predators. She comes to the position as the organization celebrates 20 years of child protection advocacy.
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Senate Democrats are threatening to block legislation that would fund the Department of Homeland Security and several other agencies Thursday, potentially bringing the government a step closer to a partial shutdown if Republicans and the White House do not agree to new restrictions on President Donald Trump’s surge of immigration enforcement.As the country reels from the deaths of two protesters at the hands of federal agents in Minneapolis, irate Senate Democrats laid out a list of demands ahead of a Thursday morning test vote, including that officers take off their masks and identify themselves and obtain warrants for arrest. If those are not met, Democrats say they are prepared to block the wide-ranging spending bill, denying Republicans the votes they need to pass it and triggering a shutdown at midnight on Friday.Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said Wednesday that Democrats won’t provide needed votes until U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is “reined in and overhauled.”“The American people support law enforcement, they support border security, they do not support ICE terrorizing our streets and killing American citizens,” Schumer said.There were some signs of possible progress as the White House has appeared open to trying to strike a deal with Democrats to avert a shutdown. The two sides were talking as of Wednesday evening, according to a person familiar with the negotiations who requested anonymity to speak about the private talks. One possible option discussed would be to strip the funding for the Homeland Security Department from the larger bill, as Schumer has requested, and extend it for a short period to allow time for negotiations, the person said. The rest of the bill would fund government agencies until September.Still, with no agreement yet and an uncertain path ahead, the standoff threatened to plunge the country into another shutdown just two months after Democrats blocked a spending bill over expiring federal health care subsidies, a dispute that closed the government for 43 days as Republicans refused to negotiate.That shutdown ended when a small group of moderate Democrats broke away to strike a deal with Republicans, but Democrats are more unified this time after the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good by federal agents.Democrats lay out their demandsThere’s a lot of “unanimity and shared purpose” within the Democratic caucus, Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith said after a lunch meeting Wednesday.“Boil it all down, what we are talking about is that these lawless ICE agents should be following the same rules that your local police department does,” Smith said. “There has to be accountability.”Amid the administration’s immigration crackdown, Schumer said Democrats are asking the White House to “end roving patrols” in cities and coordinate with local law enforcement on immigration arrests, including requiring tighter rules for warrants.Democrats also want an enforceable code of conduct so agents are held accountable when they violate rules. Schumer said agents should be required to have “masks off, body cameras on” and carry proper identification, as is common practice in most law enforcement agencies.The Democratic caucus is united in those “common sense reforms” and the burden is on Republicans to accept them, Schumer said, as he has pushed for the Homeland spending to be separated out to avoid a broader shutdown.Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has indicated that he might be open to considering some of the Democrats’ demands, but he encouraged Democrats and the White House to talk and find agreement.Many obstacles to a dealAs the two sides negotiated, it was still unclear whether they could agree on anything that would satisfy Democrats who want Trump’s aggressive crackdown to end.The White House had invited some Democrats for a discussion to better understand their positions and avoid a partial government shutdown, a senior White House official said, but the meeting did not happen. The official requested anonymity to discuss the private invitation.The House passed the six remaining funding bills last week and sent them to the Senate as a package, making it more difficult to strip out the homeland security portion as Democrats have demanded. Republicans could break the package apart with the consent of all 100 senators or through a series of votes that would extend past the Friday deadline.Even if the Senate can resolve the issue, House Republicans have said they do not want any changes to the bill they have passed. In a letter to Trump on Tuesday, the conservative House Freedom Caucus wrote that its members stand with the president and ICE.“The package will not come back through the House without funding for the Department of Homeland Security,” according to the letter.Republican oppositionSeveral Republican senators have said they would be fine with Democrats’ request to separate the Homeland Security funds for further debate and pass the other bills in the package. But it might be more difficult to for Democrats to find broad GOP support for their demands on ICE.North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis said he’s OK with separating the bills, but is opposed to the Democrats’ proposal to require the immigration enforcement officers to unmask and show their faces, even as he blamed Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem for decisions that he said are “tarnishing” the agency’s reputation.“You know, there’s a lot of vicious people out there, and they’ll take a picture of your face, and the next thing you know, your children or your wife or your husband are being threatened at home,” Tillis said. “And that’s just the reality of the world that we’re in.”Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said that “what happened over the weekend is a tragedy,” but Democrats shouldn’t punish Americans with a shutdown and a “political stunt.”Democrats say they won’t back down.“It is truly a moral moment,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. “I think we need to take a stand.”___Associated Press writer Michelle Price in Washington contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON —
Senate Democrats are threatening to block legislation that would fund the Department of Homeland Security and several other agencies Thursday, potentially bringing the government a step closer to a partial shutdown if Republicans and the White House do not agree to new restrictions on President Donald Trump’s surge of immigration enforcement.
As the country reels from the deaths of two protesters at the hands of federal agents in Minneapolis, irate Senate Democrats laid out a list of demands ahead of a Thursday morning test vote, including that officers take off their masks and identify themselves and obtain warrants for arrest. If those are not met, Democrats say they are prepared to block the wide-ranging spending bill, denying Republicans the votes they need to pass it and triggering a shutdown at midnight on Friday.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said Wednesday that Democrats won’t provide needed votes until U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is “reined in and overhauled.”
“The American people support law enforcement, they support border security, they do not support ICE terrorizing our streets and killing American citizens,” Schumer said.
There were some signs of possible progress as the White House has appeared open to trying to strike a deal with Democrats to avert a shutdown. The two sides were talking as of Wednesday evening, according to a person familiar with the negotiations who requested anonymity to speak about the private talks. One possible option discussed would be to strip the funding for the Homeland Security Department from the larger bill, as Schumer has requested, and extend it for a short period to allow time for negotiations, the person said. The rest of the bill would fund government agencies until September.
Still, with no agreement yet and an uncertain path ahead, the standoff threatened to plunge the country into another shutdown just two months after Democrats blocked a spending bill over expiring federal health care subsidies, a dispute that closed the government for 43 days as Republicans refused to negotiate.
That shutdown ended when a small group of moderate Democrats broke away to strike a deal with Republicans, but Democrats are more unified this time after the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good by federal agents.
Democrats lay out their demands
There’s a lot of “unanimity and shared purpose” within the Democratic caucus, Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith said after a lunch meeting Wednesday.
“Boil it all down, what we are talking about is that these lawless ICE agents should be following the same rules that your local police department does,” Smith said. “There has to be accountability.”
Amid the administration’s immigration crackdown, Schumer said Democrats are asking the White House to “end roving patrols” in cities and coordinate with local law enforcement on immigration arrests, including requiring tighter rules for warrants.
Democrats also want an enforceable code of conduct so agents are held accountable when they violate rules. Schumer said agents should be required to have “masks off, body cameras on” and carry proper identification, as is common practice in most law enforcement agencies.
The Democratic caucus is united in those “common sense reforms” and the burden is on Republicans to accept them, Schumer said, as he has pushed for the Homeland spending to be separated out to avoid a broader shutdown.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has indicated that he might be open to considering some of the Democrats’ demands, but he encouraged Democrats and the White House to talk and find agreement.
Many obstacles to a deal
As the two sides negotiated, it was still unclear whether they could agree on anything that would satisfy Democrats who want Trump’s aggressive crackdown to end.
The White House had invited some Democrats for a discussion to better understand their positions and avoid a partial government shutdown, a senior White House official said, but the meeting did not happen. The official requested anonymity to discuss the private invitation.
The House passed the six remaining funding bills last week and sent them to the Senate as a package, making it more difficult to strip out the homeland security portion as Democrats have demanded. Republicans could break the package apart with the consent of all 100 senators or through a series of votes that would extend past the Friday deadline.
Even if the Senate can resolve the issue, House Republicans have said they do not want any changes to the bill they have passed. In a letter to Trump on Tuesday, the conservative House Freedom Caucus wrote that its members stand with the president and ICE.
“The package will not come back through the House without funding for the Department of Homeland Security,” according to the letter.
Republican opposition
Several Republican senators have said they would be fine with Democrats’ request to separate the Homeland Security funds for further debate and pass the other bills in the package. But it might be more difficult to for Democrats to find broad GOP support for their demands on ICE.
North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis said he’s OK with separating the bills, but is opposed to the Democrats’ proposal to require the immigration enforcement officers to unmask and show their faces, even as he blamed Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem for decisions that he said are “tarnishing” the agency’s reputation.
“You know, there’s a lot of vicious people out there, and they’ll take a picture of your face, and the next thing you know, your children or your wife or your husband are being threatened at home,” Tillis said. “And that’s just the reality of the world that we’re in.”
Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said that “what happened over the weekend is a tragedy,” but Democrats shouldn’t punish Americans with a shutdown and a “political stunt.”
Democrats say they won’t back down.
“It is truly a moral moment,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. “I think we need to take a stand.”
___
Associated Press writer Michelle Price in Washington contributed to this report.
HUDSON, N.H. — A Staten Island man is being held without bail after police said he carried out a coordinated retail theft operation, stealing 455 containers of over-the-counter medications from Walmart and several Hannaford grocery stores before fleeing from officers.
The Hudson Police said they arrested 28-year-old Yasin Shearin after Walmart employees on Lowell Road reported a “repeat theft suspect” they wanted removed for trespassing. When officers approached him, Shearin displayed a New York driver’s license on his phone, but the photo did not match him, and he struggled to answer questions about his identity, including his Social Security number, according to a police affidavit.
Police said they linked him to a prior felony theft at the same Walmart involving nearly $1,500 in merchandise on Oct. 29. According to the affidavit, during that prior incident, the store’s asset protection employee took surveillance of Shearin placing items into a tote and walking past all points of sale. The employee told police Shearin appeared to be attempting the same method again on Dec. 17, concealing Zyrtec inside a closed tote.
Police said the store’s asset protection employee also alleged Shearin had “numerous open cases around the area regarding past thefts with Walmart.”
As police moved to arrest him, Shearin allegedly resisted and ran from the store. Officers chased him across the parking lot and apprehended him by the nearby McDonald’s.
Police said Shearin tried to get into a black 2025 Nissan SUV with New York plates during the chase. The vehicle was seized, and a search warrant allegedly uncovered 455 items of over-the-counter medications — Tylenol, Zyrtec, Nexium, Nicorette, Motrin, Dulcolax, Nexium, Pepcid, Breathe Right nasal strips and more — packed into bags.
Police said they also found marijuana and what they believe to be butane hash oil.
The affidavit states GPS data obtained from the vehicle showed it had stopped at several Walmart and Hannaford supermarkets in New Hampshire, including locations in Salem, Bedford, Seabrook, Manchester, Derry, Londonderry and Hudson.
Surveillance footage from the Hudson store showed Shearin entering alone, heading directly to the vitamin and health aisle, and concealing medications in a blue bag hidden inside a shopping cart before walking out without paying, according to the affidavit.
Police later matched the blue bag to one allegedly seized from the SUV.
Shearin was arraigned in the 9th Circuit Nashua District Court on Friday. Court documents state he entered a not-guilty plea to willful concealment, a Class A misdemeanor, and no pleas to receiving stolen property ($1,501 or more), a Class A felony, and organized retail crime enterprise and theft by unauthorized taking ($1,001-$1,501), both Class B felonies.
A judge ordered him held without bail, citing his risk of flight, multiple open cases in other states, and what was described as a safety risk to himself and the community if released.
Shearin was appointed a public defender, Alex Charles Fernald, who was not immediately available for comment.
Follow Aaron Curtis on X @aselahcurtis, or on Bluesky @aaronscurtis.bsky.social.
HAVERHILL — After a seven-month investigation, the Essex County District Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday that criminal charges will not be pursued against local police officers involved in the July 11 incident that preceded the death of Francis Gigliotti.
District Attorney Paul Tucker said criminal charges “are not supportable and will not be pursued” following an investigation of the police encounter led by use-of-force expert Eric P. Daigle.
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SANTA ANA, Calif. — A former Canadian Olympic snowboarder pleaded not guilty to running a billion-dollar drug trafficking ring and orchestrating multiple killings, as one of the FBI’s top fugitives made his first U.S. court appearance Monday since he was arrested in Mexico last week and flown to California.
U.S. authorities say Ryan Wedding, who competed in a single event for his home country in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, had been hiding in Mexico for more than a decade. He was added to the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list last March when authorities offered a $15 million reward for information leading to his arrest and conviction.
Authorities say Wedding moved as much as 60 tons of cocaine between Colombia, Mexico, Canada and Southern California and believe he was working under the protection of the Sinaloa Cartel, one of Mexico’s most powerful drug rings. His drug trafficking group was the largest supplier of cocaine to Canada, according to a 2024 indictment.
Mexican officials said he turned himself in at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City last week and was flown to Southern California after a yearlong effort by authorities in the United States, Mexico, Canada, Colombia and the Dominican Republic to arrest him.
When speaking to reporters Monday outside the federal court in Santa Ana, southeast of Los Angeles, Wedding’s defense attorney Anthony Colombo disputed that his client had turned himself in in Mexico and said he was living in Mexico, not hiding out there.
“He was arrested,” Colombo said after the brief hearing, offering no further details. “He did not surrender.”
Colombo said his client was in “good spirits” but added that “this has been a whirlwind for Mr. Wedding.”
Federal prosecutors declined to comment after the hearing. Wedding was scheduled to be back in court Feb. 11 and a trial date was set for Mar. 24.
Wedding arrived in court wearing a tan jail jumpsuit with his ankles chained. He smiled briefly, then clasped his hands and leaned back in his chair before reviewing papers with his attorney. When asked by U.S. Magistrate John D. Early if he read the indictments filed against him, Wedding answered, “I’ve read them both, yes.”
The judge ordered him held in custody, saying he could not immediately find conditions that would ensure public safety or Wedding’s appearance in court. He said he could consider bond if Wedding seeks it later.
Mexico has increasingly sent detained cartel members to the U.S. as the country attempts to offset mounting threats by U.S. President Donald Trump, who said last month U.S. forces “will now start hitting land” south of the border to target drug trafficking rings.
Wedding was indicted in 2024 on federal charges of running a criminal enterprise, murder, conspiring to distribute cocaine and other crimes. U.S. authorities allege in court papers that Wedding’s group obtained cocaine from Colombia and worked with Mexican cartels to move drugs by boat and plane to Mexico and then into the U.S. using semitrucks. The group stored cocaine in Southern California before sending it to Canada and other U.S. states, according to the indictment.
The murder charges accuse Wedding of directing the 2023 killings of two members of a Canadian family in retaliation for a stolen drug shipment, and for ordering a killing over a drug debt in 2024. Last year, Wedding was indicted on new charges of orchestrating the killing of a witness in Colombia to help him avoid extradition to the U.S.
Wedding was previously convicted in the U.S. of conspiracy to distribute cocaine and sentenced to prison in 2010. Online records show he was released from Bureau of Prisons custody in 2011.
In Canada, Wedding faces separate drug charges dating back to 2015.
BOSTON — Massachusetts is among a minority of states where you can lose your driver’s license for unpaid parking tickets, tolls and other minor violations.
But advocates want to change that. A proposal on Beacon Hill would effectively end debt-based driving restrictions by prohibiting the state Registry of Motor Vehicles from suspending drivers’ licenses over unpaid fines for non-criminal infractions.
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