Associated Press stories, Page 697
1st federal trial for a hate crime based on gender identity starts over trans woman’s killing
COLUMBIA, S.C. — The first federal trial over a hate crime based on gender identity began Tuesday in South Carolina, where a man faces charges that he killed a Black transgender woman and then fled to New York. The U.S. Department of Justice alleges that in August 2019, Daqua Lameek...
Ex-FBI informant charged with lying about Bidens had Russian intelligence contacts, prosecutors say
WASHINGTON — A former FBI informant charged with making up a multimillion-dollar bribery scheme involving President Joe Biden, his son Hunter and a Ukrainian energy company had contacts with Russian intelligence-affiliated officials, prosecutors said in a court paper Tuesday. Prosecutors revealed the alleged contact as they urged a judge to...
William Byron battled ‘imposter syndrome’ in climb to Daytona 500 champ
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — William Byron grew up in the hotbed of NASCAR, so close to the stars that he could trick-or-treat at Jimmie Johnson’s house every Halloween. He’d tell Johnson every year that someday he’d race alongside him at Hendrick Motorsports. But aside from decorating his Charlotte, N.C., bedroom...
Divers find body in Texas river of Audrii Cunningham, 11, who had been missing since last week
LIVINGSTON, Texas — Divers have recovered the body of 11-year-old Audrii Cunningham from a Texas river days after the girl went missing, and authorities are preparing to file a murder charge against a friend of her father who lived on her family’s property, a sheriff said Tuesday afternoon. Polk County...
Alabama Supreme Court rules frozen embryos are ‘children’ under state law
MONTGOMERY, Ala. — The Alabama Supreme Court has ruled that frozen embryos can be considered children under state law, a decision critics said could have sweeping implications for fertility treatments. The decision was issued in a pair of wrongful death cases brought by three couples who had frozen embryos destroyed...
American Airlines is raising bag fees, changing how customers earn frequent-flyer points
DALLAS — American Airlines is raising the cost of checking bags and it is making other changes to push customers to buy tickets directly from the airline if they want to earn frequent-flyer points. The airline said Tuesday that checking a bag on a domestic flight will rise from $30...
Saturated California gets more rain and snow, but so far escapes severe damage it saw only weeks agoVideo
LOS ANGELES — Much of saturated California faced the threat of flooding Tuesday with winter storms blowing through, but so far the state has escaped the severity of damage from mudslides, wind and rain spawned by an atmospheric river only weeks ago. While the rainfall was focused on Southern California,...
2 adults charged with murder in the deadly shooting at Kansas City’s Super Bowl celebrationVideo
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Missouri prosecutors said Tuesday that two men have been charged with murder in last week’s shooting that killed one person and injured 22 others after the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl parade. Dominic Miller and Lyndell Mays are charged with second-degree murder and other counts. They...
YouTube mom Ruby Franke apologizes at sentencing in child abuse caseVideo
SALT LAKE CITY — Ruby Franke, a Utah mother of six who gave parenting advice to millions via a once-popular a YouTube channel, shared a tearful apology to her children for physically and emotionally abusing them before a judge delivered a sentence that could put her in prison for years,...
College Football Playoff approves 5+7 format and reduces spots for conference champions
The field for the 12-team College Football Playoff beginning next season will comprise five conference champions and seven at-large selections after the university presidents who oversee the CFP voted unanimously Tuesday to tweak the format. The move to decrease the number of spots reserved for conference champions from six to...
A Russian court extends the pretrial detention for an American reporter accused of spying
MOSCOW — A court in the Russian capital ruled Tuesday to keep Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in custody pending his trial on espionage charges that he denies. The Moscow City Court rejected an appeal against Gershkovich’s detention filed by his lawyers, upholding an earlier ruling to keep him...
Attacks on ships and U.S. drones show Yemen’s Houthis can still fight despite U.S.-led airstrikes
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Despite a month of U.S.-led airstrikes, Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels remain capable of launching significant attacks. This week, they seriously damaged a ship in a crucial strait and apparently downed an American drone worth tens of millions of dollars. The continued assaults by the Houthis...
Adult and 4 kids die in Missouri house fire that police deem ‘suspicious’
FERGUSON, Mo. — Police are investigating a “suspicious” fire near St. Louis that killed a woman and four children. Firefighters were called to a home in Ferguson at 4:23 a.m. Monday and found the building engulfed in flames. St. Louis County police Sgt. Tracy Panus said the five people who...
U.S. casinos won $66.5 billion in 2023 — their best year ever as gamblers showed no economic fear
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — America’s commercial casinos won $66.5 billion from gamblers in 2023, the industry’s best year ever, according to figures released by its national trade association Tuesday. The American Gaming Association said that total was 10% higher than in 2022, which itself was a record-setting year. When revenue...
White House is distributing $5.8 billion from infrastructure law for water projects
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration announced Tuesday that it is distributing another $5.8 billion for water infrastructure projects around the country, paid for by one of its key legislative victories. The new allocations will go to projects in all 50 states, bringing the total awarded to states for water infrastructure...
Supreme Court leaves in place the admissions plan at an elite Virginia public high school
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday left in place the admissions policy at an elite public high school in Virginia, despite claims that it discriminates against highly qualified Asian Americans. A panel of the federal appeals court in Richmond upheld the constitutionality of a revamped admissions policy at the...
WikiLeaks founder Assange faces his last legal roll of the dice in Britain to avoid U.S. extradition
LONDON — Julian Assange’s lawyers opened a final U.K. legal challenge Tuesday to stop the WikiLeaks founder from being sent to the United States to face spying charges, arguing that American authorities are seeking to punish him for exposing serious criminal acts by U.S. authorities. Lawyer Edward Fitzgerald said there...
Welcome to the ‘Hotel California’ case: The trial over handwritten lyrics to an Eagles classic
NEW YORK — In the mid-1970s, the Eagles were working on a spooky, cryptic new song. On a lined yellow pad, Don Henley, with input from band co-founder Glenn Frey, jotted thoughts about “a dark desert highway” and “a lovely place” with a luxurious surface and ominous undertones. And something...
The Vatican’s problematic process to address clergy sex abuse cases, explained
VATICAN CITY — One afternoon in mid-December, Pope Francis had a meeting that wasn’t on his official agenda or otherwise recorded, that underscored the utter dysfunction of the Catholic Church’s response to the global clergy sex abuse scandal. In the main reception room of the Vatican hotel where he lives,...
Ukraine’s Zelenskyy says foreign aid delays are making life ‘very difficult’ on the front line
KYIV, Ukraine — Delays in weapons deliveries from Western allies to Ukraine are opening a door for Russian battlefield advances, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says, making the fight “very difficult” along parts of the front line where the Kremlin’s forces captured a strategic city last weekend ahead of the war’s...
Biden heads to California to rev up his fundraising in anticipation of a costly rematch with Trump
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden heads to California on Tuesday looking to soak up more cash for his reelection bid during a three-day swing through the state. Going into the trip, Biden’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee announced Tuesday that they had collected $42 million in contributions during January...
GOP Senate contenders aren’t shy about wanting Trump’s approval. But in Pennsylvania, it’s awkward
HARRISBURG — Since he became the single biggest force in Republican politics nearly a decade ago, Donald Trump has figured prominently in U.S. Senate races, using his massive public platform and loyal base of support to shape which GOP incumbents run for reelection and which contenders get nominated. This year,...
Israel orders new evacuations in northern Gaza, where UN says 1 in 6 children are malnourished
RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Israel ordered new evacuations from parts of Gaza City on Tuesday, as a study led by the U.N. children’s agency found that one in six children are acutely malnourished in the isolated and largely devastated north of the territory, where the city is located. The report...
Astronomers find what may be the universe’s brightest object with a black hole devouring a sun a day
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Astronomers have discovered what may be the brightest object in the universe, a quasar with a black hole at its heart growing so fast that it swallows the equivalent of a sun a day. The record-breaking quasar shines 500 trillion times brighter than our sun. The...
Minnesota man who shot 2 officers and a firefighter wasn’t allowed to have gunsVideo
A man who died after fatally shooting two police officers and a firefighter in a wooded Minneapolis-area neighborhood wasn’t legally allowed to have guns after a previous assault conviction and was entangled in a yearslong dispute over the custody and financial support of his three oldest children, court records show....
