LAWRENCE — The suspect in a stabbing Sunday morning was captured after police officers with specialized SWAT team training were deployed to a Kent Street home, police said.
Police Chief Maurice Aguiler said a man suspected of stabbing another man in the vicinity of South Union and Kent streets was taken into custody by Lawrence Police Department entry team members at 2:30 p.m. Sunday.
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In Algeria, water shortages left faucets dry, prompting protesters to riot and set tires ablaze.
In Gaza, as people waited for water at a community tap, an Israeli drone fired on them, killing eight.
In Ukraine, Russian rockets slammed into the country’s largest dam, unleashing a plume of fire over the hydroelectric plant and causing widespread blackouts.
These are some of the 420 water-related conflicts researchers documented for 2024 in the latest update of the Pacific Institute’s Water Conflict Chronology, a global database of water-related violence.
The year featured a record number of violent incidents over water around the world, far surpassing the 355 in 2023, continuing a steeply rising trend. The violence more than quadrupled in the last five years.
In 2024, there were 420 water-related conflicts globally
The majority of incidents were in the Middle East, Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Eastern Europe.
Russia and Ukraine
51 conflicts
Russia and Ukraine
51 conflicts
Pacific Institute
Sean Greene LOS ANGELES TIMES
The new data from the Oakland-based water think tank show also that drinking water wells, pipes and dams are increasingly coming under attack.
“In almost every region of the world, there is more and more violence being reported over water,” said Peter Gleick, the Pacific Institute’s co-founder and senior fellow, and it “underscores the urgent need for international attention.”
The researchers collect information from news reports and other sources and accounts. They classify it into three categories: instances in which water was a trigger of violence, water systems were targeted and water was a “casualty” of violence, for example when shell fragments hit a water tank.
Not every case involves injuries or deaths but many do.
The region with the most violent incidents was the Middle East, with 138 reported. That included 66 in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, both in Gaza and the West Bank.
In the West Bank there were numerous reports of Israeli settlers destroying water pipelines and tanks and attacking Palestinian farmers.
Gleick noted that when the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders last year, accusing them of crimes against humanity, the charges mentioned Israeli military attacks on Gaza water systems.
“It is an acknowledgment that these attacks are violations of international law,” he said. “There ought to be more enforcement of international laws protecting water systems from attacks.”
Water systems also were targeted frequently in the Russia-Ukraine war, in which the researchers tallied 51 violent incidents.
Residents collect water in bottles in Pokrovsk, Ukraine, where repeated Russian shelling has left civilians without functioning infrastructure.
(George Ivanchenko / Associated Press)
Russian strikes disrupted water service in Ukrainian cities, and oil spilled into a river after Russian forces attacked an oil depot.
“These aren’t water wars. These are wars in which water is being used as a weapon or is a casualty of the conflict,” Gleick said.
The researchers also found water scarcity and drought are prompting a growing number of violent conflicts.
“Climate change is making those problems worse,” Gleick said.
Many conflicts were in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa.
In India, residents angry about water shortages assaulted a city worker.
In Jammu, India, a woman carries a container of drinking water filled from leaking water pipes in March.
(Channi Anand / Associated Press)
In Cameroon, rice farmers clashed with fishers, leaving one dead and three injured.
At a refugee camp in Kenya, three people died in a fight over drinking water.
There’s an increase in conflicts over irrigation, disputes pitting farmers against cities, and violence arising in places where only some water is safe to drink.
A man carries jugs to fetch water from a hole in the sandy riverbed in Makueni County, Kenya in February 2024.
(Brian Inganga / Associated Press)
Gleick, who has been studying water-related violence for more than three decades, said the purpose of the list is to raise awareness and encourage policymakers to act to reduce fighting, bloodshed and turmoil.
“The failure to do that is inexcusable and it contributes to a lot of misery,” Gleick said. “It contributes to ill health, cholera, dysentery, typhoid, water-related diseases, and it contributes to conflicts over water.”
In Latin America, there were dozens of violent incidents involving water last year.
In the Mexican state of Veracruz, protesters were blocking a road to denounce a pork processing plant, which they accused of using too much water and spewing pollution, when police opened fire, killing two men.
In Honduras, environmental activist Juan López, who had spoken up to protect rivers from mining, was gunned down as he left church. He was the fourth member of his group to be murdered.
A man fills containers with water because of a shortage caused by high temperatures and drought in Veracruz, Mexico in June 2024.
(Felix Marquez / Associated Press)
“There needs to be more attention on this issue, especially at the international level, but at the national level as well,” said Morgan Shimabuku, a senior researcher with the Pacific Institute. “It is getting worse, and we need to turn that tide.”
For 2024, there were few events in the U.S., but among them were cyberattacks on water utilities in Texas and Indiana.
In one, Russian hackers claimed responsibility for tampering with an Indiana wastewater treatment plant. Authorities said the attack caused minimal disruption. In another, a pro-Russian hacktivist group manipulated systems at water facilities in small Texas towns, causing water to overflow.
The Pacific Institute’s database now lists more than 2,750 conflicts. Most have occurred since 2000. The researchers are adding incidents from 2025 as well as previous years.
During extreme drought in Iran worsened by climate change, farmers were desperate enough to go up against security forces, demanding access to river water. Iran’s water crisis, compounded by decades of excessive groundwater pumping, has grown so severe that the president said Tehran no longer can remain the capital and the government will have to move it to another city.
Tensions also have been growing between Iran and Afghanistan over the Helmand River, with Iranian leaders accusing their upstream neighbor of not letting enough water flow into the country.
Gleick said if the drought persists and the Iranian government doesn’t improve how it manages water, “I would expect to see more violence.”
BOSTON — Beacon Hill lawmakers are moving to increase protections for health care workers in response to skyrocketing acts of violence against nurses and other hospital staff in recent years.
A proposal approved by the state House of Representatives last week would set new criminal charges specifically for violence and intimidation against health care workers and require hospitals and state public health officials to establish new standards for dealing with security risks at medical facilities.
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MEXICO CITY (AP) — Hundreds of women marched through Mexico City’s streets Tuesday to protest violence against women in a country where gender violence remains pervasive.
Among the hundreds of marchers clad in purple or with green bandanas, some beat drums and others carried signs. One read: “Today I am the voice of those who are asking for help.”
“I am here for my grandmother, for my mother, for all of the women who aren’t here anymore, for all the women who report (violence) and aren’t supported,” said Alin Rocha, a 41-year-old teacher, who marched on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women.
Gender violence and equality have received more attention since President Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico’s first female leader, took office last year. But even Sheinbaum was groped by a drunken man as she walked in the capital’s historic center earlier this month.
On Tuesday, she gathered governors from Mexico’s 32 states to report on progress to make sexual harassment a crime in every state. “Changing the laws is not enough, but it is necessary,” she said.
Miriam González, a 41-year-old doctor, said that even though a woman had made it to the presidency, “nothing has changed.”
Mexico’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography said in 2021, 70% of Mexican women and girls older than 15 reported they had experienced some kind of violence – nearly half of it sexual in nature.
Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
BOSTON — Beacon Hill lawmakers are moving to increase protections for health care workers in response to skyrocketing acts of violence against nurses and other hospital staff in recent years.
A proposal approved by the state House of Representatives last week would set new criminal charges specifically for violence and intimidation against health care workers and require hospitals and state public health officials to establish new standards for dealing with security risks at medical facilities.
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PEABODY — Many of 14-year-old Jason Bernard’s happiest memories were at the Captain Samuel Brown Elementary School down the street from his house. Now, a bench in his memory will forever sit outside of the school.
Jason’s family, friends, city officials and other community members dedicated the bench on Saturday morning—two days before he would have turned 15.
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BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — A University of Alabama at Birmingham football player stabbed two teammates Saturday morning hours before the team’s game against the University of South Florida, the university said in a statement.
The two wounded players were in stable condition, interim head coach Alex Mortensen said at the postgame news conference. He said the team decided to play to honor graduating seniors in the last home game of the season, though several players opted to sit it out due to the incident.
The teammate suspected in the stabbing was in custody, the university said. The school did not release the names of the players involved.
Daniel Mincey, an offensive lineman who transferred to UAB in May, was arrested and booked on charges of aggravated assault and attempted murder in the afternoon, according to Jefferson County Jail records. He was in custody in Birmingham and appeared to be the only UAB player who was arrested Saturday.
It was not immediately clear if Mincey had legal representation. Attempts to reach family members for comment were not immediately successful.
UAB officials would not confirm that Mincey was involved in the stabbing.
The team’s online roster lists Mincey as a 6-foot-4 redshirt freshman from Pompano Beach, Florida, who was previously at the University of Kentucky.
Mortensen said that once the team decided to play, it focused on its normal game-day routines. He also said counseling was being made available for players who want it.
The coach declined to share further details about the incident, citing the ongoing investigation.
The stabbing occurred on campus at the Football Operations Building.
The Blazers lost 48-18 to South Florida to fall to 3-8 on the season and 1-6 in the American Conference. Their last game is Nov. 29 at Tulsa.
MADISON, Wis. — A Wisconsin woman who admitted to nearly stabbing a classmate to death in 2014 to please the online horror character Slender Man is missing after she cut off an electronic monitoring device and left a group home, authorities said Sunday.
Madison police issued an alert Sunday for Morgan Geyser, now 23, saying she was last seen around 8 p.m. Saturday with an adult acquaintance.
“If you see Geyser, please call 911,” the alert said, adding that she had cut off a “Department of Corrections monitoring bracelet.”
Geyser was placed in a group home this year after being granted conditional release from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. She was sent to the psychiatric institute in 2018 after pleading guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in a deal with prosecutors to avoid prison.
Geyser’s attorney, Tony Cotton, did not immediately respond to a message left Sunday.
Authorities say Geyser and her friend, Anissa Weier, were 12 years old when they lured their classmate, Payton Leutner, to a suburban Milwaukee park after a sleepover. Geyser stabbed Leutner more than a dozen times while Weier egged her on. Leutner barely survived.
The girls later told investigators that they attacked Leutner to earn the right to be Slender Man’s servants and they feared he’d harm their families if they didn’t follow through.
Slender Man was created online by Eric Knudson in 2009 as a mysterious figure photo-edited into everyday images of children at play. He grew into a popular boogeyman, appearing in video games, online stories and a 2018 movie.
Weier pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree intentional homicide. She was also sent to the psychiatric center and granted release in 2021.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A Wisconsin woman who admitted to nearly stabbing a classmate to death in 2014 to please the online horror character Slender Man is missing after she cut off an electronic monitoring device and left a group home, authorities said Sunday.
Madison police issued an alert Sunday for Morgan Geyser, now 23, saying she was last seen around 8 p.m. Saturday with an adult acquaintance.
“If you see Geyser, please call 911,” the alert said, adding that she had cut off a “Department of Corrections monitoring bracelet.”
Geyser was placed in a group home this year after being granted conditional release from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. She was sent to the psychiatric institute in 2018 after pleading guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in a deal with prosecutors to avoid prison.
Geyser’s attorney, Tony Cotton, did not immediately respond to a message left Sunday.
Authorities say Geyser and her friend, Anissa Weier, were 12 years old when they lured their classmate, Payton Leutner, to a suburban Milwaukee park after a sleepover. Geyser stabbed Leutner more than a dozen times while Weier egged her on. Leutner barely survived.
The girls later told investigators that they attacked Leutner to earn the right to be Slender Man’s servants and they feared he’d harm their families if they didn’t follow through.
Slender Man was created online by Eric Knudson in 2009 as a mysterious figure photo-edited into everyday images of children at play. He grew into a popular boogeyman, appearing in video games, online stories and a 2018 movie.
Weier pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree intentional homicide. She was also sent to the psychiatric center and granted release in 2021.
Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
MEXICO CITY — A weekend protest march convened to highlight the concerns of Mexico’s Generation Z has instead dramatized deep political divisions extending well beyond the needs of young Mexicans.
The mostly peaceful demonstration in downtown Mexico City on Saturday culminated in several hours of clashes when small groups of protesters battled with phalanxes of riot police deployed to protect the National Palace in Mexico City’s central square, or zócalo.
In the aftermath of the protests, Mexico’s leftist President Claudia Sheinbaum accused right-wing opponents of hijacking the demonstration to provoke unrest and smear her government.
“A march that was supposedly called against violence utilized violence,” Sheinbaum told reporters Monday.
But opposition leaders and other critics said the march reflected deep concern about alleged cartel infiltration in the government and charged that police brutalized young protesters.
Among those who noticed the chaotic scenes from Mexico was President Trump, who, in Oval Office comments to the press on Monday, again raised the provocative specter of U.S. strikes on cartel targets in Mexico. The country is a major production site for fentanyl, amphetamines and other synthetic drugs bound for the U.S. market, and a transport corridor for South American cocaine.
“I looked at Mexico City over the weekend. There’s some big problems there,” Trump said. “Let me just put it this way: I am not happy with Mexico.”
Asked if he would contemplate U.S. attacks on cartel targets in Mexico, Trump responded: “Would I launch strikes in Mexico to stop drugs? It’s OK with me. Whatever we have to do to stop drugs.”
Trump has charged that Mexico is “run by the cartels,” though he has praised Sheinbaum as a “very brave woman.”
Sheinbaum has denied that cartels control Mexico. She has maintained a cooperative attitude with Trump on two contentious binational issues — drug trafficking and tariffs — but has said Mexico would not yield its sovereignty and agree to U.S. strikes.
Saturday’s march — one of many similar protests across Mexico on that day — was originally called in support of Generation Z, after related demonstrations in Nepal and Morocco. Young people worldwide have decried a lack of economic and educational opportunities.
But the rally in Mexico City became mostly a march against what many participants labeled the leftist “narco-government” of Sheinbaum and her ruling Morena party
Many protesters hoisted banners declaring: “I am Carlos Manzo,” after the mayor of the western city of Uruapan, who was assassinated this monthin a shooting that authorities have blamed on organized crime.
Manzo had accused Sheinbaum’s government of coddling criminals. Supporters of his so-called “White Hat” movement — after the popular mayor’s signature sombrero — took to the streets of Uruapan and other cities in Michoacán state this month by the tens of thousands to demand a crackdown on organized crime. Backers of the growing movement were also major participants in Saturday’s march in Mexico City.
In the aftermath of the march, Sheinbaum’s opponents accused her government of repressing dissent.
“They brutalized young people who only want a better Mexico,” Alejandro Moreno, president of the opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party, charged on X. “They beat them because they are scared. They know that the power of an organized people is stronger than a cowardly narco-regime.”
Mexican authorities denied allegations of brutality and said that at least 60 police officers were injured.
A small minority of protesters, many wearing ski masks, tossed stones, bottles, fireworks and other improvised weapons at police. Police used both physical force and volleys of tear gas to push them back. Each side blamed the other for igniting the melees.
“They wanted to generate this idea: ‘Chaos in Mexico!’ “ charged Sheinbaum, noting how the images of the clashes received widespread domestic and international attention in the press and social media.
The president called for an investigation of the violence, which, she said, was funded by her opponents. She vowed that authorities would also investigate any allegations of police brutality. The great majority of protesters, she said, were nonviolent.
Authorities said 17,000 marchers took place in Saturday’s demonstration. The opposition said the number was much higher.
Opponents of Sheinbaum’s government have vowed additional protests. But many experts doubt that a deeply fractured opposition could do much to loosen Morena’s stranglehold on power.
Sheinbaum’s predecessor and mentor, ex-President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, faced much larger street demonstrations during his time in office, along with allegations of ties of drug traffickers. But neither seemed to dent his widespread popularity.
Polls have shown Sheinbaum, who just completed the first year of a six-year term, with 70%-plus approval ratings. Her Morena party, with strong backing from poor and working-class Mexicans who have benefited from minimum-wage increases and social welfare programs, retains firm control of congress, the courts and most statehouses across Mexico.
Security remains the major concern of most Mexicans, polls show, even as the president has touted decreases in homicides and other violent crimes. Sheinbaum has launched a crackdown on organized crime that has seen thousands of suspects arrested — including dozens expelled to face justice in U.S. courts.
Special correspondent Cecilia Sánchez Vidal in Mexico City contributed to this report.
As terrorizing criminal gangs in Haiti continue their aggressive tactics, U.S. authorities are sending a strong message: Fire on U.S. embassy personnel or property and expect to be fired upon.
That was the action taken on Thursday when suspected gang members fired shots near the U.S. embassy compound, east of Port-au-Prince.
“Marines supporting embassy security operations were fired upon by suspected gang members in Port-au-Prince and the Marines returned fire on the evening of 13 Nov.,” Capt Steven J. Keenan, a spokesman for the U S. Marines, confirmed to the Miami Herald in an email after the incident was made public this weekend. “No Marines were injured.”
Keenan referred additional questions to the U.S. Embassy in Haiti. The State Department did not respond to a request for further details.
This is not the first time that suspected gang members have opened fire near the embassy, which is surrounded by three major armed groups and has been forced to reduce staff due to the escalating security concerns.
Despite recent signs of gangs slowing down attacks in Port-au-Prince, they’ve continued to utilize aggressive tactics to maintain their tightened grip on 90% of the capital, and they have resumed for ransom kidnappings, demanding upwards of over $100,000 for the release of victims.
The latest exchange of gunfire between U.S. Marines and suspected gang members, who are part of the Viv Ansanm gang coalition, unfolded during scaled up security operations last week. The multi-day operations targeted the strongholds of the 400 Mawozo and Chen Mechan gangs and their leaders. They were carried out by specialized units of the Haiti National Police, Armed Forces of Haiti, and the Kenyan-led security mission operating as the recently approved Gang Suppression Force. The forces also received assistance from a weaponized drone task force overseen by private military contractors employed by former Blackwater founder Erik Prince.
Gang attacks were continuing Sunday despite the operations. Members of Viv Ansanm, which has been designated by Washington as a foreign and global terrorist organization, reportedly set up roadblocks and burning barricades in Cité Militaire and Simon-Pelé, west of the Airport Road in Port-au-Prince.
Meanwhile, 400 Mawozo, the target of last week’s operations, set up multiple barricades in its Croix-des-Bouquets stronghold. Haitian police’s anti-gang units were deployed to the areas.
In reaction to the expanded security operations, leaders of Viv Ansanm are threatening a shutdown on Monday.
In a video released Saturday night, former policeman turned warlord Jimmy Chérizier, who is known as “Barbecue,” called on the population not to go out on Monday “to avoid becoming victims.” Presenting himself as the president and spokesperson of Viv Ansanm, he said gang members plan to deploy and that the population should “leave the streets to them” and to Haitian police.
In another video on Sunday, gang leader “Krisla” another leading figure in Viv Ansanm, called for “a general strike” and for Haitians to rise up as he accused the country’s elite and transitional government of targeting the population.
“We are telling the Haitian people, rise up en masse,” “Krisla” said in a message being shared on social networks.
The gang leader controls Carrefour, a sprawling suburb south of Port-au-Prince. He said schools and government offices should all be closed on Monday. Only hospitals and the fire department should remain open. In his message, “Krisla” accused Haitian security forces of using a helicopter to try and kill the population, and called for “the entire country” to fight against the “corrupted” system.”
“We are telling the Haitian people, the youth, we have to take our destiny in our hands,” he said accusing journalists of also conspiring against Viv Ansanm.
The message, masked as a call against Haiti’s corrupt and dysfunctional system, comes as members of Viv Ansanm leaders find themselves under increased pressure from anti-gang operations.
Over the weekend, for example, the area around the embassy at times sounded like a war zone. Embassy employees as late as Saturday afternoon were under shelter-in-place orders.
As units targeted 400 Mawozo, Viv Ansanm members turned to a common tactic to stretch police resources and break the momentum of the operations. Over Haitian police radio, officers were told that gangs were approaching the old U.S. embassy building in downtown Port-au-Prince. The building, which was donated to the Haitian government after the 2010 earthquake, has been off limits due to gangs’ control of the area.
In addition to the previously reported high-powered Barrett M50 sniper rifle that was recovered from 400 Mawozo, security forces also seized six assault rifles and three pistols during operations targeting the group, which had blocked and fortified several sections of National Route 3, the spokesman for the Kenyan forces said in a statement about the operations.
Security forces also intercepted and seized an armored bulldozer the gang had been using to erect road barricades, spokesman Jack Ombaka said. Several gang members were also neutralized, he said.
Haitian police previously told the Herald that seven gang members had been killed as of Friday, and a helicopter providing air support to police units had to be destroyed after it was forced to make an emergency landing in the Santo and Lilavois area.
“The elite unit on board was immediately secured and evacuated by ground units, who came under heavy gunfire from gangs during the extraction,” Ombaka said.
On Sunday, gang attacks continued to be reported. Members of the Viv Ansanm gang coalition were said to have set up roadblocks and burning barricades in Cité Militaire and Simon-Pelé, west of the Airport Road in Port-au-Prince.
This story was originally published November 16, 2025 at 2:39 PM.
Jacqueline Charles has reported on Haiti and the English-speaking Caribbean for the Miami Herald for over a decade. A Pulitzer Prize finalist for her coverage of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, she was awarded a 2018 Maria Moors Cabot Prize — the most prestigious award for coverage of the Americas.
An Orlando woman had a horrifying experience taking an ambulance ride to the emergency room. That’s because a medical worker inappropriately touched her, leading her to eventually file a police report to document the encounter.
In a video with 270,000 views, @incasethemayanswe explained how the EMT took advantage of her while she was inebriated in transit. She hesitated to make a report because she was heavily intoxicated at the time. Since then, however, she’s filed one with encouragement from commenters and other women.
What did this EMT do?
@incasethemayanswe needed an ambulance after attending the Electric Daisy Carnival ( EDC) in Orlando, Florida. After emergency services arrived, things started to go sour. The TikToker noticed that the EMTs who arrived on-scene touched her in a way that felt intentionally inappropriate.
“ There was a hand that was under my bum, and if I was wearing thinner clothes, a finger would’ve went right in my genitals,” she said. “ I could allow some type of gray area because I was so inebriated and kind of moving everywhere [but] I felt that it was more [than an] essential [touch].”
Later, while alone with a male EMT and unconscious, she became somewhat aware of the fact that her body was “aroused.” Surprised, she started to gain a bit more clarity, waking up to realize that the EMT was touching her breasts. She fully woke up, moving her hand to stop him from touching her. That’s when he snapped and told her not to touch him.
“ I apologized to him because I thought maybe I was behaving poorly during our ride there, and that’s probably why he was like huffing and puff[ing],” she said. But, she quickly realized that she wasn’t frustrating him because she was unruly. She was frustrating him because she tried to stop him.
After the encounter
When @incasethemayanswe arrived at the hospital, she tried to tell nurses and other medical workers what happened. They didn’t address the situation, however. They treated and discharged her without asking if she’d like to make a report.
After that night, the creator posted to share her experience and warn others not to put themselves in vulnerable positions while going out. “ So to all the girls that are going out there, have fun, be safe,” she said.
On Nov. 9, @incasethemayanswe posted to her platform again to give an update and answer a few questions.
She clarified that she felt trepidation at the thought of making a report because she thought no one would believe her. “I was filled with so much shame and guilt that I didn’t even know what I wanted to do at that time,” she said. She felt more prepared to record the incident for the sake of other women, worried that a police report wouldn’t do anything.
In her update, @incasethemayanswe wondered whether it would be worth trying to make a report, an unfortunately common worry for many women who’ve experienced sexual violence.
But many commenters encouraged her. “Absolutely make the report. It doesn’t matter how much or how little clothes you were wearing, he would’ve done it even if you were covered from head to toe,” one wrote. “You were out of it and he didn’t think he would get caught-he’s 100% doing it to others. Proud of you for reporting it even if it’s the first report made.”
“I believe you. I’m sick to my stomach for you and filled with rage,” said another commenter.
Commenters urged @incasethemayanswe to speak with the police. After some helpful advice and encouragement, she says she spoke with her local department.
“We’ll see how it goes. I did an oral statement, [a] written statement, and I had to swear that everything was true and correct… I’ll keep you guys updated. Until then, we’re gonna maybe share some more positive things going on,” she said on Nov. 10.
The Mary Sue tried to reach out to @incasethemayanswe for more information, but she was unavailable for comment.
FITCHBURG, Mass. — A Massachusetts man seen on video having an apparent seizure during a struggle with immigration agents as he holds his wife and crying toddler says he lost consciousness after agents pushed and hit him and pressed on his neck.
Department of Homeland Security officials accused him of faking the medical emergency to keep agents from arresting his wife, who was wanted for allegedly stabbing a co-worker with scissors.
“I wasn’t letting go of my wife because they wanted to take her away,” Carlos Zapata, 24, told The Boston Globe in Spanish. He spoke to the newspaper on Friday, a day after his wife was detained in a chaotic traffic stop.
Bystanders shouted and recorded the confrontation as Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers surrounded the family’s car Thursday morning in Fitchburg, a city about 40 miles (65 kilometers) northwest of Boston. Agents were seeking Juliana Milena Ojeda-Montoya, who was inside the vehicle with her husband and 1 ½-year-old daughter, according to a Homeland Security news release.
Widely circulated video shows Zapata behind the wheel, his body shaking and the whites of his eyes visible as masked agents reach into the car.
“He’s having a seizure!” bystanders can be heard shouting.
Zapata told the newspaper that agents were pushing him and his wife together with the child between them, and that he blacked out after agents pressed on his neck.
“I had convulsions or something. I don’t know what they did to me,” he said. When he regained consciousness, he said, agents were handcuffing him.
Zapata said he and his wife are from Ecuador and entered the country unlawfully several years ago. They have since applied for asylum in a case that is pending and are authorized to work, he said. He was driving his wife to her job at Burger King when they were stopped, he said.
Homeland Security responded to the video Friday, saying: “Imagine FAKING a seizure to help a criminal escape justice,” in a post on social media.
“Medical personnel found there was no legitimate medical emergency,” Tricia McLaughlin, the department’s assistant secretary, said in a news release. “He was even caught on video on his feet and coherent moments later.”
The department said officers were conducting a targeted operation to arrest Ojeda-Montoya for the alleged scissor stabbing and for throwing a trash can at her coworker in August. She was charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, the Globe reported.
Ojeda-Montoya was in custody pending removal proceedings, according to Homeland Security.
The Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board voted 3-2 on Wednesday to recommend the governor spare the life of a man scheduled to be executed next week for the 2001 stabbing death of a man during a botched robbery.
Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt must now consider whether to commute the death sentence of Tremane Wood, 46, to life in prison. Stitt has granted clemency only once during his nearly seven years in office, to death row inmate Julius Jones in 2021. He has rejected clemency recommendations in four other cases. A total of 16 men have been executed during Stitt’s time in office. His office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the board’s decision.
Wood is scheduled to receive a lethal injection next week for his role in the killing of Ronnie Wipf, a 19-year-old migrant farmworker from Montana, during an attempted robbery at a north Oklahoma City hotel on New Year’s Eve in 2001.
Wood’s attorneys don’t deny that he participated in the robbery but maintain that his brother, Zjaiton Wood, was the one who actually stabbed Wipf. Zjaiton Wood, who received a no-parole life sentence for Wipf’s death and died in prison in 2019, admitted to several people that he killed Wipf, said Tremane Wood’s attorney, Amanda Bass Castro Alves.
Castro Alves said Tremane Wood had an ineffective trial attorney who was drinking heavily at the time and who did little work on the case. She also said trial prosecutors concealed from jurors benefits that witnesses received in exchange for their testimony.
“Tremane’s death sentence is the product of a fundamentally broken system,” Castro Alves said.
Prosecutors painted Wood as a dangerous criminal who has continued to participate in gang activity and commit crimes while in prison, including buying and selling drugs, using contraband cellphones and ordering attacks on other inmates.
“Even within the confines of maximum security prison, Tremane Wood has continued to manipulate, exploit and harm others,” Attorney General Gentner Drummond said.
Wood, who testified to the panel via video link from the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, accepted responsibility for his prison misconduct and his participation on the robbery, but denied being the one who killed Wipf.
“I’m not a monster. I’m not a killer. I never was and I never have been,” Wood said.
“Not a day goes by in my life that I do not think about Ronnie and how much his mom and dad are suffering because they don’t have their son any more.”
Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
MEXICO CITY — Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum ruled out a new “war on drugs” as a response to the assassination of a regional mayor who was shot at a Day of the Dead celebration, a brazen killing that has sparked national outrage.
“Returning to the war against el narco is not an option,” Sheinbaum told reporters Monday, referring to the bloody anti-crime offensive launched almost two decades ago. “Mexico already did that, and the violence got worse.”
The president spoke as the nation was reeling from the killing Saturday of Carlos Manzo, mayor of Uruapan in the west-central state of Michoacán, which has become an organized-crime battleground. She condemned the assassination as “vile” and vowed to track down his killers.
While Mexican mayors and other local officials are frequent cartel targets — scores have been assassinated in recent years as gangs fight for control of city halls, budgets and police forces — the killing of Manzo struck a nerve nationwide.
A crowd in Uruapan, Mexico, mourns Mayor Carlos Manzo, who was fatally shot over the weekend during a Day of the Dead celebration in the city.
(Eduardo Verdugo / Associated Press)
Manzo, 40, gained notoriety as an outspoken proponent of taking a hard-line against the cartels that have overrun many regions of Mexico. According to Manzo, police and prosecutors coddle criminals ill-deserving of legal protections.
Manzo’s unyielding stance won him considerable popularity in a nation where polls show security remains citizens’ major concern — despite Sheinbaum’s frequent citing of official figures showing that homicides and other violent crimes are decreasing.
“The murder of the mayor is a clear signal of what we all know but what the government of President Sheinbaum denies: The country is governed by narco-traffickers,” Felipe Rosas Montesinos, 45, a flower salesman in Mexico City, said. “And if anyone challenges el narco, like the mayor of Uruapan did, they will kill him.”
Added Gilberto Santamaría, 37, a mechanic: “This makes one feel defeated, losing hope that anything will ever change.”
Manzo — who split with Sheinbaum’s ruling, center-left Morena party — was among a number of voices across Latin America who have called for more aggressive tactics to combat crime. Some labeled Manzo the “Mexican Bukele,” after Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, who has locked up tens of thousands of alleged gang members, many without due process, according to human rights advocates.
The mayor’s killing “feels like a terror movie in which the bad guys win,” said María Guadalupe Rodríguez, 51, a nurse. “The sad part is that it’s not a movie: It’s what we live with in Mexico.”
A day after Manzo’s killing, protesters filled the streets of Uruapan and Morelia, the capital of Michoacán state. Many condemned Sheinbaum and her Morena party for what they called a permissive attitude toward crime.
While the protests were mostly peaceful, authorities said, some demonstrators broke into the state government palace in Morelia and trashed offices and other installations. Police responded with tear gas and arrested at least eight vandalism suspects.
Manzo was shot multiple times Saturday at a candlelight Day of the Dead festival that he was attending with his family in downtown Uruapan. One suspect was killed and two accomplices arrested, police said.
The killing was a well-planned cartel hit, Security Minister Omar García Harfuch told reporters. The suspects managed to circumvent Manzo’s contingent of bodyguards, García Harfuch said. Authorities were investigating which of the area’s many mobs were behind the slaying.
Uruapan, a city of more than 300,000, is situated in the verdant hills of Michoacán, where most of Mexico’s avocados are grown. The lucrative industry — “green gold” generates $3 billion annually in exports to the United States — has for years been the target of a patchwork of armed groups who extort money from growers, packers, truckers and others.
Almost 20 years ago, then-President Felipe Calderón chose Michoacán as the launching pad for a nationwide war on drugs, deploying troops to combat the growing power of cartels. That strategy is widely believed to have had the unintended consequence of increasing violence: Gangs acquired ever-more powerful weapons to match the firepower of the armed forces, while cartel infighting accelerated as police captured or killed capos.
Upon taking office in 2018, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador promised a different approach, saying the military deployment had turned Mexico into a “graveyard.” He instructed troops to refrain from direct confrontations with cartels, when possible, and vowed to attend to poverty and other underlying social-economic social forces behind the violence.
Critics labeled López Obrador’s “hugs not bullets” strategy a disaster, as violent crime spiked.
Sheinbaum, a protege of López Obrador, embraced her predecessor’s approach but sought to improve Mexico’s intelligence-gathering and investigatory powers and strengthen the rule of law. Her government has aggressively arrested thousands of cartel suspects, several dozen of whom were sent to the United States to face trial.
For Manzo, however, Sheinbaum’s strategy was a rebranded incarnation of “hugs not bullets.”
The war on drugs, experts say, did nothing to cut the flow of cocaine, synthetic opiates like fentanyl and other substances to the United States, the world’s major consumer. And Mexico’s cartels, by all accounts, have only gotten stronger in recent years, despite the take-down of numerous kingpins.
Special correspondent Cecilia Sánchez Vidal contributed.
MEXICO CITY — Carlos Manzo was famous in Mexico for saying what few other politicians would: That cartels operated with impunity and needed to be confronted with brute force. The mayor of a city in an avocado-growing region beset by crime and violence, Manzo suggested authorities should beat criminals into submission — or simply kill them.
It was a provocative message that resonated in some sectors of a country long afflicted by drug war bloodshed. Many here viewed Manzo, with his trademark white cowboy hat, as a hero.
But his iron fist rhetoric and criticism of the federal government’s security strategy also earned him enemies. Manzo acknowledged as much, saying he knew he could be targeted by organized crime. “I don’t want to be just another murdered mayor,” he said last month. “But it is important not to let fear control us.”
Manzo, 40, was gunned down Saturday night as he presided over a public celebration of Day of the Dead in a central square in Uruapan, a city of 300,000 in the western state of Michoacán. One suspected gunman was killed and two others arrested.
The slaying, captured on video, provoked outcry throughout Mexico and in Washington.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, with whom Manzo often sparred on issues of security, mourned an “irreparable loss.” U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau posted a photograph of Manzo smiling and holding his young son just moments before the attack. “The U.S. stands ready to deepen security cooperation with Mexico to wipe out organized crime,” Landau wrote.
On this All Souls’ Day, my thoughts are with the family and friends of Carlos Manzo, mayor of Uruapan, Michoacán, Mexico, who was assassinated at a public Day of the Dead celebration last night. The US stands ready to deepen security cooperation with Mexico to wipe out organized… pic.twitter.com/hf8XObasHf
Manzo was a part of a new wave of leaders throughout the Americas who have called for a hard line against criminals.
It’s a club that includes President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador, who has locked up tens of thousands of people accused of gang ties, with little to no due process, and President Trump, who has pushed a more militaristic approach to combating cartels, saying the U.S. should “wage war” on drug traffickers.
The U.S. military has killed 65 people in recent months who it alleges were smuggling drugs in the Caribbean and the Pacific, including several attacks off Mexico’s coastline. Trump administration leaders have warned of the possibility of U.S. attacks on cartel targets on Mexican soil.
Calls for a violent crackdown on organized crime are at odds with the security strategy embraced by Sheinbaum and her predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Both emphasized the need to address root causes of violence, including poverty and social disintegration.
López Obrador, especially, vowed to break with the confrontational approaches of past Mexican administrations, whose military operations he said failed to weaken cartels and only fueled violence. What Mexico needed, López Obrador often said, was “hugs, not bullets.”
Manzo — who got his start in politics as a member of López Obrador and Sheinbaum’s Morena party but later became an independent — fiercely criticized that mantra.
“Hugs … are for Mexicans who live in extreme poverty,” Manzo said. “Criminals, assassins … they deserve beatings and the full force of the Mexican state.” He encouraged police officers in Uruapan to use lethal force against criminals who resist arrest.
The mayor frequently criticized Sheinbaum for not doing more to confront cartels, even though there has been a decrease in homicides and an uptick in drug seizures and arrests since she took office. Sheinbaum has said that security in Mexico depends on reinforcing the rule of law, including giving suspects a fair trial.
The son of a community activist, Manzo became mayor of Uruapan in 2024. The city has been the site of some of Mexico’s worst drug war atrocities — kidnappings, bombings, bodies hung from highway overpasses — as a volatile mix of criminal groups battle for control of trafficking routes and profits from the lucrative avocado industry.
Manzo appeared Saturday with his family at a crowded public event in Uruapan’s central plaza to mark the Day of the Dead holiday. He posed for photographs with fans and broadcast the candle-lighting event live on social media, sending “blessings to all.”
When a journalist asked about security at the event, Manzo responded: “There is a presence from different levels of government. We hope everything goes well, is peaceful, and that you enjoy the evening.”
Minutes later, shots — then screams — rang out. Manzo lay on the ground, bleeding. Nearby lay his white cowboy hat.
Security consultant David Saucedo, who said Manzo was accompanied at the event by local police and 14 members of Mexico’s national guard, described the killing as a “kamikaze attack,” saying it was clear the shooter would be killed.
Manzo, Saucedo said, had been “brave but reckless” in his quest to confront organized crime. “Carlos lacked the human, financial, and material resources to defeat the cartels,” Saucedo said. His killing “makes it clear that even with political will, defeating the cartels at the municipal level is an impossible mission.”
The mayor’s slaying was the latest in a string of violent incidents in Michoacán. Last month, officials announced they had discovered the body of Bernardo Bravo Manríquez, the head of a lime growers association who had repeatedly denounced extortion demands against agricultural producers.
Cecilia Sánchez Vidal in The Times’ Mexico City bureau contributed to this report.
For those of us who ride the commuter rails and subways daily, Saturday night’s mass stabbing on a London-bound train is a nightmare brought to life. In such confined and well-lit spaces, there isn’t any way to do what the experts say you should: run, hide and, as a last resort, fight.
A train car moving at high speed with the doors and windows closed is a violent psychopath’s dream—a veritable barrel full of unarmed, unsuspecting fish. Most of us have our heads buried in our phones, our ears distracted by music or podcasts. Some of us are poring over newspapers or dreamily watching the countryside fly by. Rarely do any of us do a threat assessment of those nearby. We are in our own little in-between place—not home, not at work. En route. Vulnerable.
LEWISBURG — Stephanie Balliet discovered her life’s work amid one of the most difficult times in her young life.
Following an assault by a stranger at the age of 12 while attending a sleepover at a friend’s house, Balliet received services from Transitions PA during the ensuing three-year-long court case involving her alleged abuser.
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OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The man accused of fatally stabbing a Catholic priest during a break-in at his home beside the church he served in a small Nebraska town pleaded guilty to murder and other charges Tuesday in the December 2023 killing.
Kierre Williams changed his plea to guilty on murder, burglary and weapons charges during a routine pretrial hearing. He will be sentenced on Nov. 12 for killing the Rev. Stephen Gutgsell, 65, in the rectory next door to St. John the Baptist Church in Fort Calhoun. The killing occurred just hours before Gutgsell was scheduled to celebrate Mass.
Williams’ attorney didn’t immediately respond to a message from The Associated Press on Tuesday.
On the day of the attack, Gutgsell called 911 before dawn to report that a man had broken into the rectory and was in his kitchen holding a knife. A deputy who arrived at the home minutes later said he found Gutgsell lying near the kitchen, bleeding profusely from stab wounds. Gutgsell was rushed to a hospital in Omaha, where he died.
Williams didn’t have a weapon at the time, but investigators later found a broken knife with a serrated blade lying in blood on the floor of Gutgsell’s bedroom.
Williams has several felony convictions in other states, authorities said. At the time of the killing, he was working in a meatpacking plant in Sioux City, Iowa.
Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
